This Is Not A Democracy

You know what’s really annoying about writing a Sean-centric bigbang fic set in 1962? Music. Because imagining the Sean we see in the film without suspecting he'd be spending what money he had on records is just... inconceivable to me.

First of all, there’s the temptation to confuse his interests with Creepy Kid’s, but even Bob wasn’t seeing much success in 1962, so that point is moot.

The big music scene at the time was Surf Music of bands like The Beach Boys, which I just mean... LOLNO and the year opened with The Lion Sleeps Tonight at #1 on the Hot 100. I MEAN, SERIOUSLY, 1962?

This is a kid that you just know would be into the British Invasion bands and Psychedelic Rock/Pop, if not Prog Rock, a few years down the line (he’s practically wearing drainpipes and we all see the Morrison mop, right?), but at the point the film is set, most of the Brit bands are two or three years from breaking the UK, never mind the US. The Doors didn’t form until 1965, as did the Mamas and the Papas, The Small Faces and the inevitable Pink Floyd; the Yardbirds didn’t form until 1963, which was also the year the Rolling Stones released their first single; The Kinks and Lynyrd Skynyrd until 1964 and Led Zep not until 1968. The Beatles were only just entering Abbey Road in 1962. Janis Joplin only began her music career in 1966.

Even The Zombies, who formed in 1961, except they didn’t really achieve success until 1964.

Personally, I can't see Sean being much of an Elvis fan, neither can I see him being much into Do Wop or Rhythm & Blues (if only because he grew up in small town Texas, in my ficverse). Frankly (no pun intended) the Four Seasons would probably destroy his hearing because they're so shrill (selectiveness or none).

I'm not even totally sure I can see him being into The Highwaymen (Johnny Cash's band). I feel like it'd need to be a bit groovier, for a youngster of his age in that era, no?

So, I'm in a headcanon quandry. I need the knowledge because I've already spent two hours researching this and I'll be fucked if I can settle for anything realistic. Therefore, I am turning it over for discussion: Sean Cassidy, 1962, record collection. Go!

Potentially cool news, today - Paramount seems to be going ahead with a remake of Stephen King's Pet Sematary - a film I was somewhat obsessed with for a while, during my early teens.

It's the story of a young family who move to rural Maine, and find that their house is adjacent to a former Micmac burial ground, which has dark powers to revive the dead - although anything buried there comes back 'changed.'

Within the film, there is a character called Victor Pascow - a college student, if I recall - who dies in the arms of the family's physician father and returns as a ghost with half his head missing/falling off, to keep Louis from making terrible choices.

The second I saw it was being remade, I thought, "Caleb NEEDS to be cast as Pascow." He's the right age for the character, he does creepy magnificently (see: The Last Exorcism - no, literally, see it... but ignore the ending) and he's already so pale he'd have no trouble working the not-so-recently deceased look. He's also about the right level, success-wise.

He would genuinely be FUCKING AMAZING and a couple of people I know from outside the CLJ fandom have already agreed on that. So, now I'm spamming the movie sites with the suggestion, in the hope that Paramount pick up on it.

Feel free to join me in doing so...

Caleb (looking quite young, as it's a couple of years old)



( Relatively minor cinematic gore in character photos )

Caleb has a heavily locked-down Facebook. He doens't even have his own picture on the profile.

Today, he added a fan - a dude around his own age, from Brazil.

But the thing is, this dude fanboys with the best of them, and talked about it on Tumblr. Now all the fangirls are asking for links to his profile and flailing and trying to get added.

I have already seen one screencap of his profile (nothing massively personal on it, but still) and people are talking about stalking his personal photos.

I cannot headdesk hard enough, right now.

The guy keeps himself private. Very private. He clearly does not want his stuff posted all over the internet and he almost certainly does not want millions handfuls of fangirls trying to talk to him any time he's online.

If you're going to add the kid, add his MySpace, which is open to the public and is regularly updated with his new songs.

Leave the boy some privacy. Don't repost his photos. Don't repost his comments. Don't repost things his friends and family say to him. He's young and he's very new at this. Don't scare him away from his fandom before he even understands it.

But if you have the opportunity, a one-off suggestion that he gets a Twitter account, where he can manage the communication himself, may not go amiss.

Edit: Boom! There are the personal photos which have almost certainly come from his Facebook - posted by someone other than the Brazilian guy. Sounds like he's added a handful of others, too.

*sigh* Steep learning curve, you say?

Edit 2: Someone just said she has "about 20" pictures from his Facebook to post. She has already posted maybe five. This is really not good.

My nonno (my father's father) passed away, this afternoon. He was 89, and had suffered from Parkinson's since before I was born. Over the last six months, his health deteriorated dramatically and suddenly, until Dad and I made an emergency trip out there in February.

He nearly died while we were there, due to a negligent GP, but he hung on until today - despite breaking both hips in a fall a few weeks ago.

One of my clearest memories of him - aside from being the one person who sat with him and held his hand while the doctors tried to unblock a catheter at a critical moment, and the rest of the family flailed around and argued about whose fault it was - was of my brothers and I, then 11, 8 and 6 years old respectively, sitting on the porch at the family's country house and singing rude rhymes in English, while he clapped and cheered, oblivious to the obscenities his grandchildren were chanting.

He was a serious man, with a dry sense of humour. In February, when my cousin's fiance, Gaetano, asked how he was feeling, he glanced at him for a moment and said, "Yeah, I'm going dancing, now," before shuffling into the kitchen in his pyjamas.

Despite being in his late 80s, and working hard for most of his life to support his wife and sons - even moving to Germany for a few years when my father was a child, so that they could afford to rebuild the decrepit family home in Collesano - until Christmas, he was still wandering around the steeply hilled mountain village where he had been born and raised, lugging home food and doing all the things Sicilian men are expected to; a real trooper.

I wish over the years I'd had more time to spend with him, and I think he felt the same, but I'm glad he's passed, because I know he's been in a lot of discomfort and while he was sharp as a knife, mentally, he has had to watch my Nonna - his wife of nearly sixty years - descend into dementia, and I'm glad he's gone before she became unrecognisable.

So, for those of you who drink, raise a glass of Italian red like the wine he used to make from his vinyard, and for those of you who don't, some Nutella on crusty bread is one of the most Italian things in the world. Indulge in his honour.

Buona notte, amore mio. xoxo

I haven't done a silly meme for a while, so here's one from averzierlia:

Give me three fictional characters, and I'll respond with shag/marry/push off a cliff.

Texts from Last Night x X-Men mash-up. GLORIOUS.





( LOLOLOLOL*chokesonowntongue* )

Just saw this video of Bam crying at the crash site and saying he'd had some kind of premonition that the accident had happened.

Made me cry again. So sad.

Edit: The trailer to Living Will:



It actually looks like a really cute film.

Really sad to hear about Ryan Dunn. He was far and away my favourite of the Jackass boys. He seemed somehow a little more with it than a lot of the others, and he was incredibly sweet.

If the rumours of drink driving are true - and somehow, I think most of us will already have concluded that they are - then I hope to God that this is a lesson for people.

Don't drink and drive. Please, just don't do it.

I get the feeling though, that for a guy like Ryan, a dramatic and fiery death would have been something he'd be quite proud of. So long and goodnight, dude.

Awful news, today. One of the world's last remaining air-worthy B17 Flying Fortresses, The Liberty Belle, has 'crashed' outside of Aurora, near Chicago.



According to news sources, another aircraft informed the pilot that the Liberty Belle was on fire and they made an emergency crash-landing, after which much of the plane was destroyed. The seven people on board all escaped uninjured, thankfully.

Growing up, I spent several years as an Air Cadet - a member of 398 (Staines & Egham) Squadron - and at around that age I first saw the film 'Memphis Belle' (clips of the real Memphis Belle here), which was a heavily fictionalised version of a true story, about the crew of a B-17 Flying Fortress, which was the first to complete its minimum required missions during WWII.

From that point on, I was in love with B-17s. They were such enormous and hardy craft - cramped as buggery inside, and carrying a ten-man crew, but displaying incredible endurance, many returning from raids over Germany with damage which would be catastrophic for most other aircraft.

Famously, the 414th's 'All American' flew back from Germany with its rear-section almost completely severed, as in the picture below. It broke in two upon landing.



Other planes came back with quite literally no nose:



Many others made it home with their gigantic tails - a core factor in both flying and steering the plane - all but ripped to shreds. 'Hang the Expense Again III' (not sure what happened to I & II, but if I had to hazard a guess...) made it home like this, even after the explosion blasted out her tail-gunner, who miraculously survived.



Once, at RAF Sealand, during a summer camp in 1997, with the Air Training Corps, I was allowed to touch an altimeter from an unknown B-17 and it blew my mind.

There are very, very few airworthy Fortresses left in the world, and the Liberty Belle was one of the few (the Memphis Belle is currently being restored, in Ohio). She never saw active combat and was sold in 1947 for scrap, before being saved by Pratt & Whitney, which used her as a testing craft for their engines. In the late-70s she was damaged by a tornado, while located at an aeronautical museum, and her fuselage was broken. Afterward, she was used to educate and provide experiences of flight in a B-17, by the Liberty Foundation.

I genuinely cried, writing this and looking up photographs to show just how amazing these aircraft were. Many enthusiasts would tell you that these planes helped win the war because they brought the war to the enemy - even when they were suffering 80% losses.

It's a truly devastating thing to see, and I hope that the remaining Fortresses are maintained and looked after as lovingly as the Liberty Belle was before this accident.

Goodbye, old girl.

Oh God, coffee. NEED MOAR COFFEE.

Completely exhausted. The Damned Things were amazing last night - I sweated so much by the time I got home at 2am my jeans crunched. Salty.

Found it hilarious that Puddle of Mud were supporting them. I can't even...WUT. I always get the name confused with Mudvayne. Now that would have been hilarious.

Sadly, didn't get a chance to see Andy as I promised I would, but we're going to drive up next time and maybe stay over in the chosen city of gigness, so we'll have more time to go and buy pints [of juice].

Did get to see Joe beforehand. He caught me on the way back into the venue from the ladies - he's cut his hair much shorter (kind of a 90s curtain cut look) and it actually really suits him - at least until he starts headbanging and it goes all fluffy. To be fair, it looked like my hair does when it's short and I let it dry naturally, so I'm not going to mock. XD

I stopped to chat and exchange a mutually sweaty hug for a moment, but then had to dive back in to the end of the Puddle of Mud set so I could fight a giant Norwegian for my view of the stage.

We made friends with a girl of about twelve and her dad who were down in the pit, as well. When the PoM guys threw their picks into the pit, one landed it the crook of my arm, so I gave it to her. There was no reason for me to keep it and the Norwegian PoM fans had already annoyed me too much to consider giving it to them.

Did end up retrieving the phone of a cute punk girl (who was there with a girl who looked like she was probably her twin, but with a massive white (and highly inconvenient) mohawk) after I saw it glowing on the floor. She was very grateful and said thank you at least twice. It was awesome to see people really rocking out for TDT. Old dudes, young women, obnoxious, smelly goth dudes... They declared it the best gig ever, and I like to think they were serious.

After the set there was an hilarious moment of confusion with Rob. He was shaking hands with the crowd, but all my stuff was in my right hand and it would be awkward to change, so I put my hand out to high-five him. He did not appear to understand the motion. I guess he's too cool for that; and I say that with no irony at all. He did get it in the end, though. I hate those weird, same-hand handshakes...

I didn't see it happen, but apparently Keith stage dived at the end of the set and they dropped him. BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

When the set was done we had to run and get the train back, so I only had time to stop and say happy birthday to Josh and ask him to tell Andy I said 'hi' and sorry I couldn't wait around to chat. Ended up emailing him on the train. He said it was okay, but I did feel a bit bad. I promised I'd make the time, after the last show, and I don't think saying 'hello' to me is going to make or break his night, but he's a good dude and I like to keep my word.

All in all, another good one from my boys. Shame that Lib and Michelle didn't make it along, but I'm sure they'll be there next time.

It did leave me with tinnitus so bad I really felt like my head was in one of those electrical substation things, with electricity buzzing overhead, but even that was worth it...