InsaneJournal

Stuff and stuff
This is an interesting article about a thirteen-year-old boy who used a walkman for a week instead of his iPod. He didn't realise at first that tapes had a second side! D: But while it's tempting to laugh at him for being stupid...why would he automatically know that? If he has been exposed to tapes at all, it's probably been VHS tapes...which have only one side. But really, at thirteen, he has probably only been exposed to DVDs, CDs, and intangible media.

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This is a good post about sizeism, springing from discussion of a fic written for spn_j2_bigbang. I saw the story when it was first posted and the summary was enough to make me want to stay far, far away. It was about Jensen being really fat and being sent to a fat camp sort of place, where he meets Jared, a trainer, and loses weight and falls in love. Oh yeah, and he's a thirty-year-old virgin. And he's in really bad health. And the reason he's fat is because he stuffs his face all day and is lazy and never exercises.

Yeah...that sounds awesome. But of course it was a huge hit.

The idea that fat people would be thin if only they exercised and didn't eat so much is so pervasive, but it's just not true. Skinny people are not necessarily skinny because they don't eat much, or because they eat healthy food, or because they exercise all the time. Sure, some do those things. So do fat people.

I have been fat almost all my life. I have also been very active most of my life. When I was a kid, I rode my bike everywhere. When I was in high school I played sports (and still rode my bike all the time). When I was in college I walked a lot and rode my bike (UCLA is built on a mountain; going to school there will guarantee you a lot of exercise). Through it all, I was in great shape, but was still fat, and not just a little fat, but "obese". The only time I have not got a lot of exercise is the ten years or so that Bruce and I had a car. You know what happened then? I got out of shape. Being out of shape is not the same as being fat. Being in shape is not the same as being thin.

Now that we don't have a car anymore and are walking a lot again (we are now walking an average of three miles a day, and the better shape we get in, the longer our walks are getting), guess what? I am in so much better shape. I have also this past year or so made it a goal to eat healthier, and have been keeping to it really well. I have never eaten a lot. When we have family meals, I am always the one who eats the least, less than both fat and thin relatives. I only eat when I'm hungry, not for "comfort eating" or because I'm bored. I drink water almost exclusively.

Despite all this, while Bruce has lost about thirty pounds, I've lost maybe five or six. I exercise a lot and eat well, but am still over a hundred pounds overweight.

Of course I would love to be thin. I would love to just weigh less than I do now, even if I never got actually thin or "normal" weight. But I am not going to go on a diet, because diets are the worst thing for you.

And I resent the idea that I should starve myself because if I only ate less I wouldn't be fat! Eating healthy food isn't enough. Eating only enough to fill my stomach and stop it from hurting isn't enough. I'm really not fit to even eat at all. That's the message that it sends when people say all you have to do to lose weight is eat less.

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But enough ranting. Now for some of those interview meme questions.

From helens78:

1. If you were coming to Seattle (*waves little flag for Seattle!*), would you rather drive, fly, take a train, take a bus, or take a boat? Assuming money is no object but the rest of the constraints are there (driving takes longer, flying is more uncomfortable, etc.).

I hate flying. Not only are planes uncomfortable, but there is just so much hassle going through airports these days. I would avoid flying for the rest of my life if I could. I never liked it much to begin with because I get bored easily, even if I bring stuff to do, just the idea that I have to sit there in an uncomfortable seat for hours (though I guess Seattle at least wouldn't be too long a flight) makes me unable to concentrate on anything I brought to keep me entertained.

I have only been on a boat twice, and twice I got seasick, so I'm going to vote no for the boat, too.

I've never been on a long-distance train in the US. I've been on the BART in San Francisco, and a commuter train in Chicago, but I am kind of curious about Amtrak trains, I admit. The downside is that it takes like five hundred years to get anywhere. I would be more interested in a train if we had decent high-speed trains here. Still, I wouldn't totally rule out taking a train.

Driving is something I love. I have driven up to the Bay area many times, and twice have driven to Indiana and back (doing all the driving myself, though Bruce was in the car with me). I just enjoy driving. Even for very long distances. So I think driving to Seattle would be the most fun for me. I also like the stops for gas and food, listening to music in the car (and if I'm driving on my own, singing along), chatting with Bruce. It's just fun!

2. I know a lot of your personal translating projects are things like lyrics and manga -- have you ever wanted to do a personal translation of something else? A book or a magazine article or a blog or something?

In the past I've started projects that never went anywhere. Way back in the day I wanted to translate some jpop articles for my website (I think they were about GLAY), but I never finished them. I have translated part of a novel, Ikebukuro West Gate Park, and wouldn't mind doing the whole thing, but it does come down to demand. I think there's a lot more demand for manga translations than novel translations, though I'm sure I could find an audience for it if I did.

3. You were really into, was it Luxor?, for a while there -- have any games come up since then that you were really enthusiastic about? :)

I love Luxor! The version I have doesn't fully cooperate with Vista, or I'd probably still be playing it. Right now my go-to PC game is Peggle. It's so awesome. However, I really wish they'd release a new version or at least a new expansion pack (there was holiday and spring, how about summer?). Before Bruce bought me Peggle Nights for Christmas, I was really into the Vista version of mahjong. At times it's even been good old Spider Solitaire. I just like having a clicky PC game I can play whenever I want to.

4. I know you and Bruce met online and then he moved out to California -- was it hard making the adjustment to having him around in person?

Um...not really, to be honest. XD While I am often change-resistant, I am also really accepting of change once it happens. I get used to things easily. Like, okay, it's happened, this is how things are now.

5. If you could donate $1000 to the charity/foundation/research institute/advocacy organization/etc. of your choice right now, which one would it be?

I really have no idea. I have never had money to give to charity, so I really am not that familiar with the whole thing.

From mikotokun:

1. I remember you once translated a passage from Ikebukuro West Gate Park. Have you done done anything else in literary translation?

I have for others. One of the people who requests a lot of translation work from me has been having me do a Sengoku Basara fanfic lately, and before that I was working on a novel for her (original BL). I've also done fanfic translation in the past, as well as one original story from a doujinshi.

I enjoy literary translation a lot. Sometimes I even think of doing some more of Ikebukuro West Gate Park, or perhaps Nobuta. wo Produce (though I gave my copy to kakeochi_umai and would have to buy another copy) or something else that catches my interest. I'd love to do it for a living, too, but I've never quite figured out how to get into that field.

2. What's your favorite book of all time?

Ooh, that's really hard. Really, really hard. Honestly, I don't even have an idea of how to go about figuring it out. Because I don't reread, there's really no way to judge. I've loved a lot of books over the years, but how to compare them?

3. Which language were you naturally better at: Japanese, Spanish, or German?

I don't know. None of them felt more difficult than the others to me and I enjoyed them all. I probably had a boost with Spanish, since I had a lot of exposure from early childhood, but really they all came pretty easy to me for the amount I studied (I mean, I only took one semester of German, so I never got as fluent as I did Spanish or Japanese).

4. In theory, do you like email or texting better?

Email, definitely. Even the fanciest of phones still has a teensy keypad, making typing a pain in the ass. Plus I'm not out doing stuff all the time that I need to be texting, so it's pretty useles to me in general.

5. How do you feel about abortion?

I feel that it's no one's business but the person who needs an abortion. It is especially not the goverment's business.

And from bell:

1) Not a question, but: I'd like to hear more about Bruce. :D

Um...LOL. What to say? Bruce is awesome. We met on a jpop mailing list! He emailed me about videos and I rented some Tenchi Muyo (Pretty Sammy?) videos and an Amuro Namie concert for him and made copies. And, idk, we just really clicked. So after about six weeks of emailing, he moved out here and we've been together ever since. :D That's probably not what you were asking, but it's such an open-ended question! I like him. A lot. :)

2) How do you see yourself in five years?

Another tough one! I have never been good at imagining the future. In fact, I'm utterly crap at it. When I was a kid, I never thought beyond being a kid. Never had plans for the future or thought about what I wanted to be when I grew up. When I was in high school, I didn't think about college. When I was in college, I didn't think about work. I just...it's really impossible for me to imagine anything other than what is happening now, always has been. I would like to say we'd be not living in this house anymore, but I don't know. That's such a big step and really requires us to be in a totally different place financially. But we are now in a place financially that I couldn't have imagined a couple years ago, because I really couldn't see us ever getting out of debt. So who knows!?

3) How do you feel about twitter vs. dw/lj vs. other social platforms?

I really am not a fan of Twitter or Facebook. I like blogging, so they just don't meet my needs. I do use both of them because I have some people who use only Twitter or FB and the only way to really stay in touch with them is to use those sites, but otherwise I probably wouldn't bother much.

4) If there was one thing you wish everyone in fandom could just *know*, what would it be?

How to write well? XD

5) What's a question you're hoping someone will ask, and what's the answer?

I don't really do these with the hopes that people will ask specific questions. I like talking about my writing, so if someone had asked that sort of question, that would be cool, but I don't really have anything specific in mind. See above re: difficulty anticipating future situations that differ from the present.