Beowabbit

( My “love language”, according to a Southampton (UK) city outreach program(me) for queer youth )

(Looks about right to me. The top three all cluster together, though.)

Seen via harlequinade and nex0s:
I'm all for teaching DUH
in America's schools!

Not quite in the shower yet... First, ( if I were an online personality test, I’d be... )

I am: -14% Republican.

"The Marxists are too reactionary for you. With people like you around, America collectively thanks God for John Ashcroft."

Are You A Republican?Mind you, I’m not sure exactly what it means to be less than 0% Republican, but it sounds right.

I had a hard time with this, because lots of my friends have similar interests, but I did my best:

1. Given a 40-minute presentation in Chinese, a language I had only studied for two years. [Edit: This was for work, to people who didn’t speak much English, rather than in class.]
2. Dropped out of high school to go to college (OK, I bet a bunch of you have done that).
3. Seen an original Old English manuscript in the flesh (well, skin, anyway).
4. Painstakingly centered and right-justified lines on an IBM Executive typewriter.
5. Typed entire college papers with nice-looking apostrophes by rotating the platen up a half line and using commas.
6. Written a program in Z-80 assembly language to print proportionally-spaced mixed-case text on a printer that normally only printed capitals [edit: and used it to print my Russian homework].
7. Invented a new Romance language as a child (I bet some of you have invented languages, but not intended to fit in as plausible relatives of real languages).
8. Invented two imaginary writing systems as a child (I’m guessing most of you stopped at one).
9. Conducted a long-distance relationship via (what would come to be called) electronic mail and instant messaging — before 1984. (See PLATO People.)
10. Recited pornographic poetry in Esperanto for a sweetie. (She didn’t believe me that it was pornographic, so I had to translate it for her. In front of her co-workers. :-)

It’s been a week, and I haven’t had a chance to post my thoughts about the inauguration yet. Basically, I thought it was a great speech, although of course it went on a bit too long and he had his typical problems with flowery rhetoric. The very subdued nature of the celebration and the amount of time he spent talking about the tsunami and about the plight of civilians in Iraq made me proud that I’d voted for him. His call for personal sacrifice sounded kind of Kennedyesque, but I worry that it’s not going to go over politically, even though he was too wishy-washy to be very concrete about it. We’ll see, I guess.

On a related topic, I thought the decision to ask Powell to stay was a really good idea, despite how upset I am with Powell for putting political loyalty ahead of the good of the country in the last administration. (And in general, I think the surprising number of Republicans in the new cabinet show what it really means to be a “uniter, not a divider” — although a lot of them are Republicans who probably couldn’t get the president’s ear in the previous administration.) I wonder what Powell’s life must have been like between that announcement and the inauguration; I’m sure it’s no accident we haven’t seen much of him. I’m guessing cabinet meetings have been a bit chilly lately.

The weirdest thing about the inauguration, though, was Edwards’ hat. Top hats are a bit, um, unusual these days, and does anybody know what “In this Style 10/6” means?

My friend [chienne_folle] doesn’t have a LiveJournal account [but she does now]; she does her communicating the old-fashioned way, and she’s very good at it. I first met her when I was subletting an apartment in Princeton from her and her partner Norman one summer. In echos of my story about keyne, I thought she was a really neat, interesting person, and I was sorry I wasn’t likely to really get to know her. But then she and Norman moved to Boston years later, and now she’s one of my closest and most trusted friends.

She is an amazingly warm and kind person, and an incredible listener. I tend to lean on my friends a lot, and I lean on [chienne_folle] more than most – she’s just so very good at it. I feel especially good when I can reciprocate a little bit. She’s always been supportive, free with advice at the same time she realizes that advice isn’t always the point, perceptive, engaged, and caring. She’s very intelligent, but not just in a scholarly, fact-oriented way: she understands people. The things that don’t make sense make sense to her, and to have somebody like that in your life is a blessing.

She’s another one of those people who seem to me like a real grownup, while most of us are just faking it. She’s mature and responsible and trustworthy, but she doesn’t forget to put the oxygen mask on herself before assisting other passengers. If everybody on this planet had a tenth of her interpersonal smarts, this would be a much, much better world; as it is, it’s a much better world than it would be without [chienne_folle] in it.

I met bitty several years ago when she moved to Boston, but I’d been hearing about her from my friend lilbjorn, who had loads of good stuff to say about her. She’s high-energy and fun, and even when she’s complaining about something (<deadpan>which never happens</deadpan>) she turns it into a funny, entertaining story and smiles through it. She is an excellent and generous cook, and tends to bring baked goods wherever she goes. If she ever offers to feed you, take her up on it. She’s a kind and giving person, and I’m always happy when I get to see her. I’m glad she moved to Boston, and I’m glad she’s my friend, and I’m glad for the time we’ve spent together. Yay for bitty!

There are a handful of people on my friends list whom I tend to learn important, interesting things about myself from reading. eisa is one of them. (wispfox and ladytabitha also come to mind.) eisa is intelligent and eloquent and self-aware and observant (of herself and of others). And she tells wonderful stories. I admire her honesty and her directness and her cluefulness and her judgment.

( More about her being trustworthy, honourable, interesting, good company, attractive, and good for getting to know other interesting people and adorable animals. )

I could probably go on for several more paragraphs if I put my mind to it, but I think I've made my case: eisa rocks, and I'm really glad to know her.