Azkatraz: Day 1 (The apparition of normalcy.)
I suppose I've waited on this entry because I had too much to say and that was my cue to just continue living. You know, like Wordsworth and his reflections in peace and solitude, though I have little to say about daffodils or the transience of life.
Anyway, my life has changed radically, then again, I think this journal is a catalogue of the radical changes in my life. This most recent one was my week/weekend/"same-fucking-day" at Azkatraz in San Francisco.
Naively, I believed that this would be another academic conference, except that I could (blessedly!) take for granted some elements of Harry Potter and I wouldn't have to explain what slash is (the process of which has burned at least one academic bridge in my career). I even blocked out which panels I would attend in advance, regretting that I couldn't have a time-turner to split myself between my Social Justice panel and the Snape panel.
Well, you know, life has a way of being far smarter than your plans, as my weekend turned into:
All generously funded by the UCLA's undergraduate research center. How perverse.
While I don't have time for a full report at the moment, I'll start with day 1, aka Half-Blood Prince at the Metreon.
Day 1: HbP at midnight (roughly).
Bought Lupin costume at various thrift stores. I was disappointed that I couldn't find a suitable blazer, but Julia remembered that I had an academic-looking corduroy jacket...though it had antifreeze on it and was dryclean only. My solution? Drag it through the shower and hang it out to dry in the half-hour that we had to departure.
I drank generous amount of Glenlivet waited as Julia attempted to dye her hair-tips pink for her Tonks costume. She hated Lupin/Tonks, but could deal with subersive lesbian!Lupin/Tonks. In the car, I applied mustache v1 with a cheap eyebrow pencil, which looked like a chocolate milk stain. At the metreon, we got in line with Katie, an intelligent, precocious 14-year-old dressed as Tonks (complete with a blue-haired baby Teddy) and her mom. Her mom is either very laissez-faire or very dense, as she allowed her daughter to hang with two twentysomething, drunk, lesbian college students. At some point, I ducked away from group and accosted Fox, photographer extraordinaire and friend from UCLA (oh, Chaucer with Professor Allen) following her as she accosted costumers. (Oh, Mistress Accost.) Trying to be "in-character," I gave a "call me" to a Tonks who, when viewed fully, couldn't have been older than 15. Whoops.
Random moment that I can't place in time. People were doing Wizard Trivia and asked, "When did dragon breeding become illegal?" Me: "That's illegal? Oh shit."
At some point, I lost Fox and met Crystal and Tawny. Crystal has an interesting constellation of genetic traits that make her look EXACTLY LIKE SNAPE. I thought she was a guy. My first words to Crystal: "You're the other half of my OTP." We hung out, eventually sneaking Crystal and Tawny to our spot in the line. She was nervous, but I said that her costume was too dead-on for anyone to complain. (And was right.) Continued salivating over costumers. Met James, who was dressed as a scintillating Pansy Parkinson, and wondered if it would be in-character to flirt back. Took pics, including a pimp!Lupin with 5 Tonks-es. Started getting this rock star charge that continued throughout the weekend, especially when I was asked: "Hey, Lupin, we're taking pictures of the Professors." Me? A Hogwarts professor? What a trip.
Watched HbP...counted 23 gay references. Paid $20 for parking...oh, San Francisco. I wanted to go to the podcast, but Julia was way too tired, so we drove back to Berkeley and passed out until the next day...but not before I rambled ecstatically about cosplay and gender subversion and OMG I SHOULD TELL JUDITH BUTLER--I WANT TO WRITE AN ETHNOGRAPHY ON COSPLAY AND GENDER PERFORMANCE!!!! You can tell I love something when I say that I want to write a dissertation about it.
Anyway, my life has changed radically, then again, I think this journal is a catalogue of the radical changes in my life. This most recent one was my week/weekend/"same-fucking-day" at Azkatraz in San Francisco.
Naively, I believed that this would be another academic conference, except that I could (blessedly!) take for granted some elements of Harry Potter and I wouldn't have to explain what slash is (the process of which has burned at least one academic bridge in my career). I even blocked out which panels I would attend in advance, regretting that I couldn't have a time-turner to split myself between my Social Justice panel and the Snape panel.
Well, you know, life has a way of being far smarter than your plans, as my weekend turned into:
All generously funded by the UCLA's undergraduate research center. How perverse.
While I don't have time for a full report at the moment, I'll start with day 1, aka Half-Blood Prince at the Metreon.
Day 1: HbP at midnight (roughly).
Bought Lupin costume at various thrift stores. I was disappointed that I couldn't find a suitable blazer, but Julia remembered that I had an academic-looking corduroy jacket...though it had antifreeze on it and was dryclean only. My solution? Drag it through the shower and hang it out to dry in the half-hour that we had to departure.
I drank generous amount of Glenlivet waited as Julia attempted to dye her hair-tips pink for her Tonks costume. She hated Lupin/Tonks, but could deal with subersive lesbian!Lupin/Tonks. In the car, I applied mustache v1 with a cheap eyebrow pencil, which looked like a chocolate milk stain. At the metreon, we got in line with Katie, an intelligent, precocious 14-year-old dressed as Tonks (complete with a blue-haired baby Teddy) and her mom. Her mom is either very laissez-faire or very dense, as she allowed her daughter to hang with two twentysomething, drunk, lesbian college students. At some point, I ducked away from group and accosted Fox, photographer extraordinaire and friend from UCLA (oh, Chaucer with Professor Allen) following her as she accosted costumers. (Oh, Mistress Accost.) Trying to be "in-character," I gave a "call me" to a Tonks who, when viewed fully, couldn't have been older than 15. Whoops.
Random moment that I can't place in time. People were doing Wizard Trivia and asked, "When did dragon breeding become illegal?" Me: "That's illegal? Oh shit."
At some point, I lost Fox and met Crystal and Tawny. Crystal has an interesting constellation of genetic traits that make her look EXACTLY LIKE SNAPE. I thought she was a guy. My first words to Crystal: "You're the other half of my OTP." We hung out, eventually sneaking Crystal and Tawny to our spot in the line. She was nervous, but I said that her costume was too dead-on for anyone to complain. (And was right.) Continued salivating over costumers. Met James, who was dressed as a scintillating Pansy Parkinson, and wondered if it would be in-character to flirt back. Took pics, including a pimp!Lupin with 5 Tonks-es. Started getting this rock star charge that continued throughout the weekend, especially when I was asked: "Hey, Lupin, we're taking pictures of the Professors." Me? A Hogwarts professor? What a trip.
Watched HbP...counted 23 gay references. Paid $20 for parking...oh, San Francisco. I wanted to go to the podcast, but Julia was way too tired, so we drove back to Berkeley and passed out until the next day...but not before I rambled ecstatically about cosplay and gender subversion and OMG I SHOULD TELL JUDITH BUTLER--I WANT TO WRITE AN ETHNOGRAPHY ON COSPLAY AND GENDER PERFORMANCE!!!! You can tell I love something when I say that I want to write a dissertation about it.