I think last night's Chimera was a record-breaker as far as attendance goes - all the more impressive given that was even with a number of regulars I can think of missing. I found keeping up with weekend-levels of requests / assorted attention / etc. easier than I have in the past too, so that made me happy. I had a great time in any case; hope others did also.

Thanks to:

• arden_drake and eve for helping out on the door - always appreciated all the moreso on busy nights like this one.
• Barbies Shop, for helping sell tickets and for prizes.
• Gloomth for prizes.
• The ever-helpful staff at Soda.
• Everyone who made it out to show their support for the night.

Also, congratulations to the prize-winners. Here's a picture of the 'trophies' I 'made' (or at least, did the paint job on) which were included in the prize packages:



And here's the playlist:

What would your highschool mix tape be? Keep in mind that you don't have unlimited space. Post 10 songs in your journal that sum up what you listened to in highschool.

1. Iron Maiden - Childhood's End
2. Slayer - Spirit in Black
3. Morbid Angel - The Ancient Ones
4. Ugly Kid Joe - N.I.B.
5. Alice Cooper - Unholy War
6. Nobuo Uematsu - Kefka's Theme
7. Ministry - N.W.O.
8. White Zombie - Super Charger Heaven
9. NIN - Heresy
10. Marilyn Manson - Sweet Dreams

Notes:
1: Probably the first metal song I ever paid any real attention to.
2-4: All the Satanic and Lovecraftian whatnot I started to get into in high school.
5: Theme song of my whole falling-out with a friend who converted to Mormonism, one of the major formative events of my teen years.
6: I played video games a lot in high school, and spent what was, at that time in my life, a fortune on buying the soundtrack for FFVI.
7: I remember my brother buying Ministry and thinking at that time that it was 'rare' - this is hilarious by my current standards of hard-to-find music.
8: Makes me think of a lot of good times with my brother, playing video games, watching Loud on MuchMusic and etc.
9: First rock star crush.
10: Seeing the video for this when I got home from my prom was one of the only good things I clearly remember about that night... and the wisdom of age says that this demonstrates all the more just how much my prom sucked.

1. What do you think of intimacy?
Hmm. I'll assume you're talking about general closeness to someone as opposed to this being simply a euphemism for sexual activity. In which case:

• On one hand, my long-term view is that the potential benefits of becoming close to someone outweigh any trepidation I may have about getting hurt. I've never been the type to run away from a relationship because it is 'getting too close,' as to me there's no point in even having a relationship if that's an issue, and as for getting hurt, I tend to assume pretty readily that I'll heal. I expect this attitude to stand in the future should someone sufficiently awesome come along.
• On the other hand though, my short-term view is that until such time as I develop better 'sociopath radar,' I'm not convinced I can distinguish 'real' from 'false' intimacy, and therefore the entire notion makes me queasy and causes me to prefer more straightforward and immediate forms of 'interpersonal satisfaction.'

2. When did you last say to your sibling?
*checks MSN transcripts - yes, I keep those for everybody.* On Monday, he was saying that he would like The Azoic better if they didn't sing in English, as "that obsession song is really catchy but those are some pretty dumb lyrics." At which point I informed him it was a cover of an 80's song... not that this really affected his underlying point.

3. Milk or soy and why?
I think they both have their place, especially vanilla soy (which I've discovered I really like in my English Breakfast tea), but since I have yet to be impressed with soy cheese or soy yogurt, overall I'd definitely have to go with milk. I'm really glad I haven't inherited the lactose intolerance common to Orientals, as there are too many of my favorite foods that are milk-related in some way or other.

4. What did you eat for supper?
Shrimp dumplings and rice, but then I wasn't full, so I also had some seaweed, some pecans, and part of a chocolate Easter bunny. All accompanied by cranberry-pomegranite juice. Yes, this level of randomness is normal for me.

5. What's your favorite place?
My home. More specifically, in front of the computer. It seems silly for me to list some faraway awesome building or landscape when in practice, I likely couldn't spend more than a limited amount of time there before I started getting the 'where is my Internet and all my stuff?' twitches. I like traveling, it's true, but I need a lair to come home to.

6. How would you ask somebody out?
It massively depends on the person and the circumstances. I find that the combination of the two is what enables the opportunity for unique and memorable attempts, whereas relying on any generic technique doesn't appeal to me. I would say though that very consistently, if I am interested in someone I will make it clear to them pretty quickly as opposed to waiting for them to approach me; I believe that if someone slips through my fingers because I didn't speak up, I have only myself to blame, and a lot of guys tell me they appreciate a girl propositioning them as opposed them always having to make the first move, so this seems to work out okay overall.

7. Who would you most like to spend time with right now?
I'm fine with my own little world at this very moment. Looking forward to seeing various people I know at Chimera tomorrow though.

Random: typing the name in the title, I accidentally typed an 'o' at the end. I'm sure it means something flattering ??

1. What do you think of China hosting the Olympics ?
Eh, I don't know, if Nazi Germany got a turn it's kind of hard to say that anyone else shouldn't. I also tend to think that boycotting the Olympics due to not liking the country it's in just penalizes athletes for political issues that have nothing to do with the competition itself, and is therefore not an appropriate way of protesting said political issues. No idea how popular or unpopular this view is amongst people I know. Beyond that I have no particular thoughts about the Olympics.

2. When did you last feel honestly afraid?
A few weeks ago I was dealing with a situation with a friend that I thought could turn into a suicide intervention, and certain aspects of it were also a bit potentially-freaky on the occult side of things, so it's probably fair to say I was afraid then when I was first going into that situation. Thankfully it resolved ok for the person involved though.

3. Tennis or badminton and why?
Badminton, because it is the only sport I remember being occasionally-not-totally-pathetic-at in high school, plus it has a projectile that is unlikely to seriously injure anyone. Frankly I hate all sports entailing balls, because my grandmother had a brother who died at age 19 due to being hit in the head with a soccer ball, and thus due to having it always impressed upon me growing up that any possible contact between a ball and one's head was a super-bad thing, I just don't deal well with the stress of the majority of sports.

4. What did you think was going to happen after 9/11?
I didn't really have expectations as to what would happen because the whole thing just seemed so unprecedented to me. I can say though that I'm not massively surprised by anything that has in fact happened in the aftermath though. (Somewhat amusing story about my thought process at the time though: I remember being half-asleep, hearing some relative in the house slamming doors and saying "geez, did you hear four planes got hijacked today?!" and thinking "this sounds stupid - I want to reset and go back to my previous save point." Silly geek brain. )

5. What’s your favorite chocolate bar?
Mint Aero. Although I'm also pretty fond of Pep, and various kinds of pure dark chocolate bars.

6. How would you cope if you found out you were the star on something like the "Truman Show"?
Hmm, this is a very interesting question. I haven't seen the movie, but reading the synopsis online, I think a key differentiating factor is that my life has been plenty interesting and entailed a wider variety of locales and people. Given that, I think if I found out "hey, actually the star of everything is me," the most predictable result would be making any drama-whoring in my personality 100x worse - lookit me, I'm on TV!! Wonder how entertaining the world will find it if I do... this now!!! But more specifically, I think I would probably:
a) be concerned as to whether my PhD will still 'count' - are the books I've been reading 'real' or not?
b) be curious about what everyone I know is 'actually' like 'for real' vs. 'in character'
c) be hunting down directors/writers/etc. to express my irritation at certain 'plot twists,' probably with the intention of suing for lots of money over psychological damage - not because I actually feel all that screwed up, but just because I figure I could.

7. Who would you most like to spend your very last moments with as you're sinking on the titanic?
A hot dom with a choking fetish and a 'nothing to lose if we're going to die anyway' attitude - I would much rather go 'that way' than by drowning. (Sorry for the TMI, but I can't think of any other interesting and honest answer to this question at the moment. )

1. What do you think of end of the world prophecy, do you believe any you've heard?
As an occultist, I'm vaguely rooting for something interesting to happen in 2012, but as an academic, my attitude when confronted with endtimes prophecy tends to be "the other guys were all wrong, so what makes you think you're going to be right?"

2. When did you last hate "the scene" in whatever capacity?
I think for my first five years or so, I hated that the scene was making such a big deal about Marilyn Manson, and then for the next few after that I hated how it seemed like everyone I met was either all "goth rulez, industrial is teh sux" or "industrial rulez, goth is teh sux," with both groups having this stupid "if even one song of the opposite genre is played then I am going to whine and complain about how there is too much of that genre being played at the bar" attitude. I'm just glad that from 2006 onward, if not slightly before that, I've met tons of people who like both genres and aren't hung up on how goth/industrial is understood in the mainstream media... although I guess the rise of emo has actually done us tons of favors there, in that all the really stupid behaviors once associated with goth/industrial are now primarily seen as 'emo' first and foremost. All that said though, I've never really hated 'the scene' as a whole, I just got impatient with it back when I didn't have the type and level of social influence that I felt I wanted/deserved.

3.Monogamy or polygamy (polyamoury?) and why?
Well, the thing is: against polyamoury, there's my dislike of complexity and of 'meaningless' sexual behavior that all-of-a-sudden turns into something more when the person said it wouldn't and fucks over all the other partners (i.e. that trend in my past has always led to my getting 'fired' and never led to my becoming the one girlfriend or whatever), but against monogamy, if someone is going to cheat anyway I'd rather just know that they have other partners and have everything out in the open. I am definitely in a polyamourous phase right now though.

4. What did you get from the religion//philosophy (any) of Satanism that made you stick with it?
Basically what happened initially with Satanism is that I read the Satanic Bible, found it was presenting almost entirely things I either already believed or readily agreed with upon being presented with the idea, and it's just sort of stuck since then. I've had forays into other religions - e.g. Church of the Subgenius, Discordia, etc. - but I think Satanism's aesthetic has always appealed to me more. Some combination of having been a teenage metal head and my preference for purposeful evil over incompetantly-executed good is probably to blame there.

5. (Adverse to question #2?) What’s your favorite subcultural trend (fashion, behavior, music, whatever) these days?
I have long been partial to bands who can combine something from the industrial aesthetic and something from the gothic aesthetic and make it work. For example, mediaeaval music that uses synthesizers, as per Lamia or Helium Vola.

6. How would you redesign/market yourself if you won both an "extreme" makeover and the services of the world's most successful talent/booking agent?
I actually don't think I have skills up to an appropriate level for much of anything that one would need a talent/booking agent for right now. Nor can I think of much I would do with an 'extreme' makeover... pretty happy with my aesthetic as is, really. I'd much rather have a pile of money so that I could just buy more clothes/make-up/higher-end-hair-styling for myself and/or have free time (due to not having to immediately start working after school in order to get money) to do more creative stuff, like make another album or finish my novel; once I got one of the latter done, then maybe I'd have a use for a talent/booking agent.

7. Who would you most like to tear their clothes off and ravish (be ravished by) for hours?
Well, really I tend to have the same ultimate preference on this even over time, i.e. my demon-muse, in whatever form that happens to be taking at the moment.

1. What do you think of me ?
The three things that most readily come to my mind when I think of you are: a) she's hot; b) she's a thoughtful, loving person who unfortunately gets hurt easily because of it; c) she deserves improved luck with future partners.

2. When did you last wear pink?
Pretty sure I wore an outfit involving hot pink to the last Retrobution at the Warehouse, but I'm not positive when that was... last year, I'm guessing?

3. boys or girls and why?
It really depends on the context. There are trends I notice with both that I like and that I hate, I have good friends in both categories, and etc. I guess if it was a matter of 'sleep with only one or the other for the rest of your life,' I'd have to say guys, but otherwise it's hard to say.

4. What did you want to be when you were a child?
I think the earliest careers I set my sights on were marine biologist (which went away as soon as I found out how hard swimming was for me) and paleontologist (which didn't go away until later, when I found that I did equally well at English and science but found the former more 'fun' than the latter). I also briefly had that phase that many boys go through as children where they think the coolest thing ever would be to become a fighter pilot.

5. What’s your favorite sex position?
Depends on the person; some height combinations put limitations on this, I find. Seeing as how this is a public journal, I'm thinking I should probably leave it at that for now. If that's a lame response, maybe ask me in person sometime.

6. How would you go about taking over the world?
I think I covered this in Canticle's answers. Though I could add to that: I might not kill the would-be-world-conqueror; having them keep on doing the work while I live in the lap of luxury and/or control things behind the scenes is more appealing than doing it all myself when I think about it.

7. Who would you most like to party with ?
Most of the Chimera crowd has been at most of the best parties I've been to. Beyond that, and to provide random additional excitement, the following bands' members strike me as potentially entertaining to party with: Combichrist, Ministry, Lords of Acid, Therion, Iron Maiden, Slayer.

1. What do you think of state of physical music (CDs/LPs/9" Single)?
Myself, I'm still pretty attached to having some physical proof that I own music, i.e. CDs. The concept of paying to download makes me feel as though I'm paying for something that 'should be' free, since in my mind it's either a matter of a) I only like one or two songs, not enough to buy the CD, so I'm within my rights to download for free and not pay money, or b) I like more songs than that, enough to buy the CD, and the free downloading is a service that enables me to make this decision. I have yet to buy anything from the iTunes store or etc. for this reason. In concept I can see something to be said for "I only like that one song, so I'll buy that and not the rest of the album," but in my current mode of thought I'd rather the artist made a good enough album in the first place for me to just feel like the whole CD was worth buying.

2. When did you last dedicate an evening to your own pursuits??
I find that the grad student lifestyle is such that what works best for me is to do both a little bit of work and a little bit of 'my own thing' every day. So while I haven't 'dedicated' an evening to my own pursuits in awhile, by the same definition I haven't 'dedicated' an evening to academic work or etc. in awhile either.

3. Apple pie or Apple pie a la mode and why?
Apple pie a la mode, usually; the ice cream works for me with the pie flavor in that particular combo, I figure.

4. What did you do to that poor, poor monkey?
Hmm, which monkey? Can't say I care for monkeys much, really... I've always been all about Godzilla over King Kong for example.

5. What’s your favorite non-physical way of killing time?
Heh, nice qualifier there. In theory, I think the answer to this question is 'video games,' but in practice, i.e. observing what I actually do on a day-to-day basis, I'm thinking I'd have to go with LJ and/or FARK.

6. How would you describe the people who come of Chimera?
I think Chimera attracts the usual spectrum of black-clads and usually offers a pretty comfortable atmosphere for the more gothy-inclined and the more rivety-inclined alike. Personally I don't see the case that some have argued that the crowd is 'snobbish' or whatever, since a small minority of catty goths/rivetheads talking amongst themselves doesn't realistically affect the casual experience of a random newcomer, unless said random newcomer is one of those insecure people who thinks everyone is talking about them and bitching about them without knowing them anyway, in which case said person would probably find a reason to feel uncomfortable no matter what anyone else was actually doing or not doing.

7. Who would you most like to beat up (in the Fight Club sense), real or fictional?
Y'know, amusingly enough I had a dream awhile back that I was in a 'Fight Club' of some sort. It involved theyknow and her sister in Chun Li like costumes, so I certainly wasn't complaining. As for who I'd most like to beat up though, I'm tempted to name the usual candidate that I name for having-bad-things-happen-to-him, except that I stand no realistic chance against someone far stronger and more streetwise than myself, so the satisfaction value of that is probably pretty limited. Fictional character-wise, I wouldn't mind beating up those three stupid hench-pigs from the Racoons cartoon, or any equivalently incompetant minions. Though I guess upon reflection, all of these scenarios would probably end up less proximate to Fight Club than to Mortal Kombat.

1. What do you think of stoicism as a philosophy?
I'm not super knowledgable about it, but what I have heard makes quite a lot of sense to me. Certainly the self-control elements of it I find appealing. The part I get along with probably least well is the determinist aspect, but again, I'd have to read more about it.

2. When did you last lost confidence?
A probably-too-minor-to-be-interesting example that's recent would be: when I went to visit nscafe yesterday I sure didn't feel very confident I had the right place initially, owing to the fact that strictly following the street address lands one on the back porch, and I wasn't clear on how to get around to the front at first. But if that's dull and you were more fishing for big existential crises or something, do specify and I'll try to do better.

3. French or German and why?
That depends on the context, really. French is more practical for me to learn as far as broadening my career options as an academic in Canada goes, and also would allow me to read a lot of interesting thinkers in their original language (e.g. Badiou and Irigaray, though saying them one after the other I suppose sounds funny to those who know how at odds the two appear to be). On the other hand, German has the latter benefit also (e.g. Nietzsche, Bloch and Benjamin being of particular interest to me here) and also sounds sexier to me... but that's probably the industrial aesthetic combined with the 'dom radar' at work there.

4. What did you forget?
If I could tell you, that would imply that I'd remembered, it seems to me.

5. What’s your favorite band that you're ashamed to admit?
Hard to say inasmuch as I don't tend to feel shame about things like that. Given how others react when I mention it though, I suppose I should probably go with Insane Clown Posse.

6. How would you conquer the world?
Final-Fantasy-6-style: tag along as the fashionable-yet-clearly-crazy second-in-command of a would-be world-conqueror, and then when he succeeds or is on the verge of doing so, off him and take everything for myself. (And then I wonder why I'm single now... )

7. Who would you most like to debate religious concepts with?
I don't really like debating so much as discussing, but I know what you mean... I have a lot of friends whom I talk to about such things, so it's difficult to narrow it down, but I suppose the ideal is anyone who has a modicum of religious/occult knowledge and is open to learning new things that could broaden their own spirituality.

This looks potentially fun, but I suppose that depends on how others respond:

If you would be so kind, ask me the seven questions below. Just copy and paste them into a comment, replace the blanks with anything you want – personal, silly, surreal (e.g. 3. Donkeys or sandcastles and why?), or deep — and I’ll answer honestly as I can! Then post this in your own journal [if you want] and see what kind of things people want to ask you!

1. What do you think of _____________ ?

2. When did you last ____________?

3. __________ or ___________ and why?

4. What did you ______________?

5. What’s your favorite ______________?

6. How would you ______________?

7. Who would you most like to ________ ?

I had quite a blast at Datalink last night. Can't say I'm fond of the decks that the Underground has, but otherwise things were great. Thanks to Raximus for the opportunity.

Nice catching up with a few people whom I hadn't seen around in awhile too. Although I'm somewhat disappointed that one of those didn't turn into the fist fight that initially-expressed desires to 'punch me in the mouth' could have foreshadowed. I suppose the epic 'Me vs. drunk Jerkass in the Warehouse parking lot' showdown will have to wait for another time.

Anyway though, here is the playlist:

DJ Jinx @ Datalink, May 2, 2008

Noise Box - The Night the Aliens Came In (Demo mix)
Heavy Water Factory - Place of Torment
Cyborg Attack - Dunkle Visionen
Suspiria - (Loved in) Emerald (rmx)
Android Lust - Dragonfly (edit)
Einsturzende Neubauten - The Interim Lovers
Cymotec - Flucht v.2
Subhuman - Crack Baby
Snog - Late 20th Century Boy
Diatribe - The Son
Project Pitchfork - Carnival
Evil's Toy - Lucifer's Garden
NamNamBulu - Alone
Stromkern - Stand Up (Radio edit)
Suicide Commando - Love Breeds Suicide (Dioxyde rmx)
Grendel - Zombie Nation
Blutengel - A New Dawn
The Azoic - Eternal
Neuroticfish - Velocity (Club mix)
VnV Nation - Electronaut
The Retrosic - Antichrist
Helium Vola - Omnis Mundi Creatura
Lamia - Cuncti Simus
Heimataerde - Deus Lo Vult
Monolith - Talisman
Aslan Faction - Hell on Earth (The Retrosic rmx)
Dope Stars Inc. - Just Bang Your Head
Culture Kultur - Forever
Soil & Eclipse - I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For

For those who enjoyed this and those who were disappointed to have missed my set alike: my next DJing engagement will be Saturday, May 10 for Chimera: Beasts and Beauties. Hope to see you there.