Because I Like It

And because it pleases my muse today….

In fact, I bought it: Mirabilis

More about Mediaeval Baebes here.

Flashback, flashforward

1979.

2009

Kinda makes ya smile (even if they are the damned Steelers).

Typing Gloves.

You’ve heard of driving gloves.  Well, I just received my order of typing gloves, and I’m in love.

Now on those icy cold January February days when my thermostat is down low (unlike our president, and yes Mr. Obama, I adore you, but I’m looking at you) and my hands are freezing, I can keep them warm and toasty and still type!

Besides which, aren’t they darling?

Fingerless knit Gloves – Comes in several colors!

Of course, because this is Dallas and it’s January, even though it was below freezing and so icy they canceled school four days ago, today it’s 65 degrees and climbing.  Oh well, I’m sure I’ll get to wear them one of these days soon.

Really. No conspiracy? Color me skeptical.

In these two blog entries, Daphne describes the situation illustrated below–reproducing great art but making it skinnier, because, you know, it should be to look right.  In the first entry, she expresses what seems to be dismay when she says, “…when I noticed a trend that stopped me and sent me furiously turning pages back, saying “oh my god! Look what they’re doing!“

But in the second she says, “False alarm, no harm, no foul.”  Or rather, “Basically, there is no conspiracy. These are NOT a deliberate and wanton desecration of the original artworks; the sculptors and model-makers are “innocent victims” of the system and not deliberately trying to persecute women or harm anyone’s body-image.”

No, the “innocent victims” have been exposed to too many Bratz and Barbie dolls.

Somehow her initial dismay became apology for the industry in which she works.  I guess we all have to cover our own arses.

But still, desecration is desecration, and in my view, that’s a desecration of glorious art and the perpetrators are assholes.

Feel free to disagree.

Remembering

Today is the memorial service for Gee Nicholl, the wonderful woman who endowed the Nicholl Fellowships in Screenwriting.

The writers who have benefited from her benevolence include some dear friends, and also include some amazing writers–two groups that are not mutually exclusive.

Jeffrey Eugenides was named a Fellow in its inaugural year. I hope you’ll forgive me for that bit of name-dropping, but it’s as close as I’ll ever get to a Pulitzer Prize.

Other notable Fellows are listed here.

But this is just the tip of the iceberg. Every year, thousands of screenwriters plan their lives around the Nicholl deadline. Thousands of writers are fueled by Nicholl dreams. Thousands of writers create new worlds, new universes, and many go onto success without ever achieving that goal of becoming a Nicholl Fellow, yet achieve goals that surpass it.

Mrs. Nicholl was an amazing woman. She wanted to carry on her husband’s dream by nurturing writers. Despite his successes as creator/producer of some of the most loved television series in the US and UK, Don Nicholl always considered himself a writer first, and when he left this world, she decided to honour him by creating these fellowships.

I like to think that they’re together again, and that he is very, very pleased.

May light eternal shine upon them.