What Stormtroopers Do on their Day Off

In case you were wondering...

And I thought it was a Philips' Head!

By Cat Connolly

An Introduction of the Feline Sort.

Hello.

I am Cat.

Yes, the "meow" kind.

And please don't pull my tail.

Now that introductions are out of the way, let me tell you a bit about myoddself. In particular, my trans-temporal preoccupation with Victorian culture.

My goal in life is to become a 19th century gentleman, sans the Oxfordian pasttimes (lest they involve David Tennant). In accordance with such proclivities, I have a bevy of fancy waistcoats at my disposal.

All right, let me make this clear. I am not of the Sapphic sort, although I do adore poetry of the same name and can enjoy a light bout of shojo-ai from time to time. Despite my lingering affection for Emilie Autumn and her darling henchwomen, and the wishes of my more adventurous female friends, I remain ever-faithful to the tall, dark and smexy archetype. Alan Rickman, that means you. So, while I am enamoured of Queen Christina, I am not *enamoured* of her.

Right ho, onward. Why not continue with a catalogue of my genteel artifacts? Be forewarned, they might cause an antiquarian to drool slightly.

- A collection of four pocketwatches (my favorite being a piece from Cash's of Ireland)
- Two smoking jackets
- A tobacco pipe which, sadly, was in the pocket of my smoking jacket when I trod upon it....I suppose it should be crossed off the list....
- Mother-of-pearl plated opera glasses, circa 1910
- A variety of waistcoats, courtesy of the DAV
- An etoile-style, black brocade corset, which I often wear (well-laced) beneath my day clothing
- Monocle!
- Walking sticks. One cannot be without a walking stick. And one *certainly* cannot be without a sword cane.
- Various jars of poisonous herbs...though this may only gain precedent from Victorian gentlemen such as Sherlock Holmes and Cain Hargreaves.
- Absinthe.
- A full head of literary and historical facts, thought of as arcane by the masses, but quite useful when playing Pictionary.
- Melancholy.
- My own personal library. I hope it will one day rival that of Inkheart's Elinor Loredan.
- A chamber dressed in scarlet, dark wood, and a good deal of garish gold trimmings. Ooh, the Aesthete in me is well-nourished!

And I suppose it is rude of me to count out all of my shiny pennies in front of the poor, but heavens, how nice it is to realize how far I've come from being a simple little goth girl in cat ears.

And what kind of toys do *you* play with?

The Alien's Corruption

By Sara Crow

Slightly Behind and to the Left by Claire Light

Aqueduct Press, 2010

Claire Light, from her bio at the 
Aqueduct Press website

Slightly behind and to the Left is a collection of short fiction and “drabbles,” as Light calls them—one-paragraph to half-page installments of highly conceptual flash fiction. The book is from Aqueduct Press’s series, Conversation Pieces, which examines feminism with a focus on feminist science fiction.

Light’s prose throughout this book is infused with an aura of menace and loss. She isn’t afraid to throw her characters into torturous scenarios like a mad scientist trying to see what sort of atrocity will emerge from the next diabolical experiment. She illustrates the feminist struggle for equality as a common conflict across not only gender lines, but across alien worlds as well, creating characters that struggle for much more than survival—they struggle to remain human when endowed with responsibilities of power that give them the opportunity to become monstrous.

Dementia

by Sara 

I think it best to start with a shameless plug for my favorite "geek poet." Published prolifically and nominated for the Pulitzer at least twice, Bryan D. Dietrich is a fantastic poet who happens to spend his time delving into the darkness by way of our American mythologies--comics, Lovecraft, and Universal Monsters being among his subject matter.This one is among my many favorites.

The poem, after the jump...

Geek and Gamer Girls

Welcome to the first installment of Chronicles of the Geek Gurrls. 


Yes, we do exist, and we are NOT the only ones. Geek gurrls unite!