What to Know Before Going to Galaxy's Edge

As Disneyland is planning to re-open with certain COVID-19 safety accommodations, this seems like a good time to share my advice for going to Galaxy's Edge.  Fair warning, I am no longer* one of those people who will stand in line forever or call at 6am to try to get into something.

The first thing to know is that this is not designed as an amusement park.  It's designed as a new planet (one that has never been on any Star Wars movie, TV show, or animated series), and you are a visitor to that planet.  I encourage you to watch Neil Patrick Harris's "documentary" Star Wars Galaxy's Edge: Adventure Awaits to get a better understanding of the concept, and preview some of the features and activities.  You can watch this on Hulu or Freeform, if you have an account. 

I did watch that ahead of time, but didn't realize that there are two places that you have to make a reservation to visit.  The first is the Cantina.  The day that I went (a Monday in October, 2019), we walked by the line around 10 or 11am, and there were no more reservations open for the rest of the day.  Or the next day, I believe.  So, if you want to go to the Cantina, make reservations way ahead of time.
You also need reservation to make a lightsaber, but we were able to make reservations that day.  We looked about 1pm, and made reservations for about 3pm.

What else to know?  There are really only a couple of rides, and then a couple of activities that you must pay for, plus lots of places for shopping, including a whole themed open market.  The big ride is the Millennium Falcon.  I rode that like 3 times, and finally forced a kid out so that I could be the pilot.  All of the positions are fun, but I kept riding it so that I could be the pilot at least once.  You also have to rush to get a picture at the table, and it took me several tries to get to that, too. 

Building a personalized heavy-duty lightsaber (that glows and makes the swooshing sound!) costs $200 if you do the one with the reservation, or $65 if you make a plastic one in the gift shop.  You can also make your own droid, which costs $100 (or less if you make a plastic one in the gift shop, but I didn't catch the price on those).

The other cool thing is the food.  It's all themed to the idea of a planet in the Star Wars universe.  Of course you can get Aunt Beru's blue milk (which is fruity, surprisingly), and now Luke's green milk (also fruity, and cold, which means it's not fresh!), but all restaurants have dishes on theme.

I went on my birthday.  You know how in Disneyland, most of the workers wish you a Happy Birthday?  Well, in Galaxy's Edge, they wish you a Happy Origin Day!  It took me most of the day to figure that out!

There are also a few characters, and Kylo Ren stalks around a lot.  I'm not sure what they'll do after the events in Rise of Skywalker...

There's a lot more to learn and do at Black Rock Outpost, but those the important points, in my opinion!

*I did wait in line for over 24 hours for tickets to Star Wars: The Phantom Menace.  Maybe the disappointment of that film is the reason why I won't do something like that again? 

Good Omens Miniseries is Good, but Not Gay

As a bisexual women in her 40s, I understand wanting to see queer characters represented in shows, movies, and stories.  I mean, when "I Kissed a Girl" came out, I was so excited even though Katy treats the "girl" as an object, not caring about her name or her heart, and still worried about what her boyfriend would think.  But the queer community was so thirsty for representation, any representation, that we thought it was validating and cute.
I'm not sure that we've gotten that far in music, but I think we've made great strides in movies since we have more than Bound and The Birdcage, which both have problematic elements.  Especially if they're expected to represent all or queerdom.

Anyway, on to the Good Omens miniseries on Netflix, er, Amazon.  MILD SPOILERS AHEAD.
I don't remember if I read the book, but I was seeing a lot on Tumblr about fans of the show being angry that Neil Gaiman didn't make the supernatural pair of angel and demon explicitly gay. But did you see Tennant's swagger in those super-skinny leather pants?  I'm calling gay.
Anyway, I read Gaiman's tweets that they were agender beings, and thus weren't gay, which I think is a crock of shit.  Almost all of the angels and demons, and even god, were clearly gendered. The only character that wasn't referred to by gendered pronouns was Pollution (who is also a problematic character as the only Asian castmember represents pollution?!), so the angels and demons definitely had a gender.  Yes, some of them were pretty androgynous, but still tended toward a gender and used gendered pronouns.
So, I don't buy Gaiman's response.  Maybe that's what was intended in the book, but that's not what was represented on screen.

So moving on to the gay question, were Aziraphale and Crowley in a romantic and sexual relationship?  I see absolutely no textual evidence of that on screen.  Did they ever even touch on screen (other than when they switch places)?  They clearly care for each other, I can even say that they love each other, but a romantic or sexual relationship?  I don't see it.

Maybe I'll lose my Queer Card for this, but sometimes people are just friends.  Really good friends.  Best friends across the centuries.  But friends. 
And that's okay.  In addition to needing more representation of queer characters, we ALSO need more representation of healthy friendships, especially between men.  Western society is becoming more socially disconnected (look up the research on loneliness), so seeing healthy, connected friendships is important. 

It's sad, though, that the queer community is so desperate for role models and to see ourselves, that we cling on to anything, try to headcanon everything, so that we can see ourselves. 

In sum, Aziraphale and Crowley are not in a gay relationship, but they are in a deep, connected friendship, and that is great.  And we also need more queer role models. 

American Gods: S1E1

I read the book, but already noticed bothersome things after watching only one episode of the series that I hadn't noticed from the book.  It's not that the book is different from the series already, I just hadn't noticed things.  I probably didn't notice them because the book was recommended by a good friend, Robert, who loves Neil Gaiman, and loved the book.  Normally, Robert and I hate similar issues, like sexism and racism, so it didn't occur to me to worry about these things. 

I also didn't look up any of the god(desse)s while I was reading the book, but I am looking them up now that I'm watching the first season, and the first episode already has inaccuracies!

SPOILERS

In the first episode, we already have the wife fridged!  See Wikipedia for a more complete explanation of this concept, but it's basically when the wife or girlfriend of the male protagonist is killed or tortured as motivation for the male protagonist's story and growth.  It's lazy writing, and I'm sad to see it here.  So, sexist box is checked.  :(

What about racism?  The main character is an intelligent, middle-class Black man, so that doesn't seem to fulfill any stereotypes.  He does start the story in prison, but that might be more an accurate portrayal of our racially biased criminal justice system.  Although, it is also a stereotype. 

But more concerning is Bilquis, for a variety of reasons.  First, the depiction of Bilquis as some sort of sex goddess, or love goddess, is historically inaccurate.  Again according to Wikipedia, Bilquis's history is disputed, but seems to generally include providing gifts/trade and using riddles or wisdom.  There's nothing about sex.  But, and here's the second issue, there's a lot of sexualized racism about how Black women's sexuality is dangerous.  In the show, she literally consumes people during sex, presumably killing them.  In the second episode, she consumes both men and women, but mostly White people.  Misognoir much?  I like having diverse casts and stories, but if you wanted a killer sex goddess, maybe be historically accurate and find a real god/dess who uses sex as a weapon instead of plucking one African queen from history and telling a lie about her story. 

Yes, the main character is a complex Black man, but the depiction of the two women so far is as sexual and dangerous.  This plays into stereotypes of women in general, but particularly of Black women.  Sadly, because of this sexism and sexualized racism, I'm not looking forward to continuing the series.  Sorry, Robert. 

2018 Fun!

As I was adding important dates to our new Ellie calendar, I saw that we did a lot of fun stuff!  I wanted to get it all down somewhere, so here you go!

In January, we celebrated my Gram's birthday and Ellie turned 3!
In February, we had a nice Valentine's dinner.
I went to Washington in March because I missed my niblings.  I'm sure I also had pie on Pi Day.  :)
It looks like we went to Washington in April, too.
I went back to Washington in June for my nephew's high school graduation, and we started our many appointments for Brie.  Poor puppy had her knee surgery in June!
We celebrated July 4th, and I saw Gwen Stefani in Vegas with a long-time friend in July.  We also went to Seaside , OR, with my family in July.  That was Gary's first time on this annual trip!  July was our first of 3 Angel's games this year.
I went back to Washington right before school started in August.  Gary and I went to a musical in both August and September.  I went to Six Flags with a student group in September, too.  Gary also brought Ellie up to Taft to visit me for a weekend!
In October, I visited my niblings in Seattle to welcome my oldest nephew to college, and I took my student club to the Bakersfield Pride Festival.
In November, we only traveled for Thanksgiving.
I went to Wicked with my long-time friend in December, then we went to Washington again for the holidays and Auntie Day.

Lots of music, and Angel's games, and family! 

Auntie Day 2018

So, apparently I only have motivation enough to find time to post on here if it's Auntie Day, the made-up holiday for me!

Every year, my sister says that Auntie Day shouldn't have an annual theme because Mother's Day doesn't have an annual theme.  The theme is "mothers".  But every year she comes up with a cool new theme!  She does reserve the right to not have a theme, but this year the theme was DOGS!

We went to a hot dog restaurant (Mad Dogs), and played Apples-to-Apples (because the restaurant had it and it's my favorite game; it's not theme-related).  My nephew Adam won, I think.  I got a mac and cheese hot dog!

After that, we went home and watched Good Boy!, a silly dog movie that the kids had watched non-stop when they were kids.  There, we had puppy chow for a snack!

Another fun Auntie Day!  I'm grateful for my sister, and my niblings, for making a great day and for making being an aunt to fulfilling!

Auntie Day 2017

For Auntie Day 2017, we went to see The Last Jedi!  Here are the pictures! 

I got a Wonder Woman backpack- with a lasso!!  It was even on sale!

We all wore Star War t-shirts!

And I got a cup that says NIBLINGS on it!

Auntie Day 2016

I got a little behind on these,  I'm  don't remember what we did in 2016.  I know we went to noodles (I love noodles!).  I'm  wearing a Star Wars t-shirt, so maybe we went to see Rogue One?  Anyway, here are the few pictures that I have!

And they baked me something, but it's been so long that I don't remember what it was... :/