el tercer ojo

Not a Party Report

Last summer I wrote a sort of short story about a furniture fantasy involving an ad for a Chesterfield sofa.  Recently Casey Morgan blogged about the attractiveness of said leather furniture under a blog entry called When Furniture Is Hot.  

So last night as I was surfing a bit and thinking about bedtime I found this picture.  Have I mentioned I've got a thing for Clive Owen? Oh, I suspect I have, even without his having given an on-screen spanking in Shoot 'Em Up.

Yes, okClive Owen is smoking in this picture, which generally does spoil spanking fantasies for me, but I'm willing to be flexible.

Btw, when I finally get back to the rest of the party reports, I'll be able to tell of a conversation about Clive Owen spanking the lovely Amy Hunter.  

Clive, if you're reading, Amy says it would be okay with her.   Just send her an email.

Countdown to London

After a weekend spent caretaking an elderly friend so his wife could have a bit of a break (they have a pool so it's been fun as well as a bit challenging), Paul and I are off tomorrow for a trip to Britain. We're leaving in less than 24 hours and I'm not even packed.  Though we're only going to be their two weeks, the time seems packed with an almost disorienting combination of visits with relatives, scene friends and a trip to the Edinburgh festival.

It will be important not to mix the scene friends and the relatives up -- I had a dream last night where in a jet lagged blur I absent-mindedly wore my new gymslip to a dinner with my inlaws. This  couldn't really happen only because I'm not taking my gymslip. (It's with me after all at the request of my beloved -- so the danger persists.)  Otherwise I'm completely capable of such a mistake.  The only bright spot in the nightmare was the knowledge that Paul would be even more
embarrassed than me.  Trust me, that doesn't happen very often.

I'm not planning on bringing my laptop -- my mac powerbook is a creaky 10 this year and I can't justify the 8 pounds of excess weight (maybe Santa will bring me a macbook air) so my internet access will be only as frequent as I can pry Paul's laptop out of his selfish, hard and large hands.

It's been a great weekend though.  My birthday present finally came. It's a new bike -- a hot pink Hello Kitty beach cruiser (picture here -- you can click for a larger version).  This very special gift, even cooler in person  and speaks to my Hello Kitty desires which I will try and remember to write to you about another time.   

Sadly, I've barely had a chance to actually ride it yet and only just around the block, but whenever he's missing me, Paul goes into our friend's garage and finds me stroking it in a loving yet slightly disturbing fashion.

Anyway, we're about to leave for London as I write this.  I'm bringing a journal so with any luck I'll be able to write some dispatches as computer and 'net access allows.  In any case, if I go silent for a few weeks, you now know where I am.  If you miss me, tell Paul to share his computer.  (Note: he's not selfish.  We share everything else.  But our computers seem to be a share too far.

When we get back it will be almost time for Shadow Lane in Vegas.  I'm looking forward to getting together with some of PB authors (Iris, sparkle and Bridget will be there) and (hopefully) getting to call the others at the same time so we can all wish Iris much happiness in her coming (and happily spanko) marriage.

August looks to be a very good month. 

What is it about robots?

One way in which my dad and I are alike is that we both love to go to movies. In fact, growing up, I remember us as going to see a movie and then out to dinner every Friday night. I'm sure we really didn't go every Friday, but enough so that's what my memory is. He's always liked to see whatever the newest, hottest movie is the weekend (if not the first night) it opens.

I do too. The first / midnight showing if possible.

When the first Star Wars film came out in May of 1977, my family went on the opening Friday afternoon. Or rather, we would have gone except that when we got to our local San Diego theater, it was already sold out. My mother suggested we pick another film. My dad had another idea. He bundled us all into the car, went over to a pay phone and made a call. When he came back, he announced that we were going to get an early dinner at McDonald's (a huge treat in itself as we rarely had fast food) and then we were driving to Palm Springs for their evening show. The manager had apparently promised to set aside 4 tickets (and besides hardly anyone was in Palm Springs in May). So we drove an hour and a half to another city just so we could see this great new thing. It was great too.

I mention it not just to point out why I love film and take it seriously, but because I fell in love that day. Unlike so many of my friends, it wasn't with Han Solo either. I fell in love with R2-D2. So much so that it's hard for me to feel menaced by the Doctor Who Daleks. After all, they do have the same sci-fi I'm-a-robot-not-a-trash-bin look about them. Part of me is still in love with him and was even pleased that in his more recent incarnations he's been able to fly. (Why "he" is male is yet another question, but perhaps one for another blog entry).

With all this in mind, I'm very pleased that Pixar has created another film robot to fall in love with. His (and it appears clear that "his" is the correct gender) name is WALL-E ( for Waste Allocation Load Lifter – Earth Class) and he's a great character. The film, also called WALL-E is delightful too.

Paul told me before we went that it was being hailed as "the best" film Pixar has ever done. That's setting the bar pretty high as far as I'm concerned as both The Incredibles and Monsters Inc. are amazingly good. After seeing it this afternoon in a (warning: celebrity sighting alert*) Westwood audience that included Jamie Lee Curtis, Christopher Guest and their children, I do think it's a unique Pixar film. Why? Because it doesn't rely on voice acting to carry the story-- in fact there's very little dialog for much of the film. The animation has to carry the emotional weight of the story, and it does it beautifully.

Maybe that's a reason (other than his basic cuteness) that WALL-E reminds me R2-D2. Neither robot can speak, yet they manage to convey enough emotion and goodness that as a viewer I became completely attached. Oh yes. They also both manage to save the world.

Okay, R2 helped save the universe, but you know what I mean.

---
* Before you ask, no I didn't go over and talk to them or ask for autographs. This is Los Angeles and that sort of thing just isn't done. Especially when famous people are somewhere with their family. That said, this is as least the 6th time I've run into Jaime Lee Curtis in Los Angeles or Santa Monica over the years which is definitely more than any other Hollywood person that I don't actually know. Weird.

"Shoot 'Em Up" Spanking

I'd say I was startled, but the fact is that I knew from a newsgroup post that the spanking scene was there somewhere.

Yesterday afternoon I went to see this comic book - style film Shoot 'Em Up starring Clive Owen (yum!) partly because I like cartoonish violence, partly because Clive Owen was in it, partly because there's a spanking scene. I got to go with with someone into spanking who I know from Shadow Lane -- something fun but also nervous making as I always have a hard time meeting new people (he ended up being a delightful movie companion.

The film was about a B- to C+ (for me, lower for my companion who gave it a D as he's apparently not got my crush on Clive). There were a number of reference to different kinks and fetishes (including breast feeding), but the main spanking wasn't done in a fetish context at all, something which made it ever so nice for me. 

Below this point could be considered a film spoiler so fair warning.

The set up is good -- Mr. Smith (Clive Owen) spanks the woman partly as a diversion -- the pretext is a mother is yelling at her child, smacking him and threatening him with a spanking. Mr. Smith goes over, scolds her for hitting her child and then publicly spanks her about 5 times, supposedly to show her what it feels like. While the spanking is not done OTK, it *is done* in a way those of us who've been smacked in public over clothes might remember.

Short, sweet and worked for me. Not a great film, but getting to watch a spanking in a vanilla film not done to mock the fetish and watching it with a spanking friend was worth the price of admission for me.

Of course the fact I've had spanking fantasies about Mr. Owen since Closer did help.

Perving on the Good Doctor

The "Good Doctor" is, of course, Doctor Who.  If you don't know who that is, you're missing out and should get thee to a dvd rental place.  Or onto the SciFi channel.  (Or the BBC if you're lucky enough to live in the UK.)  Currently in its third series of this incarnation (the series and the Doctor date back to the 1960s), Doctor Who is wonderful television, even in weeks it isn't set at a boy's boarding school in 1913.

But oh, this week it was.  And I've been having fantasies about it ever since Saturday night. 

First off, I'm not alone in this spanking fantasy perving -- the always adorable Haron over at The Spanking Writers has been blogging about this for days [and a quick look just now shows that Abel's now gotten in on the act].  She posted a BBC picture of David Tennant (he's the Doctor) in Edwardian schoolmaster garb holding a crook handled cane. 

It's a nice picture, full of moody shadows and I can see why she chose it, but I'll opt for this one (thank you BBC for providing this and other lovely shots).

I love seeing Mr. Tennant in his schoolish garb, but also seeing the desks and the backs of the boys heads.  With the perspective, I can easily imagine myself sitting in a back row, trying to concentrate on the history lesson, eyes drawn constantly to the cane / pointer held like a drawn sword by my teacher.

Have I imaged myself bent over one of those desks, struggling to be brave?  Of course.  But in my fantasies, Christopher Eccleston is still the Doctor.  What can I say?  He'll always be my first.

Harry Potter and Literature

Deluzy wrote today this past weekend about an article on Harry Potter Fandom and its intersection with academia by Carole Cadwalladr.  It was published last August (2006) in the British newspaper, The Guardian.  I'd read it then and meant to blog about it, but forgot.  When I started a reply to Alison, I realized that my reply was going to be several times the length of her own entry and I should, perhaps, do the writing here rather than blathering on her blog.

The short version is that this article (the Guardian one, not Deluzy's) pissed me off to no end.

Why?  Mostly because the author goes for the easy digs.  Not just at academic jargon, which I would be the first to admit has a lot one can be critical of, but at the whole idea of cultural studies (though she doesn't call it that).  The author admits to having not read any of the books, except for part of The Philosopher's Stone on the flight over, but feels since she has a degree in English and "has read Milton," she's somehow qualified to judge the papers at conference on the Harry Potter texts.  Would the same work in reverse, I wonder?  Would my having studied popular literature qualify me to write about conference and papers about texts I'd never read?  It reminded me a bit of the wonderful line from the 1990 film Metropolitan -- "You don't have to read a book to have an opinion."  (1)

She makes a cheap shot, expressing the idea that something as popular as the Harry Potter novels have no place among a more adult canon of literature -- ironically using the phrase at one point "it's hardly Nabokov."  I say ironically because the phrase seems to betray a lack of cultural memory of what the reaction 30 years ago was to conference papers on Lolita.

Cadwalladr's discussion of her background (or lack thereof) with regard to the Harry Potter books does raise the question of why The Guardian thought that she would be the best reporter to go over (remember, she went from London to Las Vegas -- thank heavens it was such a long flight or one presumes she wouldn't have gotten even the bit of reading done that she managed) and cover this convention / conference.   Given how widespread the reading of this books has been worldwide (and in the UK specifically), they must have had to dig pretty deep to find someone who hadn't read them.  Perhaps the intent was to go for humor?

What mainly rang as false was her seeming belief that Rowling's books were simply for / read by children, as though unaware of their large adult readership.  I have a hard time believing she actually thought this was the case, but it is the way the article is presented.  Why do I doubt her?  Because in the UK there are so many adult readers that the paperback versions of the books are actually sold with two different covers, one for adults and another for children, so that adult readers don't feel embarrassed when reading on the train.  It's hard to imagine a journalist being so unaware, especially of something that's been reported on in her own paper.

This goes for the whole fanfic and slash fic thing as well, again something Cadwalladr presents as a subculture she discovered only by attending this conference.  While hardly as widely discussed as the different adult / child book covers, this isn't something new or even unique to the Potter-verse or science fiction and fantasy literature.  Further, it was mentioned in big type on the announcement of this conference (I know this because the call for papers was sent to my academic listserv).  As a journalist, if the term "slash fiction" was new to her, wouldn't it be good journalistic practice to do a little research by, say, entering the unfamiliar term into Google?  Doing a search for "Harry Potter" and "slash fiction" would have told her a great deal and, perhaps, saved her some of the shocks she [p]reports to have experienced.

It probably seems like I'm being a little hard on this one article.  But I don't think I am.  While this isn't my area of research (I do the much more boring field of Chicana feminist literature), there's an extremely good reason for academics in literature and cultural studies to be interested in Harry Potter and JK Rowling.  Leaving aside the importance of studying popular culture in general in order to understand about trends in our society, these are books that current undergraduates have grown up reading.  If it isn't already true now, it will be in the next five years.  It's a lot easier to introduce complex theoretical issues, whether Marxism, gender and / or race theory  or whatever, when it can be taught using texts that students are very familiar with. 

One of the most amazing moments of my life was standing in a huge line at the main Waterstone's in London with thousand of people, many of them children, waiting for the store to open at midnight so they could buy their copy of the book.   The crowd queued patiently (as one would expect of the British) but the excitement the kids were experiencing was an electric feeling.  It was clear many of them had never been out so late, that for them this was better than Disneyland or Christmas.  And I remember thinking at the time, how wonderful that one of the most exciting memories of their childhoods is going to be the collective experience of waiting in line to buy a book.  It reminded me of nothing so much as the stories about 19th century crowds of Dickens readers standing waiting for ships from the UK to dock in Boston and shouting up questions about little Nell.

As a journalist working in the UK, how has Cadwalladr managed to miss this?  Is there such a thing as a journalistic ivory tower?

---
(1) The longer version is even better.  After listening to Tom dissing Jane Austen, Audrey asks:
"What Jane Austen novels have you read?" 
Tom replies:
"None. I don't read novels. I prefer good literary criticism. That way you get both the novelist's ideas as well as the critic's thinking. With fiction I can never forget that none of it really happened, that it's all just made up by the author."

So What About You?

After reading some of my reviews of Snape fanfic, someone wrote and asked me if I'd ever written any of my own. 

The short answer is "no".  I don't write fanfics in the Potter-verse, much as I love reading it.  Or maybe because, I'm not sure.  In fact, I've really not written any fanfic.  Well, except this one.

It was written as an entry for the soc.sexuality.spanking Short Story contest in the Summer of 2004.  Although it was written as a contest entry, the story was one I'd been planning in my head for a while.  As the author notes indicate, it's based on a BBC gardening program called "Ground Force" which I'd watched daily for months and months. 

Anyway, it's just a fun little story, but I'm oddly proud of it. 

Ground Forced
by Mija

[Background: I discovered BBC America shortly after 9/11. Maybe it was the insecurity of those days that caused me to take comfort in a program unlike any I'd ever been addicted to before. Maybe it was my missing Pablo/Britain (the two are very linked in my imagination). Or maybe it's just that they're very good. At any rate, I became hooked on Ground Force, watching it daily for about 19 months.

For those of you who haven't had the pleasure, it's a 1/2 hour gardening show, where a garden is given a makeover in 2 days while the owner is away (and always very surprised by the outcome). Here's a link in case you want to know more about the main characters:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/gardening/tv_and_radio/gforce_index.shtml

Most of the time, family members and friends of the person being surprised work very hard on the project. But just occasionally that's not the case.

The following never (to my knowledge) happened. But it should have . . .]

FROM A PRIVATE OUTTAKE REEL

[A large builder does the final smoothing on a newly-laid concrete slab. He surveys it proudly, just as a small, yapping dog runs across it.]

TOMMY: Oh, DOG! That was freshly laid!

[He looks into the camera as one injured and exasperated.]

[Charlie looks at Tommy, laughing and throwing her red tresses back.]

TOMMY: [pointing at Charlie] You can just keep quiet.

CHARLIE: [mock innocent] I said nothing!

[Giggles from a dark-haired, fair-skinned attractive teen. We later learn her name is "Amanda". Her father is having this makeover done for her stepmother.]

AMANDA: [scooping up the dog] I'll just look after him then, shall I?

[Alan comes over to the group, leaning on his spade.]

ALAN: Young lady, isn't that what you promised last time?

AMANDA: [still giggling] Yes, but he got away from me. Sorry. I was, um, painting the shed, like you asked.

[Cut to the shed shows it to be remarkably unpainted.]

ALAN: Which shed would that be?

[A look, not unlike guilt, struggles with defiance on Amanda's young face.]

TOMMY: [in mocking tones] Whatever should we do with you?

[She shrugs.]

CHARLIE: Indeed. That telephone call really was a bit much . . . A bit of corrective persuasion may be in order.

[A check of earlier footage shows a call to the house with Amanda pretending to be her mother, about to arrive home.]

ALAN: [nodding and flexing a fiberglass garden stake into an arc] Time for a sharp attitude change, as me old dad would say. [He looks at the girl’s father, as if for permission.]

FATHER: I’ll just be painting the fence, if you don’t mind.

TOMMY: [looking between Alan, Charlie and the painting father] Well, my dad would have said it was past time for a good hiding!

CHARLIE: Right-o! [she grabs Amanda's hands and quickly bends her across the as-yet-unpainted bench at the side of the shed.]

ALAN: This'll be me then! Lights! Camera! Action!

[The garden stake swishes through the air, landing three swift cuts on the seat of the girl's jeans before she yanks her hands away from Charlie, stands and lands a stinging slap to the red-head.]

AMANDA: B*tch! Let me up or there'll be trouble.

[Camera shows Alan looking quite unconcerned.]

TOMMY: I'm not sure why you should have all the fun, Alan. It's my concrete that's spoilt.

[Cut to paw-printed concrete and Willy on all fours smoothing it.]

ALAN: So plant your size 13 on the bench and take your turn!

[The teen is upended across Tommy's bent knee, feet dangling above the ground as his large heavy hand smacks into her bottom with hard, sharp spanks. Tears of pain and frustration shine on her face.]

ALAN: [looking around] Charlie? Charlotte? Mr. Tommy here is defending your honour! The least you can do is watch!!

CHARLIE: [off-camera, over a muffled sound of running water] Sorry Alan!

[She reappears, holding something rubber.]

CHARLIE: I just thought we might try and fit a water feature in after all!

[REEL ENDS]

Of Course He Does Redux

Okay, after spending the last who-knows-how-long in careful study, I can say that Rebecca Webb's Hogwart fics (they're not centered on Harry, but rather on Slytherin and everyone's favorite Head of House) are definitely worth a read.

For the right reader.  Which I definitely am by the way.

Who's the right reader? 

• someone into Potter-verse fanfic
• someone who can let go the need for everyone to be completely in character (these were written a while ago, before the recent novels came out)
• someone who likes to read.  These are long.  This is a delight because they're also exceptionally well written and develop character in rather lovely ways.
• someone who isn't just looking for spanking porn. 

That last comment was the one I found most interesting to write.  Because there are a lot spankings (or rather canings, but she calls them spankings) and the characters refer to them even more frequently.  But the stories aren't about the canings themselves.  The canings aren't (generally) detailed in a pornographic* way.  Rather, like traditional school novels (think Enid Blyton), the caning / spanking is mentioned and the possiblity of them is constant, but they aren't the stories' main events. 

I love that.

For a long time I've tried to understand why I find it so much more thrilling for there to be a reference to a spanking in say an Enid Blyton book then the emotion I feel when I read most spanking-fetish stories.  These stories by Rebecca Webb have sort of crystallized the issue for me.  My enjoyment, I think, comes from them not being first and formost about spanking -- these stories have a plot and dramatic trajectory far apart from the spanking act.  Sure, sometimes the two come together and the spanking / caning is the final line drawn under some sort of student hijinks (now there's a word I've never used before) but it doesn't have to be that way.  Not every threat ends in a spanking.  Nor does every misdeed result in a drawn out, bent over scene.

I think that's what I like.  I get off on the absence of detail, the lack of pornographic detail about her knickers, about the feeling of each stroke and how she moved.  How weird is that?

The Snape in Rebecca's stories is dark but lovable, again somewhat in the tradition of English school novels.  Yes, there's a bit of the "crusty professor with the heart of gold" but she does it and the whole Slytherin house well.

Favorite passages?  Too many to count.  However, this is representitive of the lovely energy the author gives these stories:

  Malfoy ducked just in time to avoid Snape's cane, which flew across the room at him and soared right out the door.  He watched in confusion as it sailed up the corridor.  Then, as it rounded the first corner, he took off after it at a dead run.
        He chased it up deserted hallways and staircases until it suddenly stopped short at the intersection of two corridors.  Malfoy skidded to a halt, hesitated for just a moment, and then leapt inside the nearest classroom doorway, peeking carefully into the hall.  Sure enough, here came Snape, storming down the cross corridor, snatching the cane furiously out of thin air without breaking his stride as he swept through the intersection.  Malfoy waited until the robes billowing behind him disappeared and then took off after him. 
        "Can I be this lucky?" he wondered joyously to himself as he sneaked along behind his housemaster.  When Snape turned to mount the steps to Gryffindor Tower, Malfoy fell to his knees in gratitude.  "Yes!" he cried, thrusting his fists triumphantly into the air. "

Soooo... is the author kinky?  One might think so.  I mean, the cane and all it symbolizes is a central and important to the plot of these interlocking fics, but I'm not sure.  So despite what happened with Mikki's story, I'm reluctant to write to her.  I mean, what will she feel knowing I'm perving on her fic?  But I'm perving on it the way I would on some of the classic stuff (US and UK) from the 1940s and 1950s. 

Anyway, assuming you want to read them after the above disclaimers, let me know what you think.  The stories start here.  I was sorry to finish them.  Definitely a great read.

Well of Course He Does

I can't vouch for the fic (which has the too cute title of The Smallest Slytherin) yet as I just started reading it.  However this line from the first page did jump out just a bit:

"Never lie to Snape," Malfoy counseled. "Snape canes Slytherins who lie to him."

Well of course he does!

Snape and canes... a match made in... well somewhere you'd fine me.

A Small World

It all really comes down to Severus Snape and spanking, doesn't it?

Or is that just for me?

Anyway, I was reminded today that:

• a) this 'net really isn't such a big place after all  AND
• b) that it's nice and important to actually praise authors.  You know, like by sending them email.  I didn't do that and now feel slightly abashed.

This sort of all started a couple years ago when the lovely (yet oddly naughty) Haron recommended the Ashwinder site (fanfic site dedicated to the Severus Snape / Hermione Granger pairing).  I'd never explored fanfic of any kind, and soon found myself spending hours and hours reading these stories and surfing around looking for others on the 'net. 

A few months ago I found a wonderful story by Mikki_Rose (Snape, Hermione, school scene, spanking... plus delightfully imaginative writing -- I was an instant fan).  Did I write to her and tell her how much I had enjoyed it?  No.  What I did was send an emailed link to a couple of friends (including Haron) with the subject line: "Best Snape / Hermione Story E V E R." But nothing at all to the author. 

Shame on me!

Today was my birthday.  Paul gave me a Gryffindor sweater, scarf and school tie from the Whimsic Alley shop -- they're right down the street -- and Haron very sweetly posted part of Mikki's story and a link.  (Are you still with me?)  I saw it this morning and thanked her for the happy birthday wishes and again praised the story.

Okay, so I was checking their blog before bed (and my birthday spanking).  Guess who had just found the entry?  That's right, the author herself, who was a little surprised (and happily, flattered) to find her story being discussed. 

So anyway, thank you again for sharing that story, Mikki Rose.  And I'm sorry I never wrote and told you how much I liked it.  And to everyone else, if you haven't read it, what are you still doing here?

That's it.  There's only 17 more minutes and then it won't be my birthday any more. 

'Night!