Month: January 2013
Yep, I Still Want to Write Full-Time.
I’ll just have to make it a point to get out of the house, that’s all.
(from the Lazy, Stupid, and Godless group on Ravelry)
The Further Domestication of One Mrs. Snider
I was baking cookies last night (because yesterday was Saturday and Saturdays are for baking) and managed to spill cinnamon everywhere, including all over my pants. Sexy. I figured it’s about time I do something about this whole wearing-what-I’m-cooking thing.
I just bought the most adorable apron:
Look at how cute that is! I’m 100% certain it will make my already-stellar baking taste even better. I mean, seriously. How could it not?
(photo belongs to Etsy seller Boojiboo, who stocks the cutest vintage-inspired aprons I have ever seen, including this horror movie piece.)
PS – Honourable mention goes to @falconjockey on Twitter for suggesting a Darth Vader apron, though my tastes run a little more to Fifties Housewife than Dark Space Lord.
The End.
I just finished watching What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? for the first time (I know, I know, shame on me). It was a great film, but what I liked best was the ending.
Spoiler alert for those of us who have been under rocks since 1962.
Okay, so the best part was the precise cut at the moment the cops run down the beach to check on Blanche. I loved it because the movie ended right before we find out whether Blanche is dead. We see a psychotic Jane spinning and dancing in the crowd, and the crowd moving away, and the cops almost reaching Blanche, then BOOM! It’s over.
Did Blanche die? If so, will Jane be going to prison? When Blanche told Jane that she’d caused her own accident, was Blanche only trying to befriend Jane so Jane would go get help?
I loved it so much because I love complex endings. I love not being told precisely what happened. I love it when the exact ending is left up to my imagination.
It’s something I try to do with my own fiction: take What’s Inside, for example. The story has an ending, in a way, but it’s up to the reader to decide what comes next. Some reviews wanted the story to have been longer, and I get that some readers enjoy complete resolution. But I like leaving an end or two untied.
The flirtation between “finished-enough” to be satisfying and left “unfinished-enough” to let the reader interact with the story is something that excites me as a writer. I want you left curious. I want to encourage you to participate in the story, to think about it long after you’ve put the story down.
It worked in the case of Baby Jane, and I hope it works in my stories, too.
Ok, so sometimes I’m late to the party. I just came across this two month old post at Hyperbole and a Half, which hilariously depicts what happens when we try to get our lives together and act like “real adults” (cleaning the house, buying real groceries, going to the bank, etc.), take on way too many responsibilities, start to slip a bit, plummet into a guilt spiral, and wind up indulging in shameful, non-adult habits like surfing the internet at all hours of the night (ahem).
This is a cycle I also tend to go through with my writing. I’ll have a backlog of projects (blog posts, prospective articles, dissertation chapters, etc.) that I haven’t been able to finish, so I start setting schedules. Actually, what usually happens first is that I read something like this and feel terrible that I’m not churning out a certain number of pages…
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These Are Cupcakes.
I’ll take mine with extra blood, please.
I Love the Nightlife
I’m on nights again! I haven’t worked this shift in a year, maybe two, and I’d forgotten how good it was.
The work bit…well, I don’t talk about work here. Use your imagination for that part.
But the rest of it is magic. I’m at my best late at night, when everyone sensible is tucked into their beds asleep. The roads on my way home are empty, my street is dark, and I have the run of the house. I’m full of energy at night: something about the dark brings out my best and before you know it I’m cleaning the whole house. I’ve knit a ton, I’ve fleshed out a story, I’ve reworked our budget.
I feel great.
Maybe all those vampire stories had something to them. Maybe it’s not the blood that had those creatures slinking out into the darkness, but the darkness itself that made them thrive. There’s just a different feeling about the world at 3 AM that you can’t find anywhere else. I’ve missed it, but I’m so glad to be back.
Guillermo Del Toro’s “Mama”
I just saw the trailer for this upcoming horror, and it looks incredible.
It’s by the producer of Pan’s Labyrinth, so you KNOW it’s going to be beautiful and twisted. I’ll be there opening weekend, you?
Kuchisake Onna: The Slit-Mouth Woman
“Kuchisake Onna, also known as The Slit-Mouth Woman, is a scary Japanese urban legend about a disfigured Japanese woman who brandishes a large scissors and preys on children. She has an enormous slit mouth, which extends from ear to ear in a horrible, permanent smile.
The Slit Mouth Woman walks the streets of Japan, wearing a surgical mask and hunting for children. If you cross her path, she will stop you and ask you a question. If you give her the wrong answer, there will be horrible consequences.
Picture the scene. You are walking home from school and your path takes you down a deserted city street. Suddenly, you hear a faint noise coming from the shadows. You glance over and see a beautiful woman standing there. She has long black hair and is wearing a beige trenchcoat. A surgical mask covers the lower half of her face. In Japan, wearing a surgical mask is not uncommon during flu season, to prevent spreading germs.
She steps out of the shadows and blocks your path.
“Am I beautiful?” she asks.
Before you can answer, she tears off her mask, revealing a hideously deformed face. Her huge mouth is sliced from ear to ear and gapes open revealing rows of sharp teeth and a big red disgusting tongue twisting and twirling inside.
“Am I beautiful NOW?” she screams.
Terrified, you struggle to answer her. If you say “No”, she pulls out a huge pair of scissors and kills you immediately, chopping off your head. If you say “Yes”, she takes her scissors and slices your mouth from ear to ear, making you look just like her. If you try to run away, she will hunt you down and kill you, by slicing you in two.
The only way to escape from Kuchisake Onna is to give a non-committal answer. If you say “You look average” or you look normal, she will be confused, giving you just enough time to run away.
There are many rumors about how Kuchisake Onna got her horribly disfigured mouth. Some say that her slit mouth is the result of plastic surgery that went horribly wrong. Others say that she was injured in a terrible car crash. Some even believe she is an escaped mental patient who was so demented that she cut her own mouth apart.
According to one legend, years ago, in Japan, there lived a very beautiful woman who was extremely vain and self-absorbed. Her husband was a very jealous and brutal man and he became convinced that she was cheating on him. In a fit of rage, he took a sword and slit her mouth from ear to ear, screaming “Who will think you’re beautiful now?” She became a vengeful spirit, and began wandering the streets of Japan, wearing a surgical mask to hide her terrible scars.”
(via the Anime Lovers forum; which I came across by accident when I was using Google image search. I swear.)
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