It's easy for me to define why "Oz" is perhaps tied with Six Feet Under for the most amazing television (series or movie) ever made. HBO has a suberb, laudable committment to fine visual prose, and there have been SO many lines and moments in Oz that have made me stop, put a hand over my mouth in awe, take the time to copy the words down, and be so damn glad someone else out there has their eyes open. For those of you that haven't seen Oz, it is fruit. It is a window into an anthropological experiment, a social petri dish. It awakens every question of the human character, through a perspective alien only in the physical respect to many of us (prison) but not the soul (we all have demons). Here's another amazing quote:

"It's a widespread agreement that retarded people are less accountable for their crimes than people of average intelligence. But if so, someone or something has to be held accountable, has to pick up the slack, has to take the rest of the blame, right? After all, these victims still die heinous deaths, and families still grieve. If the retarded person is not fully at fault, than who, or what, shares the responsibility? God? Human nature? Society? Maybe the question is: who isn't to blame? "

Accidents are the fifth leading cause of death. But you know as well as me, there's no such thing as an accident. That's just some bull**** word we used instead of blaming ourselves, because no matter what damn lie you've been told, we're the leading cause of death. Mankind. And there's no cure for us.

-Dino Ortolani, OZ

I have moved my Criminal Intent fanfiction piece (which by this point is pretty much a novel) and all it's subsidiary material away from fanfiction.net to a new URL. It can be accessed from my main page at http://ilyahna.googlepages.com/home .The main page will eventually host the sequels, so if you plan to read them, mark this page in your favorites! If you've already read a lot of the story, you might want to go back and take a look at chapter 12, as I posted some artwork with it.

So it's come to my attention that words myself and a couple of other folks on the forum said in jest about a particular fanfiction piece struck a chord somewhere, and I would like to publically apologize if anyone's feelings were hurt. The story we were talking about seemed to me intended to be humorous, but perhaps I said something else and don't remember. Either way... sorry. It takes a lot of bravery to put something up online that one writes... I've recently learned this... and in the future will be more respectful of all kinds of writing.

From Oz:

"Mercy is the compassion we feel for someone else's misfortune. Mercy compels us to alleviate that misfortune. Mercy is the child of charity, but the sister of justice because both are about the invisible link that exists between people. Mercy is spontaneous, because misery is involuntary."

And this is why I watch this show. ;]