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I didn't post the origami I did yesterday, because I came home and collapsed and was dead for a while. I also didn't even do any on Thursday. Well, I was tired. I still am, but less tired now. So you get a whole bunch of origami in the face right now, including my awesome "Folding a bullet inside a balloon" trick I just invented.

But first: a fox puppet!

Wait, what? A fox puppet? Still, he's pretty cool, and it is deeply amazing how muppet-like his face looks.

So, caffienekitty suggested that what I needed was ghost-repelling origami, after Thursday night's ghosts, and I thought it was a brilliant idea, though I wasn't really sure what anti-ghost origami would look like. iamshadow suggested, and I was thinking, about Neal/Colin's bullet-in-a-balloon protection charm from Trace; I've actually been thinking about it for a while, wondering if it was even possible given the way the fold is done. But I thought, why not try it out?

( A paper bullet in a paper balloon, because I said so. )

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I was coding RFM this week and it's a bit light -- not that I'm complaining, good lord -- but I thought I'd put out a specific call to augment it, based on one of the items I was going to share:

In 1991, schoolteacher William Stanhope wrote to a series of celebrities asking them to describe an obstacle they faced in their lifetime, for use in teaching a class. I have very ambiguous feelings about Ray Bradbury, but I can't deny his response, Love what you love, makes me want to give his nine-year-old self a hug.

I was thinking, you know, the parents I know in fandom are generally supportive of their kids and encourage them to be open-minded and creative. I look at Wee Sam and Steampunk Jack and Bear and Harry and Vivi and other children of fandom, and I think about how my parents, who weren't and aren't fannish, nevertheless gave me tons of books to read and encouraged me to write. My Gran took me painting with her every time I visited and gave me art supplies for every birthday. My mum, three months ago, gave me a TRON hoodie for Christmas. AND I TREASURE IT.

Imagine if every kid everywhere had that kind of support and encouragement. Imagine if every girl who got bullied for liking Star Wars got half the internet telling her It's okay and every boy who was ashamed of liking Buck Rogers had Ray Bradbury telling him to love the future. We'd have an entire generation of artists and storymakers, people who love and support the arts even if they don't work in them, people who understand that the value of a story exists outside of its genre or medium.

So, if you know of a scholarship for creative kids or an after-school arts program that could use a couple of extra bucks or a NFP that provides books or art supplies or musical instruments to underprivileged kids, I'd love to have a link. If you know of programs like the Katie O'Brien Memorial Scholarship that is aimed at fannish youth in particular, or even just communities aimed at kids in fandom (like the Kids Track at the Gallifrey One con), I'd love to hear about it. Even if it's just an essay about being a fannish kid or having fannish kids, toss me a link. And I'll code them and put them up on RFM so that everyone knows where they are.

Not just so that we can support these programs, but so that we can point our kids and our friends' kids at these resources and thus build a little tribe of awesome geek hooligans.

And then fandom can take over the world! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHA.