heinous-eli

Latest Posts by heinous-eli

A Cellular Longing

Unfocus to see: it is only the inconsistency saying all isn't pulsing in unity

Then, blink into clarity

Solidity is made into illusion Most of what's between, most of what's everything, isn't anything at all What's fundamental is emptiness.

Do you hear the mostly-gaps crying out to be crossed?

Or maybe it's us yearning to traverse

To leave halos in our wake To carve the trails that we take To dust up the little clouds we make

To shed bits of ourselves studded into the vast nothing that they might serve as markers: that there is matter that we are matter that we think we matter that we matter here

love how so many cultures looked at cabbage and thought like "Let's put this in a well-seasoned, mildly acidic solution along with some other veggies, like carrots and onions, then let some friendly bacteria have its way"

curtido, kimchee, sauerkraut, band gobhi achar -- all s-tier sour crunchy sides

Untitled [written ~20 years ago, revised a few times]

So cold, it's so cold just because you were so bold as to take and squeeze the universe (whose vast distances our minds traverse in our short bursts of ample time) and with such brashness of rhyme to roll it between your cross-scarred fingers (with a gaze that I always hope will linger... ah, the clarity of that blue-dappled eye!) and narrow the uncertainty that I deny.

The terse moments are not so fleet so as to drive away what they imply Say the caustic words and repeat: Just a blip on the radar to me My own words, as I recall? But that was not it, not truly it, at all.

Here I give my translation: I've lost more than my faith in revelation for you've turned all that's in my head  but I find it much too hard to concede what I think, what I feel — what I need? I cannot pour frankness into your ear when all but clarity can be found here. It was once a truth and then once more a lie All that I no longer can bear to deny

The wellings-up grow ever more strong It's stupid and it's pointless and it's wrong But that sleight of word that does certainty decry... what that evokes — I can never deny

Here I give my revelation: While you could be but my mind's creation you feel like a cruel trick of fate. Our shared time stretches under its own weight. Silent only as we contemplate parting for the night Shirking others for each other — how delightfully trite And then you compelled me to ungrip my hand and unclasp my fingers to meet your demand palm to palm pressed, holy pilgrims — and then you told of admiration grown from how I'd grown more bold.

I might be God, and so might you be but divine signs and patterns are all I see pointing to you in a clear line but just as clearly, I know you are not mine. And so I leave it, and within an hour or two fuel my gasps for another with my thoughts of you. When I speak of it with you, my mouth twisted and wry You take the bait and begin to decry

You say that I want to be swept off my feet that I want a true mind to with mine meet I drag out my "no", let it hang in front of you as though through stretching alone I could make it true It fills my mouth to muffle what I want to cry: You — you are the love I must deny.

[for S., with equal sheepish apologies to T.S. Eliot and Surah Ar-Rahman]

I have a theory.

The Right thinks that DEI/affirmative action/etc. elevates mediocrity because of the dismal quality of their own tokens.

Look no further than the fashion designers, musicians, filmmakers, actors, drag performers, and other, ahem, "creative" types who went MAGA for proof, especially the queer and/or non-white among them. They're tiny-ass, undistinguished fish in ponds so small and undisturbed by talent that they're not even qualified to be tempests in teacups.

My brain decided this ad said "Half the Twice, Size the Worry".

This is because of the italics and because I still hate the order in which words on the road appear.

There's a Hole in the Bucket is more than just a fun little folk song. It's a warning about weaponized incompetence. In this essay I will

"Your cat doesn't *actually* love you, it's just because you feed them. Oh and they only snuggle with you because they want your warmth!"

Oh, bud, do I have news for you about the origins of affection in all those other mammalian species, too.

Is it just me or have people suddenly started using "the x of y" instead of "y's x" more? It comes off as so stilted to me.

WE NEED MORE DANCING MUMMIES

There are fewer music videos featuring dancing mummies than I expected. 1997 had two, Around the World by Daft Punk and Everybody (Backstreet's Back) by Backstreet Boys. Nearly a quarter of a century went by until we had another, Nadiyon Paar (Let the Music Play Again) from the 2021 Bollywood movie Roohi.

Music videos that I expected to have Ancient Egypt-theming but don't for some reason (?!) are 1979's Egypt by Kate Bush (more modern Egypt/ruins-themed, OK fine) and, most surprisingly, 1986's Walk Like an Egyptian by The Bangles.

Granted, those were still relatively early days for music videos, but damn, Walk Like an Egyptian really phoned it in. Not even a little Cleopatra eyeliner for the performance or a picture of a pyramid projected on the background or something? Just a quick blink-and-you'll-miss-it flash for a few seconds of the four members of the Bangles in some really bad costumes that read more Temu Ancient Greek than anything? Weaksauce.

There are lots of music videos that are Ancient Egypt-themed but are sorely lacking in dancing mummies.

- King Tut by Steve Martin (1978) - Egypt (The Chains Are On) by Dio (1984), which is technically a concert recording (Live at The Spectrum 1984) but it's themed as fuck so it counts - Tut-Ench-Amon by Falco (1984) - Valley of the Kings by Blue Murder (1989) - Remember the Time by Michael Jackson (1992) - Put Your Hands Where My Eyes Could See by Busta Rhymes (1997) , which features a pastiche of themes but that's OK, it slaps - The Curse by Josh Ritter (2010) - Dark Horse by Katy Perry (2013)

Honorable mention: Suraj Hua Maddham from the 2001 Bollywood movie Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham. Because pyramids.

The Four Millennial Horsemen of Things Not Yet Identified:

- a Jigglypuff as seen from above

- loss

- not lupus

- Rick Astley's Never Gonna Give You Up

My former foster kitty Mavis (née Duchess) was incredibly cruel with her affections. Every time I would bring a big strong paper bag home for her benefit, she would fall in love with its crinkly noises. Then, she would use it and use it until the bag had no crinkles left, at which point she'd become bored and leave it alone. There it would sit, reduced to a sad lonely life of uselessness.

Alas, poor shopping bags, destroyed by love and then abandoned.

I've long owned a very old copy of The Age of Chivalry; Or, Legends of King Arthur by Thomas Bulfinch. It's got an 1898 copyright date, a preface dated as 1900, and a title page illustration marked 1908. Its cover is extremely worn, but the insides are intact and still pretty.

Today, I decided to look up the person whose name is on the bookplate. I found him in an ad in the San Bernardino Sun, Volume 62, Number 140, 18 July 1928.

He was a butt doctor.

Could there be anything worse than realizing that you're the ex Chappell Roan is talking about in "Good Luck, Babe!"?

Yes. Yes, there is.

It would be worse to mistake yourself for the ex Chappell Roan is talking about in Good Luck, Babe!

Key to Nowhere

You cry out for someone save you from this trap an irresistible call to ears like mine

Oh, what can I do? What shall I do? Anything at all for you

I fumble to find the release There must be a catch somewhere out here that will let me let you out

My groping leads me nowhere but closer to you so I step away to get a better look

As I examine the fuller picture of it all your hand pops out as if by magic (or is it just a door I've never seen before?)

You hold it out to me but I don't take it already preoccupied with taking it all in

Your face appears above your tightly-clenched fingers Your eyes beg me to let you unclasp I let you place it upon my palm You retreat as though you were never out here

Your pleas for me to release you shift from wistful to YOU HAVE THE FUCKING KEY LET ME OUT RIGHT NOW

With one hand and both ears so full of what you've given me I resume my search, somehow more fruitless than before

My vain efforts rise in sync with your cries

You go from expelling your heart's content through your lungs to inhaling every molecule of oxygen left

Before I can drop it right there so that the force of your vacuum sucks it in and lets me let you choke on it-- you expel all you took in back out blasting me far away from you embedding its jagged edges into my skin

Now you can tell the next one a truth that I'd absconded with the only copy

I am currently reviewing and auditing digital records related to Internet governance. Many are legal documents that underwent endless cycles of revisions and approvals. The oldest among them are over 25 years old.

Much of what used to baffle me about Microsoft Word suddenly makes so. much. sense.

Hot Relationship Tip: Be kind.

That's it. That's the post.

Kindness is seemingly such a simple concept, but I think it's underrated. In established relationships, it can be too easy to drown in layers of sarcasm, irony, and cynicism to the point where genuine affection isn't really expressed. Not good.

These days, when I want to explain my divorce without getting into too many details, I'll say that being in 2020 lockdown made me see just how mean he was treating me all the time. It's the truth, and it's interesting (and maybe sad) to see how many people genuinely nod and get it. Like yeah, who wants to be around someone who is just plain old mean to them all the time?

Praxis starts at home. Concepts like axes of oppression exist to describe social issues, not to justify interpersonal cruelty. Being awful to your partner isn't "punching up". Kindness isn't ever too big of a priority.

You know what's more annoying than a preachy vegan?

Omnis who absolutely refuse to understand that a lot of things they eat that aren't straight-up meat/dairy/eggs often have animal products or by-products in them.

Plus, there are more of the latter than the former, so yeah, officially, the vegans are generating exponentially less as far as volume of annoying, by enormous orders of magnitude.

This post brought to you by a thread full of clueless omnis going on and on about plant-based chocolate, in ableist-as-fuck language to boot. Even when I pointed out that most chocolate products contain dairy, they kept on about it. Because of course.

Either read the fucking food labels (and maybe learn something for once in your smug life) or shut the fuck up. I hope none of them has anyone with allergies in their lives. They'd end up killing them in their insistence that, say, potato products couldn't possibly have gluten. Which, FYI, they can and do.

(ftr aside from a few infrequent but intense flirtations with vegetarian/vegan eating, I spent most of my life omnivorous. I've been loosely vegetarian for about, IDK, 5 years now? though I flex to pescatarian if the situation calls for it. I care enough about food and systemic issues related to it to render myself wholly uninterested in policing anyone's individual food choices)

No, autocorrect. I actually did mean "discrete", not "discreet". This isn't 2009, and I am not a married man posting personal ads on the sly on Craigslist.

The Lamb : The Goat :: Beemo : Football

Like, exactly-exactly. There's mirroring of the mirroring.

Why is no one talking about this?!?!!?!

I am not special. I deserve the same grace, rights, and consideration that everyone else does.

other people love to go on about how WOW I am so organized with my spreadsheets and taping-off of dead outlets and labeling light switches and you wish you were so on top of things and and AND--

it's all very nice, thank you. but! what exactly is the alternative? are y'all really just remembering things??? off-the-cuff???!!!?! *ALL* THE TIME!?!?!?!?!

British Egyptologists were the original weebs.

Spoiler warning for relatively advanced level of plot in Hades 2. I've gotten pretty far in it.

I am beyond fucking heartbroken for Hades himself. I am devastated.

He fucked up raising Zagreus. Yes, he eventually reconciled, apologized, all that, but it took until Zag was well past childhood. Zag himself had to do the (flaming) leg(foot?)work to make it all happen, too.

By the true ending of Hades 1, you know that Hades knows that he fucked up with everyone, from his wife to his child to his Olympian relatives to his loyal Chthonic court members.

Melinoë is the child born of his rekindled relationship with Persephone. She is his chance to be a good father right from the get-go. He probably did whatever the Greek god equivalent of Lamaze classes and reading What to Expect When You're Expecting might be. I can imagine long and difficult yet loving conversations between Persephone, Hades, and Zagreus about how much they want the better version of their family to be the one that welcomes the new baby into the underworld.

And then, wham! Hades's own father shows up to be like "healing from ur toxic masculinity? learning that emotions are valid? caring about others? knowing better to do better? LOL BISH U THOUGHT" and takes it all away. Prior generations doing all they can to prevent cycle-breakers from healing. Too real.

I realized all this in the encounter where Hades tentatively and oh-so-tenderly asks after Mel's well-being and she responds with "LORD FATHER I AM AN INSTRUMENT OF VENGEANCE AND I HAVE NOT YET HAD IT SO HOW DO U THINK I AM DOING". Calling poor Hades "defeated" doesn't even begin to cover it.

Then, in the encounter right after that one, he expresses his regret that he, Persephone, and Zag weren't there to watch her grow up. And then HE ASKS HER WHAT HER HOBBIES ARE?!?! And seems saddened by the fact that her response is, yet again, "LORD FATHER I AM AN INSTRUMENT OF VENGEANCE AND I HAVE NOT YET HAD IT SO WHAT DO U THINK I DO WITH MY TIME". He is just so damn sad and full of regret.

He is the most dynamic character in the series, even without Hades 2 being unfinished. The series is named after him for a reason. Hades grows, changes, regrets, learns, all that.

My. Heart.

Here is a list of 10 Black artists/bands you might enjoy if you're millennial indie trash like me, roughly in order from better to lesser known and accompanied by a single song rec. There are, of course, more than 10 Black indie artists I listen to and even more that exist (and lots more songs just by these artists/bands!), so please do drop your recs in the comments.

(and yes "indie" means very little but whatever you know what I means it's vibes OK?!?)

Artist: Solange Jumping-off point song: Losing You Yeah, she's Beyonce's younger sister and fairly famous, but hear me out: I feel like she is perceived as overexposed as a result and therefore is sometimes dismissed as an artist. She really is fantastic and has her own thing going. I honestly don't think her singing voice sounds anything like the other Knowles's. Her style is definitely unique, too.

Band: Bloc Party Jumping-off point song: Flux You may know at least one song by them, even if you don't realize it. They've been featured on video games like Need for Speed Pro Street, FIFA 06, Burnout Revenge, and Guitar Hero 3, as well as TV shows like Skins, Waterloo Road, and How I Met Your Mother. The frontman, Kele Okereke, has also released his own solo stuff.

Artist: Santigold Jumping-off point song: Disparate Youth Formerly known as Santogold, she's opened for acts ranging from The Beastie Boys to MIA and Bjork, plus she was name-dropped by Beyonce in Break My Soul (The Queens Remix).

Band: TV on the Radio Jumping-off point song: Young Liars They've been one my faves since the first day I heard them ~20 years ago and have stayed in the rotation ever since.

Band: Alabama Shakes Jumping-off point song: Don't Wanna Fight The band is on indefinite hiatus for a lot of reasons ranging from messy to objectively awful. That said, what a fantastic and highly influential band, especially considering how relatively short-lived and recent its existence was.

Artist: Ekkstacy Jumping-off point song: i walk this earth all by myself For the record, Ekkstacy himself has expressed annoyance at the comparison. But! The first time I heard him, I immediately was reminded of Bloc Party in a good way, and I'm not the only one.

Band: Black Kids Jumping-off point song: I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance with You The first time I came across this band, I was convinced the band name was indie irony, like the band Girls. I was wrong. Also, the lyrics to their aforementioned biggest song is accidentally a transmasc mood.

Artist: Toro Y Moi Jumping-off point song: Talamak I've seen a lot of artists live, and his slot at Desert Daze is one of the best performances I've ever seen. The music is danceable and the lyrics poetic and thoughtful, yet unpretentious.

Artist: Yuno Jumping-off point song: No Going Back A man after my own heart, he mentions HIM’s Razorblade Romance and AFI’s Sing The Sorrow among the albums that have influenced him.

Artist: Blood Orange Jumping-off point song, more normal song edition: You're Not Good Enough Jumping-off point song, trippy glam edition: Uncle ACE This is the artist and song that inspired me to write this list, because I absolutely cannot get enough of both of these songs right now, so he gets two song recs. Fun fact: Dev Hynes has collaborated with Minimalist icon and ye olde meme Phillip Glass.

The only time we met was enough My heart is a stopped clock Stuck on one particular time

woke up this morning w/ this fully-formed in my brain [oc]

I made this in MS Word while at a job I hated (:

Even though religious women who cover up will claim that they believe in feminism and free choice, they sure do love to call their own particular style of clothing "modest".

Think about that for two (2) seconds.

I don't think it's random, accidental, or coincidental. Words mean things. If you want to reclaim that style of dress as by and for women, rather than dictated by men and imposed on women, then you really do have to step away from the inherently patriarchal branding embedded in words like "modest".

And I'm speaking as a former devoted hijab-wearer. "High-coverage" is right there for the taking. You could also specify what you mean by "modest": high-necked, long-sleeved, loose-fitting, ankle-length, dark-colored, whatever. It's not like women even within the same religion agree on what's suitably "modest". Saying what you mean is a good thing.

While it's true that drugs aren't never the answer, they definitely aren't always the answer.

Maybe I'm just too Elevatorgate/Gamergate poisoned but