Takadanobaba

We're staying in a ryokan in Takadanobaba.

The REALLY nerdy among you will know that Takadanobaba is the birthplace of AstroBoy (or Tetsuwan Atom, as he is known in Japan). When you get off the train here, the station PA plays the theme song. 

Also, me and AstroBoy share the same birthday.

Flying

If you ever have the opportunity, fly from New York to Tokyo*. The route goes north, up though the very top of Alaska, over miles and miles of pure white snow and frozen lakes, with absolutely no sign of people. Then a short stretch of ocean and then down through Siberia. This time with enormous cliffs and mountains of snow that drop dramatically into the ocean.

It was perfectly clear the whole way, and as we were flying west in the late afternoon, we had a perpetual sunset for most of the way. It was amazing.

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* But don't fly American Airlines. Ever. No matter how cheap it is. It's like being in jail. But I'm sure you get better food in jail. There isn't even any booze! Not even to BUY!

The True Story of a Squirl who Loved a Soldier

So I'm standing in line, ready to get on the ferry to Ellis Island. It's a long line, I'll be here for an hour and a half. It's also outside, and about 1 degree. Brr.

There's a gruff-looking soldier standing, supervising the line with disinterest. A Swedish guy goes over to him and asks in broken English where to buy tickets. The Gruff Soldier stares at him, and does this irritating thing where he refuses to anticipate what Swedish is trying to say, even though he's struggling, and also even though Gruff must get asked that question about a million times a day. He doesn't even smile or nod to indicate that he's listening. He insists on waiting until Swedish has managed a complete sentence before he jerks his head and mutters a few words.

'Nice,' I think. 'Very courteous. Bloody Americans.'

There is a Squirl* sniffing around the park, eating all the things that the tourists drop. He stops near Gruff and looks up at him, its Squirly nose all twitchy and adorable. Gruff looks down at Squirl and continues to look gruff.

Squirl is clearly disconcerted that Gruff didn't acknowledg

e him. So it shuffles a bit closer, and puts a little Squirly paw on Gruff's khaki trouser leg. Gruff exhibits no discernable emotion.

Squirl is just plain pissed now. Can't this stupid man see how CUTE the Squirl is? The fluffy tail? The twitchy nose? The adorable wide eyes?

Squirl does a little shudder of the tail, and then runs up the outside of Gruff's military issue trousers, grabs his belt, and fixes him with a beady and slightly pugnacious eye.

Gruff looks down at the adorable ball of fur attached to his hip pocket.

And he winks at Squirl.

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*Squirrel. Like this one:

Snow meets Squirl!

Spectacular

So I could tell you about the amazing off-Broadway play we went to last night, directed by Ethan Hawke. I could tell you about the awesome cast. Or I could tell you about the famous people who were mere seats away from us in the audience.

But I'm not going to.

Because tonight we went to the Radio City Music Hall Christmas Spectacular with the Rockettes. And it was made entirely of cheese, Christmas and Awesome. There were fireworks and midgets and children and camels (real camels) and ice-skating and toy soldiers and a whole bit where we put on 3D glasses to watch Santa fly his sleigh over New York. I cried with joy the whole way through - even the Jesus bit (but mostly because of the camels. also the donkey).

Thankful

So I had my first ever Thanksgiving on Thursday. So this is my list of what I'm giving thanks for:

1. THIS.

2. Maureen & co for making such an amazing feast.

3. Justine & Scott for introducing me to the aforementioned.

4. THIS.

5. Turkey.

6. Staying up til 5am New York time with S&J and Snazzle to read the words landslide, mauled, humiliated and crushing defeat.

7. Pumpkin pie.

Happy holidays, Australia. I am proud of you once more.

New York Minutes

Scott, Justine, Sarah and I are walking through the East Village on our way to dinner.

me: (randomly musing out loud) I should call David Levithan to see if we can get on the set of the Nick and Norah movie.

sarah: (pointing) Uh, isn't that him there?

David Levithan: Oh hai.

Yeah. They were shooting on that street. Unfortunately Michael Cera wasn't there (playing Nick), but this guy was, playing Jesus with no pants on.

(justine photographing david listening to movie).

Start Spreading the News...

So this is New York. It's cold, but not too cold. It's full of people and trains and shops and museums and Christmas trees.

At the moment we're staying in Queens with Sarah's Uncle Larry. His car's SatNav has a mind of its own, and is always trying to take us to other places.

Yesterday we visited the American Natural History Museum, which had this great way of explaining the universe. There's an enormous sphere (about 35 m across) called the Hayden Sphere. And you walk around it down a spiral ramp. At the each station on the ramp, there is a comparison, like 'if the Hayden sphere is the size of the known universe, then this marble is the size of the Virgo supercluster of galaxies'. As you move down you get smaller in powers of 10, until the comparison is 'if the Hayden sphere is a raindrop, this (small lump) is the size of a red blood-cell'. It was an amazing way of describing scale and understanding the universe.

Tomorrow is my First Ever Thanksgiving.

Lili is...

in Tokyo.

It's strange being back here. We caught the train past my old apartment, and went to some familiar shopping haunts today (not too fat for Japanese clothes!).

I also learnt that the difference between Western Breakfast and Japanese Breakfast is - Western Breakfast has a knife and fork. Otherwise it's still fish and miso (oiishi!).

Tomorrow - New York.

So what's this Golden Compass film all about then, eh?

There appears to be a rather big dummy-spit going on in the US about Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy. Here are some claims and comments:

In the last book, a boy and girl are depicted representing Adam and Eve and they kill God.

They are hoping that unsuspecting parents will take their children to See the movie, that they will enjoy the movie and then the children will want the books for Christmas. That's the hook. Pullman says he wants the children to read the books and decide against God and the kingdom of heaven.

I couldn't believe that in a children's book part of the story is about castration and female circumcision.

IF you're goal is to raise your child in a way that would cause them to grow and know God as He is described in the Bible, you should shield them from the writings.

I want more than anything else I want for my children, even their own happiness in this life, for them to believe in God, Who is their salvation.

i dont know much about pullman or his writings but the Word of God is the truth and the Bible says that Lieing is a sin.*By pullman writing this book he is lieing and he knows not the truth and the truth is not in him But God is truth and His word never fails and God has the final say. So Mr Pullman God wins you lose.

If a book is written by an atheist, the spirit of everything in that book is one of atheism.

Why risk filling your childs head with thoughts that you may have been able to prevent?

Why indeed? I'm pretty sure this stuff don't need any extra commentary. Just imagine me jumping up and down being REALLY angry. And then imagine some Stupid People complaining about books they CLEARLY HAVEN'T READ.

These comments are all from beliefnet, which i'm not going to link to because I don't want them all coming over here and dirtying up my blog with their petty and repressive thoughts.

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*So what does the Bible say about spelling?

Why I Love the State Library

People often ask me what my favourite part of the State Library is. Sometimes I say the dome, or the Mirror of the World exhibition. But I'm lying.

My real favourite place in the Library is right next to my staff kitchenette. It's this:

I like to think of it as a rather profound and existential statement on the human condition.

The Inevitable Post about Dumbledore

"The Potter books in general are a prolonged argument for tolerance,"

-JK Rowling

I find with all things Harry Potter, that I really enjoy it, until I start thinking, and then I get irritated. It was the same with Rowling's recent announcement about Dumbledore's sexuality.

At first I thought "awesome! positive gay characters in children's literature!"

And then I thought 4 things.

Thing #1

"He is my character. He is what he is and I have the right to say what I say about him."

Once your book is published, it doesn't belong to you anymore. It belongs to your readers. Let THEM tell YOU what happens next, not the other round.

Thing #2

"If I'd known it would make you so happy, I would have announced it years ago!"

No. You should have announced it years ago anyway. You should have put it in the books. You are probably the most influential human being in the world for young people. You have more power to influence young people's attitudes than the United Nations, Sesame Street and their parents combined. You had an opportunity to present them with a positive gay role model, and you chose not to, I assume, because you were scared of the reaction from the religious right.

Thing #3

[Rowling] didn't feel the need to be explicit about Dumbledore's sexual preferences because she wanted to focus on character development.

I'm going to skip over the fact that many gay people might find that sentence deeply offensive.

Dumbledore was brave. Dumbledore liked to stick it to the Man (no pun intended). Dumbledore was never afraid to tell anyone his opinion, no matter how powerful or dangerous they were.

Except no one in the Harry Potter world knew he was gay. Not Harry, or anyone else that we know of. So he was in the closet.

So if a man as open and brave as Dumbledore felt he needed to keep his sexuality a secret - exactly what kind of a world is the Potterverse? How homophobic must the world be for Dumbledore to conceal such an important part of his identity? That's not a "positive message" at all, or a "prolonged argument for tolerance". It's sad and regressive and scary.

Thing #4

Seriously. Like Rita Skeeter wouldn't have known and put it in her book.

Improve Your Vocabulary - help developing nations!

Check out Free Rice, a project from poverty.com

For every word you correctly label, poverty.com will donate 10 grains of rice to a developing nation.

It's procrastination AND worthy AND promotes literacy!

Advertising and Bunnies

My parents always mute the TV and go and do something whenever the ads come on. I do too. Most of the time.

Except ads are getting... well... really good.

Advertising companies are obviously hiring some fresh-thinking film school graduates to make amazing, expensive, innovative short films with brands attached. Like that (and I can't believe I'm saying this) that Golden Arches ad where all the kiddies climb out of the grown-ups tummies. And the eBay one with the shopping trollies and the snow (although I kinda don't like the way it implies that when you buy so

mething from eBay, it's never what you expected).

But my very favourite ads are the Sony Bravia ads*. You know, the first one was all the millions of little bouncy balls bouncing their rainbowy goodness down hills in San Francisco? And the one with the building being demolished with layers of coloured paint exploding out of each floor as it went?

The think I like the most about these ads is they REALLY do them. They really did let a million coloured bouncy balls loose in SF. And they really did explode a building full of paint. Bugger all this CG nonsense (sorry, Gollum).

Well now there's a new one. And it has bunnies in New York.

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*due to my leftiecommiepinko guilt at essentially giving Sony some free promotion, I need to link to this article about how plasma screens are really bad for the environment.

Freedom to Read

There is an organisation called the Happy Endings Foundation's East of England Cheering Committee.

What do they do? (I hear you ask.) Do they reunite orphans with their long lost parents? Do they find Handsome Princes for Lowly Peasant Girls? Do they provide support and counselling for failed Idol participants?

No. This lady and all her lovely, caring friends are out there to make sure that kids don't get too upset by books with sad endings.

Oh (you say), that's nice. They talk about why the Snowman melted, and why the puppy had to go to the Big Doghouse in the Sky.

No. They just burn all the books with sad endings.

(they WHAT?)

They burn them. With fire. They call it a Bad Book Bonfire, and they have them quite often.

So the newspaper article says that Lemony Snicket is on the pyre. But I'm thinking you'd have to torch The House at Pooh Corner, Charlotte's Web and Bridge to Terabithia as well. And let's not even mention The Velveteen Rabbit.

Now seems like a REALLY good time to mention that it's Banned Books Week.

This weekend, read a Sad Book or a Bad Book or a Banned Book to celebrate your Freedom to Read...

Memetastic

(from Penni)

1. My rock star name (first pet and current car)
Mishka Swift (hott. with two 't's.)

2. My gangsta name (ice cream flavour plus cookie, or biscuit)
Cookies & Cream Shortbread (sounds more like a fluffy bunny)

3. My fly girl name (first letter of first name, first three letters of last name)
L Wil (meh)

4. My detective name (favourite colour, favourite animal)
Green Bear (rawwr)

5. My soap opera name (middle name, city of birth)
Mei-Ling Melbourne (i can totally see her. she'd wear lots of awful faux-Chinese dresses)

6. My Star Wars name (first three letters of your last name, first two of your first name)
Wil-Li

7. My superhero name (second favourite colour, favourite drink, add “the”)
The Blue Water (She surfs. She wears a bikini. She's on the ABC. She's soft porn for teenagers...)

8. My Nascar name (first two names of my two grandfathers)
Jack James (I like this one a lot)

9. My stripper name (favourite perfume, favourite sweet)
Olene Musk Sticks (how foxy is that? She'd be a totally classy strippper)

10. My witness protection name (mother’s and father’s middle names)
Ann Richard

11. My weather anchor name (fifth grade teacher’s name, a major city beginning with the same letter)
Jeremy Jakarta

12. My spy name (favourite season/flower)
Spring Jasmine

13. Cartoon name (favourite fruit plus garment you’re wearing, with an “ie” or “y” added)
Cherry Red Bootsie (she'd be unreal)

14 Hippie name (what you ate for breakfast plus favourite tree)
Peanut Butter Toast Ornamental Cherry (well, if by 'hippy' you mean 'utter nonsense')

15. Your rockstar tour name (favourite hobby plus weather element, with “the”)
The Reading Fire. (sounds a bit Christian Rock...)

BY NOD LET IN

So, if Enid Blyton left secret codes in her books to tell the world how much she hated her first husband... well, that would be Made of Awesome.

But the "clues" that biographer Duncan McClaren found in the Mystery books are... unconvincing. To say the least:

1. Her husband used to drink in the cellar. The bumbling policeman got locked in the cellar. Once.
2. Her husband had no imagination. The bumbling policeman had no imagination.
3. Her husband's name was Hugh. The bumbling policeman's name was Theophilus Goon, which anagrams to O Hugh Spoilt One or O Let Hugh Poison.

Yeah? Well it also anagrams to Highest I Polo On and Eighth Oil Spoon. And Sleigh Hop In Too.

There are, in fact 32250 legitimate anagrams of Theophilus Goon. Yep. THIRTY TWO THOUSAND. Secret code my foot.

So let's give up on that particular "theory", and look at the awesome new promotion for the Wyoming Library.

Pros and Cons

Pro: singing karaoke with my peeps til the wee hours of the morning.

Con: my head today which is ouch.

Con: getting out of bed.

Pro: doughuts.

Con: going to the office on a Saturday.

Pro: (from The Age) "Apart from Ruth Park's Playing Beatie Bow, there are few stand-out young adult books with an Australian history background. Scatterheart is a notable exception."

Now it is time for a nap.

What I Know Is

1. Heroes is much better when you watch it in Spanish*. (it's pretty good normally, but Made of Awesome in Spanish, especially if you do funny voices over the top of it.)

2. Old people Baby Boomers are far more likely to engage in risk-taking behaviour than teenagers. Take note, Today Tonight and Jim Schembri: "Middle-aged hooligans!", not "teenage hooligans!". Binge drinkers? More than double the amount of boomers than teens/early 20s. Illegal drug-death? Five times more boomers. For shame. (via Justine)

3. The following statement could not be more untrue:

Children’s book protagonists skirt past private wounds; they are too busy exploring Narnia or Neverland and fending off witches, pirates and Indian chiefs — or hostile saleswomen at Bendel’s.
Only adult fiction indulges the grown-up delusion that children are interested in their parents’ personal lives.

Too busy exploring Neverland? Please. There's a reason why Mr Darling and Captain Hook is usually played by the same actor.

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* This may not be true if you actually speak Spanish.

Launch of a Lili

All of these photos were taken by the wondrous Snazzles, who is made of awesome.