Sententiae Draconis

When I first heard about Teen Wolf I thought it sounded awful. I think part of it was just the name. It's ridiculous. And my immediate assumption was that it was going to be a shallow, teen-centric show with dubious acting to capitalize on the popularity of Twilight. (Having since learned that three of the four main guys on the show were at one point up for roles in Twilight, I may have had some justification.) And well, I guess it is those things in some ways. But the reason I love it is that between the ridiculousness there are a lot of small things that make me really happy. Things that you don't normally see on TV let alone in a show of this type.

What I'm trying to say is, I thought the show was going to be awful. But then the internet irrupted with love for (seriously I have never seen hit- and kudos-counts that high on the AO3 and I don't exactly hang out in tiny fandoms all the time) the show and I needed something brainless to watch while studying for the Comp (which I passed!!!!). And then somehow dubious enjoyment turned into complete love. And the end of the 2nd season is just filled with AWESOME. I mean there have always been moments in the show where I've laughed my ass off at points which probably weren't supposed to be funny. And the show will always be ridiculous in the best possible way. But those last few episodes of season two are just... EVERYTHING HAPPENS AND IT IS AWESOME.

So here are some reasons that I love the show:

- The cast is really pretty. (and I am shallow - also they're all my age despite playing teenagers, so there's no need for awkward guilt about finding them sexy)
Here they are in character:


And out of character:


- There are werewolves! Which are always my favourite. And not a Vampire in sight. :)

- There are not very subtle werewolf puns. So the Argents are the family of hunters that comes to town at the beginning of the show.

- JR Bourne plays Chris Argent, the Dad. And he is as awesome as he usually is.

(Photo just because I love JR Bourne.)

- Naturally the main love story is between Scott, who is turned into a werewolf at the beginning of the show, and Allison Argent, who doesn't know (yet) about what her Dad really does for a living. And I actually really like their love story. Partially it's because they are super adorable. But I think a lot of it is that neither of them were created to be the love interest or to be the damsel. Both of them get to be badass in their own way and it's awesome.

- The high school sport they all play (or are trying to play in Stiles' case) is not football. It's Lacrosse! And I admit that I know next to nothing about Lacrosse, but I just like that it's not the obvious.

- Jeff Davis, the Creator and Executive Producer, is openly gay. And it kind of shows in a very good way. One of the other high school guys on the Lacrosse team is gay and I love that he's just another character who is doing normal teenage boy stuff. He's just there. And it's not a big deal. Actually Scott keeps accidentally flirting with him and it's adorable. Jeff Davis has actually said in an interview with AfterElton (there's also and interview with one of the cast there that is adorable and also worth a watch) that's he's envisioning this world as being kind of a perfect world without homophobia, racism or sexism. It's not an agenda he's trying to push. The gay characters and things are just there. And he thinks that if you put that kind of perfect world on TV then maybe it can help shape our reality. :'D

- Scott is an adorable idiot, but he's smart enough to surround himself with smart people who can do the research for him, and is actually a great leader because of it. Actually pretty much everyone else on the show is way smarter than Scott and it's great. And a few of the characters actually manage to figure things out without having to be told which is delightful. Also the look on Scott's face when Jackson explains that of course the Argents are hunting werewolves because Argent means silver is priceless.

- And the parents are awesome. Too many of these shows, with the violence and the crazy running around at night that the teenagers do, make me wonder what the hell is wrong with their parents. But Scott's Mum and Stiles' Dad so clearly care about their kids. They know something is going on, but it also makes sense that they don't know. And because she's an ER nurse and he's the Sheriff it make perfect sense that they're away from home at odd hours.

- In addition to being pretty the cast seems to be delightful. I watched a whole bunch of interviews on YouTube and they're obviously good friends and have a great time making fun of each other and hanging out. I love that it seems like every time they have an interview they somehow manage to fit all six of them onto what's probably a three person couch.


And I love that in all their publicity they are totally aware of and cool about the Slash fans. Actually they treat it the same as they would any other fan speculation about relationships on the show. Which is awesome.

He actually says the chances are 50/50!

And then they play to it because they're ridiculous:


So yeah. I'm currently in a happy place, except that I have to wait another year for season three. But it is coming and there's going to be 24 episodes instead of 12! So it's going to be awesome. And in the meantime there is lots of fic and I can always rewatch the episodes.

Instead of working on my Roman aqueducts paper (which - at least aqueducts are super cool) I'm trolling around the internet looking at hockey blogs and being greatly amused.

Here are some things that deserve sharing because of awesomeness. :)

The Sedin Twins are different people (sort of)
This is an article from before the All Star game that's talking about the Twins and how they've played together their entire lives. How they are still different people despite their identicalness. And asking the other Canucks how to tell them apart.

Best quotes (ie almost all of it):
[if they're drafted to different All Star Teams]the mirror image Swedes always could consider punishing their antagonists with a switcheroo. They're both certain the only ones that could tell would be teammates.
"No," Henrik said definitively when asked if anyone other than fellow Canucks All-Stars Alexander Edler and Cody Hodgson would notice. "You're right, we should do that."
...
Defenseman Kevin Bieksa figured out one difference when he lived in the same building as Henrik and often would spot Daniel waiting for his brother in the parking lot.
Despite being the Canucks' captain, Henrik has a bad habit of running late.
"Danny's always on time," Edler said. "Henrik is always a couple minutes late."
It drives his punctual younger brother (by minutes) crazy.
"He hates when people are late," Henrik said. "I'm usually late."
Within that dynamic, Bieksa said Daniel emerges as the more "responsible" of these road-trip roommates, dictating their schedule and keeping Henrik "in line."
"Hank is going to say he's the one in charge, for sure," Bieksa has said of the differences. "And Danny might even say nobody is just because he's a humble kind of guy. But we all know Danny is the one in charge. And Hank still wants to retain that older-brother status, too, so he tries to boss Danny around sometimes and Danny takes it, which is the funny thing. But Danny is usually the one in charge when push comes to shove."
Edler, who knows them as well as anyone after being taken under their collective wing when he made the move from Sweden to Vancouver, seemed to agree with Bieksa.
"Danny might be in charge. He makes the more smart decisions," Edler said with a mischievous grin. "They are twins, but they are still two different people."
...
As for which twin really us in charge, it may not matter. Daniel may arrive first, but if he's the one waiting around, isn't Henrik really dictating the schedule?
"Well, he thinks he's in charge," Henrik said of Daniel.
"I am in charge," said Daniel, "but he doesn't care."

I love them. :)


Also there's a new campaign going around to help end Homophobia in sports and Hockey in particular. There's a pretty comprehensive article over at Puck Daddy, and a shorter one in the Toronto Sun which features my guy Tanner Glass, who is a former Canuck, a current Winnipeg Jet and an all around awesome guy (if only he were better at hockey and could have stayed on my team - I miss ya Tanner!).

The Campaign is call "You Can Play" and it's being spearheaded by Toronto Maple Leafs General Manager Brian Burke and his son Patrick who is a scout for the Flyers. They're trying to make the league a safer space for gay athletes starting by reducing homophobic language to begin with. And it's in memory of Brendan Burke (son and brother) who died in a car accident. He was a hockey player, he wasn't in the NHL, but he came out in 2009, which is awesome.

Anyway they're trying to get a lot of NHL players to speak out about it and they've already got over 30 who are going to be in various TV spots. It's really awesome to see some of these guys speaking up about it. Especially since considering the number of Canadians and Europeans in the League I've been expecting hockey to be a more accepting place than some of the other major sports (still not easy - but yeah).

I'm super happy that some of them are even calling guys on homophobic language in Games! From the Toronto Sun article:

If Glass hears an opposing player use a gay slur during a game, he’ll let him know he’s crossed the line.
“The language has got to be the first thing to go,” Glass told the Winnipeg Sun, Monday. “You hear it all the time.”
The reaction he gets tells him there’s hope, but still a ways to go in educating the rank-and-file in the macho world of pro hockey.
“Some guys will be, ‘Yeah, well, f--- you,’ or whatever,” Glass said. “But some guys are like, ‘Maybe I shouldn’t have said that.’ ”

Tanner Glass, I love you! Please continue to be awesome!

Anyway here's a TV spot:


And sometimes looking at the comments section is not filled with sadness. Examples:
From the Puck Daddy Comments section

(It's still weird for me being in places on the internet where the assumed gender is male.)

More photos of attractive hockey players. Because it seemed like a good idea at the time. :)


Henrick Lundqvist - Goaltender, NY Rangers (also a Swedish twin, but his twin is not on the same team as him, and not a goalie)


Dreamy...


Swedes from the All Star Game! Lundqvist (Rangers), Henrik Sedin (Canucks), Eric Karlsson (Senators), Daniel Sedin (Canucks), Daniel Alfredsson (Senators - I love him too), Alex Edler (Canucks - my hockey boyfriend)


Jarome Iginla - Calgary Flames. When he smiles everything is right with the world.


Patrick Sharp - I should hate him because he's a Blackhawk... but look at that face!


Edler's spot for GQ...


I actually have this photo saved as "Cory Schneider looks into your soul.jpg" - Canucks, natch.


Harrison Mooney (Blogger, Pass it to Bulis) with trophy and Tanner Glass (then Canucks, now Jets) - okay, so Tanner's not actually that attractive, but I like his smile and I actually think that his mullet is kinda endearing. Plus it helps that he's an awesome person. :)


This is unrelated to attractiveness. I just have no idea what Alex Burrows is doing. But it's hilarious!

So earlier this week I made this post, and everyone (well, five people) ordered me to tell what I meant by it.

I suppose I can now.

Last night we had a panel on campus about Transgender Issues (in honour of the Trans Day of Remembrance on Monday). As Member at Large for our PRIDE Society I was in charge of making posters and I made one with the gender symbols and "GENDER ISSUES?" written in big letters to catch people's attention. (My original catch-phrase idea was shot down, quite rightly, as being too flippant, but that's okay because we're going to use it for the Drag Show in March)

Of course I enjoyed telling people that I gave the entire campus gender issues.

But I'll be taking them away today.

Oh yeah, and the panel itself went really well. We had a good turn out and good food at the reception. I missed out on hearing the Q and A session after the speakers' presentations because I had to go and help set up for the reception, which kida sucked because they only had ten minutes each to speak so of course they couldn't get really into the topic and I wanted to know more, but I also had no idea what questions to ask so I wasn't able to get them answered at the reception.

All and all the PRIDE Society looked good last night. (Go us)

So I'm currently baking cookies (choclate chip cookies top be exact) because I felt like accomplishing something that didn't take too much effort and wouldn't tire me out completely. Also we've been talking about doing something like this for our really awesome neighbour for quite some time now. So this morning once I woke up and couldn't go back to sleep again (Curse you internal clock, and you too evil sickness while I'm at it!) I decided to get up and start baking.

At one point in your life you aways wonder why chocolate chip cookies taste so damn good. Then you actually bake some and you realise that it's the two to one ratio of sugar to butter and equal parts chocolate chips.

Now just take a moment to think about how wonderful that is.

In other news I'm trying to figure out whether or not I'm well enough to go to Rugby practice today. I'm feeling much better than I was for most of last week but I'm still coughy and congested and can't quite breathe through my nose. I tried doing twenty and twenty (20 push-ups and 20 sit-ups, normal practice routine) and that was okay, but I think that it's really going to be the running that gets me. I think I'm going to try and go, do the warm up, and if I hack, splutter and cough go home instead of inishing the practice. This is totally a sucky way of finishing off the season.

In less-rugby related news, we are finally having a PRIDE exec meeting tonight. Although it's going to be on MSN. Sigh. Me no likey. But at least we're getting something done. I mean we're not even ratified yet and the showing of Rocky Horror on Hallowe'en is a week away. This is ridiculous!

Must go back to baking now. Mmmmm coookies....