Random Birthday Thoughts

Red Gryffin, AKA Joy, at 4 Winds Faire

Wednesday was Joy's birthday; Mother Nature gave us a hot present ... so hot, in fact, that we stayed inside as much as possible until the sun went down. Luckily, we had made a book store stop on Monday, so we had mind candy to keep us diverted (more or less) from the heat ... although you wouldn't believe how much body heat felines and a canine can emit when they insist on sitting right next to you. Here Joy stands inside our booth at 4 Winds Faire, our home-away-from-home during the weekends of March & April; we'll be back there for Celtic Music Festival in September ... She wore her pirate garb to BJDC Austin -- since the theme was Carnivale, her garb stood out because it IS clothing to us, not a special occasion outfit ... and ladies asked whether she still had her tail. Of course! everyone needs a bit of tail to follow them about ...

When the sun lowered in the western sky, Joy decided that Outback Steakhouse would be a good choice ... until we learned that they had changed their menu. She liked the kebobs over rice with grilled peppers and pineapple; teriyaki steak medallions were a barely adequate substitute. I had their special -- I preferred their salad with steak strips, but I never found a description in the salad menu ... But the food wasn't bad; it just wasn't exactly what we desired ... and once you're seated in a restaurant, you feel trapped. Unless the service is egregiously awful, it's hard to find a reason to get up and go before you've ordered ... and going out in the heat to find another restaurant near Lancaster required more energy than we cared to expend.

Sorry to whine, but the heat tires everyone out. Yankees wondered why Southerners moved and talked slowly ... if it takes this much effort to operate WITH air conditioning, just imagine living in the Old South, dressed in layers upon layers of petticoats and starched shirts ... I know why the belles undressed and had a lie-down during the afternoon. It's the only way to survive the heat.

Two more days of "summer vacation," followed by the weekend ... then the 2010-11 school year begins. Woo-hoo! Didn't we just finish an academic season?

BJDs -- The New Drug?

Yancy & Matthias fight over Ellowyne Wilde -- no ennui for that girl when the boys are around!

If you let them in, ball-jointed dolls creep into your consciousness. Like drugs, the collecting urge slowly takes over ... and you find yourself with a houseful of resin or vinyl dolls -- and they have a better wardrobe than you!! Worse, they look better in the most outrageous outfits than anyone -- with the exception of drag queens.





Maybe BJDs are more like vampires ... They put the bite on you (or your wallet) until, little by little, you become their thrall. (I may be mixing the vampire motifs here, but a true paranormal fan can follow the thread.) With the Internet opening the markets for clothes and wigs, you can have a closetful of doll shoes and outfits -- with the accessories to complement them -- before you know it.

So, what about Ellowyne Wilde? She's the vinyl girl in the middle -- sculpted by Robert Tonner, she's part of his BJD line (more or less). This doll line has expanded to include several versions of Ellowyne; her BFF Prudence Moody; her handyman/swain Rufus; and her arch-rival Amber. The outfits are beautifully detailed ... but the Tonner Company has written such an extensive back story for EW and the crew that all a fan can do is ... collect. I suppose you could create your own EW stories, but it would have to fit the "canon," to use fan-speak. By giving specific parameters of what Ellowyne thinks and feels, Tonner has limited collector input ... I might be wrong, but I don't see EW fans creating the bizarre fun that the BJD ladies do. We have all sorts of mini-dramas of who is "in love" with whom ... All in good fun, and none of it taken seriously. Plus, EW is all about her "ennui" -- with all those clothes, she ought to get more fun out of life! I was hoping the "evil Amber," her theatrical rival, might respark my interest in the line, but she looks too much like Ellowyne ... maybe if they do a "wigged out" Amber, I might get the doll ... or I might get a new friend for Colette. I did like the "Sushi for One" Ellowyne, with her black hair done in the Sailor Moon pigtails. That limited edition finally sold out; I think it took longer than the others because it didn't fit the standard EW look ... which is probably why I like it the best.

Back in the day (as my students say), fanzines had the nickname of "drug of choice" for many female fans; however, the Internet has ended most traditional fanzines. You might never have seen one -- a doushinji comes closest (if you're a manga/anime fan) with art and stories based on a TV or movie ... Fanfiction.net carries many stories; however, since there's seldom editing, the reader has to wade through a lot of muck before she (fan writers and readers are mostly female) stumbles upon a gem ... That sounds a lot like panning for gold, doesn't it? As one of the "Shady Ladies," I wrote and edited several fanzines based on Beauty & the Beast (ah, Vincent!), Night Court, The Real Ghostbusters, as well as Sailor Moon. You might find some of them on-line ... I know that Sheila Paulsen keeps her work available.

For many of my students, anime and manga eat up their cash ... although many of them haunt the free manga sites on the Internet. They're in for a major disappointment this fall because the Japanese publishers and American companies have forced several sites to shut down ... well, just because the material can be scanned, doesn't mean that the creators want readers to have free access ... As a writer myself, I sympathize; my only problem is that I'm not sure what series I'd like to purchase -- and unless I can visit panels during the cons (which I can't since I work behind a table), I'm reluctant to pay out $10 a manga ... So far, Joy and I found some winners; according to the panel at San Diego Comi-Con, two of our favorites made the "best" manga list: Cat Paradise, a horror series set at a private school; and Chi's Sweet Home, the slice-of-life story of a little lost kitten in his new home. Within reason, I pass along my manga to Sunset's library; however, the manga I'd like the library to own -- and the school and personal budget -- make it hard to expand the collection quickly ... The manga get checked out, but they don't always return ...

Today is Joy's birthday, so we shall eat Greek and go to Wal-Mart ...

Dance quote: “There are shortcuts to happiness, and dancing is one of them.”
- Vicki Baum

Oh, You Beautiful Doll, 3

Yancy & the Lady from Maryland -- and you thought only humans got some action at the con!


Saturday 4 women & 13 dolls, searching for wild things ... Show time in the sales room, at leadt for me. I let Joy and Mariann begin the quest for outfits while I sat behind the table and smiled at the lookers ... well, I did sell 1 jewelry set to Kathy from Oklahoma, as well as another jewelry piece ... Some folks came down from Dallas; we see them at every anime con in our area. I chuckled at the gentleman who claimed that he had driven a van-load of women from Dallas to BJDC Austin ... Brave man -- but he collects dolls, too, so I'm sure the ladies gave him a "legitimate" reason to come, like adults who bring a niece or nephew to a kids' movie so they don't feel out-of-place. I even got to pitch for 4 Winds Faire once or twice.



After the sales room closed at 3 -- and that seemed so early since dealers' rooms at anime cons close about 6 or 7, and even Intergem show rooms close at 5, we had to break down the table. Dolls back upstairs to return to their boxes, stones into containers, etc. Again, that hand cart came in very handy ... As we broke down, the hotel staff was breaking down the tables to transform the sales room into the banquet hall.



Afterwards, we adjourned to the room to check out the goodies. Marcia got out her Obitsu boxes, and we passed around wigs to see whether the color, style or size fit other dolls. Joy had bought the "Magician" by Paulette Goodreau because he reminded her of Harry St. Cloud, a character she created ... and Mariann had bought a forest goddess and fennec mini-fee. Both dolls are less than 6 inches tall, but the sculpts are as detailed as the larger dolls at the top of my post today ... In fact, she already bought wigs and clothes for them ... Myself? I enjoyed the show -- Colette had her new clothes from the swap meet.

The banquet proved that the ladies and gents know how to party ... Joy, as table hostess, provided party gifts; I contributed jingle bell earrings, while the ladies from Oklahoma gave goody bags with glow lights so we could do the "rock concert" thing at the awards presentation. The food wasn't bad, by hotel standards -- the pecan chocolate chip quiche soothed taste buds and kept everyone in a zen state of mind. Many door prizes -- Joy contributed 2 Obitsus -- and three people at our table got something, even Mariann who had opted not to come. (She had her own adventure down at the hotel bar, but that is her story to tell -- not mine.) The 2 hours flew by -- doll people were determined to have fun, meet and greet other collectors, so even 8 strangers parted as friends after the lights came up.

Well, 2 of us returned ... Joy stayed downstairs to hang with Jen and the others while Marcia & I wended our way upstairs ... and the slumber party continued until 1 by 1, we konked out -- Mar, then myself, leaving Marcia and Joy to talk about dolls until the wee hours of Sunday morning.

Sunday Mar had disappeared when I rose on Sunday morning ... so I got dressed & took a walk. Although the hotel is located near a warehouse/business district, the landscapers decided to line the cross streets with trees and build a gravel walking path under them ... the only danger came from the pigeons who populated the lovely trees overhanging the walk. Fortunately, they seemed more interested in peppering the cars than a moving target. I walked about a 1/2 mile circuit before I looped back towards the hotel ... nary a car or another pedestrian in sight. In some ways, it was a fairly safe choice, yet it could have turned nasty if any gangstas or muggers lurked in the area ... and I did have a strange encounter on 6th Street while going from the distant parking lot to the hotel back in January when we vended at Ikkicon. Maybe the Omni was too far from convenient mass transit to tempt panhandlers to the area ...

Mar decided to go for a swim, and the other two chose to sleep -- well, that's what happens on the morning after a slumber party, so we headed downstairs to enjoy the salt water jacuzzi and chat ... Then back to the room and the chores of closing down a hotel room and packing the cars ... a job that took 2 hours, since everyone was waking up and checking out between 10 and noon. Finally, after missing a 3rd elevator car filled with women and dolls, Mar and I decided to use an old anime con trick: you ride an empty car up, then you ride down with other people. It isn't nice, but a few times the car only went up one more floor -- then we were the only ones inside when it came down non stop. 3 cars, 2 filled to the brim (Marcia drives a van, so her vehicle looked empty compared with ours.), then we bid farewell to friends, in Texas and around the country, until the next meeting. I wonder if some BJD fans aren't beginning a countdown to August 2012. As the theater people say, "Another opening, another show."

I'd invite anyone to come to the BJD conventions, if one's in your area ... or go to an anime convention. Joy and I saw our first BJDs back around 2000 or so; he was a Volks that the girl had ordered from Japan, a 60 cm (SD) model ... we were fascinated that, unlike American dolls, he was anatomically correct -- and had changeable eyes and wigs. Over the decade, more and more BJD fans have come to the anime conventions since the dolls are considered part of Japanese culture ... In that way, you can meet other doll people -- and actually see the dolls depicted in the magazines and on line. Be warned: the dolls like company; and they like to have many clothes, wigs, etc. Shoot, Colette has more wigs, shoes, and outfits than I do ... but she looks a whole lot better in them! I guess she might be my avatar ... she's definitely my companion doll. You never forget the first.

Dance quote: "The people who do not dance are the dead." ~Jerry Rose of Dance Caravan

Oh, You Beautiful Doll, 2

Chi & Friends

We enjoyed BJDC Austin 2010 , but it took some prep work to make the experience an enjoyable one -- and even so we experienced minor drama. (Like that's a surprise? Those hotel rooms look large until you get 4 people and all of their stuff in the space.)

If you've ever coordinated a trip for multiple friends, located around the state, then you can appreciate the effort ... we planned for months, yet everything came down to the Internet and long distance phone calls during the final countdown to Austin. Who would bring what; who was arriving when; which cell numbers were good; etc. Even so, the fates twisted a few threads just to make things more interesting.

Tuesday night We drove to Mar's home to get her dolls. Many doll designers come to the BJD conventions, so we wanted to show off Sarah's costumes that she made as Lady Fayre this season ... Mar built portable clothing racks, so we drove across Dallas County in order to load the car with goodies ... I'd called Marcia earlier that evening to get confirmation numbers, etc., which caused us to roll up to Harbor Freight 15 minutes after it closed ... SIGH! another errand before we could depart ...

Wednesday Joy left first, since she knew many of the folks coming to the convention ... But before she could go, we drove to Harbor Freight to buy a new hand cart; the one that Karen had bought years ago had slowly fallen apart -- and none of us has the tools to fix it. In fact, I shamelessly played the "unhandy female" card because -- well, I have no rachets to fix the casters in place and we also needed to hit the road. The managar sold us the floor model --for less than it was on sale!! You know we'll return there for more tools ...

Joy arrived in Austin safely and hooked up with Jen and Marseille. They played dolls that evening ... and caught up on details of the doll world. Jen has a very large female doll that Jen decided was in love with Yancy (He's the redhead on the left.); Yancy presented her with a red crystal heart ... and Jen (and others) bought some of the doll jewelry, as well as the human wire-wrapped stones.

Thursday Joy worked on pieces at the hotel while I got things together in Lancaster. It is hot (about 100 degrees) -- so I work on stuff at home. The smallest kitten (the Fee -- Fiona) plays all over the place; she's so much help!

That evening, Joy goes to the swap meet ... many people have culled their clothing collections, so she gets some good buys. Colette now has a new outfit, as well as her Ian.

Friday Sales day at the BJD convention, so Joy gets to move about 8 boxes of dolls, plus assorted boxes of goods to the sales room ... I head over to my mom's house; I've promised to place film on her front windows to reduce sun glare ... just what I need to do on the day of departure! But the task is done, and I'm home before noon ... but Mariann has a "null" reading when she tests a program, so she has to stay at the office until the problem is resolved. Such is life, right?

Mariann arrives between 3 and 4, and we take off for Austin ... It's about a 3-4 hour drive; traffic slows us down a little, but there's nothing too traumatic -- no major wrecks, no serious stop-and-go. You just can't zoom along at 75 m.p.h. Still, the sun is setting as we go under the big loop where I-35 and 290 cross. (Years earlier, we had gone to a convention at a hotel near that location to meet A-Team friends.)

Yet Marcia has not arrived -- she had called Joy to tell her that she had left Flint about 6 P.M. Ouch! That means she's traveling most of the way after dark ... Joy departs for the meet-and -greet while Mar and I chill for a bit. She wants to swim; however, there's a bodybuilder convention at our location. All those ripped muscles are quite intimidating when you're a middle-aged, overweight female ... and so tan! Yes, the spray tanners made a small fortune off the bodybuilders -- all the better to see the muscle definition, you see.

We have a bit of a dilemma as the evening passes -- we call Marcia's phone, but it has no voice mail ... and we can't very well call her mother. I could imagine her reaction -- it would match my mother's: all worry and no ability to DO anything about it. So, we hang in the room ... and Marcia arrives safely about midnight. The Google map (or Tom-Tom) and navigator grossly under-calculated the drive time. Still, we're all in place, and all is well for the night.

But the convention hasn't truly began ... at least, not for Marcia and myself since we didn't buy memberships ... Saturday will be the big day.

Dance quote: "Dancers are athletes of God." -Albert Einstein

Oh, You Beautiful Doll, 1

Matthias & Yancy

Joy & I just arrived back in Lancaster after a whirlwind weekend in Austin for the ball-jointed doll convention. Joy went down on Wednesday to hang with out-of-state friends that she knows from on line groups; Mar and I drove down on Friday while Marcia arrived very late on Friday night ... We enjoyed the on-going slumber party with the dolls ... well, many dolls were displayed in the sales room, so we mainly talked about Marcia's small (27 cm) Obistu dolls that live in tiny storage boxes ... after all, no one wants Mom to know how many dolls make up the collection (and how much they cost).

Joy was surprised to learn that she and her dolls have fans ... Matthias and Yancy (above) are two AoD elves -- one's a vampire from Angel of Dreams. Yancy has a very large resin girlfriend to whom he presented a wire-wrapped heart ... and he spent the weekend in the hussy's room! Joy had to go up and fetch him down Saturday night. Some boys just shouldn't go out alone! There's no telling whom they'll meet. Matthias is the quieter one, but you know what they say -- watch out for the quiet ones!

My Obistu daughter Colette went to the ball with her Beast, Jurgis -- several BJD ladies want her to stay with him exclusively, but Colette enjoys a bit of a change ... and with a change of wigs and clothes, she becomes another persona. That's the fun part about BJDs -- they can change whenever you like. Alas, Tonner's creations Ellowyne Wilde and Evangeline Ghastly have good sculpts -- and great clothing -- but the writers have given them such a specific back story that the collector can't really create any new stories about the dolls ... and half the fun is making up a story to go with the fabulous outfit or look that you've developed for your doll ... Even ladies who didn't like Barbie get into creating scenarios for BJDs.

How does a BJD convention differ from an anime con? First, the con is very small -- about 100 people, with a few walk-ins for Saturday sales. Second, very few teens and children attend this conference -- and the ones who do have come with their parents -- so the energy level is very mellow. This is a relaxacon -- and no one thinks you're strange if you squeal over a lovely dress or gasp in awe when you see your "grail" doll in the flesh (so to speak). Third, the activities are very limited -- no video rooms, no speakers, only 1-2 workshops per day, and after the sales room closes, everyone heads for dinner and the bar ... well, we didn't most times since this con

had a strict budget -- but we had our own doll convention in the room. Oh, and Sunday's devoted to leaving the hotel -- the con officially ends after the banquet on Saturday night. I suppose the "dead dog" party will occur on line ... The cost? about the same amount as any 3-day convention, once you figure in the food and banquet for attendees.

Would I go again? This is my third ... and I'll be back in 2012!

Dance quote: “Ballet discipline:
only the true believer would suffer the rigors it demanded.”
-Author Unknown

When the Dolls Come Marching In

Dolls from BJDC Austin 2008

Today Joy drives down to Austin to meet with friends before the BJDC-Austin 2010 begins. Yes, the dolls will come out this weekend to shine in all their finery ... and we're hoping that their human companions decide to adorn them with Sarah's beautiful clothing and Joy's jewelry. Mar will sell portable racks for the costumes ... All these preparations have made life a bit hectic, since the phone line went out on Friday. It turned out to be a minor wire that we could replace easily -- but the first wire that I used was bad, so we thought it was the actual hard-wiring into the house ... luckily, we have cell phones. One of the few times I was glad to have the technology handy. For me, it's usually a fight to keep the kids' attention focussed on class content ... and they tell me it's worse in college since students bring their laptops. Of course, in college, profs don't have to worry so much about their failure rates and graduation rates; students must take control of their learning ... which is why so many freshmen fail their first semester.

This year's theme is "Carnivale," so the dolls will display their best costumes ... About 100 collectors, plus vendors, will meet in Austin to share their favorite hobby -- and cash cow. If you think collecting antiques can become expensive, you haven't seen these dolls! Many have a wardrobe that matches -- and sometimes exceeds -- their owners. Colette has many more wigs than I do ... and looks good in all of them. As Mar says, the dolls will always look young and never gain weight ... Her fey and human court will display Lady Fayre's costumes, so our table will be quite crowded on Friday ... and we forgot a table. That's what happens when you don't make a list ahead of time. I'll include the TV trays. They may not be large, but they can add a little space behind the table so she can extend the display a little.

The dolls at the top of the page are Claudia and the Vampire Lestat, based on the movie -- the theme of the last convention. Most collectors in our region look forward to the convention since few stores carry BJDs ... Worse, since 2005, most of the doll shops in the Metroplex have closed or returned to online status. Some people enjoy shopping online, but a picture doesn't match the experience of seeing the doll in front of you ... Of course, the costs to maintain a brick & mortar store have risen astronomically -- I could go on, but everyone who enjoys a specialized hobby has experienced the frustration of the search for goods and services. Hence, the conventions -- and Animefest will be next month; it gives younger fans a taste of BJDs at the meet-and-greet sessions, although those often become a show-and-tell around the topic of "see the new doll in my collection." Maybe we'll send Mar as our delegate; she's got the Court to impress the resin snobs as well as the newbies. For more information about BJDC Austin, go to http://www.bjdctexas.com/


"We're fools whether we dance or not, so we might as well dance."
~Japanese Proverb

May all your dances be happy ones!

Fine Feathered Friends

Yesterday we discovered that the phone line has gremlins ... On Friday, we found a gnawed line and replaced it -- but no evidence on Saturday of what's wrong. The internet still works, but we don't have an "interface box" from A T & T, so we can't run the first home test on their online tutorial ... Luckily, we do have our little "burn" phones so we can call others in an emergency. I guess that's why many people have cell phones, Honestly, my students have them to text -- I'd hate to know how much they or their parents spend, even with unlimited texting and family plans. Unfortunately, the ability to text has nothing to do with one's ability to communicate effectively in a composition. r u w me?

Before we could leave for our work session today, I called Mom and got word that she'd found a baby bird ... We took off on a mission of mercy, which didn't quite work out the way we thought. She'd put the little sparrow under a collander on her kitchen table ... he'd call loudly -- and she thought he was "just talking." Well, he was ... Joy checked him out, and we took him with us ...
This baby sparrow probably had fallen from thenest while he was "branching," and his wings were just strong enough to break his fall. His beak had the turned-down frown of the bird in the picture -- he reminded me of Joy's finch Coffee, although Joy says that it's cardinals who are related to the finches and not sparrows. He kept calling ... and calling ... when I went into Mar's bedroom, he just stared at me as if saying, "Are you gonna let me out so I can go home?" ... and called more until all of us decided that enough was enough. The little guy wasn't eating, wasn't calming down ... and Joy commented that we should've convinced Mom to let him take his chances in the back yard. So, we packed up our gear and the little bird and headed back to Mom's house.

When we arrived, the sparrow baby called -- and birds hidden in the trees called back. The parents were around, somewhere, if we could persuade them to come down. We found a shady spot near the bird feeder and placed him in a tree. He fluttered down, and Joy almost couldn't find him -- he was camoflaged among the green plants, and so still that you might not see him unless you were looking right at him. We put him into a second tree; he fluttered down on the other side of the fence ... and the calls from the trees stopped a while after. Hopefully, the parents found their lost chick. But this incident did convince Mom that little wildlings need to stay in the trees and not come into the house ... though we did leave the cage so she could place babies inside if she's worried that a cat might find a chick before the parents do ... The birds in the neighborhood come to her feeder and bird bath, so an open cage shouldn't scare them away.

Afterwards, we went back to Mar's house, where we built necklaces ... I re-wrote a short piece that describes the human/Fey court of Melene ... Mar mentioned that she had a story in mind that she wanted to write; she has enough in the outline that she has a good cast of characters and the beginning of a plot. She liked the subplots that the "letter" hints at, so perhaps we'll see a story later in the year.

... I have a chapter outline to work on myself. Like Mar's story, it's set in the Renaissance although (thus far) I don't have any elves or fae folk. However, that could all change as soon as they cross the mountains and travel north and east along the Silk Road . . .

Art credit -- ATC artist

And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music. ~Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

May all your dances be happy ones.