Fess Up Friday, SYTYCD and whatever else I'm in the mood for...

First, Fess Up Friday. Keep in mind, I'm not counting today cause I probably won't get my words done till later. I've been finding (again, don't know why I thought it'd changed) that I write best at night. Duh. I've known that since I was 10, but it seemed like a lot of other things changed in grad school and out in the Read World, so I wondered if that had too... Nope.

Saturday, August 2: 1,328 words
Sunday, August 3: 1,626 words
Monday, August 4: 921 words
Tuesday, August 5: 837 words
Wednesday, August 6: day off due to exhaustion, work and SYTYCD
Thursday, August 7: 2,039 words

I was so excited about PerNoWriMo starting August 1st that I entirely forgot that it was my one-year anniversary of living in Nola. That's what anniversaries are good for, though. They're on-going. So now I've been in Nola a year AND a week. LOL. Thank goodness the First Day Clusterfuck didn't turn out to be a tradition...

Now, well...SYTYCD. Sigh. What am I going to do not that it's over?? It was so hard to wait every week for Wednesday and Thursday and now I'll have to wait till next summer...MONTHS! Well, it will give me more time to write. So why am I so addicted to SYTYCD? Let's just say, I've always loved watching dancing (LOVE cheesy dance movies, it probably all started with Dirty Dancing). But I never had a favorite choreographer before. And now I have two. Mia Michaels and Wade Robson. I love Tabitha and Napoleon too. And I've gotten so good at differentiating their styles that I recognize their work in other mediums and I can tell when they're cribbing moves from each other. Ashamed to say, but I've always been a Survivor fan, and I got into American Idol two seasons ago against my will. But SYTYCD is better. Yeah, it's still commercial, it's still FOX pulling the strings, it's still highly produced. But the blood, sweat, tears, the personalities all seem well...real...and that's a different beast for reality t.v. There seems to be something actually at stake. The dancers are attending a very public education and you can see them grow, really grow, by leaps and bounds through the season. And, ironically (or not), I discover MUCH MORE great music on SYTYCD than I do on a "music show" like AI. It's going to be hard to wait for next season...

But I've been lucky. I discovered the wonderful Blog About Things and the SYTYCD vlog which actually made me understand that people like Josh so much (and sorta why). I mean *I like* Josh, I just liked lots of other people better. Twitch, for instance (my favorite after Kherington and Chelsie and waaaay before them, Kourtney) or Katee, who seemed like a lock. And EW, who I love, is mad about SYTYCD too, so that's good to see. And then there's the funny post-finale discussion boards where everyone was apparently creeped out by the amusing Homage to the Rabbits routine that I adored. LOL. And this, from the official Fox site boards:

I love this show and watched every episode. I was glued to the set last night for the announcement of the winner. I was so disappointed that the end came so late and was rushed. After waiting two hours the announcement of the winner should have been a little earlier so that Twitch could have had his moment with the judges and audience before being escorted off the stage with just his flowers in the midst of the rain of confetti for Joshua! It was not the way to end.

Thanks Geri317 for one of the calmest, most balanced takes on the finale. I agree.

Alright, no more SYTYCD talk for months (likely). Let's move on to another terrifying author story (What is it about Fess Up Fridays and literary true tales of horror?).

And this about Joyce Carol Oates (sigh) and her fictional take on the JonBenet Ramsey story, as told by the brother of the slain 6 year old. I agree entirely that JCO is capable of much, much more than the crap writing (read the first chapter), but I'm not surprised. JCO doesn't have to write well in every book. She's so prolific that even if 1 in 20 of her books/stories are a masterpiece (and those are pretty safe odds, likely), she's still leaving an enormous legacy. I have a weird tie with the JonBenet case in that she was buried in the tiny cemetery across the street from my high school. I'd sit in writing class, looking out these HUGE windows and I could tell when her grandmother was visiting her grave because most of us students knew her car AND let's not forget the passel of reporters that would take up the bus curb on the tiny one-way street waiting to get incriminating, grieving shots of her coming or going. It's one of the experiences, if not THE experience, that made me decide I didn't want to be a journalist. I was certain then, watching all of this happening from such a weird angle, that I could never remove my emotions from my writing. *AND I DON'T WANT TO*

And just so you'll know how well-balanced my interests are (LOL), here's an interesting article about an advance in fingerprint technology and cancer research.

And let's not forget there's another war on. "Saakashvili agreed the timing was not coincidental, but accused Russia of being the aggressor. 'Most decision makers have gone for the holidays,' he told CNN. 'Brilliant moment to attack a small country.'"