MOOP!

Youth Trad Song: The Annotated Ephemera edition!

( about 1700 words and a lot of images! But it is as complete a con-report as you'll get. )

It was a good weekend, and honestly, I think this sufficiently covers what all I did. Any time not covered by the above was probably spent cuddling and chatting with my friends, and singing all the nice songs they were leading.

~Sor
MOOP!

1: It is me, if I were a half-centaur, half-minotaur.

2: She is my nemesis and was fool enough to tell me the etymology of her last name. Honestly, usually I refer to her in my head as "Laurie Sheepfucker" because that has a much better ring to it, but technically it is not fucking the sheep, it's getting them to fuck each other. Hence.

Original Tags: how can I keep from singing?, conreports

It Saturday!

It a _really good day!_

Today started with scrambling out of bed as subtly as possible in order to not wake up Austin, then going to the online photography class I'm taking. (Photo class is honestly mostly just an impetus to take more pictures, since that is a thing I actually like in my life, but frequently forget about. But I also get to see lots of pretty photos taken by other people, and I get to see some of my faraway friends, and I do get to listen to someone who is an expert talk about stuff (which is _always_ a good thing!))

After photo class, I went and jumped on Austin so he'd be awake, We had a nice leisurely morning, with lots of Steven Universe and eating breakfast, and doing a yoga. Finally around three we got ourselves together and left the house, to go on a bike-and-hike adventure!

Masks safely on, we went waaaaaay down Trapelo road, basically into nearly Waltham, and did some wandering around a green space that had _shockingly_ few people for how nice the day was. I took a huge number of photos (some of which might even be good for photoclass next week, yay!!!!) and it was a very nice time for the legs.

Also we saw these wildlifes: red-winged blackbird, dark-purple-headed-bird-that-is-otherwise-black, robin, geese, GOSLING!, duckduckduckducks!, duckfuck¹, bumblebee, firefly (unlit), fireflyfuck, chipmunks, squirrel, really big seagulls, AND A MUSKRAT!!!!

Also a small mummified mammal of some sort, on the steps to the possibly-haunted-but-definitely-full-of-asbestos abandoned hospital. It's pretty clear that some weird ass-teenagers left it there in a fake satan ritual. It was cool as shit and no I did not touch it.

So long walk around and looking at aforementioned abandoned hospital and also the water tower _covered_ in graffiti, and then we got on our bikes and biked way into Waltham proper so we could go look at train infrastructure. Look, Austin was patient with me while I photographed all the bright coloured graffiti and pointed out every single bumblebee I saw, I was patient with him while we wandered on bits of gravel road and behind buildings because it used to be a train tracks. He and I are pretty good at the buddy system and I am very happy for it.

We biked home along the Charles bike path, and it was only marred by me having weird PrivateSchool feels (we were very close to parts of my commute from a long time ago), and also by it having been _four and a half hours_ since we left and we were starting to flag.

Luckily when we got home, Austin was willing to take point on dinner --I washed dishes and helped sous chef and stuff, but it was really nice to have him in charge of the mental load for that one-- and we made Ash's really wonderful Ethiopian lentil recipe, with added potatoes. Putting the whole thing over rice was an Excellent Decision as well! Gosh that's good. It turns out spices are awesome ;)

And then post dinner we had a really nice time on the couch where I played some Animal Crossing (mom came over! Yay mom!!) and he worked on his secret train project and both of us just...rested together. It was _really_ lovely.

One of the nice things about him coming to visit on weekends is that it really does make them feel like _weekends_, like a chance to get away from the rest of my life and rest and do some things different. Tomorrow we might make a cake (we've been meaning to for ages) and we will probably go outside again for a while. Definitely do yoga, they lied. (actually, we're pretty good when we're both in person and reminding each other to do it, it's just really hard to keep track when we're apart.)

I love you, and I hope your days have had something nice in them, despite...everything else.

~Sor
MOOP!

1: Maybe? It appeared to be one duck humping another duck while they were in the water, but it also appeared to be two male mallards. I am not judging?

Today was excellent, and by all rights, should be delivered via a photoessay. However, most of my photos are on my camera, and I don't feel like digging out the card reader right now, so...

...wait, what? There's a card reader on my laptop? I...I am skeptical. Hang on, I think I need to try some science.

OKAY FINE, I guess I will give an account of my pretty much completely awesome day via photoessay, gods!

( So today was excellent! )

Tomorrow I am going to be very sore, but it was an excellent day.

~Sor
MOOP!

I should be accomplishing schoolythings, or at least packythings, but instead I'm being led off into tangents by rm's livejournal.

Background is that dramashit¹ hit the fan regarding a con in the SPN fandom. You can go read Rach's journal if you want the details on the mess.

Anywho, nancylebov, who I don't actually know in the slightest, made this comment, which I started to respond to, and realized it was going to get long:

Care to take a crack at rules for photographers? One of my most annoying con memories is of a photographer (large white guy wearing bear ears) who insisted that I stop working (I huckster) and look at him while he took my picture. He kept persisting past a number of refusals.

Or is "Your desire to take a picture does not override other people's desires to do whatever they're doing" plus a few rules about permissions and privacy enough?

Response:

Man, "your desire to take a picture does not override other people's desires to not model for you without recompense or choice, especially without knowing where those pictures will end up." ought to just be one of those common sense rules that people magically get. Of course, common sense isn't and all that, but wouldn't it be nice if it was.

(Said as someone who has both taken a fair number of pictures at cons and who has been asked for pictures at cons)

And I do take a fair number of photos at cons, especially animu ones, where you actually get a majority of everyone dressing up (seriously sci-fi fandom, can we fix this? Because that may just be my favourite part of dealing with the anime fandom³). If I want someone to not move, so I can get a nice, non-blurry photo, I ask them. It's an incredibly simple process, for those who don't get it, I provide a simple walk-through.

• Notice someone in a cool costume.


• Pull out your camera, and politely get their attention. This means you may have to wait a moment if they're in a conversation already with someone else.


• Ask "May I take your picture". Possibly add "I love your costume/that character" or "...for my website/blog/flickr" if it's appropriate.


• Wait for them to say yes. If they say no, thank them for their time, and walk away.


• If they say yes, wait for them to pose, and take a picture, maybe two. Try not to take up the entire hallway, especially if you're somewhere crowded.


• Thank them


• OPTIONAL: offer to show them the photo if you're using digital, offer to send them the photo if you're organized enough to do that, give them a moo-card with your flickr account if that's how you roll.


• Walk away and let them enjoy the rest of their con.

I have done this dozens of times, across multiple cons. It works pretty well, honestly, leaves me feeling happy because I got a nice picture, and generally seems to leave them feeling pretty happy because someone liked the costume they worked hard on. If it's an obscure enough character, sometimes you actually get them *really* excited --this girl started bouncing when I recognized her as Daria, and after I snapped the photo, we hugged (Oh hey, there's another thing you should ask permission for...)

On the occasions when they say no, guess what! It's not the end of the world. It's probably not even you --sometimes people are in a hurry, or chatting with their friends, or something messed up with their costume and they don't want proof, or they can't legally afford to be seen in this costume⁴, or the other half isn't here right now, or whatever. Or maybe it is you, and they think you're a creepster --the best way to make them think you're *not* a creepster is to thank them for their time, and go away. Asking why someone isn't willing to give up THEIR time for YOUR photograph is rude at best. They owe you nothing.

And that's me babbling some about photos at cons. If other people have other thoughts, I'd love to hear them.

~Sor
MOOP!

1: I was having a discussion with zombie_dog about this at NEFFA, namely the fact that I strictly make a difference between drama and just problems, be it in relationships, fandoms, friendsships, what have you. I usually tend to define drama as a strictly bad, and usually unnecessary thing. When something big happens, and lots and lots of discussions and arguments get started, and emotions get heated, that's not necessarily drama (or wank²). When people start acting like morons about it, and attacking each other rather than discussing the issue at hand, then it starts to get dramay.

2: They're a little bit interchangeable for me, but I am trying to break myself of using "wank" and "fuck" as pejoratives, because both wanking and fucking are awesome things, and I don't like the underlying idea that a sex act should be our strongest curse. That being said, this is going even more slowly than the not using "lame" thing, mostly because "fuck" is one of those words I use several dozen times a day, really. It just has a good *feel* to it, much like "cunt" --there is a power in the word that, say, "frell" just doesn't have. Hard syllables versus soft maybe?

3: And believe me, I have many *many* least favourite parts about the anime fandom, mostly in the form of horror stories told to me by future-rooommate distant_flicker.

4: I've been there --anyone who saw me at Arisia knows that I've worn things at cons that I really can't have pictures of me leaking out on, because I will lose my future job. That being said, a lot of casual crowd-shots get taken at cons, and the chances of you being able to control every photo of you is nil --all you can really do is limit the number of posed photos.

OHMAN, and I just remembered the last time I was at Rocky, and dolled up appropriately, this asshole journalist just pointed his camera at me and started to take a photo. I wound up blocking it with my hand, and totally going off on him for not asking permission. He seemed more amused than anything else (haha, look at the overwrought little slutty girl) but I felt better for bitching at him. (And he didn't point the camera at me again at least)

Comment Policy: (Eventually I will stop doing comment policies, but they entertain me): None, actually. I mean, if you go about being all "HURR EVERYONE NEEDS TO STOP FOR MY CAMERA AND ALSO TAKE THEIR CLOTHES OFF BUT ONLY IF THEY'RE A HOT GIRL" I'm gonna seriously reevaluate our friendship, but have at it.