Misunderstood

I recently caught my mother praising me behind my back about how I recently brought back tea for our two workmen, and how good it was that I could pity the less fortunate. It had me shaking my head about how badly my mother misjudged me.

Now understand this: my mother considers herself a Good Samaritan. She's always being nice to "the working class", particularly those working at our house, occasionally cooking or buying food for them because "I feel so sorry for them that they would never get to taste [name of food] otherwise", or "I don't understand why some people would want to discriminate against others who are in a lower social class when they should pity them." I will reserve my judgment on this matter, save that I do at times feel that there is perhaps also an element of Magmanimous Superiority Complex there somewhere.

The truth of the matter is that I do not feel sorry for people. I don't write big cheques for wildlife funds, or pledge yearly donations to the local kidney foundation. I tend to ignore panhandlers and charity muggers who assault me on the street - although this is in part due to the fact that a number of people "raising money for charity" are actually swindlers. I don't volunteer at soup kitchens. On a rational, logical basis, I can understand why people with diseases, those who have faced calamity, or those mired in drudgery are in undesirable situations; I can even understand the need of some people to extend aid to such people, and I have done so myself on various occasions because everybody else is doing it, and it's the right thing to do. But I feel nothing on an emotional level. My heart does not bleed for people; I do not cry my eyes out when I hear about disasters killing hundreds half a world away; tragedies do not move me. And I certainly don't do charitable things for people like bring them tea just because I feel sorry for them, because I don't.

What I do possess, however, is the natural tendency to befriend anybody who is good and decent at heart, regardless of social distinction. I don't care if it's the dustwoman or the odd-job guy or the local politician's son; it's not a person's place in the social hierarchy that matters, but their moral character. What my mother has effectively mistaken for charity is simply my way of expressing friendship, in the same manner that I would occasionally say, "It's my treat" to a friend I'm out with, or get something for someone when there's no occasion for it. Just because.

In this case I simply thought they'd enjoy a chicken ham and cheese foccacia sandwich.

Alphabet Soup!

I got tagged by Natalie. Read it and weep!

A - ADVOCATE FOR: Respect for microorganisms. Nerdage and geekery.

B - BEST FEATURE: My eyes. Which, ironically, are probably also the worst part of me.

C - COULD DO WITHOUT: Mosquitoes and other annoying insects.

D - DREAMS & DESIRES: To become Supremely Evil World Tyrant of Pink Bunnies. And to have my own book published.

E - ESSENTIAL ITEMS: Glasses, supremely heavy watch, Swiss card/army knife. (I won't name people since they're not exactly items. Except when they're "an item". Haha).

F - FAVORITE PAST TIME: Reading, painting, playing violent computer games, playing music.

G - GOOD AT: I'm a jack of all trades (and, by implication, a master of none). But okay. Scrambled word games. Writing science articles.

H - HAVE NEVER TRIED: Skydiving. Bungee jumping. Skating. And far too many other things!

I - IF I HAD A MILLION DOLLARS: I'd invest it. I don't exactly have use for a million bucks.

J - JUNKIE FOR: Orchestral & swing music. Damned good hard SF. Gunblade.

K - KINDRED SPIRIT: Dr. Terrence Thirteen. LOL.

L - LITTLE KNOWN FACT: I used to watch Pokemon...

M - MEMORABLE MOMENT: Too many to pick!

N - NEVER AGAIN WILL I: Attempt to cook eggs in the microwave without breaking the yolk up.

O - OCCASIONAL INDULGENCE: I. Don't. Indulge.

P - PROFESSION: Boffin, science writer, art dabbler. Oh, and President of the Gizka Haus of Fine Living.

Q - QUOTE: If something goes wrong... I meant for it to turn out like that!!

R - REASON TO SMILE: I'm alive, aren't I?

S - SORRY ABOUT: My temper.

T - TAG SOME FRIENDS: Yargh! No taggage!

U - UNINTERESTED IN: Cooking. Gardening. Non-F1 cars. Politics. Golf and other sedentary outdoor games.

V - VERY SCARED OF: Syringe needles.

W - WORST HABIT: My eagerness to jump into debates at the drop of a hat.

X - X MARKS MY IDEAL VACATION SPOT: Someplace where there are plenty of ruins to explore and photograph. Failing that, Rottnest Island.

Y - YUMMIEST DESSERT: Er. Um. I seldom eat dessert and I don't hanker for stuff.

Z - ZODIAC SIGN: The fish. ;)

Works in Progress

Just another of those art dumps...

Here's my latest project: Bomber Boys. It was initially *meant* to be a quick speedpaint for my Sketch-a-Day challenge at Deviant Art, but then halfway through the paint-blobbing I became emotionally attached to it, and decided I had to do a real painting.

When I was 14 years old, I desperately wanted to be a pilot. Specifically, a B-17 Flying Fortress pilot. The fact that I was born in the wrong historical period, in the wrong country, and at a time where there were no active conflicts in my area, and had worse eyesight than a dead bat never deterred me. So almost all of my vacation time NOT spent at the astronomy club was spent writing hideously bad WWII bomber fiction. Seriously. I guess I was just feeling nostalgic when I started this.















And a halfway done commissioned painting of a Rebel Pilot and a Sith Lord doing the Lindy Hop in an Alliance hangar. LOL.

Bleakness

I am wounded too deeply to heal. The irony is that the people who need to understand it won't, and the ones who will are in no position to do anything about it.

If all of life were just a stage, it would be a simple matter to turn off the lights, walk out and softly close the door behind you.

DevianTart

I'm not sure I like the new Deviant Art anymore.

dA launched V6 a few days ago. I'd been using the beta version for some time now, so the transition wasn't all that severe. I was already comfortable with the message bar being relocated to the top of the page, the new front page (which had new search and browse functions, instead of channels), and the annoying-but-you-can-turn-it-off Sears Tower-high footer, with everything they could jam in it from Deviousness awards to polls. On the other hand, there were a bunch of new features, some of which I didn't like (like the message centre set to display snippets of everything until you filtred it), and some of which I did like (like how they've put filtres for different message types, and the customisable toolbars). On the whole, though, I thought I liked the new version, and everything else I didn't like I could get accustomed to.

Or at least, I thought I did.

V6 worked like a dream on the first morning. No lag; everything worked fast and the way it should. By evening, however, the site was barely crawling. By the second evening, I was spending five minutes trying to load pages, and previewing the new journal layout I was working on was torture.

And then yesterday, dA quit working for me. I couldn't get in. Simple as that. Oh, I managed to get in at something like 12 midnight, but -

This morning I failed to get in again.

Nice.

In the meantime, I have one ongoing commission, and no way of getting in touch with my client unless I can somehow get back in for two minutes and send her my email address.

A friend of mine recently commented that, in terms of functionality, the new version pretty much broadcasted the message, "Fuck off and die." I'm starting to think that's pretty sound advice.

Thus the Dumping Starts

Admit it, Far.

You have far too much junk in your Deviant Art account. Besides, it would be nice to have an alternative site where you can put up works in progress, idle doodles and things that might or might not cause your dA watchers to grind chopsticks into their eyeballs.

Haha.

So anyway, I was on vacation, and on an afternoon that I had nothing to do, I idly drew the following Resident Evil 2 picture (see left) for a collaboration with WraithTen. I'd have tried to pack more characters in, but there's only so much you can decently fit into a notebook-sized piece of paper:



[Apologies to Leon Kennedy fans, but I had no intention of drawing him *pretty*]

And then of course I had to entertain my itching fingers by splotching colours on it. I can't very well post it in my gallery, so it goes right ... here.



Far from a decent piece, but I did have quite a bit of fun painting Birkin. I should try drawing more mutants. Ahahahaha.