Notes, Notings, and Common Refrains

For those immigrants from Tumblr who are now in my Dreamwidth Circles, this will be your first "Fishbowl". You can read all about it here.

If you're wondering why you'd want to read all about it, here's a short list of reasons:

• She tells fabulous Original stories of the SF/F variety, in the form of poems.
  
• Her stories include Representation of all sorts of characters who are marginalized in the mainstream, including LGBTQ, race, religion, disability, socioeconomic status, species...
  
• She crowdfunds all her work
  
• (it only goes public on her journal as people pitch in to pay for it)
  
• A "fishbowl" is a time when you get to give her a prompt for a story. And
  
• if she uses your prompt in a poem, you'll get that whole poem as private copy in your inbox (for your eyes only).

So, yeah... Try it! I think you'll like it!

From Important to Impertinent:

1) The Hearse at the End of the Driveway: http://davehingsburger.blogspot.com/2016/01/the-hearse-at-bottom-of-driveway.html (Breaking the silence around mental illness and anxiety -- vivid, first-person description of what it feels like to have a panic attack).

2) A trio of strips from Robot Hugs: "Return" http://www.robot-hugs.com/return/ (a message from the future about life with mental illness) "Rat Race" http://www.robot-hugs.com/rat-race/ (A fable about/metaphor for job hunting today -- show this to people who say you're not trying hard enough) "Tone Policing" http://www.robot-hugs.com/tone-policing/ (an explanation of what it is, and what's wrong with it -- this is also another strip of theirs which includes Disability in their Diversity... This is the only strip [not specifically dedicated to Disability] that I can think of that regularly does that. So kudos to them).

3) "Mrs. Ribeiro" https://youtu.be/6GqMgLnluKY (a poem from Sarah Kay about happy learning).

4) "Science Wars" -- Acappella Parody: https://youtu.be/LTXTeAt2mpg (The old "Which field of science is most important?" debate, sung to the John Williams theme, aimed at high school students, and an infernal earworm, with puns).

5) Tomska Behind your Sofa -- a Mr. Weebl Song: https://youtu.be/8yW28zw5PpQ (Included to make the list an odd number, and also to complete the spectrum from "Serious" to "Seriously?!?!").

Hey, gang!!

Give yourselves an-end-of-the-year prezzie! For the astonishingly low price of a prompt, dialecticdreamer will write a 500-word story for you. And that's not all! If you signal boost, she'll add an extra 100 words for each place the boost lands. Full details of this incredible offer can be found here: Magpie Monday for December, 2015 (the last of the year).

And it needs just shy of 5,000 more signatures to survive to the next round. [ETA: It passed! Just checked the site, now, out of curiosity, and number needed: 0. Number received: 25,132. \o/ Happy Hand-waves! Congratulations to all who sign/ed.]

I signed this petition last month, by the way. But forgot to signal boost it at the time.

[ETA: Oops! forgot the link! Officially Recognize American Sign Language as a Language of Community and Instruction in Schools]

Frankly, even if official recognition would "only" be symbolic, I think it's a good idea (wouldn't have signed it, otherwise). American Sign Language has, as some of its roots, the natural emergence of Sign Language on Martha's Vineyard, as well as the signed languages used as Lingua Franca among the aboriginal Nations of North America, prior to European invasion. In that sense, it's more "American" than English, which is, after all, the language of King George the Third. :-P

This video has closed captions.
If you sign, sign it!


( Transcript below the cut )