Random Thought Thread

Let's just return to pagan nature rituals and communicating with the dead, eh? Make All Hallows Eve Great Again! (MAHEGA)

 

Sexy Donald Trump.

Go!

 

I'm sure someone has done it. In some dark corner of the earth.

 

Google finds Donna T. Rumpshaker:

 

She can't even get the hat slogan right! Fraud! Fake news!!

 

Want, probably won't work here though:

 

https://i.imgur.com/WNxXrfn.png

 

Also I think I found @Link the Writer happy theme song.

 

I want to put this in "General Writing", but I'm afraid @big soft moose will kick my ass and @Wreybies will stare sternly at me when he gets back, so I'll just drop it here and run away:

 

I honestly don't even know what to say

 

Has anybody heard from Wreybies ? Is he OK?

 

He texted his brother on the 15th saying he and hubby were okay, but getting clean water was still a problem for them, also that he was amazed to see the amount of support, both moral and material, that was coming from around the world for him.

 

I'll have to keep him in my prayers

 

I know. I think it's because most of us are deprived of proper masquerade parties the rest of the year. Unless you're in New Orleans for Mardi Gras, that is.

 

I have so many stupid tropes in this thing I'm writing and I just don't care! Yes, the character starts off in prison and has a dream. Although the dream isn't entirely important to the plot. It's more of a coping mechanism. I'm embracing it, because I'm not changing it just so I can say it's not a trope, because it is.

 

Halloween as far as I can remember has always just been about costumes, candy, and trick-or-treating.

I read somewhere that early America used to use Halloween as an excuse for inappropriate partying & hook ups (we've come full circle) and so to clean it up it became aimed predominantly at children.

From this I'd assume that scary/spooky things are not actually fun for children, so less grotesque & more fun guises were allowed. And of course the commercialisation of mass produced trick-or-treating costumes in the 1920s or 30s or whatever probably just made it evolve in to the type of costume party culture it is now.

Another key factor I think would be that America as a hodgepodge of cultures tends to just grab onto reasons to celebrate without caring about the actual culture or customs behind them.

For instance, at least in California, Cinco de Mayo is a big day of drunken revelry—but predominantly by nonMexican peoples. Most Californians assume Cinco de Mayo is Mexican Independence Day, which it isn't. Most of my friends & acquaintances from Mexico or of Mexican descent don't think the day is any bigger a deal than Columbus Day is for Americans.

Sometimes schools use it for celebration of Mexican-American culture, and there are definitely parades & special events〜 but honestly we just love a holiday, so if we can have an excuse to down tequila, then to hell with the origins or the meaning or the purpose.

I feel like Halloween is in the same light. Just an excuse for a party & fun with no real cultural context.

My mom always just used it as an excuse to dress us all up in kimono for most of my childhood. When we got older, it became pop culture related costumes—partially because we wanted to wear specific costumes and partially because we outgrew all the kimono. Also, kimono are small fortunes (these had been passed down from my mother's mother) and I can imagine us at a junior high or high school party somehow damaging them with spilt soda or smudged with chocolate or trying to run or jump in then, or whatever else.

I don't know if mom took photos of us for Halloween, but I do have this general photo of me & my siblings. Clearly by how comfortably we're laying, none of us are wearing obi which was my mom's favourite part, with the obijime and obidome, second only to the hair accessories.



If I wasn't so tall & busty, I'd probably try getting away with wearing kimono on Halloween. Although it's probably for the best I don't, because I'm so white I'd probably get chewed out with the "our culture is not a costume!" spiel.

 

This last time I was home, I bought a yukata for my best friend's wife. I'd gotten one for their daughter last time, and mom had asked if they were terribly expensive. She's about 5'8", but the one I got was nice and long, meant to be folded up under the obi to adjust the length. It was "one size fits all" from a store in Kyoto that caters to tourists, so I assumed it would fit, since Japanese women usually have about a foot of overlap in the front. However, my friend's wife is, well, generously proportioned through the hips. She carries it very well, so it's not terribly obvious, especially in 'Murica, but when she put the yukata on... well, if she'd been wearing it traditionally, we would have gotten an eyeful. ]

I felt terrible, I just wanted to get her something she'd admired as a thank-you for letting my use the guest room...

 

Yeah, yukata & kimono are so difficult to fit generally to Western proportions.

It's such a bummer too, because they are so beautiful.

I do own some fusion styles, like I have a Lolita kimono style top/skirt with obi, and because it's a fusion design, I can get away with layering a cute undershirt for where my bust gets in the way of closing the traditional way. . .

But generally, I just have to admire from afar.

Edit: I heard the traditional kimono & yukata industries were slowly dying out, so it seems they should start catering to the western body types.

Kind of like Wafrica's kimono style, but instead of just cultural aesthetic fusions—actual accommodations or alterations for other bodies

 

I'm in a coffee hangover.

 

I feel like this is some unpardonable sin, but. . .

I think I prefer Dirk Gently's Hollistic Detective Agency television series to the original novel(s) by Douglas Adams

 

Hon, you're a saint compared to me.

 

Can I be the Patron Saint of Contradictions?

I'll throw my cap in the ring for Patron Saint of Hypocrites, if not already occupied〜

 

Can I be the Patron Saint of Shenanigans?