Kate Cornell

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How Spoiler Alert Culture is Ruining Everything

Spoiler alert, I guess? I mean, I might be spoiling things in this post, but the whole point of this post is to explain why saying spoiler alert is stupid, so keep reading at your own…risk?

I am a nerd. Obviously. I am also a huge fan of SHIELD and Agent Carter. There is a certain website, that will remain nameless, that has been reviewing this season of Agent Carter. Side bar: this season of Agent Carter has been fun and amazing. If you haven’t been watching, you should.

The reviews, however, have been troublesome. Peggy Carter will eventually be one of the founders of SHIELD. We know that she is still alive by the time Captain America: Winter Soldier rolls around. We also know that Hydra eventually infiltrates SHIELD. The reviews seem to insinuate that knowing all these things makes Agent Carter less interesting to watch because we know that Peggy Carter will fail in trying to defeat Hydra.

Um…what?

Knowing where the Marvel universe is heading does not diminish the enjoyment I get from the show. Hayley Atwell and James D’Arcy have wonderful chemistry. The late ’40s early ’50s vibe is crushing it. I don’t really care about what will happen in the future; I still enjoy the hell out of what Peggy is doing in this season.

You know, kids, eventually, television will be in color. Gah, spoiler alert, Dad.

This brings me to my point.

We don’t watch things or read things or play games just to see how it ends. If that was the only reason we used any form of entertainment, every book would be one page, every movie, one minute. You don’t get on a roller coaster for the one drop. You want to ride the ride.

Have you read Harry Potter more the once? How many times have you watched Jurassic Park? How many times have you walked through the world of Skyrim?

I started watching Star Trek: The Next Generation. Spoil away. The show’s been out for twenty years. It’s my fault that I haven’t ever seen it before. I know the Borg are coming. The Cardassisans. The onset of Deep Space Nine. But, to me, those “spoilers” are small islands on a vast unexplored ocean.

That episode where Picard fights tooth and nail for Data’s humanity. Remember that one? So good, right? It’s like a fresh tropical paradise nestled in a stormy sea of inexplicable holodeck episodes. It’s not necessarily one that people talk about. It’s not one that I had spoiled. But, it’s still important on my journey. And, the earnestness of Captain Picard is not something that can be spoiled. The way LeVar Burton plays Laforge isn’t something you can describe to me.

In some ways, knowing a little about TNG is making it MORE enjoyable. The first time Picard said, “Shut up, Wesley,” I was delighted. There are more of those to come, punk. Just you wait.

He still hasn’t said, “Tea, Earl Grey, hot.” But you better believe I’m ready for it. And I will be all over the Internet when he does say it.

I get fat and grow a beard. I basically turn into space Santa.

Here’s what I leave you with:

Spoilers are bullshit. Who cares? Stop acting like knowing the ending changes the journey. Just relax and enjoy the ride. And, if you still don’t like it, you can always get off at the nearest exit.

Lemonade. Or, perhaps, some sort of lemon salad

It’s weird when life hands you lemons. And you’re like, “Sour yellow fruit.” And everyone says you’re supposed to make lemonade and there’s this big metaphor and it makes you feel better, or, usually, doesn’t.

It’s weirder when life hands you lemons and you look around and think, “Well, shit. Turns out that’s the only ingredient I was missing.”

I was recently laid off from my job. They gave me three weeks of warning, which is a fair amount of time and gave me the security of rent for another month, if not car and student loan payments. I made the preemptive call to my parents. Not quite an SOS. Just making sure the channel is open. Because we see an iceberg coming and we don’t know if we can avoid it. With years of experience in the job market, they have the context to know what to expect.

There was the rush of calculation. How much money do I need to survive? How many years of experience? Am I even good at anything? I had the same job for 6 years and now it’s gone. There’s no paycheck. There’s no clocking in. If I have to move back to Texas…I won’t move back to Texas. I will become homeless before that happens.

In three days, I applied for a California driver’s license and became a Lyft driver, thinking, “It’s something.”

I applied for jobs. Hundreds of jobs. Tons and tons of jobs. Maybe one in a hundred got me an interview.

I didn’t really realize anything was wrong until I met with a rep at a temp agency. I gave him my salary requirements, more than I made at my last job, and he laughed. He literally laughed out loud and said to me, “You’re being robbed.”

It was a sobering moment. I didn’t particularly like or dislike my previous job. It was something I did. It was something I did well. It was something I was paid to do, but I didn’t know I was being robbed.

Then, I got a paycheck from Lyft.

I was being robbed. Driving my car for 10 hours over the course of two days netted me over $200. I can make $20 an hour if I drive smart. Plus, fuel rewards were saving me on every fill-up, I was meeting and talking to interesting people, I was getting to know Los Angeles better than I’ve ever known. Lyft is the best job I’ve ever had.

A 9 to 5 job interview came up and I actually had to weigh the options of accepting a “real job” position over just driving my car whenever I felt like it because the material rewards were balanced.

I mean, when was the last time I had to sit down and think, “What am I doing with my life?” That kind of thing is left to college students who have the luxury of wasting time.

A slow realization has dawned.

Getting laid off may have been the best thing that happened to me.

It’s an interesting feeling to be handed lemons and open the cupboard to find sugar, a juicer, filtered water, and a frosty pitcher staring at me like, “Where you been?”

Or, maybe the ingredients for some sort of lemon salad. I could really go for a lemon ice right now…

Posted by Kate Cornell | February 11, 2016 | Categories: Adulthood, Los Angeles, Real Life Adventures | Tags: job, job hunt, job search, laid off, lemonade, los angeles, lyft, made redundant, when life hands you lemons | Leave a comment

Adventures in Cosplay

It all started with a text.

Joe: Hey, that foam you need to make armor. Can that be any color?

Me: Yeah. You just spray paint over it.

Joe: I have something for you to see.

Someone in our apartment complex had used EVA foam pieces to try to sound proof their walls (they were a music student) and they were throwing out all of their pieces. All of them. I ended up around 30 pieces of foam. If you’re wondering what that is, it’s this stuff.

You may recognize me from children’s playrooms.

I had been doing some research about armor material for cosplay. I had bought some of this and built a Loki helmet over the course of a weekend. Now, here I was, with a surplus of foam. What to build?

Having fallen in love with the movie Frozen, I decided to make a warrior Elsa costume. Not just Elsa in armor, but Elsa in armor that she forged out of ice herself. It all started with a chestplate design, a slab of ice that she would conjure up.

I carved it out of the foam, experimented with some cutting techniques and there it was. Just as I envisioned. More or less.

It wasn’t until three months later that it got its coat of paint.

And started to look bad ass.

With that as the center piece, I went to work on the other pieces. Shin guards were supposed to be ice spikes.

Before

After

The vambraces followed suit with some snowy accessorizing.

The collar and shoulderpads were equally snowy.What kind of weapon would Elsa wield? A sword? Spiky and destructive.

Of course not. She needs something that makes more logical sense. A hammer. Freeze her enemies, then smash them to pieces.

The (near) final product.

One does not simply let it go.

There you have it. Ice warrior Elsa will be debuting at WonderCon in Anaheim in April. See you there.

Posted by Kate Cornell | February 14, 2015 | Categories: Items of Interest, Real Life Adventures | Tags: cosplay, cosplay construction, elsa, elsa frozen, frozen, ice warrior elsa | Leave a comment

I Bought a Couch

I bought a Couch.

Note the Dharma Initiative pillow and large cat

Now, at the risk of the post digressing into “The Many Sofas of Your Lifetime,” let’s rewind and talk about the significance of couch purchasing. Before January of 2015, I only lived with people who already owned couches. My butt is not so discerning. Most couches are all comfortable. The only thing is, none of these couches were MINE. These were the couches of others. The sofas they had chosen. My butt was a guest upon their cushions.

Now, every time someone comes over, they’re butt is my guest.

Another thing about this Couch is the…officiallity of it. While I’m not particularly proud of this, I took some comfort in the fact that I could pack everything I owned into a car and move it. When I first came to LA, it was with everything I could carry. The next move only took three big trips to get everything out. No moving vans. No truck rentals.

But, now, the Couch.

The Couch cannot be shoved into the back of a hatchback. The Couch is the death knell of the notion that I could simply fill up the car and drive back to Texas. If I move again, the Couch will require help. The Couch will require two people to move it. The Couch is practically insistent upon itself, for, if I ever desire to move without hiring someone, I will most likely call on someone who has been a guest-butt on said Couch. For, if I do not have that help, the Couch goes into the garbage (I’m not a fan of used upholstered furniture, and wouldn’t sell it).

The purchase of the Couch is a milestone. And adulthood achievement. So, what comes next? What is the next marker in the adulthood road map? Because it took me 28 years to get to this one, and I would appreciate some kind of time estimate.

Now, I just need to figure out what to name it…

Posted by Kate Cornell | February 1, 2015 | Categories: Adulthood, Los Angeles, Real Life Adventures | Tags: adulthood, couch, friends, real life | 2 Comments

The 12 Things of LA

I’m back in LA after traveling for the holidays, so now I will share a song with you. I think you can see where this is going.