onion beef water

Alan made an enormous wok of French onion soup tonight, using the portabello stem, all our onions, a stick of butter, beef broth and some pieces of our roast. It came out delicious, far superior to anything prepackaged. I will take a pyrex bowl of it over to my mom tomorrow. He cut the onions very small so she could have something to eat while she recovers from the dental surgery.

I will now go curl up in the bath with Radinzsky and bubbles.

high school Beowulf

While cleaning out the closet, I found a box of video tapes. Inside was my copy of Beowulf, the only film I've ever helped to create. It's a rough copy, before some of the computer to VHS transfer issues were worked out, but I am glad to have it.

Imagine the story of Beowulf and Grendel told through the use of action figures and copious inside jokes. There's only one part where the actual wording of the story is used. The rest is chock full of midget jokes, chainsaw noises and the soulful cry of "Burlywood." I am listed in the credits as assistant puppeteer, waitress, volume verification beeps, and the Bitter Voice of Truth.

I think it took about two weeks to shoot enough stop-motion footage to animate a 20 minute film. Using one of the original black and white Quickcams, we moved aorund Matt's collection of Star Wars and Spawn figures. Skinless Spawn makes an excellent Hrothgar, and the shots of him waving the storm troopers into battle are epic.

Two or three computers later, unccountable bits of data, television transfer equipment borrowed from the school, one Lego ship, three cds of sound effects, one editing program, dozens of action figures and sodas later, Beowulf appeared.

In the credits, Ms Sullivan is thanked for assigning a project with no criteria.

special #55

Ran errands and purchased cat supplies. It will be nice to have a kitty around again. Ate pho for lunch, which was good on a cloudy day. Have a new coat that was $25 instead of $120. It's black and velvety, with fake fur trim. It is good. Would like nothing more than to go home, but supposedly we are playing tonight? I don't know. Everything is stressful.

the traffic in sex slaves

NY Times article on the traffic in sex slaves in America

How many articles in major newspapers does it take? How many TV news exposes does it take?

The above is a great article because it deals with this issue, but there are some things wrong with it. The assumption that the internet has created this problem is patently ridiculous. People wanted to have sex with underage girls long before we had net porn.

Quote: Donna M. Hughes, a professor of women's studies at the University of Rhode Island and an expert on sex trafficking, says that prostitution barely existed 12 years ago in the Soviet Union. ''It was suppressed by political structures. All the women had jobs.''

The above is untrue. Prostitution was a problem in the USSR, but it was officially denied by the government because under the perfect structure of communism things like communism couldn't possibly exist. Prostitution was declared a byproduct of capitalism and therefore impossible. This is a documented issue, and frankly I'm weirded out that a university professor could make a statement like that.