{ updating from ljgate.com because the net is still being a bitch. }

[delga]

The net is being a bitch today. I'm actually typing this as a draft in gmail as that's about the only page that will load properly.

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Just watched the latest Battlestar.

OH, WHAT THE FUCK JUST HAPPENED?

I think the most surprising thing in the episode - other than STARBUCK frakking DYING - was the way in which I was totally unprepared for it to be the end of the episode. Considering how difficult it's been for me to sit through an episode of anything over the weekend (1 hour shows took me 2 hours to watch), it surprised me that this episode seemed to go so fast. I thought the ship blowing up was the third act closer, not her actual death. Which, by the way, is so crazy traumatic that I cannot find the words. But yeh, I saw the end title card and was like, what? Already? IT'S OVER AND SHE'S DEAD, WHAT?

I wonder if she's a cylon? Hmm.

Her mother quite obviously explains a lot. That shot of her slamming the kid's hand in the door went straight through me. My hand numbed in horrified sympathy. Shudder. Also, her destiny was... to die? Her mother spent her entire life preparing Kara to...blow up? Lose her nut and commit suicide? Hallucinate about a cylon? I don't even know. (I do know, however, that every time I go to type cylon, it comes out 'cyclone'. I'd blame this on my brain not liking fake words but I deal with frak and huzzah and a hundred Meishisms, so that can't be it.)

But yeah. I'm just completely shell-shocked right now. And really upset that Kara and Adama's father-daughter relationship only resurfaced at the very end when it was too late (!!!) Actually, Kara accepting the Lee/Dualla thing should have been a clue as to how the episode was going to go, right? Not to mention her unholy fixation on death. And now I sort of understand the Leoben thing. It's not him she's afraid of, it's death, and Leoben's image comes to represent that.

(I know there's a whole faction of fandom that hates Starbuck but I have never ever been in that faction, ever, and this is a startling plot development. However, I sort of understand - there's nowhere else for Kara to go. She's been the win it all, she was surpassed, she fell from grace and then she was nothing, because she was nothing if she couldn't be a pilot. And that's a miserable thing, but it's a true. This was literally the end of the line for Kara. Unless she's a cylon, which is totally possible with this damn show.)

How awful for the fleet, though. Starbuck, more than Kat, was a staple of that place and now, suddenly, she's gone and they're still floating around, lost in space. It's sad, and a little lonely.

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Gmail keeps giving me this piece of information:

Reuters: Oddly Enough - Traumatic memories easier to recall than happy ones

All I can think is duh, flashbulb memory. I miss psychology.

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Was talking earlier about how Native Son filled me with rage at certain parts of the novel. I always thought I was pretty clear cut with race but after this book, I'm not so sure. I think we're supposed to have sympathy of some variety for the protagonist in this novel but I have none. In fact, I get really, truly angry at him.

My housemate, T, is from the States and she's read this book, ad she's read it in the original context (sort of) which is why I was talking to her. I told her that it inspires frustration and anger in me and she said, "Well, it's supposed to." But I don't think it's supposed to act on the reader in quite the same way that I am receiving it. I used to spend a lot of time thinking about race and recently I've sort of put that aside because it wasn't constructive thought (it revolved a lot around how to label factions of the community and if and why we should, and how that effects me and the people that I know; Omid Djalili's stand-up really brought those questions back to me last night and today) but this book is really kicking up a fuss in my head. I'm really angry about the book, and it's a surprising emotion.

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I spent the rest of the day messing around in PS (NCIS icons, mostly Hollis Mann, which is unsurprising considering my new love affair with the character) and researching for the group project. I'm going to pick an article for the critical reading assessment and make notes on it - tomorrow I can make the plan and write the first 500 words. I was supposed to email the tutor, too, but that can wait. (Verily my weekend off was detrimental to my ability to give a damn. Niiice.)

Oh, SLS is writing my character reference for me, yay. WP has just had a hip operation which I totally forgot she was going in for. SK has relinquished the Deputy Head of 6th Form position. I knew he was planning on doing that, but not so soon. It's quite shocking to me. It's been a somewhat unsettling evening, what with all these unexpected happenings, fictional and real. I have no real yen to do anything, just like old times.

Have been listening to Patty Griffin's Tony a lot. Am disturbed by how anthemic the song is considering its topic. I'm playing Chapman's Devotion again, but only really as background noise. I'm not really paying attention to it. But listening to Tony is not healthy.

OK, off to do a little bit of work before going to sleep. I have a group meeting tomorrow and then a lecture, so I need to get cracking with this On Reading malarkey, especially considering I have all this reading to do, too.