I loved the 1880s
Jun. 13th, 2008 02:11 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kleenexwomanI am working on a bibliography paper, but here is a decade survey I got earlier from ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
miskatonika's LJ.
Blast back to 1985
1.What would you look like?
Apathetic punk sort of thing. Black T-shirt, flannel overshirt, ripped black jeans with safety pins, zits, green hair.
2.Where would you live?
Chippewa, Michigan. (Where "Freaks and Geeks" was set.) VH1 tells me that the cultural center of the United States would have been Los Angeles, but let's be reasonable, I'm not gonna get there.
3.What would your name be?
Still Rachel, but I'd use the nickname "Miss Simulacra" for whatever.
4.Would you be in a band?
Yes. They would be like the Epoxies.
5.What would you name the band?
Actually, they would be the Epoxies.
6.Would your band have keyboards?
SYNTHESIZERS AND KEYTARS.
7.What would your hair look like?
It would be bright green. I would dye it with Kool-Aid.
8.What car would you own?
I wouldn't. Fucking recession.
9. Or would you skateboard to school?
I can't skateboard, I freak out and fall off. Oh, hell, I probably would skate to school as some sort of personal statement.
10.Who’s your favorite band?
DEVO, Oingo Boingo, X-Ray Spex. Dead Kennedys. Maybe even some Zep.
11.What is the first thing you would do when you arrive in 1985?
Hitchhike to concerts of bands that broke up before I reached puberty.
Blast back to 1955
1.Where do you hang out?
Greenwich Village or Interzone.
2.What do you look like?
Black turtleneck, black jeans, sunglasses, cool beret.
3.Do you choose to go the school dance?
I am out back smoking reefer with the Negro musicians. School dances are for squares.
4.What do you listen to?
Cool jazz and CRAZY bongo music.
5.Chuck Berry?
Sure, why not.
6.Do you drink?
THE DRINKING AGE WAS 18 OMG
7.Do you smoke?
Green tea, baby.
8.Do you “Park”?
"Park" implies the necessary addition of a car. I am so cool that no car is needed.
9.Do you get in fights?
TTLY CARRYING SWITCHBLADE
10.Do you defend the woman you love?
IDK, it would depend on whether I was the butch or the femme.
11.Where do you live?
New York City or Tangiers.
Blast to 2015
1.Do you need roads to drive?
You can't drive. Barely any cars work because we will have no more oil and didn't get biofuels right.
2.Are you afraid that if you bring something back with you than it will cause a major paradox?
No, I'd just try to avoid using vulgar magic.
3.Do you own a HOVER BOARD?
SKATEBOARDING HAS BEEN OUTLAWED. JUST LIKE THE THRASHERS FEARED.
4.What do you look like?
Pretty much like 1985 me, except with more Mad Max-esque armor and Spider Jerusalem shades.
5.What is the first thing you buy in the future?
DIPPIN' DOTS: THE ICE CREAM OF THE FUTURE
6.How old is your future self?
28.
7.Are you careful that you don’t run into your future self?
My future self would be expecting me. It would be rude not to go get coffee or something.
8.Where does your future self live?
In the ruins of a warehouse in Detroit, farming mutated vegetables and scavenging wireless Internet.
9.What is the food like in 2015?
Fresh and organic, because it's all grown in hydroponic skyscrapers in the middle of the city! Woohoo!
10.Is Michael Jackson gay?
He has his consciousness transferred to a child clone of himself.
11.What is the music like?
Eastern European fusion. Gypsy punk is just the beginning! Ukrainian drone-grunge, Polish New Wave, Latvian rap, Bosnian trance-pop...
12.Do aliens conquer the world?
They tried, but it turned out to be a massive P.R. failure.
13.Have scientists discovered a cure for cancer yet?
Didn't this lead to a world of vampires? No, they haven't. Not if we don't all want to be vampires. However, you can choose to have designer tumors installed.
14.Are Boy bands and pop sensations still exploding thru the billboards?
Boy bands and pop will never go away, ever. They're just a little more inventive now.
Blast back to 1885
1.Ride a horse?
Yeah. Sure. Why not. However, I prefer those newfangled contraptions called "bi-cycles."
2.Have a hat?
An entire species of rare bird went extinct just so their feathers could adorn my hat collection.
3.Own a gun?
A pearl-handled pistol I keep in my garter.
4.What Cowboy name do you pick?
Oh, we're cowboys now? No, fuck that, I want to be a lady of industry and herd orphans into my factories. I will take the name Lady Rachel Whitstone, and the socialist rags will nickname me "The Whitstone Witch" for my utter refusal to kow-tow to their muck-racking activists and roustabouts. (Victorian me is a horrible person, I'm sorry.)
5.How about Clint Eastwood?
The name sounds like that of an actor in one of those fascinating "blue" motion pictures.
6.Scared of Mad Dog Tannen?
I secretly collect the penny dreadfuls based on his ill-bred and rowdy adventures.
7.Do you have distant relatives?
Disapproving aristocrats in England, and a secret Jew in the family line.
8.Do you drink whiskey?
Whiskey is for the lower class. I drink brandy.
9.Do you hate Indians?
I hear they are fighting a war with the red man out west; I applaud the homesteaders fulfilling our national Manifest Destiny, but I do wish they'd ship a few copper-skinned braves and maidens to the opium brothels I frequent. Just for variety's sake, you understand.
10.Are you a friend or foe of the sheriff?
I have bribed the police force so heavily that I technically own the sheriff.
11.Like the name Clara?
It seems to me to be the name of a spinster schoolmarm who must spend hours each day in a stuffy public learning-factory, pushing scattered and inaccurate notions into the withered, malnourished brains of her orphan students who will never need them. Fire the woman and send the children to the factory! Every moment they spend in the school-room is a moment they are NOT manning the steam engines.
12.Love the name Clara?
Why has the infernal woman not vacated her post yet? Ship her off to the frontier and let her perish in a train wreck, or a wagon accident, or an Indian attack, or a bout of typhoid fever, or even let her be beaten to death by her own dull-witted, burly farm-worker students.
13.What do you eat?
Beef that's not actually rotted yet, milk that hasn't been adulterated too much with water and chalk powder, fruits and vegetables that have a minimum of worms, fresh white bread without stone grit or maggots. Best you can do in an era without federal food regulation.
14.Listen to ZZ Top?
DEVIL MUSIC. (I secretly go to music halls to listen to top-hatted male impersonators sing smutty songs through megaphones.)
15.Is the Old West a fun place to live?
I have my own fun in my enormous mansion with my own private park, private beach, and vacation home in the mountains, thanks.
16.Ever been Hung?
I'LL HAVE YOU HORSEWHIPPED FOR ASKING IMPERTINENT QUESTIONS. WHAT BROADSHEET ARE YOU FROM, GOOD SIR?
17.Do you do your killing at high noon, low noon, or noon?
High noon, if you get my drift. I never whip orphans without a good snootful of cocaine-laced wine. (It's medicinal! Really!)
18.Have you ever read anything by Jules Verne?
Indeed, I thrill to his predictions of a technocratic future.
19.How often do you wash?
Every other week, as prescribed by my personal physician.
20.Do you own an Out House?
I have three water closets, the kind they exhibited at the Crystal Palace. TECHNOLOGY!
miskatonika's LJ. Blast back to 1985
1.What would you look like?
Apathetic punk sort of thing. Black T-shirt, flannel overshirt, ripped black jeans with safety pins, zits, green hair.
2.Where would you live?
Chippewa, Michigan. (Where "Freaks and Geeks" was set.) VH1 tells me that the cultural center of the United States would have been Los Angeles, but let's be reasonable, I'm not gonna get there.
3.What would your name be?
Still Rachel, but I'd use the nickname "Miss Simulacra" for whatever.
4.Would you be in a band?
Yes. They would be like the Epoxies.
5.What would you name the band?
Actually, they would be the Epoxies.
6.Would your band have keyboards?
SYNTHESIZERS AND KEYTARS.
7.What would your hair look like?
It would be bright green. I would dye it with Kool-Aid.
8.What car would you own?
I wouldn't. Fucking recession.
9. Or would you skateboard to school?
I can't skateboard, I freak out and fall off. Oh, hell, I probably would skate to school as some sort of personal statement.
10.Who’s your favorite band?
DEVO, Oingo Boingo, X-Ray Spex. Dead Kennedys. Maybe even some Zep.
11.What is the first thing you would do when you arrive in 1985?
Hitchhike to concerts of bands that broke up before I reached puberty.
Blast back to 1955
1.Where do you hang out?
Greenwich Village or Interzone.
2.What do you look like?
Black turtleneck, black jeans, sunglasses, cool beret.
3.Do you choose to go the school dance?
I am out back smoking reefer with the Negro musicians. School dances are for squares.
4.What do you listen to?
Cool jazz and CRAZY bongo music.
5.Chuck Berry?
Sure, why not.
6.Do you drink?
THE DRINKING AGE WAS 18 OMG
7.Do you smoke?
Green tea, baby.
8.Do you “Park”?
"Park" implies the necessary addition of a car. I am so cool that no car is needed.
9.Do you get in fights?
TTLY CARRYING SWITCHBLADE
10.Do you defend the woman you love?
IDK, it would depend on whether I was the butch or the femme.
11.Where do you live?
New York City or Tangiers.
Blast to 2015
1.Do you need roads to drive?
You can't drive. Barely any cars work because we will have no more oil and didn't get biofuels right.
2.Are you afraid that if you bring something back with you than it will cause a major paradox?
No, I'd just try to avoid using vulgar magic.
3.Do you own a HOVER BOARD?
SKATEBOARDING HAS BEEN OUTLAWED. JUST LIKE THE THRASHERS FEARED.
4.What do you look like?
Pretty much like 1985 me, except with more Mad Max-esque armor and Spider Jerusalem shades.
5.What is the first thing you buy in the future?
DIPPIN' DOTS: THE ICE CREAM OF THE FUTURE
6.How old is your future self?
28.
7.Are you careful that you don’t run into your future self?
My future self would be expecting me. It would be rude not to go get coffee or something.
8.Where does your future self live?
In the ruins of a warehouse in Detroit, farming mutated vegetables and scavenging wireless Internet.
9.What is the food like in 2015?
Fresh and organic, because it's all grown in hydroponic skyscrapers in the middle of the city! Woohoo!
10.Is Michael Jackson gay?
He has his consciousness transferred to a child clone of himself.
11.What is the music like?
Eastern European fusion. Gypsy punk is just the beginning! Ukrainian drone-grunge, Polish New Wave, Latvian rap, Bosnian trance-pop...
12.Do aliens conquer the world?
They tried, but it turned out to be a massive P.R. failure.
13.Have scientists discovered a cure for cancer yet?
Didn't this lead to a world of vampires? No, they haven't. Not if we don't all want to be vampires. However, you can choose to have designer tumors installed.
14.Are Boy bands and pop sensations still exploding thru the billboards?
Boy bands and pop will never go away, ever. They're just a little more inventive now.
Blast back to 1885
1.Ride a horse?
Yeah. Sure. Why not. However, I prefer those newfangled contraptions called "bi-cycles."
2.Have a hat?
An entire species of rare bird went extinct just so their feathers could adorn my hat collection.
3.Own a gun?
A pearl-handled pistol I keep in my garter.
4.What Cowboy name do you pick?
Oh, we're cowboys now? No, fuck that, I want to be a lady of industry and herd orphans into my factories. I will take the name Lady Rachel Whitstone, and the socialist rags will nickname me "The Whitstone Witch" for my utter refusal to kow-tow to their muck-racking activists and roustabouts. (Victorian me is a horrible person, I'm sorry.)
5.How about Clint Eastwood?
The name sounds like that of an actor in one of those fascinating "blue" motion pictures.
6.Scared of Mad Dog Tannen?
I secretly collect the penny dreadfuls based on his ill-bred and rowdy adventures.
7.Do you have distant relatives?
Disapproving aristocrats in England, and a secret Jew in the family line.
8.Do you drink whiskey?
Whiskey is for the lower class. I drink brandy.
9.Do you hate Indians?
I hear they are fighting a war with the red man out west; I applaud the homesteaders fulfilling our national Manifest Destiny, but I do wish they'd ship a few copper-skinned braves and maidens to the opium brothels I frequent. Just for variety's sake, you understand.
10.Are you a friend or foe of the sheriff?
I have bribed the police force so heavily that I technically own the sheriff.
11.Like the name Clara?
It seems to me to be the name of a spinster schoolmarm who must spend hours each day in a stuffy public learning-factory, pushing scattered and inaccurate notions into the withered, malnourished brains of her orphan students who will never need them. Fire the woman and send the children to the factory! Every moment they spend in the school-room is a moment they are NOT manning the steam engines.
12.Love the name Clara?
Why has the infernal woman not vacated her post yet? Ship her off to the frontier and let her perish in a train wreck, or a wagon accident, or an Indian attack, or a bout of typhoid fever, or even let her be beaten to death by her own dull-witted, burly farm-worker students.
13.What do you eat?
Beef that's not actually rotted yet, milk that hasn't been adulterated too much with water and chalk powder, fruits and vegetables that have a minimum of worms, fresh white bread without stone grit or maggots. Best you can do in an era without federal food regulation.
14.Listen to ZZ Top?
DEVIL MUSIC. (I secretly go to music halls to listen to top-hatted male impersonators sing smutty songs through megaphones.)
15.Is the Old West a fun place to live?
I have my own fun in my enormous mansion with my own private park, private beach, and vacation home in the mountains, thanks.
16.Ever been Hung?
I'LL HAVE YOU HORSEWHIPPED FOR ASKING IMPERTINENT QUESTIONS. WHAT BROADSHEET ARE YOU FROM, GOOD SIR?
17.Do you do your killing at high noon, low noon, or noon?
High noon, if you get my drift. I never whip orphans without a good snootful of cocaine-laced wine. (It's medicinal! Really!)
18.Have you ever read anything by Jules Verne?
Indeed, I thrill to his predictions of a technocratic future.
19.How often do you wash?
Every other week, as prescribed by my personal physician.
20.Do you own an Out House?
I have three water closets, the kind they exhibited at the Crystal Palace. TECHNOLOGY!
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-13 07:09 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-15 08:51 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-13 10:57 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-13 12:36 pm (UTC)Also:
In the ruins of a warehouse in Detroit, farming mutated vegetables and scavenging wireless Internet.
sounds like it would make a good story.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-15 08:57 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-15 08:56 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-13 01:08 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-15 08:52 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-13 01:30 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-15 08:52 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-15 09:05 pm (UTC)If you find the novel interesting enough to inspire you to related research, I'll be grateful for whatever you come up with. Though of course an author can never guarantee to use such research, you have a mind well worthy of being listened to.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-16 12:48 am (UTC)I like that angle--I was drawing on T. Herman Zweibel more than Susan B. Anthony for comedic value, figuring that unfettered greed knows no gender boundaries, but I'm gonna have to see if there's anything about the history of feminist thought pre-first-wave in the library.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-16 01:30 am (UTC)I am so looking forward to you reading the novel, because I'm so sure that you will have interesting things to say about it that will spark new ideas :)
(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-13 10:40 pm (UTC)Hey. We ain't got no social classes in 1885 Western America. Them's duelin' words, young missy.
Okay, I make a lousy cowboy.
Good lord. I just realized we're only seven years away from 2015. Christ. I remember watching part 2 when I was ten or eleven and thinking "wow, 1985 was only five or six years ago. 2015 is soooo far in the future." This is frightening. I'm getting old. Now fetch me some more bourbon, or I'll whack you on the head with my metal medical cane.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-15 08:55 pm (UTC)Oh, please. America has always had social classes, we just love to pretend that we don't. Do you really think those deformed apes who toil in my factories are anywhere near my social stature? And if you want a duel, I will meet you at high noon on my factory floor with my own personal bodyguard army and a small cannon--if they don't get you, we'll push you into the gears of the steam engines.
Aaaaannnnnyway. Yeah, the BttF series is now, like...a period piece. Like watching history. Isn't that weird? It's so dated.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-15 10:29 pm (UTC)Herman Melville
(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-16 12:48 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-16 12:54 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-16 01:02 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-16 01:09 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-16 01:53 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-14 07:25 am (UTC)This is pretty neat, though! I may save it with the intention of one day filling it out myself.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-14 10:34 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-16 05:24 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-16 05:31 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-15 08:56 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-06-16 04:59 pm (UTC)