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Words I never thought I'd have to say in all seriousness in my lifetime until yesterday:

"They're shooting at us!"

Remember this guy?

Police: Ky. census worked staged death as homicide

On the surface it all seemed like a gruesome hate crime in a rural part of Kentucky with a history of disdain for the government: a census worker found bound with duct tape and hanging from a tree, the word "fed" scrawled across his chest...

Investigators said Tuesday what they had been hinting at for weeks, that Bill Sparkman's hanging was a ruse to mask his suicide for a big insurance payout.

Video Reviews (11/24/09)

TV: The Universe [Season 1] (2007-2008)
Review: I'm always up for a good documentary about astronomy, astrophysics, or whatnot, so I couldn't possibly turn down an entire series dedicated to such a theme. From the History Channel, each episode regards a different subject matter, be it a planet, a phenomena, or an area of study. It gets narrated rather slowly, leaning heavily on its CG sequences which are not only repeated and reused from episode to episode, but even within individual episodes. Some imagery is reused over a dozen times during season one alone. Luckily, the information related is interesting to its target audience, albeit sensationalized to a degree. A few theories are misrepresented as outright fact, but that can be forgiven in cases like the big bang, which is the leading theory to date. It's all capped off with a 90-minute feature-length doc on the historic evolution of understanding of the universe itself. Altogether an engaging series that could stand a few more original FX sequences.
Rating: ***1/2 out of *****

Movie: Severance (2006)
Review: Have I mentioned I'm a sucker for horror-comedies? I didn't have particularly high hopes for this one, being both foreign and indie, but it surprisingly manages to deliver. The production is very professional, feeling like a full budget effort, and there are plenty of dry-wit laughs. The antagonist isn't really clear, and the script can't seem to make up its mind as to who or what is after our business leaders on their team-building exercise in Bulgaria, even after the big reveal in the finale. The gore level, of which some of the FX are a little amateur, is tolerable but higher than necessary, including some excessive scenes of inexplicable torture porn. Overall, it's genuinely enjoyable in its camp and giggly scares, delivering a refreshing experience that at least doesn't feel like its gone back to the well.
Rating: ***1/2 out of *****

Movie: 2012 (2009)
Review: Take Independence Day, strip out all the aliens, and for the most part you have 2012. It features a more inventive ending of a neo-future survivalist nature, but primarily consists of the same airplane escape sequence from ID4 repeated no less than three times. I found myself asking the screen, "Got anything else?" These episodes are separated by some of the most gratuitously treacly Disneyana broken-family afterschool special material that could've been dished out - totally formulaic and frequently laughable: Hey, kids, there's a fence with military signs that say no tresspassing around an empty, smoking lakebed filled with the carcasses of dead animals...let's go play on it without any thought or hesitation! Deservedly, extraneous characters who would make the ending awkward are killed off haphazardly and for no good reason. But what did we really pay $10 to see? Not the tortured script, nor the cornball acting (although Oliver Platt was pretty good in this new angle), but the overachieving scenes of barely-explained carnage and fantastically excessive catastrophe, which is delivered in spades, although you already saw 90% of it in the trailers. Nevertheless, the destruction is the star, featuring explosions, eruptions, tsunamis, collapses, crashes and more on an epically detailed scale that I would hazard has never before been seen in theaters. Science, script, acting be damned, this made for a fun experience, if totally loaded with empty calories. If you can manage the herculean effort necessary to leave your brain at the door, this is pure schadenfreude entertainment.
Rating: ***1/2 out of *****

Next: PowerPuff Girls (Season 5), The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, American Carny, Hairspray (2007)

Em Eff Eff '09 Report

Thursday

Despite the FAA scheduling snafu that morning, we were able to board our plane on time. On time enough to sit on the tarmac for 45 minutes, that is. Luckily, we met Kodian and his companion who happened to be seated directly in front of us.

During the turbulent ascent, there was a bright orange flash outside the airplane and a mmm-WHOMP sound. Everyone was silent for a few seconds, doing the equivalent of an internal check on the plane, waiting to see if it was an engine failure or just lightning (which doesn't really bring down planes anymore). When we determined we were still ascending normally, everyone let out a collective sigh of relief. Exiting the plane, I asked if that had been lightning and was informed that it was electrostatic discharge, or ESD. Here's some info on it, but basically it's like lightning from the plane due to built up static by the A/C and other electrical components, in this case facilitated by the rain clouds we were flying up through.

On landing, we all shared a taxi to the hotel.

xydexx and I unexpectedly napped in the room for three hours and woke up around dinner time. We hooked up and went to the Ram Brewery with

bohor,

torrle,

normanrafferty,

lukas_otter, ZombieBunny,

mirkowuff,

nikvulper, and several other people who were at the other end of the table. While the company was wonderful, this is a good time to note that I think the food options around the Wheeling location were sub-optimal. Looking at restaurants near the new location at the Hyatt Regency O'Hare next year, I'm not convinced the improvement will be more than marginal, but any change will be for the better.

We met up with

leonard_arlotte and played Monkeys On The Moon in the Zoo/not-yet-open Con Suite until late. The Zoo/Con Suite was in the old Osteria di Tromonto's, a budget version of the fancy Tramonto's next door, which closed nine months ago but still had all its furnishings. It was an excellent place for a Zoo, but turned into a feeding trough as soon as the Con Suite opened the next day, making it tough to find a clean space anywhere.

Friday

Slept in and grabbed lunch with X,

roxikat and

ben_raccoon at Claim Jumper. Then spent most of the afternoon sitting in the lobby doing Sudoku puzzles because I couldn't find anyone to play games with. I ended up doing this multiple times during the con, for hours on end. This has to stop. Next year, I'm going to apply to host a bunch of games in the game room, like Snorta and Zooloretto, because I frankly cannot continue to justify spending $1000 to play Sudoku all weekend because I don't know enough gamers, I don't have enough friends to hang around with, and I don't really think much of most of the Programming at furry cons - a personal thing, not in any way a statement regarding the quality, content, or capabilities of the Programming staff.

Eventually, I was able to nail down X, Rafferty and Darkwolf (I don't know which one) to play To Court The King, and then Notre Dame with Darkwolf and X in the Zoo. We flailed around a bit for dinner options and eventually went back to Ram again (ugh) with Darkwolf.

At 9pm was my Lupus In Tabula event which went quite well. We played three consecutive games of 14-17 people and ended up running overtime until 1:45am. Lots of new players who are now new addicts.

Saturday

Had a 9:30am breakfast/board meeting with all the Anthrocon board members attending the con in Tramonto's, which had a very nice buffet for $11. We traded info around and probably had more to discuss than we originally thought we would've.

More sitting in the lobby playing Sudoku. Eventually, I got X,

halfelf (Kiva), and a guy from last night's Lupus to play To Court The King in the Zoo again. We picked the location because the fursuit parade was scheduled to go through there - even got a table right against the parade route. Ten minutes before the parade, they announced that the show would no longer be going through the Zoo. At that point, the route was already a mob scene and we were invested in the game, so we missed the whole thing. For the record, that was a real disappointment.

The group broke up and I went up to the room to, essentially, mope. Around dinnertime, X and I picked up Rafferty and Kiva and we went to India House a few miles away because Kiva had a car, thank goodness. That was good stuff. We tried to squeeze in a game of Stone Age, but it ran into my midnight dance time and wasn't turning out to be popular, so we cut it short.

Regarding my Saturday dance: the less said the better. Thanks are in order to

hartree,

djgenki, and even

tekfox for enabling it to go on at all despite miscommunications and missing equipment. I managed to clear out

pistolpup's full dancefloor in short order. I didn't think what I was playing was that bad, but I couldn't figure out how to lower the bass on the foreign equipment set up for hard house to make my breaks sound right, and my placement of lower-bpm funk was a jarring transition. I probably should've been either first or followed up a fursuit dance.

Sunday

More sleeping in, followed by more Sudoku in the lobby. During an aimless wander, I found many of the players from Friday's Lupus game trying to run Looney Labs' basic version by themselves in the game room. They asked me to moderate, which I was honestly desperately thankful for. Ended up running multiple more games of table-based Lupus until Closing Ceremonies.

Following that, it was back to the game room to play Bandu with

shakaldraconis,

jarylanvulpine,

rikoshi, Kiva, and X. Then we all went out to dinner at Buca di Beppo, adding on Sunata, where we ordered way too much food and had to bring it back and dump it in the Zoo, where the locusts descended upon the leftovers like...furries.

Finally, I traded off games of Kingsburg, To Court The King, and Witch's Brew with Rikoshi, Jarylan, Shakal, Darkwolf, Leonard, Kiva, Sunata, X, and one or two others who dropped by until 2am.

Monday

Went home.

Current Mood: tired

November 2009/MFF 2009 Mix

Sorry for lateness, but here's the newest mix up for grabs. It's based on my set from this year's Midwest Furfest 2009. This doesn't include everything that was played at MFF or in the same order but it includes some extras that didn't make it onto the final playlist due to mood and time constraints, indicated by asterisks. The actual MFF playlist can be found here.

Direct download from HERE. MP3, 192 kbps, 61m32s, 89MB

Tracklist (artist - "title" [style])
*1. Paul Oakenfold - "Starry Eyed Surprise" [Breakbeat]
2. Krafty Skillz - "Music Sounds Fatter With U" [Breakbeat]
*3. Stereo MCs - "Lost In Music (Ultimatum Remix)" [Hip Hop]
4. Arthur Baker - "Breaker's Revenge (Freestylers B-Boy Mix)" [Breakbeat]
5. Ursula 1000 - "Electrik Boogie (Fort Knox Five Remix)" [Breakbeat]
*6. Gene Kelly - "Singing (35th Street White Label)" [House]
7. Fatboy Slim - "Sweet (46th Street White Label)" [House]
8. Fort Knox Five - "Spirit of '75" [Big Beat]
9. The Ragga Twins - "Let It Burn" [Breakbeat]
10. Deep Impact & The Autobots - "Ultrafunkula" [Breakbeat]
11. Way Out West - "Killa (Orkidea vs Dallas Superstars Mix)" [Trance]
12. $.C.A.M. - "Retail Therapy (North On 41 Mix)" [Pop]

Video Reviews (11/15/09)

Movie: Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (2007)
Review: Pure sugar and absolutely no nutrition is what quantifies this sequel. If I didn't know any better, I would think it was a weak chinese ripoff of the Fantastic Four characters and storyline, with key elements changed to allow it to dodge plagiarism charges. It follows the classic Silver Surfer/Galactus storyline loosely and with such b-grade camp that it never rises above the level of its 60's pulp roots. It's enjoyable to watch the attempt be made, there are a few clever one-liners, and the action is tolerable, but the cheese overwhelms. Jessica Alba as Susan Storm has all the depth of a scream queen, particularly. And Julian McMahon as Dr. Doom is so painfully mishandled - in fact, I think the Surfer (spoken by Laurence Fishburne) and Doom should switch voices to correct the dissonance when hearing them talk. Comical and comic-booky, it never rises above its original material which, unlike more polished exercises such as Iron Man, leaves the viewer with all the satisfaction of reading an old 22-page silver-age comic book today.
Rating: **1/2 out of *****

Movie: Religulous (2008)
Review: A good step towards making this film more credible would've been if Bill Maher hadn't needed to trick the subjects of his interviews by giving them a fake title of the documentary and not telling them who was starring in it before meeting with them. He then doesn't so much interview them as he does ridicule, oftentimes laughing at them to their faces derisively. Unlike Michael Moore who finds something wrong and corners the perpetrators by asking them to explain wherein the subject hangs themselves for him, Maher brings his own noose, shouts his subjects down with feeble stand-up jokes, and then hangs them himself. It's a credit to those he meets with that he's not thrown out because of his insulting tone more often. Now, I get where Maher is coming from. I agree with the points he's making for the most part. But he's not so much trying to convince the audience with evidence as he is shoving a bunch of religious leaders into mud puddles with heavily-edited and heavily-spun footage in his favor. Refocused, this could've been an excellent and damning documentary. Instead, it's "Bill Maher punks religion".
Rating: **1/2 out of *****

Movie: Paprika (2006)
Review: Reminding me again why anime simply does not appeal to me, Paprika is another in what seems like an endless series of pretentious abstractions. From what I could figure out, a psych doctor with an alternate dream-personality must discover who is invading the dreams of scientists who work on a technological project to allow psychologists to share the dreams of their patients. And that's before things start getting complicated. The culture seems to flourish on unexposited non-sequiturs, every other line attempting to be delivered as oracular-sounding wisdom. And, of course, it all ends up with a naked girl being assaulted by tentacles - surprise, surprise. Especially towards the climax, too many events go unexplained, trying to be waved off by the excuse that it's a dream where anything can happen and doesn't need to be rational. That works only to a point, but falls apart when those events are the core plotline. Add in that it's the same limited animation, character design, and low framerate of just about every other anime I've seen, and it's just one more reason for me to pass on most anime offerings.
Rating: ** out of *****

Next: The Universe (Season 1), Severance, Powerpuff Girls (Season 5), American Carny, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Hairspray (2007)

...and for my boardgamer friends going to MFF...

Here's the tentative list of board games I plan to lug to MFF this year, depending on what fits in the tub (parentheses are maybes):

(A Touch of Evil), Aye Dark Overlord!, (Galaxy Trucker), (Ingenious), Kingsburg, Lupus in Tabula, Niagara, Notre Dame, On the Underground, Samurai, Small World, Stone Age, To Court the King, (Torres), Witch's Brew

Back at the dance!

I will be DJing again at MFF, hooray! My set is from 12am-1am on Saturday. Set is planned, mix is made for post-con. Gonna be funk-ay.

Current Mood: excited

Lupus In Tabula (Advanced Werewolf) at MFF - Friday/Saturday, 11/20,21 @ 9pm @ Maple

Alkali and I will be running the traditional series of Lupus in Tabula games on Friday (me) & Saturday (Alkali) night (11/20,21), each starting at 9pm in the Maple room.

Thanks to MFF for scheduling it this year!

Video Reviews (11/2/09)

TV: MXC [Season 5] (2007-2008)
Rating: *** out of *****

TV: The Amazing Johnathan - Wrong On Every Level (2006)
Review: So you like your stage magic crazy, zany, and madcap, eh? That would be The Amazing Johnathan to a "T". Master of comedic distraction, along with his empty-headed assistant Psychic Tanya, his wild escapades cover up what are, for the most part, a handful of rather shabby magic tricks that he only manages to get away with due to a level of self-awareness, as if it were part of the gag. Bordering on the ghoulish, several of his bits are not for the faint of heart, surprising the viewer with abrupt and over-the-top fountains of fake blood, for example. But for the most part, he's like a kid off his Ritalin who got into Carrot Top's closet. This Comedy Central program, complete with commercial breaks, includes a good dose of his other appearances which are unfortunately very similar to each other, but fortunately high on audience participation which provides varied results. Definitely worth seeing for a good laugh, even if it is rough around the edges.
Rating: **** out of *****

Movie: A Life Less Ordinary (1997)
Review: After "Millions", "28 Days Later", "Trainspotting", "Slumdog Millionaire", and now "A Life Less Ordinary", I think I can safely say that I'm not really a big fan of director Danny Boyle's work, each of which has elicited little more than a "Meh" from me. In ALLO, two angels are instructed to make a lowly janitor and a haughty heiress fall in love through a kidnapping. Billed as a romantic comedy, the disjointed plot, superficial characters, and Bergman-esque ending instead result in a downward slide to insanity, and not in a good way. What begins as a light fantasy ends up with one of the granddaddies of all cop-outs which it at least earnestly tries to make the viewer believe. Plenty of big names contributed to this experiment, including Cameron Diaz, Ian Holm, Ewan McGregor, Holly Hunter, Stanley Tucci, Tony Shaloub, and more. Some may consider this one of Boyle's stepping stones to greatness, but not I.
Rating: ** out of *****

Next: The Universe (Season 1), Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, Severance

Halloween 2009

This Halloween, we were joined by Bengali, Tig, Provo, Furio,

neogeen, and

deejayawesome for neighborhood costuming. NeoGeen and DJA arrived first and I introduced them to Ticket To Ride while we waited for others. The weather was high-risk because a warm front was due right during prime Trick-Or-Treat hours. Luckily, it broke up over the Blue Ridge and all we got were a few showers.

Kids started showing up at 5:30 instead of the usual 7pm. This may have been due to a combination of the weather and the fact that Halloween fell on a weekend. Since it caught us off guard, we missed the first third of the rush while everyone was suiting up, having arrived around 6pm. But the rest was fun, as everyone hung out in front, each with their own bucket of candy, and posed for photos and such. Total kids this year: 89.

Afterwards, we went out to La Chozita Grill for dinner, followed by "Behind The Mask" and "Below" for late-night scary movies. This morning, those who crashed overnight joined us for breakfast at Bob Evans before heading home.

All in all successful! We'll be on again for Halloween 2010!

Current Mood: pleased

Video Reviews (10/26/09)

TV: The Simpsons [Season 9] (2000-2001)
Rating: *** out of *****

Movie: Year of the Dog (2007)
Review: For a movie predicated on the death of a beloved pet, this dramedy manages to competently hang onto its goal and only goes off the rails a little bit. Pencil, Peggy's beagle, is her anchor in all things, to the degree that it's a well-secured freak flag. When he dies, she tries to find a new outlet, and starts falling to pieces the longer it goes on. While I didn't entirely agree with Peggy's final destination or certain portions of her descent, I'm not certain you're really meant to. The moral seems to be that you should determine your own path, not let others dictate your direction, and not try to dictate others' directions, which is pretty cool. It's eminently watchable because the characters are very strong, almost like old-school Coen Brothers films. The humor is very dry, deriving from each players' characteristics rather than dialogue or slapstick. Also beneficial is if the viewer is an animal lover, specifically of dogs, which may assist in making a connection with the story. It's a different kind of romantic comedy that is unique in its own way.
Rating: ***1/2 out of *****

Movie: Ruthless People (1986)
Review: This film gets the rating it does purely out of nostalgia. It's so unrelenting 80's that it elicits more laughs from the wardrobe and set design than it does from its dated humor (I think I only gave a solid laugh once). Sam, played by Danny DeVito, wants to kill off his wife (Bette Middler) for money, but she's kidnapped and held for ransom, to his delight. Bill Pullman makes an appearance as a completely unbelievable bumbling accessory to a subplot, wearing a most ridiculous retro hairdo. It plays out like a silly soap opera, with gaping plot holes and set equipment visible in some shots. Cheap, simple, late-night movie-of-the-week. Oh yeah, and there's the requisite gratuitous boobies. Those were the days.
Rating: **1/2 out of *****

Next: MXC (Season 5), A Life Less Ordinary, The Amazing Johnathan: Wrong On Every Level

We joined the Masons...

...for a board gaming fundraiser on Saturday. The Washington Post redesigned their Thursday regional insert which made it much easier to read the local event listings. Under "Miscellaneous" in the back, I saw that the Ashburn-Sterling Masons Lodge was having a board games day fundraiser. $2 gets you in for all-day gaming.

We got there just before the skies opened up (it rained nice and hard all afternoon, so perfect time to be inside gaming). I didn't know what to expect, but it was just a small meeting area with a kitchen attached and four long tables set up. We found that we knew the guy running it (John) from

paleboat and

ohio_geek's game days and we also ran into

sharrainchains there. One of the members knew another Mason I work with, too.

It was lightly attended, only about 15 people at peak, but primarily because they didn't really know where to advertise - we gave them some tips on the right local audiences to market to, what game stores and sites online to visit, as well as made some discriminating invites to

chez_turtle. We played On The Underground, Stone Age, Notre Dame, and Settlers which lasted us until 1am. They seem very interested in having another meet, or even a regularly scheduled event. Great way to spend a rainy Saturday.

Current Mood: pleased

Halloween Handout Help Wanted!

Each year, we invite anyone with a fursuit/costume to our place on Halloween to help hand out candy. Over time, we've become one of the favorite places in our neighborhood to get candy from because you never know who's going to answer the door! We have guest showers and crash space if necessary. Total kid count last year: 78. Feel free to frolic out in front if you want to really entertain! Our neighborhood is safe and nearly crime-free. Help us surprise the trick or treaters again this year by joining us for handouts, dinner, and maybe a scary movie afterwards!

Where: Leesburg, VA (email for more info)
When: Saturday, October 31st (handouts approx. 6pm-8:30pm; dinner 9pm, movie after?)
Who: rigeltiger@gmail.com

You do not need to be a fursuiter/costumer to participate, but we want to leave the handouts to those with costumes.

Let us know if you're interested!

Video Reviews (10/18/09)

TV: Battlestar Galactica [Season 3] (2007-2008)
Rating: *** out of *****

Movie: Offside (2006)
Review: As much as this film intended to make a societal and political statement regarding the prohibition of women at sporting events in Iran, it probably would've come across a lot more effectively if it had taken a little injection of Hollywood. While it's prefixed with a note that major parts were filmed during a real soccer championship, it really takes place almost entirely outside the stadium in and around a makeshift "cell" made of bike racks. The women detained there spend most of their time bantering with their guards and behaving more like a watered-down Breakfast Club than informed activists. The situation isn't even resolved by the actions of the women as much as it is by lucky circumstance, which really deflates the meaning of the piece. It barely registers as the comedy it's billed as, either. If you appreciate middle-eastern political dramas, you might get something out of this, but the average filmgoer will find it hard to stay awake.
Rating: ** out of *****

Movie: Blades of Glory
Review: It's hard to reconcile when a film is incredibly, intelligence-insultingly dumb, but still manages to elicit laughs. Let me restate that: still manages to elicit groans at the terrible lines, requires the viewer to look away from the crotch gags, and to be embarassed at hearing the lines of six year olds coming from grown actors. This is clearly not anywhere near a sophisticated comedy, and one should know that before pressing Play. The story of two male skaters who are forced to compete as a pair is mainly one long, confused gay joke. It hits its mark with the same adults-as-children humor perfected by Arrested Development that's all the rage in comedy these days. Will Ferrel is the same unevolved character actor from SNL, but Feder, while not eliciting as many laughs, really seems to have solidified from his indie roots - it was hard for me to believe it was the same guy from Napoleon Dynamite. Mainly a film for those who appreciate cringe-worthy humor and groin-jokes.
Rating: *** out of *****

Movie: Zombieland (2009)
Review: Definitely gets the award for the silliest zombie movie out there. I'm a sucker for horror comedies and this one fits the bill nicely. The road trip of four societal misfits who continue to survive a zombie epidemic garners plenty of laughs for its slapstick sense of humor, which works surprisingly well when applied to the undead. There's nothing meaninful here that rises above the level of teen romance, so you have to take it for what it is, especially the comic-book level of scriptwriting since enormous amounts of the film defy logic. Behind the scenes, it features all the pitfalls of a creator's debut big-league project, in this case being inspired by a better version and last-minute additions as filler, specifically the self-serving, navel-gazing middle third which was all added less than two days before filming started and acts as little more than Hollywood brown-nosing - as funny as the cameo it features is, of course. It never gets particularly clever, with the exception of the animated notation that gets forgotten halfway through the film. Worth seeing for the fluffy entertainment value, despite all the best parts having been given away in the trailers (That zombie kill of the week in the preview? There aren't any more.)
Rating: ***1/2 out of *****

Next: The Simpsons (Season 12), Year of the Dog, Ruthless People

Captain Lou Albano

Current Mood: sad

October 2009 Mix

Here's my latest mix! This one's focused on some harder material, between 125-150 bpm, featuring breaks, house, and trance. It includes both new material I've collected recently as well as some old favorites.

Direct download from HERE. MP3, 128kbps, 61m41s, 59MB

Tracklist (artist - "title" [style])
1. 2 Bit Pie - "Nobody Never (Hamel & Jamieson's Audiomagnetics Vox)" [Breaks, House]
2. Bitmonx - "Freeware" [Trance]
3. Soul of Man - "Acid Punch" [Breaks, House]
4. Brothers Bud - "Crazy Jack" [Breaks]
5. Hatiras - "Lightspeed" [House, Trance]
6. POB - "Boiler" [House, Trance]
7. Yasi vs. The Orb - "Little Fluffy Clouds" [Breaks]
8. The Entity - "Flip de Trax" [Acid, Trance]
9. Apotheosis - "O Fortuna (Fast Bird Mix)" [Techno]
10. The Secret - "Big Mutha" [Acid, Trance]

x-posted to

furrydjs

End DADT, End Abuse Of Gays In The Military

Via, WaPo, this is powerful and persuasive reading material:

I Didn't Tell. It Didn't Matter

I was 18 years old when I landed in the kingdom of Bahrain, off the coast of Saudi Arabia, in the winter of 2005. It was the first time I'd ever left the continental United States. My joints ached after more than 24 hours of travel, but I knew that a new life of service and adventure awaited me on the other side of that aircraft door.

This was the day I had been dreaming about since I'd enlisted in the Navy a few months before, on my birthday. I loved my country, and I knew that I was ready to prove myself in action.

I also knew that I was gay.

However, I chose to put service above my personal life. My understanding of the "don't ask, don't tell" policy was that if I kept quiet about my sexuality and didn't break any rules, I would face no punishment. I was wrong.

Current Mood: distressed

Yellow Cake

Via

cartoonbrew...

Giant cats steal little bakers' yellow cake.

Yellow Cake from Nick Cross on Vimeo.