A Wish to Build a Dream On

What do you think about before you sleep? Are you out as soon as your head hits the pillow, or do you stay in some kind of in between state for a few minutes (or an hour or so?)

When I was little I would daydream (night dream?) about what my life would be like if I were a student at Hogwarts.  The stories I imagined were linked and episodic, and played out in my mind over the course of about two years of bedtimes.
Apparently this might be maladaptive daydreaming, a symptom of multiple mental disorders.

Whatever, as the Mad Hatter said “We’re all mad here.”

So with that in mind, some nice things to think about as you drift off to dream land:

• Insert yourself as a character into your favorite fictional or fantasy world.
• A flood in a LUSH store
• All the amazing things you could do if you were tiny (like 2 cm tall tiny). Spelunking in a Swiss cheese, anyone?

Links Actually on Friday 12/15

TEN DAYS UNTIL CHRISTMAS!!!!!!

I’m so ready.

Here’s what’s happening:

• Some shit-talking about the Golden Globes and their (sometimes absurd) nominations. Get Out is a comedy? Rly?
• How to sell cruise tickets? Carnival thinks tropical scents in a can might work. Aruba, Jamaica, oooh I wanna take ya.
• If John Boyega wasn’t already the cutest, here’s proof he’s also a family boy. Does he have a dog too?
• An odd but amusing card game.
• And given my love of hot seat, this seems totally up my alley.
• A computer-generated Harry Potter chapter? I mean, I miss new books being released that I’ll take whatever I can get.
• The New Yorker article “Cat Person” is taking the internet by storm. It’s really relatable.
• Here’s why.
• Polish and French Nature Word names. Some are out there, but I would totally name a cat Coquille.
• I’ve fallen in love with Raymond Peyote’s illustrations (even with the obsession with boobage), see the example above.

A Very Blasphemous Christmas Film List

Featuring movies I both have and haven’t seen.

Let’s say you’re the kind of person who prefers their Christmas light on the Christ. And also light on the mas(s).  Thankfully some parts of the world have accepted Christmas as part of the non-denominational holiday season- a time when we celebrate not the mis-dated birth of our Lord Jesus, but rather our love for one another. Our family, our friends, cozy nights, festive lights, and a rapacious culture of consumerism.

One of my favorite traditions for holiday togetherness is the Christmas movie, whether it’s on in the evening while I’m curled up on the couch or its just on in the background while I decorate the tree (just kidding, you have to play the Nutcracker Suite while you decorate the tree. It is written).

While I’m usually all ready for a trite and sentimental holiday story, sometimes you just need something a little more subversive. If that’s you, here’s your list.

Films I’ve Seen:

• In Bruges: I honestly love In Bruges, a black comedy-crime featuring Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson (my real Santa Claus) spewing a never-ending stream of swears and spirit.
• Edward Scissorhands: This just treads the line with being actually Christmas-y, with the heartfelt themes of family, community, belonging, and the harm of isolation. But Johnny Depp has scissors for hands and Winona’s awesome.
• The Life of Brian: Biggus Dickus. ‘Nuff said.
• The Lord of the Rings Trilogy: There are a lot of families for which LOTR is a real Christmas tradition, given that the films were released around the holidays. For me it’s because I found the box set under the tree as a child after Dad and I read the series together.  An Ent is the only real Christmas tree I need.
• The Harry Potter Series: Actually tender and fuzzy feelings with delightful magic and Christmas scenes. But because evangelicals like to burn the books, the series gets a spot on this list. *Christmassiness declines as the series progresses.
• The Nightmare Before Christmas: Multiple songs with references to murdering Santa.

Films I’ve Yet To See:

• Eyes Wide Shut: Tom Cruise on a harrowing and dangerous night-long odyssey of sexual and moral discovery. Kay.
• Gremlins: My plan is to get this one watched this year.
• Die Hard: I didn’t finish this movie. I just don’t find it very interesting, mostly because of Bruce Willis. But if you can hang in there for Alan Rickman, do it.
• The French Connection: There are a few more Christmas-adjacent gang/crime films (Blast of Silence is another), but I’ll put this one on as the representative. But watch In Bruges first. I vouch for it.

Names I Shouldn’t Name Babies

I guess I just need more cats…

I have a long list (Okay, if I’m being brutally honest here I have Excel spreadsheets) of my favorite baby names, because onomastics and naming has been one of my obscure interests since middle school.
Collecting names that long, you end up with some pretty odd favorites. So I thought I would post a list of names even I would hesitate to saddle a child with (a lot of the names I enjoy would I think set off red flags for others- Edwidge, Ludovica, Odysseo, Faisal- and yes, I did choose those names because they’re some of the hardest to get behind) but this list is for the really out there, or otherwise unacceptable.

Friday Links: 6/30 Edition

I have a lot of exciting news to share that I can’t share yet because not everyone in my physical life knows the news yet- but stay tuned for a thrilling announcement.
On a less significant but still exciting note: I won $150 dollars off of Dad this morning. It’s been a good day.

Other news: I’m away this weekend and into Tuesday, being back Tuesday night and possibly posting again on Wednesday. So a short hiatus, in honor of Independence Day and family visiting.  So instead of checking in here, do enjoy your barbecues and illegal fireworks, popsicles and movie nights with the family.

Other other news: I’ve been very excited by the growth of the blog in the past few months, and you may remember that last month was the first that views exceeded 1.0k.  This being the last day of the month, you may be interested in an update of the blog views- with 2 more views we will breach 1.0k yet again! Which generally does happen in a day, statistically. But it is early and presumptuous to celebrate, so again stay tuned for Wednesday for the final word.

Now back to the actual links game that we play every Friday:

Friday Links 6/2

Happy first Friday of June! It’s hard to believe we’re almost halfway through 2017 already.
And as I know you’re wondering, a brief update my spring summer resolutions:

1. Yoga everyday: Successful, but mostly because I’m zealously practicing upside down tree pose (aka, a handstand)
2. Dry brushing: Also successful- I’ve dry brushed once every day.  It’s been good for my skin I think, especially because it helps me remember to moisturize.
3. Daily meditation: Failure. I haven’t meditated since I posted indicated my intent to do so.

And the image above is my new monthly desktop background. Alright, I think that’s all the updates.

Oh, no it’s not, I lied. Excitingly, this May that just ended was the highest-viewed month that List Mimsy has had, tallying at over 1,000 views. Thanks everyone!

Flower Boys

We give girls flower names all the time but boys are really rarely named after botanical things- particular botanical things as frilly and fecund as flowers.  Even though when you get down to it, flowers have both lady-parts and man-parts.

Not that I’m advocating naming your young boy something like Candytuft. Don’t name a girl Candytuft either.  Or Ranunculus.

Candytuft and Ranunculus aside, I think there are profound unplumbed depths in flower names. Especially for boys and especially in English, because I don’t know about where you are, but America is very annoyingly anti-feminine.
Flower names can be both sensitive and strong, so in the interest of equal opportunity naming, here are some of my favorites that I think would suit little boys (and eventually men and granddads) to a tee.

Movies Now

I’m taking a quick break from my thesis research ( O.O ) to bring you a list of movies CURRENTLY SHOWING IN THEATERS that I want to see (but can’t because… thesis).

Don’t worry, break is in about three weeks (my last exam is three weeks from yesterday, not that I’m counting) and then I’ll buy a movie ticket and sneak from movie to movie all day. Noooo, me? Never!
Actually, as far as I know the only time I sneaked into a film I was a toddler with my parents. And clearly I can’t be held accountable for that.

Back with Books

And we’re back.

It’s taken me a while to regain the desire to blog (or do anything, for that matter) post-election. I haven’t made the fact that I’m fairly liberal a secret, on this blog or anywhere else. And I’m very distressed about the looming prospect of a Trump presidency.
However, this is something I’ve talked about on various other social media, and for now I don’t see this blog becoming a platform for that. In very great part because it’s not something I’m ready to talk about to a general audience.
I’ve been thinking a lot about how to broach the subject of the election here. This is all there will be for now.

And in the meantime, I’d like to let you in on some family dynamics. Some family reading dynamics.  We’re all rather literate.  I read more than either of my parents do. I also think about and talk about books a great deal more.  There are over 400 distinct titles on my ‘to read’ list at the moment, and at one point it was over 2000.

I love recommending books to people (especially when people are willing to talk about their other favorites so I can get a good idea of what they like)- this may sound a bit strange, but I’ve realized that searching for ‘the perfect thing’ is one of my favorite things to do.  I do it with movies, books, gifts, names, everything really.

In a horrible twist of fate, I don’t like taking recommendations very much.  Especially when it comes to books.  Books take a little while longer to get through than movies, and while I will not infrequently add things to my reading list based on recommendations, I’m not likely to let some upstart recommendation jump the 400+ line of books waiting for my love and attention.  And you have to read a book when you’re in the right mood for it.  I can’t just be in the right mood for a book because someone recommended it.

But to the point of this post: My parents and I trade recommendations pretty frequently.  Or they sometimes recommend things that I eventually get around to and the rest of the time I’m shoving an elite selection of books at them, desperately trying to get them to read when really they have lives and other hobbies and I… well, I do, but not as much.

So a dissection of this over the years, starting with Mom- I’ll do Dad tomorrow:

Man Pain

Brought to you by men.

There’s a video we watched in my Law, Technology, and Culture class that compiled the parallel stories of many movie and television leading men who suffer from man pain.  I’ll give a go at explaining man pain, but first, here’s the video, which will likely clear up a lot of confusion. 😉