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1. Today's Somewhat Unfortunate Event Involving a Kitten - Hee Hee Hee.


2. Very interesting acceptance speech at the RWA Rita's, posted by smartbitches...Suzanne Brockman won the Nora Roberts Lifetime Achievement Award, and below is an excerpt from her speech:

[ETA: I posted this on FB, and cousin responded, "good for him", I had to tell him that it was actually a her, and that many het or straight women write male/male gay romance novels. This, I know, comes as a shock to a lot of people in the mainstream world...they just don't understand why a straight woman would write that. ]

So here comes the part of my speech where I get “political.” Oh, yeah, I haven’t gone there yet.

Be strong, be brave, be courageous and kind, be willing to take a risk and open your heart to let in some stranger—some scary “other”—and only then will you win the beautiful gift of love, of connection, in the form of a romantic HEA.

That has been the message of romance since we first began whispering our stories around campfires on cold nights.

But somehow, somewhere along the way, someone decided “Not so fast there you. You don’t look like me or think like me. These stories aren’t about you. You don’t belong here.”

Some of us intentionally tightened our circle to keep people out.

And when you grow up in a world where you learn, just from watching, that you are let in, but others are not, you often accept it as your truth. So when you write what you see and what you know and what you have been told to believe, like books set in a town where absolutely no people of color or gay people live...? You are perpetuating exclusion, and the cravenness and fear that’s at its ancient foundation.

Yeah, I’m talking to you, white, able, straight, cis, allegedly christian women.

And don’t @ me with Not all white women.

Because 53% of us plunged us into our current living hell.

53% of us are racist and some of us don’t even know it!!

Oh, wait, what’s that...? You’re not racist...?

Then do something. Prove it.

In November, vote these hateful racist traitors OUT.

If you believe in love, like I do, if you write romance, where the stories we tell are about the courage that it takes to open your heart, it’s time for you to do the same.


Open your heart and look hard at your political and religious beliefs. Examine all you were taught—usually by white men in power—and try to see exactly who and what they erased from the stories they then labeled truth.

But the sad truth is, we no longer expect anything of you, you 53%. It’s up to the rest of us, including the 99% of all women of color who continue to inspire me and lead the way.

Stand up. Speak up. Fight. VOTE. Our lives, our rights, our marriages, our love depends on it.

What I find fascinating about this -- is the RWA (Romance Writers of America) has been known for being rather socially conservative in its political leanings over the years. Just recently has it begun to change. About five years ago, she'd have booed off the stage. Instead she was applauded.

Things are shifting....

YAY.

It also makes me very happy because I'm writing a subversive contemporary romance novel ( what controversial novel is about )

Don't worry, I doubt anyone is going to see my story. It's just a story I have to write.

Least I forget...

I think I forgot to post about this?

1. According to FX Has Ordered a Bob Fosse Limited Series with Sam Rockwell and Michelle Williams, which is being executive produced by Lin Manuel Miranda

FX has ordered a limited series based on the life of Bob Fosse and Gwen Verdon with Sam Rockwell and Michelle Williams attached as the series leads, Variety has learned.

Based on “Fosse,” the biography written by Sam Wasson, the untitled eight-part series tells the story of the romantic and creative partnership between Fosse and Verdon. He was a visionary filmmaker and one of theater’s most influential choreographers and directors, while she was the greatest Broadway dancer of all time. Together they changed the face of American entertainment at a perilous cost. Featuring Fosse’s choreography, the series explores the hidden corners of show business, the price of pursuing greatness, and the suffering inflicted in the name of art. Production on the series is slated to begin in the fall with the show set to launch in 2019.

Lin-Manuel Miranda, Thomas Kail, Steven Levenson, and George Stelzner will executive produce, with Rockwell and Williams also executive producing. Levenson, who will serve as showrunner, wrote the premiere episode which will be directed by Kail. Nicole Fosse, daughter of Fosse and Verdon, serves as co-executive producer and oversees The Verdon Fosse Legacy. Co-producer Andy Blankenbuehler is the choreographer.

This, I think, is wickedly cool. I love Fosse. But, the main deal is not the music, but the dancing.
Fosse wasn't a composer, nor was Vernon, they were dancers and choreographers -- and insanely talented ones. Also his dance style is hard to do, it looks easy, it's not. That's what is so amazing about it. He moves a part of the body one way, than another in the opposite way. Also it's a highly sexualized and erotic method of dance.

I'm a fan of Bob Fosse. Seeing all his films and three revivials of his theaterical works. Pippin, Chicago, and Dancin. The films that I've seen are: All That Jazz, Sweet Charity, Damn Yankees, Chicago (which didn't really do Fosse justice), Pippin (the original film of the Broadway presentation with Ben Vereen and William Katt)...

But I find Rockwell and Williams interesting choices -- neither strike me as dancers. However they fit the look of Foss and Vernon. And neither was Roy Schneider who Fosse chose to play him in his own bio-pic of his life story, All That Jazz.


2. Also... Hamilton Movie Released in 2020 with bidding starting at 50 Million for distribution rights

The much-anticipated movie of Hamilton, Lin-Manuel Miranda’s smash musical, wrapped two years ago – but won’t appear in cinemas for at least another two.

According to a report in the The Wall Street Journal, a recording of the stage version was shot in 2016, shortly before the departure of Miranda from the cast, and it is this – rather than a film adaptation – which will be released. Citing two insiders, the paper said that it won’t be seen until at least 2020, presumably to maximise attendance at the stage versions still playing.

Studios are apparently bidding for the rights to distribute, with a price tag of as much as $50m (£38m).

Which means those of us who can't figure out how to see it without spending a fortune, finally will get an opportunity to.

A social media friend on FB advised me that she knew people who had seen it many many times. And I thought, eh, you probably do not want to advertise that unless you find people judging you for well...

I mean it would be one thing if the show was accessible. But it's not. Most of the people I know can't afford to see it.

So bragging about seeing it mulitple times...sort of makes you look like a greedy asshole. You know the person who eats all the pies, when there are starving kids looking through windows watching you do it?

I decided not to point this out to her. If she can't figure it out on her own...