Distracted By Something Shiny

I had the honor of meeting Adam West and Burt Ward at Motor City Comic Con 2016. Last year was the 50th anniversary of the original Batman TV show and they announced that they would be doing con tours in its honor, but that it would be the last year they would go on tour as they were both retiring from the convention circuit.

I was probably 4 or 5 years old when the show started rerunning on the weekend and my dad and I would watch together. When I told my dad that they were going to be at the convention I was attending, he reached into his wallet, pulled out some cash, handed it to me and said, "I want a picture. You better bring me a picture." Thanks to my dad, I got the chance to meet Adam West before he passed away. I remember when I came into the photo booth with my Batgirl costume on, he loudly declared, "Well now we're talking! Alright!" Which made my day.



I'm so thankful I got the chance to meet these two great actors and I was sorry to hear that Adam West passed away this week. The Batcave is good and all, but I know he is someplace even better now. Rest in peace, Mr. West, rest in peace.

So, if you’ve been following this journal for a year or more, you probably know that Halloween is a big deal to me and my sister. We started buying things to go in the yard as soon as we moved in together - a sound activated creepy bat/ghost/witch/light up eyes in the front bushes, giant spider and cobwebs, light up zombie/skeletons coming out of the ground, tombstones - we just go wild. Then we (along with The BFF) always dress as something scary and do a sort of Larping in the big front windows, acting out things to scare the kids who come to our door. We’ve gotten a bit of a reputation in the neighborhood and on a good year, we can get 150 kids. On our best year, we got approx 250.

But this year…we aren’t doing it. The tombstones fall over all the time from wind and rain and Sis just didn’t have it in her to set them back up over and over again all month. We didn’t have time to carve pumpkins. I even totally forgot to send out my traditional Halloween cards. Plus, Sis is on a new schedule of four 10hr work-days, to have Wednesdays off to take Mom and myself to appointments, so she won’t be home until 6:30, in costume until 7. And The BFF is working (yay for permanent job!) and can’t come to town on a weekday. I’m sad about the lack of Halloween around here.

But I am still dressing up! As Ballerina Batgirl! Which is basically just Batgirl, but in a yellow tutu and with glittery makeup. And I have two friends stopping over for dinner and to see my costume - they’ve joined us three years now, and they love to watch our zany Halloween antics. And when she gets home, Sis is putting on her Darth Vader outfit and Winston’s R2D2 outfit and taking him for a walk amongst the trick-or-treats, which will delight them.

At any rate, since I’m more comfortable posting photos here of myself, I thought I’d share some of my costumes from years past. The first year we did the Larping, we did zombies. We stood in the big front windows and acted like we were trying to get out of the house. Sis would throw herself against the window and growl. One little boy dressed as a soldier ‘killed’ her repeatedly with his toy gun. The next year we were Reapers and BFF and I stood in the windows and held very still. Many kids thought we were holograms. Until we started to turn our heads, very, very slowly. One girl, about 9, screamed and ran away at full speed. The next year it rained and BFF had the flu, so Sis and I took what were going to be Scary Witches and turned them into Good Witch outfits. Then the next year, we did Scary Witches. BFF brought a cauldron and fog machine and there was a lot of cackling. I sat in the rocking chair, positioned so you could see me once BFF opened the door to hand out the candy. I would start rocking very slowly once I knew I was in view and I got a lot of, “What is THAT?!” from the kids. The following year we were Steampunk Vampires. I sat in the front windows with my face in my baby doll’s stomach. Sis would signal me when to lift my head and I would and my mouth was covered in blood and guts and the kids would scream, “She’s eating her baby!”. Also K brought his then-tweenaged son over and wanted a picture of us and right before he clicked it, I turned and tried to rip the kid’s throat out with my vampire teeth. The look on his face clearly says, “I hate my dad’s friends.” Last year we went for Scary Fairies, though they turned out a bit more Victorian Fairy than anything. It was a slow year last year, so I just sat in the windows and sort of growled and screeched at kids.

( Photos under the cut! )

This year I’ll just politely handout candy like any good ballerina superhero should!

So The Canadian Kids are now preschool age - TCNephew turned 3 in May and TCNiece turns 5 in November. It's a good age.

TCNephew is really into superheroes and action figures at the moment. He has a Darth Vader figure, but he calls him 'Darth Smader'. He found a flashlight in the cupboard and decided it was a lightsaber and went around yelling, "Pew, pew, Darth Smader is in your house!" (He says 'pew pew' for everything; guns, lightsabers, karate chopping).

( More under the cut! )

Also, one day I went and laid down for a litle rest and when I got up, my hair was sticking up so I asked TCNiece if she would brush my hair for me. But she decided she didn't like the barrette I had in so I got out the rest of my barrettes and asked her which one she wanted. I have a set of about 30 little plastic flower ones and she proceeded to put every single one in my hair - all 30, all the way around my head. Then she proudly showed it off to everyone, - "Look, I do her hair!" - and my sister took a bunch of pictures of it.

It was a wacky fun week!

My dad turned 65 on Thursday, so on Saturday myself, my sister, brother, sis-in-law and both the kids went up to the hospital to have lunch with him. He seemed to make a real effort for the day - got dressed, cleaned up and was waiting in the lobby when we arrived. He made it about an hour and a half before he said he had to go back to bed, which my dad admitting he can't do something is a huge red flag to me - but even so, he seemed better than my sister had been saying, so that's something. Though, at this point, his quality of life has gotten so poor that I wonder if he has the drive to even fight these infections anymore.

The Nephew had just read a huge chunk of his Marvel Encyclopedia and he was talking to me about it at great lengths. But I'd had to get out of bed about 3 hours earlier than I usually do, so I wasn't as enthused as I can be. At one point he propped his head up on his hand and said, "So, I guess we're just running out of things to talk about." How does he sound like such a grown-up little man?! I told him I was just really tired. Also, remember how he told me that writing is ‘just typing words‘? Well I gave him a prompt - a Batman and Blue Beetle fic idea - and I have been bugging him for weeks about when he is going to write it (just like he bugs me when I am writing one for him). He kept getting so frustrated with me for bugging him! But he finally finished it - so you guys, The Nephew has now filled his first fanfiction prompt!! I am so proud.

( Two more things under the cut. )

And 'thank you' to everyone who reblogged my charity post! It's appreciated, guys! I’m gonna end it there, since I art-ed for 4 ½ hours today and I am exhausted now! Night all!

Today we were driving out by where my little brother lives and we passed this place called "Omega Physical Therapy". It was in this run-down tiny building and my first thought was, "Well, what kind of quality do you expect from a place that serves the societal lower-class breed of omegas?" My second thought was, "I need to spend less time in the Supernatural fandom". So...that happened.

Anyways, we were out that way - far too early in the morning for me - to see The Nephew play his first baseball game of the year. I am tired as hell right now, but it was worth it. Got to sit out in the sun, the smell of the ball-field in the air and watch him play. He got several really good hits (they are young enough at this level though that everybody bats until they get a hit) and he fielded a few balls and made the play to first base twice (I think they only got one official out in the whole game, but at this level basically they cycle through the batting order once and then the inning is over). It was a good day.

In other Nephew news, he called me this week and when I answered the phone, he said, "I just have to ask you something real quick: Who do you think is better; Batman or Wolverine?" What the hell kind of a question is that? Doesn't he know I hate to pick favorites? I went with Wolverine, after much debate, but hoyboy that was a tough choice. What do you guys think? Who's better; Batman or Wolverine?

He also told me that he likes animated movies better than 'real people' movies because he just watched these three Superman movies (by the description he gave me, I think they were the original Christopher Reeve ones) and he thought they were boring. I said, "Buddy, those were made a long time ago when special effects weren't very good yet," and he said, "But no, because, okay, I like when Superman shoots lasers out of his eyes and he didn't even know he could do that until halfway through the third movie. So I had to watch like, uh...five whole hours until he even shot lasers out of his eyes. And that was just boring and stupid." My little man, the film critic.

In other kid news, my aunt is a vegan now (and my mom is a vegetarian apparently) and so The Little Girl Cousin (who is 8) had this box of cookies and she said to them, "These are for you too, but I don't know if you can eat them. You better read what's on the box, because I know you are virgins now." Everyone within earshot busted out laughing and my aunt goes, "No, honey, we're vegans," and The Little Girl Cousin throws her arms up in the air and says, "Well, there are a lot of V words!"

That is all.

THREE YEARS ON LJ TODAY!!! This is post #507. Holy crap, I didn’t even realize that I had hit 500! Wait…apparently this post about my monthly word count was #500!

So here are the answers for my fandom questions. You guys asked some really good ones, thank you!

1) I know about the A-Team being your first fandom - but what were the second and third ones, and why?
2) Who is the best sidekick ever, and why?
3) If you were only allowed to write about one specific fandom for the rest of your life, what would it be?
4) How did you first get into Lord of the Rings' fandom?
5) Who was the person you were most excited about meeting?

( Anniversary answers under the cut! )

That’s it, folks! Thanks for the awesome questions!

I was going to post yesterday but after everything that happened in Colorado, I was so emotionally drained and I just couldn’t find the energy to make a coherent post. I think Chris Nolan said it well when he said, “The movie theatre is my home, and the idea that someone would violate that innocent and hopeful place in such an unbearably savage way is devastating to me.” I also feel like it hit me so hard because these were our people - fanboys and fangirls who loved something so much that they put on their costumes and their Bat-shirts and went to a midnight showing. My thoughts are with the families and survivors.

I did go see the movie today and I highly recommend you all go see it. It was the perfect final piece to Nolan’s story. Truly. I’ll make a thinky-thoughts post later, maybe after a second viewing.

Before I sign off, let me ask you peoples a few opinions on some fanfic-related things. What do you consider ‘kid!fic’ to be? Stories where the main characters have kids or stories where the main characters are kids? Or both?

I have written another story that is aimed at a reading audience of 6 year olds. I would like to make a tag for it as well as the stories I have previously written for The Nephew. I keep changing my mind on what to call them. Which one do you guys like for stories aimed at children?

[Poll #1855396]

I hope to post my latest Harry Potter fic sometime in the next few days.