Round Peg in a Square Hole

The Importance of Being Abby

2010-12-10T10:27:00.000-08:00

For Halloween this year, despite the fact that I’d been on my new project for less than three months, I dressed up as Abby from NCIS at work. The responses were about evenly split between a short pause when someone first saw me, then an exclamation of, “Abby!” and, after a full explanation of who I was, the comment, “Oh, I don’t watch TV.” With one of these latter folk, I got into a discussion of just who Abby was, and was really caught off-guard by his question, “Is it a comedy?” The comment distressed me, so I’ve been thinking a lot about it ever since, and I have come to the conclusion that Abby’s work here is not done.

When I was a kid, the roles women played on TV were pretty limited: mom/wife, nurse, school teacher, nun…and that’s about it. Maybe bank teller and crime victim, screaming and needing to be rescued. After a while, we made progress: there were women as cops (in an evolutionary spectrum from Charlie’s Angels to Police Woman to Cagney&Lacey to Law&Order), lawyers, doctors; usually a small, but present percentage. SF/F shows have had a little more scope, ranging from Uhura, to Willow and Buffy, to Xena, to Captain Janeway and Belanna Torres from Voyager, and Zoe on Firefly. But in looking at Abby, and why she appeals to me as a technical woman, it occurred to me that she is pushing a boundary I’ve been battering for years: what is a smart, technical woman allowed to look like?

For years, I’ve given technical talks at SF cons in a variety of outfits, from a saloon hall girl to Victorian underwear to a silver lame Star Trek gown to alternate universe Star Trek characters. I’ve heard that it can be very surreal to see one of these talks; one friend likened it to seeing the picture from one TV channel and the sound from another. The important thing is that every time someone saw one of these talks, their idea of what a technical woman looks like was broadened. And that’s not just important for people who deal with technical women—it’s vitally important for the little girls, and not so little girls, who may one day grow up to be those technical women.

If the only role model you saw for a scientific/technically ept woman was Scully or Bones (of the show of the same name), some subset of girls would be very comfortable with that. (I know I would have been, had they been around when I was impressionable.) However, more of them would feel that that sort of career wouldn’t be good for them because that’s not how they see themselves, nor how they want to see themselves. Abby is important, not because I think all little girls with a technical bent should grow up to be goth forensic scientists, but because that should be within the realm of possibility. Because what music you listen to, the color and style of your hair, and what clothes you wear do not affect your abilities in logical/deductive thought and thus should not keep you from a technical career. Because you shouldn’t have to always be serious, always be straitlaced; you should be allowed to have fun, to enjoy your job; to be enthusiastic and perky without having to fetch the coffee.

Being Draco Malfoy

2010-12-10T10:01:00.000-08:00

I wrote this post after first wearing my Draco Malfoy costume at Baycon (May 2010), but did not post it then, as I wanted to surprise the Convergence folks with the costume the following July. After that, Life(tm) happened, and I didn't get back to it until now.

Though I’ve been costuming for most of my life, I have never happened to want to portray a specifically male character: gender neutral or “mannish” women, along with a host of femme fatales, but no actual males. Even when going to a con whose theme this year is villains, my first thoughts were of bad girls and witches. And, indeed, I did one: Maleficent, the witch from Disney’s Sleeping Beauty. Very much in my typical style, if my past costuming-all-over-the-map can be said to have a style.

But then I got a bee in my bonnet to do something from Harry Potter. The obvious choice would have been Bellatrix Lestrange; definitely within my “idiom”, similar to things I’d already done. For some reason, however, I was reluctant to go with it, in part because I hadn’t seen that movie (still haven’t, though I’ve read all the books). But there was something more, something else, that made me keep looking, and somehow I got the idea that I could do Draco Malfoy. I have a pointy nose and chin, and am fairly petite, so I thought I could pull off an adolescent boy role. Was worried about the wig, as I remembered Draco’s hair from the first movie; with it slicked back like that, you need a pretty expensive wig to fake it. A friend suggested I go with Lucius instead, as the hair would be easier, but I didn’t think I could pass convincingly as an adult man. I even considered cutting my hair drastically short again, and bleaching it, just to simplify matters. However, pictures from the later movies show a lovely tousled mop, complete with bangs, that would be MUCH easier to do, so I started really warming to the idea.

The costuming, per se, wasn’t that challenging: shirt and pants from the thrift store; wand, tie, robe and sweater purchased(!) from a specialty store, even the wig was bought online and dressed by a friend. The first time I put it all on, to try it out at a con before the main event, the effect was really striking. Particularly while standing still, the quick first impression of “Draco” was very strong. But when I started to move, it quickly became clear that this would be one of the most challenging parts of the characterization. I believe I am something of a mimic, and my dance training allows me to really see how people move, and copy it better than most. In addition, for all my “sexy” costumes, it took me a long time to self-identify as female, and for many reasons, I still see myself on the tom-boy end of the female spectrum, but I was stunned at how much “girl” was in my body language. I knew that I let the girl in me “come up” more when at a con than I regularly do at work, but I hadn’t realized how different “not-female” movement was from “male” movement. I had chosen clunky boy’s shoes, which were not recreation-ist accurate, but weren’t completely out of character, which helped, but I found myself horribly conscious of my hands and stance, the tilt of my head and my use of personal space and precedence. Very, very strange. I soon became overwhelmed with trying to be Draco, and settled first for the male identity, figuring I could graft on the English accent (the voice was the other hardest thing that I doubt I will ever get right, as that is usually how folks identify me in a new costume; apparently, it’s pretty distinctive) and more of the character later. That helped, and I was able to draw on interesting sources for ideas and inspiration, most notably, the movie “Victor, Victoria” and the passages in Lois McMaster Bujold’s A Civil Campaign where a character returns to a strongly chauvinistic society after female-to-male transgender surgery, and is coached on proper male body language, attitude, movement, stance, etc. Also, Heinlein’s Double Star and Georgette Heyer’s The Masqueraders were helpful in identifying crucial points in this sort of characterization. (They say that, for a writer, anything you’ve ever done/seen/read becomes research. Didn’t realize this held true for costumers, as well.)

Oddly enough, it was pretty daunting to actually step out in the costume. I was much more anxious than I anticipated, which probably interfered with the characterization, as well. I had actually intended only to wear the costume for the afternoon, but became fascinated by the challenge. I sat on a technical panel where I was the only woman, and tried to project male while keeping up with the flow of the panel. I also found myself, then and afterwards, covertly studying the men around me, noting how they moved, stood, made (or didn’t make) eye contact; I was taking notes, copying, modifying, internalizing what I saw, seeing how I could make use of it.

Then I took an even bigger challenge and went Regency dancing! Messed with my mind a bit; not just having to dance the man’s part, which I had done before, but having to dance it as a man. Here, my dance training was both a help and a hindrance: on the one hand, I can control my body and movement; on the other hand, I had YEARS of experience to undo. I wanted to come off as a man, but not as a klutz, and it was really, really difficult. The worst part was holding hands in the dance, as I could never remember whether my hands should go on top or not (on the bottom, if I was holding a woman’s hands; with a man, it depended on who was the lead man), all while trying to sneer and not “sway so much”, as one of my friends who was critiquing me put it. Interestingly, I had little trouble remembering to bow instead of curtsy; maybe the slacks helped with that, though I’ve never had any trouble curtsying in jeans.

All in all, this has been a fascinating experience. I’m really glad I was able to “test drive” the costume in advance, as I have a childish need to see if I can really shock the folks this summer. This has all been a much bigger step out of my comfort zone than I anticipated, but I’m really glad now that I didn’t go for the easy solution. And I suspect I will be having fun as Draco for some time.

How Fleeting is Fame.....

2009-01-13T16:52:00.001-08:00

Just discovered that the video described in this post is no longer available. Sigh. It was fun while it lasted.....

Contingency Planning Rocks!

2009-01-05T11:18:00.001-08:00

Being an anal soul comes in handy once in a while! I was so busy putting tonight's dinner into the crock pot this morning (pot roast, yum!) I forgot to pack a lunch. But as the morning wore on I got this sneaking suspicion that I had something at work. Bingo! Last year, during a bad patch, where I didn't want to eat anything I had (I go off my feed for a variety of reasons), I bought several frozen meals and put them in the fridge at work, and I have two left. Score! I even have a choice of meals!

I know. It takes so little to rev me up. I need a life......

To Sleep, Perchance to Dream.....

2008-12-18T07:08:00.000-08:00

Let me just state, up front, that insomnia sucks. I know that there are many worse things, but here, at 3:47 in the morning, it's hard to think of many.

Let me start out by saying the time it took me to realize that I had insomnia is the best example of the damage it can do. I work in a highly technical, detail oriented field, that requires one to perform routine tasks with great attention to minutia. (O.K., my spelling is never good, and lack of sleep isn't helping), while simultaneously being ready to react to emergencies on a moment's notice. Yes, it's high stress, but I do actually love what I do. What I don't love is that, without enough sleep, my ability to do my job is seriously impaired.

The other issue is that, all modesty aside, I'm a pretty smart person. In addition, I'm smart in a lot of different areas, and pretty creative at problem solving. I tended to catch, or be able to mitigate, the errors that I was making. So, it took me a while to realize that I really was making a lot more errors than I ought. Then, my judgment being impaired, it took me even longer to realize what was at fault.

So, being the direct and linear soul that I am, when the penny finally dropped, I attacked the problem head on. I started making sure I was in bed for at least 7 hours a night. That's when I realized that being in bed does not translate automagically into getting sleep. I cruised the internet, looking for suggestions. I meditated. I drank herbal tea. I had already given up caffeine in grad school, at the strong recommendation of my homeopath (I still hold that at least partially responsible for the fact that I never finished). I ate heavy meals right before bed. I ate turkey. I had a glass of wine. I ate light meals before bed. I took warm showers right before bed. I tried yoga positions said to help with insomnia. I went to bed at the same time each night (well, sort of). I tried "good sleep hygiene": using the bed only for sleep or sex, not for reading or knitting or anything else; getting up if I lay awake for more than 20 minutes and trying to do something boring. (Side note: I'm actually finding it difficult to find something boring to do. Even my old standby, my organic chemistry book from undergrad days, failed me. Having only read bits and pieces of it, I decided to "start at the very beginning". Just my luck, the intro was all about the birth of modern organic chemistry, which just happened to have occur ed in the fabric dyeing industry. As an avid knitter who has dabbled in hand-dyeing yarn, I found it fascinating.) Finally, I tried OTC sleep medications; they worked for a while, but then I acclimated to them. Then began an interesting shell game, using various OTC sleep aids alternating with NyQuil and other antihistamines: using one for a night or two, then switching, taking the weekends off. I even tried progesterone cream, just in case this was an early sign of menopause. Few things helped and those that did didn't work for long.

Somewhere in all this, I visited my doctor, trying to get a prescription for something a little more potent. Bless her soul, she's thorough; she asked a zillion questions (even remembering that I work in space and asking about whether I had to do a lot of shift work, which messes up one's circadian rhythm) and wouldn't prescribe anything until she had sent me to a sleep specialist.

I have to admit, I was less than impressed with the sleep specialist; although he did listen to me and was willing to credit my assertion that stress was the major factor, he supported my GP's desire to make sure all the organic causes were ruled out. I have no problem with that; what bugs me is that he casually doled out to me three or four sample packets of prescription medication and told me to save them for nights when I really had to have a good night's sleep. What he didn't take into consideration is that I'm fairly small: 5' 4", between 120 and 130 lbs. Now, when I was younger, I always made sure that I got the lowest dose possible of any medication, at least to start out with. (Ask me sometime about the idiot shrink who had me on a triple dose of Prozac, along with something to counter the anxiety attacks it was causing, and which combination left me sobbing on the lobby floor of a hotel at a professional conference. Yeah, that did a lot of good for my professional image....) But it has seemed to be less of a problem in recent years, so I didn't worry about it.

Come Thanksgiving weekend, and I haven't had a decent night's sleep in a week. I'm scheduled to give a Cassini slide show Sunday at a local science fiction convention, and I'm starting to get a little punchy, so I take one of my "magic bullets" Saturday night.

Huge mistake. The thing is formulated for your average adult male, who probably weighs at least 50% more than I do. I slept like the dead for 9 hours, woke to the alarm (thank goodness for my anal-retentive tendencies!) feeling drunk and disoriented. Knew there was no way I could drive in that state, and wasn't too sure I'd be able to give my talk, even if I got a ride. For the first time in my life, I had to cancel out on that sort of commitment, and it really pissed me off. I remained groggy (not enough to sleep, damn it, but too much to watch football, which is saying something, for me) all freakin' day, only coming out of it late that evening. Of course, by that point, I was leery of taking anything that night; that, combined with the stupor I'd been in all day meant I got virtually no sleep that night, and was unable to go to work for two days, until my cycle settled down a bit.

So, that's where it stands. I need to do a sleep study: go to their facility, and be monitored through a night of sleep (or attempting to sleep) to confirm that I don't have restless leg, or apnea or something, before I can get a prescription. Being close to the holidays, I haven't yet shaken loose the time to do this, so I'm sitting here blogging instead of sleeping, because I couldn't stand laying there any longer. Goddess only knows how I'm going to focus in the all-day class I've got to go to today (last day of a 6-day series). I am reminded of a button I own:

"Sleep deprivation is neat! You see such pretty colors......"

Nerd Girls! I've Found My Tribe At Last!

2008-06-12T15:10:00.000-07:00

Saw this article in the online Newsweek, and was absolutely thrilled with their attitude! Can't wait until they get their website up and working, since I'm not on MySpace or FaceBook.

Bridget Egg-splains

2007-10-04T15:34:00.000-07:00

Did you know that the yolk of an almost-hard-boiled egg will explode in the microwave?

Ask me how I know.

On the upside, I finally got around to cleaning said microwave.....

From the Dungeon

2007-08-23T15:53:00.000-07:00

The building I work in is currently undergoing a remodel. In particular, the area where missions are run from is being extensively reworked (think jackhammers, arc welding and asbestos removal). Along the way, they are taking the opportunity to repaint and re-carpet.

Now, this is all well and good. I'm sure the building could use a little sprucing up. However, the color choices were made on the basis of what would make the huge (4 x 5 foo-ish) prints of images from various space missions look good. And let me just briefly explain that the only glass to the outside world on any floor of this building is in the doors on various levels. (one set of doors/level)That gives you the info to truly appreciate it when I tell you that they are painting the walls dark grey and putting in black carpeting.

I admit, they are not doing this in the actual spaces in which we work; it is just in the hallways that we have to traverse to get to and from our offices. And to and from the conference rooms. And to and from the bathrooms. Basically, to get anywhere but to the copier and the fridge. Ya know, we all thought this building was dark before this; I suspect we haven't seen anything yet. (And won't in the future, unless we have excellent night vision.)

Someone suggested putting up portholes, with pictures of tropical islands behind them (the grey is darker than battleship grey, but it feels similar). My impulse is to come in some night with black paint and paint in the blocks of a dungeon wall, complete with cobwebs and dripping water.....

One of Those Days

2007-08-21T13:04:00.000-07:00

Many years ago, when I was a little baby undergrad, I was having a really lousy day. I don't remember in particular what had gone wrong, but I remember clearly the feeling that the Universe(tm) was out to get me. I was changing for a dance class and more things were going wrong, when I whined rather pompously, "If ONE more thing goes wrong, I'm going home!"

Well, of course, you know what happens when you throw down a gauntlet like that to the Universe(tm). In this case, what happened was this: my wallet, which was in the back pocket of my corduroys, picked that moment to leap out of said pocket--and into the toilet next to me. Now, when the Universe(tm) says "Nyah!" to you that loudly, you just have to laugh. Which I did, and the whole rest of the day went better.

Well, I had a similar sort of day last week, with one startling difference: I started laughing from the very beginning. One thing after another went wrong, and I just kept laughing; sometimes ruefully, sometimes disbelievingly, but usually with at least some genuine humor involved.

The good news is, I'm sure it's a lot easier on my system to laugh at these things than to stomp around in a snit, the way I used to.

The bad news is, I'm still having those sorts of days, and laughing no longer re-routes them.

Hmmmmmmm.

Creating Monsters

2007-08-08T08:43:00.000-07:00

Have been listening to some old classic literature this year that I had never gotten around to before. It's interesting, in a lot of ways, but I'm also having some strong reactions.

First, I've found that I have to be in just the right mood to listen to them, because the old fashioned language and usage is somewhat opaque, and requires that I work harder to understand it and get into the story. Second, as a child of the 60's, who grew up on the 30-second commercial, I find that they are quite slow-paced for my taste, which can be good or bad, depending again on my mood. Thirdly, I'm hampered by having my first exposure to some of these stories be Hollywood's interpretation, and so have some difficulty in appreciating the original text. For example, Dracula, the book, is very different from the bits of Dracula movies I've seen over the years. And I had no idea that Robinson Crusoe was set in Elizabethan times; I had somehow got the idea that it was Victorian, or Regency at the very earliest.

But, I've really gotten torqued listening to Frankenstein. Again, the Hollywood interpretation had the monster be inarticulate and crude, unable to control his violence, at best, of evil intent, at worst. But that is totally at odds with what is presented in the book. First of all, Frankenstein creates the body, instead of stealing a dead one, so his horror of what the creature looks like when it is animated makes no sense. If he's so freakin' ugly, wouldn't Frankenstein have noticed that, before bringing him to life? And then, he just abandons the creature he has made, simply for the failing of being ugly. In fact, until halfway through the book, that is the monster's sole crime--to be ugly. My husband says that this is a function of the time the story was written in, that at that time, it was assumed that the beautiful were good and the ugly were evil, end of story. Not sure about that, but I do know that, if this was a representation of the ethics or morals of the scientists of the time, it's no wonder we got such a bad rep.

Let's get back to that abandoning thang. If Frankenstein had, indeed, decided that his creation did not deserve to live, then, by gum, he should have killed the monster himself, right at the beginning. Heinlein's quote is something along the lines of, "If it becomes necessary, a man shoots his dog himself." It's an issue of responsibility. I know, I know, Frankenstein falls ill right after the final experiment, but he had at least a day in which he could have done it. And why didn't he confine the creature in the first place? Again, irresponsible science.

So, it is not until after the creature manages to find a hiding place, learn language, learn ethics and caring (once he sees how hard the family has to work, he stops taking their food, and starts providing firewood, sweeping paths, etc.), all this after he has been run out of a village by being stoned, that he starts to become destructive. After he tries, and fails, to connect with the family he has been watching, and they run away, the creature burns their house down. But even at this point, he hasn't injured anyone. And the first death could arguably be an accident; it isn't clear that he meant to kill the boy, and he has remorse afterwards. His framing of Justine is a little out of place, and I don't think it flows naturally from the story; it feels somewhat contrived. And the creature has deep remorse at the end; granted, too late for all the dead bodies in his wake, but it is clear that he is not unremittingly evil.

Frankenstein, on the other hand, takes no responsibility for his actions. Yes, he wallows in guilt, but he does nothing to rectify the situation, until the very end, and is not successful in his aims before he dies. I guess I have to admit that, by not creating the partner the creature wants, he is taking some responsibility, but I feel that is too little, too late. And don't get me started on his inability to see that the creature will not kill him, Frankenstein, but those Frankenstein loves; maybe I'm being unfair to a character who did not grow up watching horror films and TV shows (EVERYONE knows you shouldn't go into the barn at night.....), but I find it hard to believe that that kind of sadistic twist was invented so recently. To my mind, the doctor was the monster, and monster was the victim, but I don't think that that was what the author was trying to convey.

It's possible I'm being unfair to Mary Shelley, in the same way I had trouble reading E.E.Doc Smith's Lensmen books. I kept feeling that they were trite and derivative, and had to keep reminding myself that all those books and movies I had seen with the same storylines had been copied from these books, not the other way around. So, maybe I'm not giving Ms. Shelley sufficient credit for, some would say, inventing the genre of speculative fiction, even if her effort still had a few rough edges. And maybe I'm wrong and she did mean for Frankenstein to come off as the bad guy, instead of the suffering hero. It just doesn't feel that way from the text.

UPDATE: I am reliably informed that she did, in fact, mean to convey this poor opinion of scientists. Huh.

But I AM A Rocket Scientist!

2007-08-02T16:05:00.000-07:00

O.K., I just spent the better part of an hour trying to figure out how to upload pics to my web page and position them properly....AND IT DIDN'T WORK!

C'mon folks! This CAN'T be THAT hard! Not to sound conceited, but dumber folks than me are able to do it easily; why am I having so much trouble? Macs are supposed to be good at this stuff! Am I just over-thinking it?

Gaaaagggghhh!

Decisions! Decisions!

2007-07-12T16:31:00.000-07:00

While parts of this year's CONvergence are still a little fuzzy in my head, I have the distinct impression that next year's theme is going to be "We're Going to Party Like it's 1999!" (Took me a while to figure out why, as I kept making fence post errors.....)

Now, for an "old school" SF fan like me, the obvious thing that springs to mind is: SPACE 1999. So, of course, I started doing online research because, while I'm old enough that I actually saw it when it aired (Hell! I think I even saw the pilot ep!) it's been a looooooooong time, and I haven't actually been trying to remember it. (It was pretty dreadful, as I recall.) I do have a patch and one 8x10, as I had some idea of doing the uniform for the historical masquerade at Costume Con in 1999, but that came to naught. Other than that, I have no references to draw from. I have to say that I was a little disappointed at what was available online, with one exception: this. Now, you gotta understand, this is RIGHT up my alley, stylistically. I've already made several things with powernet, as well as several evening gowns in the same vein, and I (if I say so myself) have the legs for a gown like this. However, I'm a little torn: should I do the uniform, which is more recognizable? or go for the gusto of this dress? Or should I just do them both?

Decisions! Decisions!

Home Again

2007-07-11T12:48:00.001-07:00

Just a note to say that I am safely back from CONvergence, where I had a blast! As they were last year, both the staff and the attendees were great, very friendly and welcoming. And I got to interview Lois McMaster Bujold! I think it went well, despite the fact that I was somewhat nervous about it. (Guess we'll have to wait for the DVD to get an objective view.)

Anyway, still digging out from under the work that piled up while I was gone, so will blog more about the con later. And, if you ever get the chance, check out CONvergence; great con, well run, good energy, and possibly the best d*mn room parties on the planet!

Getting in Touch with my Inner Zoe

2007-06-21T15:24:00.000-07:00

O.K., I may not be the last person in fandom to get hooked on Firefly, but I am well and truly behind the curve, at the very least, considering it's been cancelled for over 4 years. But, through the magic of DVDs and long lunch hours, I've been wallowing in the Firefly 'verse for a while, and thoroughly enjoying it, though with the bittersweet understanding that it was dead before I got here.

Was just re-watching "War Stories" today, and marvelling at the fact that an episode which contains graphic torture scenes is hysterically funny in places. I am once again amazed at how the networks can cancel shows with such great stories, writing, dialog, but most of all, great characters. Those people are very real to me, in part because I know analogs of most of them.

I have to say, though, that Zoe is a balm to my feminist soul. In some ways, she is the direct descendant of Uhura, but she is what Uhura was never allowed to be. Zoe is strong, and loving and intelligent and funny and sexy and tough and unflinching and quick and competent and brave and loyal and so many more things, things that men have always been allowed to be (not that they always were, but such men were not deemed "unrealistic"). She is not perfect, she makes mistakes, but she is such a wonderful, admirable character, it's just a tragedy that she is not known to more people. We need such characters, such people and we need to know that they are possible, and not a fantasy.

I admit, even though we own the DVD of the theatrical release movie "Serenity", I haven't yet watched it. I ran through all the episodes in quick succession, and am now running through them slowly, savoring them. I am holding off on the movie because, once I see it, that will be the end, and I just don't want it to be over. I know there will be questions unanswered, and that always drives me nuts, but it's more than that. It's that I need to feel that Mal and the gang are still out there, still running, still a family, a team, a crew, still living free. The Zoe in me needs to know that.

No "Fan-Girl"ing Allowed

2007-06-04T13:47:00.000-07:00

Many years ago, I was offered the chance to speak with Robert Heinlein on the phone. Now, you have to understand that I read everything I could get my hands on by Heinlein, and he was very influential in the formation of my concept of what a woman should be like, what she should do and be able to do. Yet, I declined the honor, knowing that I could say nothing he hadn't heard many times before, and fearing to sound like an idiot saying it.

Quite a few years later, I met J. Michael Strazyncki, shortly after the end of Babylon 5, when we were both guests of honor at a con, and I gibbered uncontrollably. Ever since then, I have tried to stay away from people around whom I feared I would act like a moron, with the sole exception of Lois McMaster Bujold, as she was so easy to talk to (and, I admit, Kate met her first, and insisted I talk with her. Thanks, Kate!). And even though David Weber is one of my favorite authors, and we were co-GoHs at Convergence, I was very leery of going "Fan Girl" all over him, so did not talk with him very much over the course of the weekend.

Well, it happened again at BayCon this weekend. I was called out of the audience of a panel to meet to an actual astronaut, and was introduced as a rocket scientist. I said I was delighted to meet her, thanked her for the picture that was taken of the two of us, then scurried back to my panel. I had seen her earlier, and it was obvious she was not a fan (not a con-attending fan, I should say), and I was somewhat uncomfortable, standing there in one of my many bimbo costumes. I only found out later that she had geeked out when, at her panel, James Hogan (who was GoH) had asked her a question, so she obviously reads the stuff. We would definitely have had things to talk about, even though I have never worked in the manned program. I was just self-conscious enough to not be comfortable, and that is sad.

Why did I feel this way? Lotta reasons. One is that it came at me cold; I wasn't expecting it, and I'm not too fast on my feet in social situations. Another is that I wanted to be an astronaut, applied to the program even. (Later, I was told by a woman who came that close to making it that you need both a pilot's license and a Ph.D to make it into the program, neither of which I have.) Even my family of origin plays into: being the youngest of a large family, I expect to be the slow one, to know less than everyone else around, to rank less, and that becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

But I also think it's more basic than that. Most women, and I would guess quite a few men, often have a feeling that they're faking it, passing, masquerading, that if people knew what they were really like, they wouldn't trust them or hire them or give them responsibility. So many of us feel like impostors, actors, building and shoring up facades; so many have no confidence. Some pretend better than others; some actually do have the confidence they project. But, from everything I've read and seen and heard, they are few and far between.

What I can't decide is if that is a failing or a virtue on our parts. Keeping on when one is terrified takes great courage; trying things we aren't certain we can do stretches us, makes us stronger. But it would be wonderful if we could do these things with a sense of hope, and of companionship with those around us. The saddest part of all is that the fear keeps us from sharing, and so knowing that others feel the same.

Best Laid Plans......

2007-05-02T10:53:00.000-07:00

O.K., I did have a plan, it just didn't work out, alright?

Last summer, I was Science GoH at a Minnesota SF convention called CONVergence, and had a blast! They took great care of me, the audiences for my panels were great, the other panelists were great, and they throw totally awesome parties. Made a whole lot of new friends and eventually decided to go back this year, on my own nickle. But, in the meantime, MISFITS (the non-profit group that runs CONVergence) had invited me to come back and speak in their In the Schools program, where they bring scientists, engineers, writers, etc. in to local schools. AND they planned the school visits so that I could play in their annual Trivia Contest. Totally cool.

This is all right up my alley. One of my concerns in life is to reach out to young girls and encourage them to pursue their interest in science and math. I've done a little online mentoring, and rarely turn down a chance to talk at a school. I was excited and a little scared when I found out just how many kids I would be talking to: nearly 600 over the course of 2 days, ranging from 2nd graders to high schoolers. So, I put together a geared-down version of my usual Cassini talk, packed up a bazillion book marks and stickers and off I went.

The first day went great. Farnsworth Elementary School is an aerospace elemetary school, which meant, 1) I was preaching to the choir and 2) they have their own flight simulators, and I got to ride in one! Woot! Talked to 2nd through 6th graders, they had great questions, and were very involved. I even got to talk with some of the parents at lunch, which was great. I am so envious of these kids; I would have LOVED a school like this when I was their age! (They do, however, have a bit of a rough time when they get to middle school, since there is no equivalent middle school, so they have to go to a standard school. That's GOT to be a let-down, after what these kids do and learn in their elementary years!)

Went out that evening with some of the friends I had made last summer, (hey! Perrin and Jeff!) had a great time, and was pretty well pooped by the time I hit the hay.

Unfortunately, that's where things started going south. I became dreadfully ill that night: flu-like symptoms, including body aches, wicked sort throat, headache, but, oddly enough, no fever. (Would have been convinced it was strep, if I'd had a fever, so I was checking for it pretty obsessively.) Slept in hour to hour-and-a-half increments, and was pretty much a basket case by morning. Went down to the hotel restaurant, had tea and toast, went back up to my room, went back to bed.

Now, them as knows me know that I'm one of those nervous folks. I need to be doing something, building, making, reading. So, when I tell you that I did nothing that day, it's an indication of just how bad off I was. I didn't knit (I had brought _5_ projects, just to give you a clue). I didn't read. I didn't listen to my recorded book. I didn't even watch TV. I tried to sleep some, but it didn't really work; I mostly just laid there and felt miserable.

Did participate in the Trivia contest (again, the fact that I got the wrong conversion for 8 into binary and screwed up the definition of UHF gives you an idea of just how out of it I was) and my team, the Space Cadets, managed not to come in last, woot! Crashed as soon as the contest was over, hoping that the wine I had drunk would at least get me some much-needed sleep. (You don't want to know how I screwed up the sock I was knitting while at the contest. Pain killers+illness+wine+complicated sock pattern=very ugly result.)

Sunday was a repeat of Saturday, with dinner with the concom folks replacing the Trivia Contest in the evening. (Wasn't sure, by then, if I was feeling better, or just getting accustomed to the pain.) Tried to be optimistic, but I had two more schools to speak (croak) at on Monday, and was worried the my flesh simply wouldn't hold out. My angels of mercy, Linda and Anton, who gave me a ride to and from dinner, were kind enough to take me by a drug store to pick up more drugs, and even spotted me when I realized that I had come out w/o money or ID. (Sigh. I really don't like it when my brain doesn't work.)

Was able to sleep a little better on Sunday night (Chloroseptic? Exhaustion? You be the judge.) and so was able to carry out my duties on Monday, as planned. (My liason for the day was wonderful; she talked all day, so I wouldn't have to, bless her! Thanks, Amada!) Fortunately, when I get going on my talk, adrenaline or endorphins or something kicks in, and I really don't notice the pain, so I was almost my normal self for those talks.

However, when I finally got back home on Tuesday, I went straight to Urgent Care. The doctor took one look, went, "Whoa." and wrote a prescription for penicillin. (He said the original problem was probably viral, but that I had secondary infections going by that point, so he wanted to hit it with a BIG hammer.) Sure enough, about 36 hours after the first pill, I started to improve, so I guess you never know: a new strain of strep that doesn't have a fever? Who knows. Here's hoping that I didn't "share" with all of MISFITS folks or the kids I spoke to that week.....

The point of all this is that I got cheated out of my fun time, damnit! I LOVE speaking to kids, get really energized by it, but this time it was like slogging through mud, some of which was in my head. And I had really been looking forward to the Trivia Contest, and seeing all the fun folks I had met the previous summer, but tried not to breathe on folks too much, lest I infect. Sigh. Just not fair.

And the OTHER other thing is that I had planned on blogging heavily while I was out of town. Whether or not I posted while I was out there, I had wanted to get down some impressions, and other things that I had been wanting to share, and just hadn't had time for; figured a weekend in the hotel would give me a perfect opportunity.

Nuts.

My Warhol Moment

2007-04-03T10:45:00.000-07:00

Squeeee! SpaceGrrl is finally up!

Last year at WorldCon, I was interviewed by Brad, who is doing a project for Yahoo! on, basically, sub-cultures. I had heard about him through costumers, as that was one group he was interested in profiling, and, from what I could see, he was willing to deal fairly with us, not point and shout, "Eeewww! Look at the freaks! Aren't they funny?" which is what SF fandom and costuming have come to expect from most outside the community. Then, I happened to run into him at WorldCon, while I was dressed as Yeoman Rand, and while he was making this video (you may have to refresh a few times, to get past the ads; and you might want to try different browsers. Netscape doesn't seem to ever go to the video after the commercials, though Safari does.). He decided to do a video on me alone, as well as including me in the one about fandom as a whole.

First, I'm so relieved that I don't look like an idiot. (After talking and emailing with him, I wasn't worried about Brad, just self-conscious that I'd look like a dork, despite anything he could do.) Second, I think I come off pretty well in both videos, and got a huge ego-boo out of watching them. (O.K., I'm vain; I know, you would never have guessed.) And the kicker of it is, I had email from Brad a week or so ago letting me know that the site was going live soon, but I didn't hear about it actually being up from him--a friend of mine saw an ad on Yahoo, and said, "Hey, that looks a lot like Bridget...." and followed the links, then sent me a note. (Hi, Craig! And thanks!) Ain't nuthin like viral propagation on the 'net!

Anyway, I'm jazzed that the videos are up, and will be interested to see if any of my other friends stumble across it and let me know.

P.S.(Just a note: I didn't intentionally channel Jodie Foster from"Contact", but it kinda looks like that in the video....)

Lab Supplies

2007-03-12T15:00:00.000-07:00

Was just sent this site and REALLY want to qualify for the "inappropriate nocturnal use of lab equipment in the name of alternative science experimentation/communication" badge, so I'll tell you a little story about me and fleas........

The summer between my freshman and sophmore years in college, I worked at the NASA Ames Research Center, in a high vacuum lab, and shared a house with 4 other students and my then-boyfriend Biker Guy. The adventures involved in actually getting a place to live were many and varied, so, by the time we finally got the house that we stayed in for most of the summer, it could have been next door to the Manson Family and we would have taken it. As it was, it was a pretty nice house, for about two weeks. Then, the flea eggs that had evidently been in the carpet hatched and life became insane, for me, at least.

For some reason, some people are more susceptible to flea bites than others. My dad and I are on the "yummy" end of the flea's taste spectrum, while Biker Guy and most of the other tenants fell into their "won't bite on a bet" range. This meant that, while I was literaly covered in bites, they were not being bit. Being the only female in the house didn't add to my credibility; they just felt I was whining, even BG, who was not very sympathetic.

After a month or so of this, I was going a little nuts. Nothing kept the fleas off, nothing seemed to kill enough of them to make any difference. I was getting desperate. So, I hatched a plan with a friend. We smuggled a dewar of liquid nitrogen out of the lab and spent the evening pouring it over the carpets in my bedroom and the living room, trying to kill both fleas and eggs. Didn't work too well, but we did have fun freezing and shattering stuff. And my friend got the dewar back on lab the next day, with no one the wiser.

Adventures in Life--Living Out Loud

2007-03-05T15:54:00.000-08:00

Recently got hooked on a knitblog called Crazy Aunt Purl. She's witty and funny and has chronicled the journey as she went through a divorce and a re-birth of her life, including her readers in her voyage of discovery to find herself. In doing so, she has helped others recognize and understand things in their lives, served as an example and a ground-breaker for those of us who are following her on this trek, and as an indicator of progress for those who trod this path before her. Sometimes she's spit-tea-on-your-monitor funny, sometimes sad, sometimes poigniant, often insightful, and she has cats and knits, too! What's not to love?

I've been very intrigued by her technique of "living out loud"--putting what's she's going through right out there in front of God and everybody, the good, the bad and the drunken. It's a brave way to be, and not one I've ever considered, but reading along with her adventures and ups and downs has given me new insights on myself. She is very asute and painfully honest, and I'm starting to think that this might be a better way to live.

As it turns out, CAP and I live very close to one another, but, rather than track her down and invite myself to her next party, I thought I would take the less-stalker-like approach and try meeting her at the West Hollywood Stitch and Bitch, which she attends on a frequent basis. Though I'm usually busy on Thursday nights, which is when they meet, my shrink was out of town last week, and that gave me the opportunity to finally meet Laurie and tell her how much I've enjoyed her blog.

An interesting thing happened, though: I got kind of shy, thinking about going to meet folks that I had read about on CAP and leary of meeting a whole group of new people. Since I regularly go to science fiction conventions where I know few, if any, folks, it kind of surprised me that I would feel this way. But, in trying to describe the difference to a friend, I said of SF cons, "Well, but they weren't really strangers; they were family I hadn't met yet."

So, I am left with two different revelations: SF fandom is my family, the one I've chosen, warts and all, for myself and for my future. And second, I can, and should, reach out to people, and to life, break out of the safe/known worlds and into uncertainty and possibility.

Book recommendation

2007-02-28T10:48:00.000-08:00

Being several sigma off the norm on many scales has it's down-sides: I end up exposed to a lot of advertising which is not designed with my interests in mind, and I often have a need for things that don't exsist, not because no one has thought of them, but because there is no market for them. But, when someone does decide to aim for me AND hits the nail squarely on the head, it's golden.

Recently started reading a fantasy series that I was exposed to at WorldCon, when they included the first chapter or so of the first book as part of the freebies given out to each con attendee. I was intrigued enough to buy the first two books of the series, but hadn't gotten around to reading them until recently. The author is Naomi Novik, and the books are His Majesty's Dragon, Throne of Jade, and Black Powder War, and I am really enjoying them.

It's not often that a fantasy book is set in any other period than a bastardized version of the Renaissance or Middle Ages, but these are set in Napoleonic times and Ms. Novik has done her research, at least to my half-trained eye. I've listened to most of the Patrick O'Brian novels, re-read Jane Austen and Georgette Heyer incessantly, and what is in these novels rings true to both. The mind-set of the characters, the social interactions, even the sea scenes show a deep understanding of the period. It's such an unusual combination of interests; I keep wanting to recommend them to people, but can't think of many people who would be interested in both aspects of the book, and the combination of the the two is what delights me so about them.

And the writing ain't bad, either. The characters are sympathetic and admirable, though definitely not perfect, and even the villians are believable and consistent, both with themselves and with the time and place. I don't know whether these are her first efforts (there is some sense of the novice writer in the books) but they are quite good, and I will be looking forward to more in the future from Ms. Novik. Oh, and going on Amazon later today to get the third book.....

Hyphenation Carryover

2007-01-03T10:58:00.000-08:00

Years ago, when I was on Mars Pathfinder, part of my job was to take mission flight rules (specifications for things that we were not allowed to do with the s/c) and code them up, so that the sequencing s/w could check to see if any of the commanding was violating these rules. Not all of them could be checked that way, since not all of the flight rules related to things that were commanded: e.g., if the restriction was "don't let this piece of hardware go below this temperature", there was no commanding that could directly violate that. (Obviously, if you turn a heater off, you might end up violating the FR, but turning the heater off, in and of itself, was not a violation.) Anyway, after suffering with poorly written, contradictory, or confusing rules, after spending time tracking people down and making them clarify this or that, I swore that SOMEDAY, *I* would be in charge of flight rules document on some project, and the rules would, by GOD, be written RIGHT! :-)

While that has not yet come to pass, it is interesting how this experience has affected me. I've recently started writing my first knitting patterns that might possibly be used by someone else, and I find myself going back again and again, clarifying things, making things more explicit, trying to figure out where things could be misinterpreted and re-writing so that any confusion is avoided.

It's funny; I've always known how my hobbies gave me insight and parallax on problems at work. It never occurred to me that the process might work in both directions.

Woo-hoo! Happy days are here again!

2006-11-29T09:12:00.000-08:00

Earlier this year, I was Science GoH at Convergence in Minneapolis. I had a fantastic time, they treated me great, and I have been scheming ever since, trying to find a way that I could go back next year, on my own nickel. Then yesterday, I found out that my favorite author, Lois McMaster Bujold (if you haven’t read her yet—DO SO! IMMEDIATELY!) will be GoH at next year’s Convergence. That settled it—I didn’t know how I would do it, but I was going, no question. I figured I’d need on the order of $600 to do it. I had almost that much in my “Mad Money” stash, but that would leave me with almost nothing in that fund for about the next year. Not a pleasant prospect.

Then, last night, one of the women who are kind enough to carry my corsets to various craft and historical faires to sell called and said that they had sold some of my corsets, and, you guessed it, my share came to almost exactly $600. I was stoked!

Sometimes, life is good!

What Are We, Chopped Liver?!?

2006-10-18T14:11:00.000-07:00

O.K., I've worked in this biz for 17 years, and there are some home-truths that are clear and unchangeable:

Mars is sexier than any other planet (Earth included)
Landers are sexier than orbiters
Rovers are sexier than landers
The public and the press have a short memory for success, and an elephantine one for failures.

I admit to all of the above, but it still really frosts my fanny that the MER rovers seem to be the only thing reported on AND are (incorrectly!) given as the only things we're working on or have EVER worked on. It's as if they constitute the entirety of the unmanned US space program.

The most recent episode that got my goat was when I went on Amazon to order a bazillion copies of the new book _Saturn: A New View_ . (I'm giving it to all my friends and family for Christmas, and NOT just because I'm in it OR because a friend of mine is one of the authors, but because it is a SPECTACULAR book with stunning images and great info.) Anyway, Amazon does the old "people who bought this book also viewed/bought these...." and in that list was a book with a subtitle The First Photographer on Mars. Now, unless the author was on the imaging team for Viking, that is flat out WRONG! He is on the MER team, and the pic on the front of the book was from MER, so it looks like yet another instance of the Ares-centric view which appears to be so pervasive.

Don't get me wrong, I'm a Martian at heart. All other things being equal, I would rather work on Mars, partly for the reasons listed above, partly because I've always loved Mars. But it galls and frustrates me that all the work we did on Pathfinder just.....vanishes, as if it never existed. Viking, too, is completely ignored, despite an enormous data set that grad students are still plodding through to this day. And, frankly, though the MER rovers and missions were very different from Pathfinder, they would never have gotten off the ground, if Pathfinder had never existed.

Now, I'm not taking anything away from the MER team; they have accomplished incredible things, far longer and better than anyone had any idea of before they launched. And working on Mars, with a small team, is no picnic; you have to choose to work on Mars time, in which case you're time-skewed from the people around you, your family in particular, or you have to decide to limit your activities on Mars to those which can be planned and built only during "reasonable" hours, JPL local time (for suffieciently loose definitions of "reasonable").

Not even really sure where the blame lies, if there is blame to lay. I just feel that there should be SOME coverage of the marvels we're discovering at Saturn and SOME acknowledgement of the historical context in which these missions are designed, built, and run. And, for heaven's sake, get the facts right, will ya?

Harumph.

A Late Report from WorldCon

2006-09-13T16:29:00.000-07:00

Had a fabu time at WorldCon (the 65th World Science Fiction Convention, held this year in Anaheim, California, practically in my backyard). Was sinfully indulgent, having a room to myself part of the time (though part of the time I shared it with the Alien from our Masquerade entry). Was on a blurt-load of panels, which I love--I get to show off my costumes, have people pay attention to me and listen to what I say, and get to shoot off my mouth on several topics on which I know a little more than the average bear--what's not to like? The Cassini Science talk went well, and I think the Inside Cassini panel did too--several of my co-workers came to the con, too, and we talked about what it is like to work on a space mission, Cassini in particular.

The parties, at which I drank heavily (well, heavily for me; a friend recently said that I get snockered just smelling the cork), were great, though I swear it was like Hogwarts; the rooms kept moving. If we were trying to find a party, it was nowhere to be found; once we managed to locate it, we couldn't get AWAY from it. But, maybe that was due to the alcohol.....

Our entry in the Masquerade went well--Thomas' smoke machine worked wonderfully! And everyone laughed in all the right places, so hey! That's all you can ask for, especially in a competition that tough. Some truly amazing entries.

Was interviewed by several people while wearing "Yeoman Rand" (sans belly) the day after the Masquerade, including the woman from NPR's Marketplace--who never even bothered to ask what I did for a living. Amusing. Hope she Googled me, though she'll probably think it's someone else of the same name......

Intro

2006-08-18T11:26:00.000-07:00

This will be a repository of reference material on various subjects, for my own use and that of others.

"Samantha-safe recipes": My daughter Samantha has galactosemia, a genetic condition in which she cannot metabolize the milk sugar galactose. This section contains links, lists of allowable ingredients, and recipes with appropriate substitutions, as a reference for those who may have to feed Sam.

"Sewing/crafting articles/hints": This is a collection of articles I have written describing various techniques, along with directions and/or patterns that I have designed in various crafts: sewing, knitting, and counted cross stitch, in particular.

"My Day Job": I am an engineer at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. Currently, I am a Sequencer on the Cassini mission to Saturn.

"Mars Pathfinder journals": My favorite mission so far has been the Mars Pathfinder project, the first Martian rover. I worked on it from around '94 until end of mission, which was fall of 97/spring 98 (these things get fuzzy, after a while). During that time, I wrote journal articles, primitive blog entries really, that were aimed at middle-school students, girls in particular, about what it was like to be working on Pathfinder, but also about what was going on in my life at the time.