rusty_halo

http://rusty-halo.com/wordpress/?p=2608

SuperVegan was named one of the 21 best vegan blogs by VegNews Magazine. They called us “The Vegan Daily Show.” I am so proud!

Our incredibly-belated second birthday party also went off well. Tons of people showed up and devoured our giant cake at record-breaking speed. And I served free beer from a keg! Now I just need to get cracking on the hundred-million things on my to-do list…

But first, I need a vacation. I haven’t traveled anywhere for the entire year. (*sigh* I never found the time/money for Florida.) I’m going stir crazy. And it’s summer!

But I’m low on money and vacation days, so I posted here asking for advice. Several people told me to take a train to Asbury Park, swim, stay overnight, and take the train back the next day. So I booked a Saturday in July at the Empress (which is mostly a gay hotel but seems welcoming to everyone, has great reviews at TripAdvisor, is right on the beach, has a hotel bar, and looks very pretty).

My memories of Asbury Park are, um, grim (Uranium 235 played at the Stone Pony on Halloween 2000–I think that was the place where my friends had to switch hotels because the original hotel they’d booked wouldn’t let them in!), but apparently they’re remodeling the boardwalk and cleaning everything up, so it’s a good place to have a beach vacation while the prices are still fairly low. (At least, I hope so!) It’s heartbreaking how much is gone, though, and how such an amazing place could decline so badly.

It looks like I’m going alone–I’d rather have company, but it’s hard to find people I travel well with, and none of those I know I get along with can go. I’ll keep asking around, though, and I don’t really mind bringing a book and going on my own.

I also really want to go to Coney Island this year–I adore kitchy old amusement stuff, and I want to see what’s left before it all gets replaced by condos. :( Maybe I’ll go there for July 4? Not sure, it could be too crowded. Whatever, I’ll figure it out–I’m officially a Brooklynite now! (Although HopStop tells me the quickest way to get there is to go into Manhattan and transfer to the N at Union Square. :P)

Pretty much the entire past two weeks have been taken up by moving. I barely even had time to rant about Doctor Who! It’s getting better, though; my living space is starting to feel more like “home” and less like “empty space full of unpacked boxes.” So far I have:

( lots of talk about moving and organizing )

Originally published at rusty-halo.com. Please click here to comment.

10zlaine came to visit this weekend. ( my fun but exhausting weekend, seeing Chemlab, watching Doctor Who, and hanging out with fandom friends )

[Cross-posted to InsaneJournal]

I'm making InsaneJournal my main journal for now, but for the time-being, I'll also be cross-posting to my LiveJournal. (Eventually I will stop posting in LJ, but I'll give plenty of warning when that happens.)

I picked InsaneJournal because, compared to its rivals, the server is faster and the code seems more up to date. The account-creation process is easier than that of JournalFen and its dictator is more benevolent than that of GreatestJournal (which is no better than LJ in terms of random deletion of users). I am still awaiting a real non-profit alternative, though.

So, anyway, a couple of things about InsaneJournal, if you're also thinking of moving:

* It's ugly, but you can fix it! Go here to change the default site layout. Some of the options are still ugly, but the text-only version is as clean and simple as you can get. (This is not your journal style; it's the site style).

* You can change your journal style; InsaneJournal supports S1 and S2 styles. (Go here to do so if you already have an account.)

* You can still read your LJ friends via syndication. Instructions here.

* Free users could only have 100 friends. Well, they just changed it to 250. Yay!

* You can buy a permanent account for only $40. It comes with tons of features. I bought one.

* I'm trying to keep my FL at InsaneJournal up-to-date (ie, I'm trying to add anyone on my LJ friendslist who creates an InsaneJournal). I'm terribly haphazard about this, though, and have probably missed people. It's not intentional; just let me know if you want to be on my FL in any of the other places.

(Thanks to miggy for pointing some of this out.)

Other stuff:

* I loved fodian's post about why disturbing art should not be banned.

* elfgirl summed up the repulsiveness of Six Apart's stance on pro-anorexia communities. While frequently contradicting themselves, Six Apart has said that even if artwork depicting underaged characters engaging in sexual acts is legal, they think it's icky and don't want it on their servers. But they allow hate speech and groups that teach young women how to kill themselves, "because it's legal." Having already said that they'll delete legal stuff if it offends them, we can only assume that they're okay with racism and girls starving themselves?

(I'm not saying these disgusting communities should be deleted; I'm hugely in favor of free speech. But if you're going to selectively decide which "legal but icky" stuff you're going to delete, isn't actual people being hurt worse than fictional characters having sex?)

* "User Generated Content" & Ownership: The User as Citizen - a great post about the larger issues at stake here.

* We're on Slashdot.

And in real-life news:

* I went to see Juliette and the Licks (Juliette Lewis's band) play five acoustic songs at the Union Square Virgin Megastore the other day. They were really good. Juliette is a passionate singer and amazing performer, and the band was energetic and fun. Plus, the crowd was pretty small--you could just walk right up to the stage, and the band was just walking around interacting.

I bought their album, and it's okay, but the live performance was much better. If you get a chance to see them, I highly recommend it.

* jaydk and I went to see Harry Potter 5 in IMAX again last night. That's the fourth time I've seen the movie, and the second in IMAX. It's just so cool! (Still not Alfonso Cuaron cool, but what is?) Then we stayed out late having dinner and talking endlessly about Harry Potter. It's fun to share an obsession! (She loves Remus, I love Sirius, so we squee over the same moments but for totally different reasons.)

She keeps telling me that I *must* read a story called "Beyond the Veil" by Helene, but I can't find it anywhere. (All the Google results lead to broken links.) I don't suppose anyone out there knows where I could find it?

We're ridiculously excited about DragonCon; check out the YA Lit Track schedule. (I am totally going to check out at least one Cassandra Clare panel this year! And I'll totally be polite and sit in the back and not snicker.)

And the Goth Track schedule is looking pretty good, too, although I'm upset that they've scheduled what looks like the most interesting panel ("The Craft of Songwriting" with Andy Deane, Rick Joyce, Rogue, and Voltaire) on Monday at 2:30pm, when I'll already be gone. :( (Although the good news is that I'm going to Disney World for the Pirate Party on Monday night with jaydk and drujan--yes, drujan is finally coming to DragonCon!)

[Cross-posted to my InsaneJournal].

John Oliver from the Daily Show is performing tonight at a bar near my apartment, and I can't find anyone to go with me.

How is it that one can live in the center of the cultural universe and yet feel completely alone?


*debates whether the coolness of seeing my favorite correspondent will be worth the awkwardness of being there alone*

We threw an awesome party! We made a zillion decorations, lugged them plus a ton of donated food to the bar, sold raffle tickets and got people to sign up for our mailing list, wore party hats and stupid nametags, got incredibly drunk, and watched as several hundred people filed in over the course of the night to devour the free food.

I think the free food was the key (and holy crap! it went fast!) but still, we raised a lot of awareness about our website, and we had an awesome time. Also, we got a drink named after us. "The SuperVegan." Basically a White Russian made with soymilk, but it was ours! People were going to the bar and asking for SuperVegans! When I'm on my deathbed, I can tell my grand-nieces and grand-nephews that once upon a time, I had a drink named after a website I made.

Don't laugh at me. It was really cool. The weather was nasty and we were terrified that only twenty people would show up, so it was just so cool that people actually came.

Check out the awesome photos in our Flickr group!

( my first two party photos )


(I got home around 3am. I'm so tired. And I can barely speak. I can't wait to sleep all weekend.)

Oh my god, Albion actually closed!

But... but... that's the first Goth club I ever went to! I was 17, with Stefanie and Athena, and I totally didn't fit in, but that night I fell in love with the Depeche Mode song "Walking in My Shoes."

I got my fake ID for the main purpose of getting into that club. (It worked.) I saw Uranium 235 there, and Joe (who didn't have a fake ID) snuck in as a roadie, and the band hung out outside with us and the underage fans who couldn't get in, and Chrissy's hair got stuck in Shane's nipple ring, and I was trying to prevent drunken Margaret from falling over, even though I barely knew her.

Steff, Chrissy, Jitney, Shane, and I went there after Uranium 235 played the Bitter End, and we took these goofy pictures, and no one could believe that Jitney was only 13.

That same night I had my final confrontation with a psychotic lunatic of a former friend. We had a tearful screaming match on the second floor, where the coat check is now, and I never spoke to her again. One of the best decisions I've ever made, and it taught me how to recognize (and avoid) the psychic vampires and pathological narcissists I've encountered since.

I saw Godhead there with Stefanie and Lisa and Helyne, and we papered the bathroom with Uranium 235 fliers, and some dude calling himself "Voltaire" hit on Helyne, and I thought he was creepy. And then afterwards the girls came back to my dorm room and we drew goofy pictures of Chris Bride and did impressions of Jason Miller.

I saw The Cruxshadows there more times than I can count. I'm sure I spent at least one Halloween there, and I spent a New Years Eve with drujan seeing Voltaire and Melotron. I saw Bella Morte and Slick Idiot and dozens of other bands. I saw Chemlab there for the first time, and met Jared Louche there. I saw PIG there when they didn't play until 3am and the poor friends I'd dragged along went home, and then 10zlaine and I took Guenter Schulz out to breakfast at a diner on 9th Avenue. I've hung out there with nearly every friend I've ever had, including plenty who would never have entered a Goth club otherwise.

They can't be closed.

I hated the snooty atmosphere and the overly-loud speakers and the disgusting bathrooms and the awful, expensive drinks, but still, I have so many memories of that place. :(