Near-equality makes inequality less visible. American women largely have access to the same things as men: education, employment, the vote, etc. They live independently, making their own decisions without society judging them as radical. And when people commit egregious amounts of sexism (I’m looking at you, Rep. “Legitimate-Rape” Akin), societyContinue Reading
It’s amazing some of the things still taught in schools. They’re just plain wrong, but we’re so familiar with the claims it never occurs to us to double-check the facts. Today, less well-known but equally wrong stories are also constantly circulating through social media such as Facebook because people presumeContinue Reading
Start shameless plug: In the last couple weeks, I have been cleaning up Steaming Apparel, my website for steampunk costuming ideas. Much of it targets beginners looking for places to start, although there is some more complicated material as well. The costuming instructions I’ve been posting here will eventually beContinue Reading
Medieval is a rather abused word, often being used to cover everything from the fall of the Roman Empire to…well, gosh only knows. People commonly mash it at least with the Renaissance, which comes with it a healthy sense of irony as Renaissance thinkers very actively separated themselves from medieval culture. Continue Reading
There’s three kinds of lies: lies, damn lies, and statistics. Numbers are easy to manipulate. You can fairly easily tell technical truths while obscuring the actual truth, or, at least, over-simplifying complex issues. Pundits and politicians do it all the time. Unless, of course, you’re just lying. Unless you liveContinue Reading
This is a continuation of posts relating to my current steampunk costuming project Steampunk Loki Jacket Part Two: Color, Fabric, and Trim Holding Costumes Together: Sewing, Fabric Glue, and Hot Glue I have a love-hate relationship with the sleeves and shoulders. The most successful part of whole coat was theContinue Reading
Elizabeth II, queen of the United Kingdom and head of the Commonwealth turns 88 today, April 21. She is already the oldest British or English monarch. The second and third oldest monarchs (Victoria and George III) were both 81 when they died. As an Aside: Great Britain is the unionContinue Reading
This continues from Costuming Project: Steampunk Loki Jacket, where I outlined the first steps in finding a suitable base coat and did some basic shaping. Now it’s time to create more intricate decoration and add some color to the project. Fabric Color Loki’s movie jacket is black and overly brilliantContinue Reading
I am always suspicious of glue. It’s failed me in a wide variety of projects. When working with hard materials, I tend to default to superglue to side-step the almost inevitable failure of lesser glues. I can’t do that with my steampunk Loki coat project. I have to actually chooseContinue Reading
If I asked random people on the street to name a pharaoh, most would say King Tut. (More than a few would probably also look at me oddly.) They wouldn’t even call him a pharaoh (much less by his full name, Tutankhamen), because we’re so used to the phrase “KingContinue Reading