Greetings, programs!
AG here with a little update and some thoughts that have been stirring for a long time. First, the little update.
AM is a busy little bumblebee these days -- a busy little bumblebee that is made of glitter and shimmies a lot -- and doesn't get much time to blog. Also her computer recently died and was brought back to life, so, cut her some slack. She's rehearsing for Superboobs where she will be playing BOTH (yes both) Harley Quinn AND the Joker. What's that you say? IMPOSSIBLE, YOU SAY??? Maybe you should just go see the show and you'll see how it's done. I'm personally terrified to go. Happy as usual to see my best friend shake it in front of strangers, but also terrified. She sent me some teaser pics of her makeup for the show and I'm still trying to decide how I feel about it. It's probably going to be amazing. Just saying. Our dear AM will then be choreographing a Power Rangers based burlesque, as directed by our friend Bobby (@Haberdasher9k on Twitterz). It will be AMAZE. Totes amaze.
I myself am about to go into tech rehearsals for The Cherry Orchard at Piccolo Theatre which has preview March 9 and opens officially March 16. The run continues through March and April until closing on May 5. I am super happy about the production overall and have been having an utterly smashing time with everyone involved... The icing on the cake has been how NERDY everyone in the cast is. We spend our five and ten minute breaks screaming and flailing about Battlestar, Doctor Who, comic books, and everything in between. It's been completely joyful. I spent an evening with several of them watching the new release Justice League: Doom... which was fab. We are all making plans to be at C2E2... currently discussing costume possibilities. So far I'm thinking I'll be bringing back my Lady Steampunk Eleventh Doctor ensemble from TeslaCon, but I'd like to do something more comic based too... Still thinking. ;)
Also, I am pretty sure I haven't said this yet here but I've said it on Twitter... one of my dearest friends in all the world, James Tynion IV, is currently working with Scott Snyder on the New 52 Batman. NOT JOKING. James is a SUPER legit human being, a great writer and he is wildly passionate about comics, so I can't wait to see what the finished products are. Once some of the stuff has been officially published/announced, he has kindly agreed to do an interview with the Lady Nerds, so look forward to that! :D HUZZAH!
Okay, so that's the update.
The other thing I wanted to talk about was a conversation I had with my boyfriend the other day about "the state of the world" and what the real issues are. Obviously, our dear Amurrkuh isn't exactly well-balanced right now. We started talking about politics and the Occupy movement and the wars and all of the big garbage we're all dealing with these days, and he startled me by remarking how obvious it was that I was a passionate science fiction nerd. I asked what was obvious about it -- knowing that he didn't mean it as an insult -- and he repeated a few things I already said, indicating how clear it was that science fiction had influenced my worldview. I've always been aware of it, but more in a "taking-it-for-granted" kind of way. So here I am, to tell you what I think in a vague sort of way, with direct connotations to my beloved sci-fi stories/authors/examples.
***SIX THINGS I BELIEVE (THANKS TO SCI-FI)***
1. The destiny of mankind lies in the stars. This comes from the introduction of Star Trek. "Space: the final frontier." Space is the final frontier. I mean, yes, there's the bottom of the ocean, the inside of the earth, and even the inside of the human body if you're going to reverse the spectrum, but then there's all that STUFF going on out there that we can only see a teensy part of. There's so much beyond us and our tiny world and our ridiculous problems. So much creation and destruction and STUFF happening. In what way does the existence of all of that beyond us mean that we are NOT meant to explore it, see it, experience it? True, maybe we'll never understand it all. That's probably a good thing. But I absolutely believe that the future of our species lies in space travel and exploration. We're smart enough to do it, even if we're not smart enough to fix our own economies or stop fighting wars or heal the sick. We are smart enough to figure shit out EVENTUALLY. And when we do, we'll go to the stars. I mostly just refuse to accept that this species was crazy smart enough to make all of the technological advances we made in the last 100 years only to hang out on the moon for a little while and then SHUT DOWN the space program in favor of a shitty economy and more international conflict and death. We'll be back. We have to. Otherwise, what the fuck is that shit there for?
2. The only option for human beings to survive must be to cease international conflict and unite as one planet. Again, Star Trek. If we keep bombing the shit out of each other, we're going to destroy any chances of further advancement as a species. Maybe that's for the better. I'll go ahead and quote the new Battlestar Galactica:
"It's what you said at the ceremony before the attack, when Galactica was being decommissioned. You gave a speech, it sounded like it wasn't the one you prepared. You said that humanity was a flawed creation, and that people still kill one another for petty jealousy and greed. You said that humanity never asked itself why it deserved to survive. Maybe you don't."
So that's pretty fucking grim, right? But unless we get our SHIT together -- on a national, and then a global scale -- it's a valid point. Like, if aliens come calling and find out we're this stupid, they'll either A) abandon us permanently (or at least till we evolve again) or B) destroy us. Okay. Also, economy/politics/war aside, we are eating away at our planet like termites, and you're an idiot if you think global warming isn't real. I repeat what I said before: we are smart enough to do this. We just aren't doing it. Which is almost worse.
3. Time travel is possible but really messy and may be beyond human technology altogether. Obviously. This is a little blurry/vague, because I want to believe in time travel. Don't take that away from me. I think it's possible but it's way advanced shit and the aliens probably know how to do it properly. :D
4. The only way to change things is to become less self-interested and more aware of our own history. I read something about kids in elementary, middle and high school being polled to see what they wanted to be when they grew up. I remembered my own childhood pursuits, which included archaeologist (Indiana Jones), paleontologist (Jurassic Park), astronaut (Star Trek, Star Wars, Contact) and then later on, writer/actor/performer of stuff. This poll that I read about current students' ambitions was shocking. I wish I had the link but I don't, so I will grossly make up the statistics, but just be aware that the real numbers were just as shocking as this misinterpretation: something like 80-90% of the students cited "celebrity" as their chosen profession in life. Now, we all know that "celebrity" isn't an actual job description. Some of the students were also aware of that, and therefore cited "American Idol" or "reality TV star" as their directives. It broke my heart that nobody said "President," "scientist," "artist" or "teacher," but it really got me that nobody said "astronaut." I feel like when I was a kid, EVERYONE wanted to be an astronaut and EVERYONE wanted to go to Space Camp. It was like, the coolest possible thing that could happen to you as a child. Now, not only do kids not know who the Presidents are, when America won its independence, or how many states there are, but they don't give a shit about the fact that we've been to the fucking moon. De-press-ing. Devastatingly depressing. We have to fix that, seriously. SERIOUSLY. How is it "cool to be a geek" but not cool to want to be anything better than a vapid, self-interested, dispassionate body with no connection to the other human beings around them, let alone the human beings that came before them and will come after? It's horrifying.
5. Aliens exist. This is sort of a given. I think maybe I could have clarified this earlier, but I'm 100% positive they're out there somewhere. There's more shit going on that we even know. Period. There could be lots of them, there could only be a few. But they're there. I'm not convinced we've already made contact -- I'm not a Men In Black conspiracy theorist, but it's fun to think there's conspiracy. At least then there's something going on down here that isn't just war and money. But yeah. Aliens. Yep. Ahoy. Live Long And Prosper.
6. Magic is real. I don't want to get into this in detail here because it's complicated and partly open to interpretation and steers dangerously into the realm of religion. But like I said before, there's a lot of stuff going on out there that we aren't even conscious of. Hamlet says, "There are more things in heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy." Duh. Duh, Hamlet, duh. Exactly.
I would make it seven things, and talk about the Zombie Apocalypse and how I think the possibility of it actually happening relates to the tendency of mankind to fall prey disease/plague/the fucking common cold/pneumonia mutations... but AM doesn't like zombies. So I won't talk about it.
Anyway. Small update, small rant of exposition and belief. Hope it wasn't too tiresome. Stay tuned as always for more fun, and bother us on Twitter if you're bored.
LLAP,
AG
