Bullet points for the busy

[stoney321]

• It is dancetomato's birthday! Oh, DT, you are one of those people online that makes me happy knowing you're alive. Keep having birthdays, please. <3 <3


• I want to reiterate the purpose of Hey, Don't Judge Me: fannish love. If you want to make fun of shows or bitch about how horrible something has become, that's what ONTD and TWoP are for, not Hey, Don't Judge Me. Creepy fannishness (as in, if one thing doesn't go how I like with X character, I am going to post 1000 words on why I hate the show and everything about it) isn't tolerated. Character bashing isn't tolerated (Well, Will Schuester being inappropriate is okay to talk about because come the hell on.) I recently had to tell someone in comments that if they felt a certain way - which they're entitled to feel, of course - then they should a) maybe stop watching the show (Southland) and b) stop commenting on my site.
  
  Bad PR? I don't care. I want there to be ONE PLACE ON THE INTERNET where people can be happy with shameless love for something. There's no judgement for whatever you love - it's in the title of the URL for crying out loud.


• A girlfriend needs my help today, so I'm running out the door for a bit, then it's off to the school with The Mr. to put the smack down on the school for their handling of yesterday's situation. I said this earlier, but if you hear a sonic boom, that's what it is from. :)


• I am working on not using two spaces after a period. It's not easy. [/learned on actual typewriters OMG]


• flaming_muse wrote a super sweet (and heart-achy) episode tag fic for The Spanish Teacher (Glee 3.12) and you should read it: Feelings. I haven't steered you wrong yet, have I? Exactly.


• I pulled a muscle in my neck so badly that I can't turn my head. Muscle relaxers and hot tubbing are in my future. Mind, I'm not complaining about that.

FRIDAY ZOMG. Hoorays! (And THIS made me laugh - as I say there - until snot-streams waterfall'd off my face. SO NSFW. - the audio, not the image.)

THE TALK WITH THE SCHOOL re: MY CHILD AND SEXUAL HARASSMENT.

The Mr. cut right to the chase after the handshake. The principal hadn't even sat down when he said, "I feel that you and the Coach are enabling sexual harassment."

The counselor (who knows us from our older two kids) popped in and asked if she could sit in and record the meeting. YES, YES YOU CAN.

After the Mr. laid out why our daughter shouldn't have been punished for defending herself, and why it was wrong for the boys to go unpunished, the principal blinked a bit and said, "You're absolutely right. We didn't get all of the information. Emily seemed quite mortified to be in trouble--"

"Because she's never been in trouble before, she's a lovely young lady," the counselor interjected. <3

"Right," Principal nodded. "So now that we have further information from you - (I filled her in on the actual noises made, etc.) - we can address this with the boys and the coach to make sure this sort of thing doesn't happen again."

Blah blah blah, she learned that she didn't actually know Emily, the counselor came around and gave us both huge hugs and asked if we would tell #2 and The Boy hello from her and how much she misses them, and the new Principal watched all of this very thoughtfully. Yeah, we're not asshole that ignore our kids' education. We just haven't had to come to the school this year because our kid is such a non-trouble maker/good student with her head down.

So. She shook our hands, her eyes very wide with the Mr. (who can be very imposing, I must say - he exudes authority, rawr) and all manner of assurances were made that she'll keep her eye out on our daughter and how wonderful it is that we teach our kids to stand up for themselves, etc.

Long story short: I'm satisfied. :) (And the office girls came out to say Hi to us, too. We're good citizens, damn it. We've been with this elementary since the year it opened for crying out loud.)

Comments

[mpoetess.livejournal.com]

There had damn well better be an update on EPIC SMACKDOWN later, ladycakes!

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

DONE.

[mpoetess.livejournal.com]

ROCKSTAR. RAWWWWR.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

OMG, I love when my husband is all "stands tall and pwns someone" it is when he is his most handsome. LOL.

[kuzu-no-ha.livejournal.com]

I miss typewriters sometimes, but not correcting mistakes. I have a hard time not doing two spaces.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

Oh my god, how awful was it to correct a mistake? I had a part time job typing invoices in triplicate on typewriters, and you couldn't White Out over a mistake in that case. GAH.

I had to backspace over the extra space I put in the paragraph above. It's hard because the comment window is Courier, but it displays in Arial on my screen. KERNING OMG.

[kuzu-no-ha.livejournal.com]

Oh hateful!
I remember the day my parents bought a new FANCY typewriter that had white out tape installed INSIDE the machine. It would automatically fix your mistakes! Truly, the future had arrived!

Yeah...no.

Is it wrong that I'm really looking forward to hearing how this meeting turns out? Because I totally am.

[tabaqui]

Oh! My parents got me a 'Brother' typewriter for my...fifteenth birthday, i think, it and i would correct itself back like twenty characters. That was *so awesome*. I was in love. :)

[glitzy09.livejournal.com]

I have such a hard time not double-spacing after a full stop. That's what I was taught at school - one space after a comma, two after a full stop. Now everyone is like "oh you should only use one space on the internets" and I just can't get my head around it.

Looking forward to the update on the school smackdown - let them have it!!

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

Gah, ME, TOO. Two after a full stop for me, too, and it's because we typed in Courier - everything is equal so you needed the visual of a bigger space. I'm trying to force myself into it, and it's so hard. I never think when I type - my fingers have been trained for years! Boo.

(It's added!)

[jenbooks.livejournal.com]

I refuse to not double space after a period. It just feels WRONG! :D

Although, for school papers, before I print it I just go back and do a find replace all [two spaces] with [one space] a few times and all is well. :D

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

...why have I NEVER THOUGHT OF THAT?!?

THIS IS REVOLUTIONARY!!!

[druidchick.livejournal.com]

i've done the opposite as well. find and replace period+1 space with period +2 spaces to hit a minimum length.

it's the little things :)

[harmonyfb.livejournal.com]

Physical typed sheets? Double space. Digital? Single space (and kern that puppy if you want more room.) That's how I keep it straight in my head. :)

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

But you LOVE THE SHOW. That's the difference. It's okay to be a fan of something and want an aspect to be different, etc., but character bashing (like the chick on Southland's comments - she's done it for two or three recaps now) is TOTALLY DIFFERENT.

I mean, I hated on The Situation in the Jersey SHore recaps. Because he deserved it. I still loved the show/everyone else. THAT IS OKAY, SAM. <3

[tabaqui]

Good to hear the principal didn't try to twist it around or play it down. Sucks that she wasn't paying attention and getting the full story *yesterday*. But good on you guys.

And re: your comments up there - when you put a period in, you double-space after. That is all. I don't care what the internetz says - one stop is not *enough*. It looks weird and crowds everything.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

Oh, if she had tried, we would have shut that down fast. There's a reason my husband has been zooming up the ladder at his job - he doesn't take shit from anyone and is charming enough to not piss people off when he pwns them. :D

Well, every single typesetter in the world is going to disagree with you. :D The only reason the double space after a period was added was when typing as a profession became widespread in the 50s. Before that, the rule (for when typewriters were invented) was one space. Now that people use fonts that aren't mono-spaced, there's no reason for the double space after the period. I'm not the one making the rules, I'm just trying to follow them.

(Do you know that your comment appears with only one space after a period? And it looks fine. If it was in Courier or another mono-spaced font, it wouldn't, I agree.)

[tabaqui]

Yeah, and it looks *weird*. I'm used to two. It's two when i type in Word and it's definitely what my hands do when i type. Trying to stop myself from doing two is just sort of pointless and would take way too much effort - i'd be backspacing all over the place.

[bitchygrrl.livejournal.com]

Good to hear the prnicipal didn't try to play it off as no big deal. I hope this will be the end of it and those boys will be punished.

[flaming-muse.livejournal.com]

Meh, I use two spaces. Sure, html strips it, but that's how I was taught. I like how it looks; it's easier for me to read. Plus, I'm a dinosaur. Rawr.

ETA: I AM SO HAPPY WITH YOUR ETA.

[menomegirl.livejournal.com]

I don't think that's Bad PR. It's your place, your rules. People should follow them.

Yay! for the principal seeing reason. But it would have been nice if they'd gotten the whole story *before* castigating your daughter. Hopefully, they learned some kind of lesson from this.

[anelith.livejournal.com]

I'm so so glad that it went well. Fantastic!

Although it troubles me that she didn't bother to have a conversation with Emily *first* before calling you about your "troublesome" child.

[cat-eyed-fox.livejournal.com]

right?! I got in trouble a few times in elementary school and every time *everyone* included in the altercation was brought in. And we each told our side of the story to the principle by ourselves, and then the principle mediated the problem all together. My parents were never really included in it because it was never a big enough deal. This includes the time I attempted to "strangle" my best friend for being a dick about the monkey bars. No means no, Graham.
Course I did go to a hippy school, but again the emphasis was always a mediation and conflict resolution type thing instead of a punishment.

[mumsisdaughter]

Good for you and yours and the counsellor and the office girls et al! I hope you are informed about the follow up with the boys, and their parents had better be called in! The Principal has some stinky-bud-nipping to do with those boys or they'll think they have carte-blanche to do it again.

[dancetomato.livejournal.com]

GO you and the RAWR Mr.! You are great parents.

Thank you so much for the birthday wishes!! Is it wrong that I was all, "Look at me, I'm before the bullet points! *\o/*?

I have to learn the spaces thing because I can't do it on my doctoral thesis. It's going to be hard, yo.

I would massage your neck, but muscle relaxers and hot tub win.

*smishes*

[harmonyfb.livejournal.com]

You GO, Mama. Maybe next time she'll trouble to find out what's going on before she metes out punishment.

::fistbump::

[lynnenne]

I'm very glad the principal saw sense. Good on you for demanding justice for your daughter.

[cdvla313.livejournal.com]

Wait, why aren't we supposed to put two spaces after the end of a sentence on the internet? Just because it's the internet doesn't mean the laws of grammar are completely invalid, if one chooses not to type like they forgot vowels exist.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

tabaqui is the one that brought up the internet. This is how we should be typing everywhere. No one types on 50s-era typewriters anymore, which was when the "One space after a period" rule was bent to allow for new typists in the work force.

But every typesetter/editor I've know or read has gone off on a rant about how it's wrong wrong wrong and they have to remove the extra space. So, I'm trying to get myself out of the habit.

[eccequambonum.livejournal.com]

thpppppptptptptpt. Typesetters can kiss my two-space fanny. I learned to type on a compy and I've always done 2 spaces, and argh, I hate reading damn screen stuff when those spaces aren't there. Blind bats like me appreciate the space to tell if that is a period or comma...

[cdvla313.livejournal.com]

Interesting. It's just the first I'm hearing of this, and how I was taught to type on a computer in the 90s. You would think if it became obsolete officially in the 50s (and I totally went and wikied it. lol) that by the 90s the single space would be incorporated into typing classes. I should ask my younger brother what he was taught.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

no no, it was DEVELOPED in the 50s to accommodate new typists and the influx of mono-spaced typewriters (as opposed to Times New Roman.)

Zyrya has a great comment that explains why it's obsolete now.

[cdvla313.livejournal.com]

Ah. I was going off the wiki on this (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentence_spacing) that said the double space was developed in the late 19th century for mono-spaced typewriters, by the 50s single spacing became the norm in published works, and then by the 60s most typewriters were capable of proportional spacing, and thus in informal typing.

[zyrya]

It's mostly because of compatibility between computer programmes, and html limitations. For example, if I want two spaces on a web page I used to be able to type a space and then a shift-space to force a second space, but I don't think it's possible any more and it certainly won't read consistently between different browsers. Sometimes a double space shows as a weird punctuation character if read in another programme, app or format. Lots of programmes, even rich-text readers, don't recognise double spaces and just remove the extra one.

Lots of fonts claim to kern in some extra space after a period. I usually can't pick it. I miss double-spacing.

[zyrya]

Emily has learned a hard but valubale lesson with this one.

1. Stand up for yourself.
2. Keep standing up for yourself after standing up for yourself has made things very difficult and you have been villainised (I just made that up) and accused of trouble-making.
3. Her parents are ALL the awesomes!
4. Other people are butts, and this is why sometimes Mummy drinks.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

All of these are true, with extra YES for #4, but you assumed that already.

It was a very satisfactory outcome, I must say. (Even though I wish I hadn't needed to have the discussion in the first place.)

[out-there.livejournal.com]

As someone who learned the full-stop-two-spaces thing, good luck. I can't train myself out of it, and I've got to the stage where I've decided that if I want the extra spaces there, I'm sure very few people will mind.

and I'm glad the school interview went well. That's the outcome that should happen.

[heatherbird.livejournal.com]

My stance on the two spaces is that if I'm writing for publication someone else will do the actual typing of the version going into print and it's THEIR job to know that two spaces have gone by the wayside :)

[heatherbird.livejournal.com]

Glad you & your husband got Emily's situation straightened out. I'm working for a new principal right now and let me just say I have no aspirations of EVER becoming an administrator.

[kouredios.livejournal.com]

Somehow I missed your ETA here until I went looking for it (just now). I'm glad you're pleased. I hope that next time they'll give any girl the benefit of the doubt, though, and not just the ones they've learned are actually Good Kids (tm).

[nijireiki.livejournal.com]

I admit I have a hard time not getting to "creepy length" when I'm writing critical reviews, but that's because I'm trying to be critical.

Also, because the last season of True Blood was bonkers. RAPE AROUND EVERY CORNER.

But it's not like I'm going anywhere! I just can't be to go-to person to think thinky thoughts about TB or my head explodes. (Sooooo looking forward to Russell Edgington and the return of Campy Vampahrs, not gonna lie.) Anyway, I like to think I handled Game of Thrones better, but I think I cursed more, too. Always important.


...AND YOUR ETA IS GLORIOUS. :D

[kseenaa.livejournal.com]

Glad to hear you BOTH gave one HELL of an epic smackdown to that principal! :-D That makes me happy to read, it does. :-)