(no subject)

[sorcyress]

Once every year or two, I get all caught up in the interview meme, which often lasts forever in my crowd, as questions go back and fourth. I probably still owe people questions that I'm forgetting about, but whatever.

So, the deal is you ask for questions in the comments, and I give you some. I got questions from petrona and then woefully ignored by badmagic¹, but then got more questions from jazzfish so YAY QUESTIONS!

petrona From Petrona:

1) Since I'm kind of new to your blog, please explain the LJ name?
The username is kdsorceress because that's what it's always been. KD are my initials, Sorceress is an identity I started using back in 2001-or-2 (which is not all that impressive compared to the friends who've had their handles a decade longer, but give me a break, I'm young). My current handle is "Sorcyress", which I thought to be a suitable misspelling.

The journal name is MOOP! with a subtitle of "The Rantings of a Terminal Optimist". MOOP! is my word, and has nothing to do with the burner crowd, Terminal Optimist is one of my favourite phrases to describe myself. It was meant to be a stopgap after I could no longer use "A Most Unusual Teenager's Views on the World at Large", but I've had it for close to two years now, soo...

2) What are you studying in college?
Secondary Education and Math! I'ma gonna be a high school math teacher, because I am insane!!

3) What is the strangest thing (by your own standards) that you have ever done?
.....ever?

Um
Er
Hum.

Wandered around NYC dressed in all black pretending to be a part of a gang and enjoying the hell out of a scavenger hunt?

Swiped a sign that Randall Munroe wrote at a multi-cartoonist event to indicate you could go past him if you didn't know who he was, just because it had his handwriting?

Spent much of third grade throwing myself down a hill trying to fly?

Man, I've done a lot of strange stuff. Possibly inventing the Rod of Kimchee --it is a piece of PVC pipe about two feet long that says "Rod of Kimchee" on it. It gets hidden around our house. You are not permitted to say the word "kimchee" (or, more accurately, "kimchi") unless you are the one who knows where it is hidden. This game worked quite well with my siblings and I for some time, though I've basically had possession since I hastily hid it in a temporary spot before leaving for college three years ago.

4)On a scale of 1 through 10, where do you put yourself in the ability to relate to people in general?

Both two and eight. I am decent at interacting with people so long as I know where I stand (and "stranger" is a very valid relationship in this case) and I like drawing out information about people I care about, because people are fascinating, but I'm hellish at actually letting people have information about *me*.

5)What puts you at ease?
...huh. Things and situations and people that make me feel safe. Being in tight, enclosed spaces --under desks especially. The roof of my favourite school building. People I am able to cry around. Libraries, personal and public. People with whom I know exactly where I stand. Collaborative, human-driven, creative spaces, to live or work. Doing math problems. The Pirate's Mixed Up Voyage. Cons. Playing Are You a Werewolf (though it's a somewhat vibrant "at ease"). Other things, I'm sure.

jazzfish From Tucker:

1) What's the best thing about living in Boston?
The single best thing? Urk. Um.

Okay, the single best thing is any moment when it all hits me and I have this incredible knowledge of the fact that yes, I am Home, and this is exactly where I belong in the world. But since that's not consistent...

Eating ice cream from JP Licks while sitting in the middle of Davis Square and watching Morris Dancers before going off to Scottish Country Dancing on our ducking *excellent* public transit snuggled up against a good friend?

(For less specific, it's a toss-up between "public transit!" and the science museum. Home is the city in which you've a membership to the science museum, and a library card, amIright?

2) Who do you wish you could get back in touch with?
Discounting people who are dead...I miss Tho a lot. We talk still, and keep trying the e-mail thing, but our relationship has never been as intense as it was from about June-November of 2006, and I miss that intensity.

I miss Drummer_Dude, off the sluggy.net boards, and maybe could kinda get back in touch with him, but it'd be hard. We're Facebook buddies. but I refuse to use that as a means of communication, and there's so little other means of communication.

(Facebook makes this question strange and difficult).

I would like to know what would happen if 15!me and I actually got to hang out a bunch. I think I would like her, and also laugh at her a lot. And I think she'd like me, and be disappointed in me.

Oh! My first set of friends who were twins, Lily and Zoe. And not just because I've been crazy reading Knights of the Dinner Table this past week, and so really want to game again. They were good people, I should say hi again.

3) What is it that makes you you?
My DNA, paired with my unique pattern of experiences that have shaped my outlook on the world at large.

...Sorry, that was rather pragmatic, wasn't it?

4) Where do you want to end up?
Hard question.

Boston is the short answer, though I'm not even positive about that anymore. Some days I wish I could settle down, have a partner (or two?) that I live with, have kids --ye gods do I want children of my own someday some days. Other days, I am quite positive that I am quite content with the life I am slated to lead, with all the freedom of being childless and living --well, if not alone, at least with roommates who are of the "just friends" variety. There is a lot of loneliness to having a series of long distance relationships, but there's also a lot of freedom.

So, I'm not sure yet. I think that's okay when you're twenty and immortal.

5) Are you happy with your life?
Gods yes.

There are things that I am unhappy about, but I am incredibly happy that I am still alive and lucky and getting to run around this incredible world and take pictures of bugs and make friends with girl scouts and such. I love my life, a lot.

~Sor
MOOP!

1: meh, so are several other people, I am sure has has just been too busy for question-giving, as I myself often am. No actual negative feelings. :)

Comments

[mekthehatter.livejournal.com]

Hit me! I will find someplace to put it.

[kdsorceress.livejournal.com]

1) If you had to start a blog that had nothing to do with fiction or writing or art, what would you like it to be on?

2) All the wine you could ever drink for the rest of your life, or a glass of the World's Best Vodka?

3) Am I going to be able to find where you put this? D:

4) Where are you in the apartment process? Do you and Jake actually have living quarters together, or will soon, or are in the process of moving, or...?

5) What *do* you do with a BA in English?

6) Why is life complicated?

~Sor

[mekthehatter.livejournal.com]

1) If you had to start a blog that had nothing to do with fiction or writing or art, what would you like it to be on?
What, you mean my various personal blogs don't count?
I suppose I'd want it to be a place for proper essays on my thoughts about the world, like I used to do every so often with AF2. It's a shame I don't have many thoughts on the world anymore, and when I do they're easily compressed down to 140 characters.
(Or if not easily compressed, easily forgotten)

Either that or I'd want my life to be interesting enough to warrant having a blog about things that happen to me.

2) All the wine you could ever drink for the rest of your life, or a glass of the World's Best Vodka?
I've never had wine, so I suppose the vodka! I'm more of a whiskey man, though, so if that was an option on either end I suppose it would be that.

3) Am I going to be able to find where you put this? D:
Gosh, I hope so!

4) Where are you in the apartment process? Do you and Jake actually have living quarters together, or will soon, or are in the process of moving, or...?
Living in it! We're still in the process of moving - most of my shit is still back at the parents' ho
use, but I've got computer and bed over here.
The apartment is "The Den" by the way.

5) What *do* you do with a BA in English?
Frame it, hang it on a wall.

6) Why is life complicated?
It would be terribly boring if it was simple all the time.

I guess if anyone wants questions from me they'll have to find this comment and reply to it.

[mekthehatter.livejournal.com]

Where did that line break come from.

[gravitrue.livejournal.com]

A while back, some DEC employees got curious one day and starting attaching their lunches to test equipment. They found that the kimchi one person had brought acted as a rectifier.

[kdsorceress.livejournal.com]

That is kinda awesome!

~Sor

[harena.livejournal.com]

Quessssssssssssstions! i love answering questions! 'specially questions from youuuuuuuu! ♥ *poingpoingpoing*

[kdsorceress.livejournal.com]

YAY!!!!!

1) What are five awesome things that have happened in the last month?

2) What are your favourite kind of pretty flowers?

3) Is a horse really a horse, of course, of course?

4) Describe, in a hundred words or less, your favourite sort of weather.

5) Harena Atria, how do you be so rad?

~Sor

[lyrwen.livejournal.com]

*puts hand up*

[kdsorceress.livejournal.com]

1) Do you actually consider yourself to be some degree of genderqueer, or are you mostly just a femalebodied person who enjoys traditionally masculine styles of dress and dance?

1a) If so, is "she" the appropriate pronoun?

2) When are you going to come visit the AMERIKAS?

3) Are the similarities in movement between fencing and dance? What sorts?

4) What is an excellent fiction book you have read recently?

5) I know you play games, but what sorts? Do you like role playing games with shiny dice? What about tabletop games? What all do you play besides Werewolf (I have proof!) and LARPS at BoD?

5a) When does Werewolf in the Park run, as it seems useless for me to come visit and not be able to play werewolf with all five of the enzeders I even vaguely know. (You, Jan, Rose, Matthew, and Mark)

~Sor

[lyrwen.livejournal.com]

1) Nope, the latter. Possibly surprisingly for someone who is never particularly feminine, I really like having a typically female body. But, waistcoats are fucking hot. If only I could find a suit jacket that'd fit my shoulders. Sigh.

Also, part of it isn't so much that I really like masculine dress so much as in terms of casual wear it's much more convenient (it tends to have more pockets for putting Stuff in, and you don't have to worry about how you bend over or sit down incase you flash your knickers) and I feel horrendously insecure in feminine formalwear.

Probably because in my year in school there was this big thing about not being a tryhard. I still have this leftover compulsion that if you aren't feminine or pretty and you wear things that are too feminine or pretty (which are too good for you) everyone else will be perfectly allowed - nay, it'd be practically their duty- to tear you to shreds.

Also, because at the time when I first had any reason to wear any kind of formalwear at all, all the dresses available ANYWHERE were all this particular style, erm, I don't know the name for it, but they looked horrible on me.

2) :P When are you coming to visit Enzed? I suspect I am more likely to visit Scandinavia than America. I also want to visit the Mediterranean. I would like to see America some day though. I suspect I'd have to do it when I had a lot of time in one go (well that's true of all travelling really) because there is so much of it. Maybe in the future plane costs will be lower... :/

3) You need precision, flexibility, and especially balance for both. I found that when I did ballet and fencing together, they both helped each other out a bit. There aren't much similarities between any of the actual movements, but a lot of the muscles and skills are the same. Social dancing and fencing on the other hand really don't help each other out at all, I've found, except in that general fitness helps all sports.

[lyrwen.livejournal.com]

4) The old kingdom trilogy, by Garth Nix. I've read it over a lot of times, and I really like it. I want to read His Dark Materials again soon though, a trilogy I would heartily recommend if you feel like getting your heresy on. No, seriously, though, if you haven't read that one already, you must. Because it is FUCKING AWESOME. It's probably banned in america or something though. Oh and don't watch the movie, it's shite and they removed all the church/god stuff and replaced it by some sort of mysterious political organisation so as not to offend anyone xD

5) I like RPG's the MOSTEST. I am not a fan of d&d style hundreds of formula games, which is a shame because I really like dice. (Why yes. I *am* easily distracted by shiny objects). But I just hate a) the fact that mucking around with stats takes time away from actual interesting/fun story stuff, and b) the fact that you are not rewarded - or even punished- for casting magic missile at the rope holding up the giant cartwheel in the inn so that it falls on a mooks head, then rolling under a table and grabbing peoples ankles, rather than just casting magic missile at each mook 16x until the end of the conflict. I've played a lot of FATE, because it was Jans obsession for a while, and now I really like playing games where your character has attributes or whatnot that add in to a relatively simple dice mechanic. I also really like it if, like in zombie cinema, other players can add in dice to support your rolls on the basis of where they think it'd be awesome for the story to go.

I've played in one LARP and it was awesome :D

I've played a few wargames and have actually found them rather fun, but I don't generally play them simply because I'd rather be rping. I'm a bit ambivalent about boardgames. There are some I really like, but I find learning a new game frustrating sometimes (especially if it's complicated), because it irritates the fuck out of me when there's someone in the group who will constantly be like "oh you should have done this you'd have got one more point" or "why didn't you do that then you could have got this as well" because, well, you know. It makes you feel crappy, and then you have pressure to move quickly (because a fast game's a good game), AND ALSO slowly, because if you aren't maximum efficiency then someone will Point This Out and you'll be embarassed. Which there often is among boardgame lovers. It's different if you're actually stuck or whatever of course.

Werewolf itp runs in summer holidays, usually like December or January or even November and February too. But, you know, if you did come visit, we'd run werewolf specially for you anyway :P

[lyrwen.livejournal.com]

Forgot to say, his dark materials is by phillip pullman.

Miow.

And now, to totally spam out your comment thread here, I've thought out some questions for you!

[lyrwen.livejournal.com]

Mwa ha ha ha etc.

1) What or who, if there was anything in particular, got you interested in those concepts which might broadly come under the umbrella of social justice?

2) When are you going to come visit TEH ZEALANDS?! (We really are an excellent country, y'know. It's got me in it, after all, so how could it not be?).

3) You seem to really like writing, how much of that do you actually do? Have you ever wanted to do more writing, or was it one of those things where you knew if you started actually having to *study* it and do assignments it would instantly suck?

3b) Can you draw?

4) Do you like a wide variety of foods? Or are your tastebuds fairly shy?

5) One of my pet peeves is the phrase "pet peeves", for absolutely no logical reason as far as I can tell. This make question 5 hard to ask. But, here we go. What are your... above mentioned things?

[tolkienkookad.livejournal.com]

I could just look up from the computer and ask you anything...

Who is your favorite composer?

[kdsorceress.livejournal.com]

I think I said John Cage. 4'33", baybe!!

Also, do you want questions?

~Sor

[lordrefa.livejournal.com]

I would like questioned.

Am I allowed to ask for a specific number? Both of the above are 5, but you didn't post the meme... Am I allowed to have 8? Because I want to have enough for you to find out as much as you want to know without feeling like you're wasting questions... But I want you to be comfortable with a few that are fluffier...

It's been a rough night. Sorry for yammering.

[kdsorceress.livejournal.com]

You are totally allowed to ask for eight questions! I'm pretty vague with things like numbers.

1) What are six good things that have happened in the last year?

2) I see you at Origins every year, but I don't actually know what you do when you're NOT playing werewolf. So, what are some other games you enjoy playing?

3) Why on earth do you think that you have to apologize to *me* for babbling? That's just silly!

4) What is your favourite thing about people?

5) Besides Pittsburg, are there other places you would be willing to live? Are there other cities you've enjoyed spending time in?

6) I absolutely don't consider these questions a waste. But do you really expect me to be asking Deep and Serious questions to be answered in a public fora?

7) Why? No, not in conjunction with the above question. Just a more general "why"?

8) What did you do on your favourite summer vacation?

~Sor

[moniquill.livejournal.com]

...But how would you indicate a certain pickled cabbage dish in the event that you -didn't- know the location of the rod?

[kdsorceress.livejournal.com]

Luckily, it doesn't really come up very much. My siblings are, um...unadventurous in regards to food. We're really more losing out on an old Sluggy Freelance reference than a food that gets talked about much.

Also, there might have been a spare rule that the people who didn't own it could say the word, but were risking being beaten with the stick. Which could serve as a strategy for getting the stick unhidden --if you couldn't find it in one hiding spot, you'd get it revealed, and hopefully chase them into another room or part of the house. (It wasn't allowed to go outside, or be hidden in any private rooms. Possibly not the basement, either.)

Also, would you like questions?

~Sor

[moniquill.livejournal.com]

I love questions!

[kdsorceress.livejournal.com]

Sweet!

1) So, you seem to be at least familiar with kimchi --what sorts of delicious foods do you like besides it?

2) You mentioned getting trapped in the land of TV Tropes --do you have a favourite page? (Mine is Brian Blessed, warning, tvtropes will ruin your life, don't click that link)

3) I'm totally stealing a question from Racklesaurus above --what got you into the whole (for lack of a better term) social justice thing?

4) Are you a city person or a country person? Which cities? Which bits of country?

5) Did you ever go through a stage where you wanted a pony more than anything? What about a fire truck?

~Sor

[moniquill.livejournal.com]

1. Hooooooooboy. Declaration: I am a foodie with an adventurous palate. I cook well and often. I am willing to try pretty much anything, and I enjoy a vast and wide array of foods. Hence...anything edible? This question is really far too broad for me to tackle... most things can be made delicious with effort and forethought.

I love food.

2. I can't say I have a distinct favorite, but I do tend to fond over any and all of the index-type pages (I.E. The Index Is Watching You, This Trope Name References Itself) and I'm not especially fond of tropes pages that are about tropes pages (I.E. ociety To Prevent Overly Original Names, Friends Of Really Kool Sobriquet, Kalculated Naming Indifference Violent Enforcement Section, People Letting All Trope Titles Exist Relishably) I have been known to spend an entire 40 hour workweek immersed in tropes.

3. Getting into social justice...pretty much happened organically as I grew up. I'm poor, female, and NDN. Social injustice was never something I had the option of not noticing. I'm pretty sure the internet and contact with other actual social justice seekers helped me more than any of my 'social awareness' type classes in college, though. It certainly smacked me over the head with the algorithm of privileges I enjoy more than classes ever did, and taught me how to not be a douche and operate in an intersectionally aware manner.

4. I wouldn't classify myself as either of those things, because I'm from Rhode Island and we have both run through a blender into a chunky mix of city/country/city/country without large expanses of either. The cities with which I'm familiar and comfortable include Providence and its outlying areas, and Boston. Country that I'm familiar with is large chunks of northeastern coastal woodland (Re: many weeks over the course of my childhood spent in Miles Standish State Forest, greenspace areas near my childhood home, tiny local farms all over Southern New England that I visited sporadically through my youth) I'm pretty versatile about where I feel comfortable/where I can survive.

That said, I live on the Internet at this point in my life. Meat-space is tangential to that. When I cannot connect to the Internet, I feel unsettled and disconnected from most of my social support network and the important people in my life.

5. Not really. I had vague 'a horse might be nice' ideations through early childhood, firmly stamped down when I spent a week at an equestrian summer camp at age 11 (I have been firmly in the FUCK HORSES camp ever since). I never really cared about vehicles other than bikes.

What I wanted more than anything as a child was to not be a child. Took a while, but I eventually got that wish.

[jazzfish]

Sure, always interesting to see what people hand out.

[kdsorceress.livejournal.com]

1) So, you've probably explained this a couple dozen times, but why Jazzfish? Besides the fact that it leads to a just fantastic usericon.

2) Do you read comics/graphic novels? Any recommendations?

3) What is a thing to do in the DC area that you think everyone ought to at least try?

4) I found a LEGO unicorn at Toys'R'Us yesterday! Do you like LEGOS? Which are your favourites?!

5) How do you describe the way you look?

~Sor