The Sidekick-him-while-he's-down

Today I'd like to talk a little about one of my favorite characters, courtesy of JK Rowling.

Raise your hand if you're familiar with the Harry Potter books. Not just the movies. I'm talking about the actual physical original books. (I hope there are a lot of people raising their hands out there.)

Now think about Ron Weasley. He's pretty okay, right? Ginger, funny, Harry's best friend and Hermione's love interest. Wait, are we still talking about the books? Because there's a lot more to recommend Mr Weasley if you take a look at the books instead of the movies.

[Spoilers!]

Big Damn Heroes

When you think of a stereotypical Strong Female Character in a book/movie/television show/play, how is she characterized? She's usually an overt warrior of some sort, tries to subvert the system and break out of her "feminine" boundaries, buddies up with the men, and berates or quietly judges her fellow women for not following in her footsteps.

So what do we do when presented with a Strong Female Character who doesn't quite fit into these standards? As an example I'd like to talk to you about Inara Serra of Firefly and Serenity; at a later date I'd like to discuss a few others as well.

[Beware: spoilers lie below this line!]

Vote Maggie

As an introduction to this post, I'd like to tell you a little about my 16-year-old sister, Maggie. First off, she's awesome. Her aspirations are somewhat inspiring; her "life plan" is to earn a PhD in history, become a tenured professor, be elected President for two terms and then serve as Secretary-General of the United Nations. Quite impressive, no?

Maggie is also hilariously entertaining, so of course I laughed this morning when she made this observation: 

Presidents are always old... They should lower the age so I can be President while I'm still young and hot. It's harder to be sexy when you're forty. My goal in life is to be a sexy political figure.

But then I started thinking about it. Why should that be so funny to me? Why shouldn't she be a "sexy political figure"? Here comes the Equality Train, and my sister has volunteered as the engineer.

Word of the Week: Dubious

The last few days have had me all in a tizzle over dubious.

Word of the Week: An Intro

Alright, internet, I'm going to do a new thing! For your enjoyment (and to keep me posting regularly), Word of the Week is going to become a regular feature. I'll whip out a particular word that's been tickling my fancy, give you a short introduction to its definition, etymology, and any interesting trivia surrounding it, and then write a little bit about why it's my word of the week. 

Brace yourselves!

Divination

What makes people choose their next reading materials? Some go strictly by genre - adventure, romance, Young Adult; others choose only certain authors or read only on a specific subject (for example, I used to read anything I could get my hands on about the Tudors: "diaries," nonfiction, rambling fantastical novels). But are their favorite books all in the same category?

For the Love of Words

If you've spent any time glancing around at this blog, you may have spotted the quotes page. I've got quite a fondness for quotes and have spent years amassing a collection of them - scribbled into notebooks, tacked to bulletin boards, stashed away on index cards, lining my mirror on Post-it notes.