Hi. I'm Karen Funk Blocher. After watching Wikipedia from the sidelines for a year or so, I finally registered in April 2006 to take responsibility for a few edits to the Madeleine L'Engle entry. I doubted that I'd be a major contributor, but appreciated the opportunity to correct errors and fill in a few holes. Ha! 22 months later I've just passed the 5000 edit mark, and some individual edits took hours to write. I should have known that I'd be obsessive about it. My watchlist currently stands at 400 articles.
My interests include fantasy, science fiction, television and Tucson. I've primarily been writing about contributions to popular culture, circa 1955 to 1990, that Wikipedia has neglected and I know something about. I'm also reverting vandalism, trying to conform to citation and style standards for fictional subjects, and learning to do the preferred reference format correctly. I'm getting better, but I know I need to double back and fix up a number of articles with inline citations. Care to help? Please? I'm finding out that I can't spend hours every night on Wikipedia without pushing my sleep deprivation issue into the red zone. If you take a look at my edit count,[1] you'll see that it started going down on a monthly basis in the new year. Then it went up again. Blame Doctor Who. (Fortunately, I'm able to cut back now that we're in the break between series.) Oh, and I'm trying to deal with "fair use" crises as they come up on my watchlist. If I added a fair use rationale to your image and you don't think it's good enough, feel free to fix it!
Mostly I've been filling in some of the major gaps in the coverage of Madeleine L'Engle's young adultnovels and characters, but occasionally I remedy other gaps as well.
Francie (Barbie doll) - I was amazed that this article about "Barbie's MODern cousin" did not exist. It does now - short, but at least it's there.
Landmark Theatre (Syracuse, New York) - Having mentioned it in the Harry Chapin article, I decided to put together at least a stub on this historic Oriental style "movie palace". I leave it to others to add photos and other details, since I haven't been there in over 30 years.
A Thurber Carnival - Thurber's 1960 Broadway review had a slew of links before the article even existed.
You now are a Nobel man/woman/otherworldly-creature[edit]
Because of your display of great magical potential, and your latent ability of wizardy you never knew you had, The Prophet Wizard of the Crayon Cake{Prophesize)has awarded you this delicious Great Stone of The Goat Cheese of The Arduous Bindage of Metaphorical Flax, for your great achievements in defeating tomfoolery and countering many nasty things. This stone is a gateway to higher, immortal enlightenment and the key to increasing your magical powers as a magician. But be warned, the goat cheese is a tempting treat to consume... should you consume it, then it will cease to give you immortal powers. Many a person has succumbed to the beast of desire, consuming the delicious cheese in a torpid rage. Egads!
"Vortex" over Tucson, March 31, 2006To date I've uploaded well over 50 images to Wikipedia, excluding the ones on this page. Most of these are related to either television, baseball or Madeleine L'Engle. My scanner broke down after the first 30 or so, but I've now replaced it.
If you like, you can see my Gallery of non fair-use images. Several are baseball-related, and most are Tucson-based, including a couple of photos of Old Tucson Studios, one of Park Place Mall and one of Hotel Congress during Dillinger Days. Also here: a close-up of a vintage aluminum Christmas tree, and a fun sign in Gila Bend, Arizona.
As for the big fandoms I've been involved with, e.g. Doctor Who, I tend to assume that other Wikipedians can take care of things without my help. However, recently I've been sucked in anyway, cleaning up plot summaries on the Tenth Doctor's episodes. You probably won't see me around much on articles that are lightning rods for controversy, such as those on major political or religion-related topics.
Oh, and the name "Mavarin," in case anyone wonders, refers to a country in my (unpublished) novels. That word is the key to learning more about me. (And no, that does not mean that I am without professional writing credits. I just haven't sold the novels. Yet.)
Ack! Here comes that vortex! No sleep again tonight!
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