January 2009
“I hope you will have a wonderful year, that you’ll dream dangerously and...”
– Neil Gaiman, here. That about sums up my wishes for myself and others in 2009. Thanks Neil!
December 2008
Queerness as a Challenge
cripchick:
written by jess hoffmann, posted at the bilerco project:
“And I’m wondering — if compulsory heterosexuality, gender binarism, and upward mobility are hope-draining emptiness; if queerness is an outsiderness in relation to convention; if queerness is a challenge meant to liberate — how to imagine and live nonconformity that is not selfish, honesty that is not cruel (those drunken...
unexpected bonuses of finally using google reader
I’m going around trying to remember every blog I’ve ever read once, thought “wow awesome!” about, and totally forgotten ever to check again, which means I can spend time browsing their archives, which means, in the case of Two Women Blogging (which is seriously a great blog), I come across a post with the line:
The first time I re-read Hamlet after med school, I thought...
some disorganized thoughts on making things
An old dear friend of mine called friends together to have an arts and crafts afternoon. I made a pair of dreamcatcher earrings out of wire and embroidery floss and thought about how much I used to love making things when I was a kid, stupid things like lanyards and friendship bracelets and cootie catchers and tiny fruits out of Sculpey, and how really I still love making things, especially...
Time Begs For Obama Boy →
Renee gives them an appropriate takedown. I am refusing on principle to link the original article, because it pissed me off too much.
A Visit From Aunt Fattie →
Delightful holiday parody, courtesy of A Sarah at Shapely Prose.
But just as I started turning around,
Down the chimney Aunt Fattie came with a bound.
She was dressed all in pleather, from her head to her heels.
On her chest and her cape? Baby doughnuts, for reals.
Her eyes – how they twinkled! Her dimples – how merry!
Her cheeks were like roses, her nose like a cherry!
The stump of her...
Baby Dolls Raise a Stink In More Ways Than One →
via:thebestbirthcontrolofall
Put her on her little pink plastic toilet. Press the purple bracelet on Baby Alive Learns to Potty. “Sniff sniff,” she chirps in a singsong voice. “I made a stinky!”
This season’s animatronic Baby Alive — which retails for $59.99 — comes with special “green beans” and “bananas” that, once fed to the...
across the universe
is not that good, I recognize. It glosses over major issues like race riots and Vietnam without even approaching the emotional weight they merit, it’s full of more 60s cliches than you can shake a bong at, it romanticizes East Village bohemia and acid trips without delving into such messy issues as drug addiction, it’s got zero character development, it tries too neatly to express the...
“Music’s the only thing that makes sense anymore, man. Play loud enough, it...”
– Some character whose name I don’t know yet in Across the Universe. If subtlety is real important to you, maybe don’t watch this movie.
When Was Your Real First Time? →
As you might have gathered, I am way in favor of broadening the way we normally think about sex an sexual expression. Thanks to Thomas for a great post doing just that.
Louisa May Alcott Unmasked: Collected Thrillers →
Having read Alcott’s (very) posthumously published, awesomely melodramatic A Long Fatal Love Chase and loved every insane word (one of these days, I’ll type up a recap, because that plot deserves to be shared with the world), all I can say to this is: WANT.
The tales cast a spellbinding aura around characters thrust into webs spun by evil, deceit, and intrigue. Spurned lovers often...
NYTimes: Psychiatrists Revise the Book of Human... →
talking about the DSM-V
me: apparently they're also considering de-pathologizing a bunch o' fetishes
keane: VINDICATION
do you ever stop missing the person you thought you were?
guerilla mama medicine: 10 reasons to fall in love →
“you spend the first five years trying to get with the plan, and the next five...”
– LCD Soundsystem. I have nothing to add except “yeah seriously.”
reasons i want to HULK SMASH, part 2
Kate Harding has a good take-down of why NY’s proposed “obesity tax” is a terrible idea. But because I get irrationally bothered by things that fail to live up even to their own intended logic: why would you charge people less for a drink that some scientists expect can lead to increased weight can and is linked to metabolic syndrome? It’s almost like no one is looking too...
dreaming of a global warming christmas
Weather.com says it’s 62 degrees out. In CAMBRIDGE. In MID-DECEMBER.
WHAT THE FUCK, PLANET.
"after dinner orgasm" is the new name of my...
So some time ago Renee posted a video of a pretty awesome spoken word piece with the refrain “if you don’t come, don’t nobody come.” I gave my praise for it in the comments over there and I still think it’s pretty badass, hilariously written, with a great delivery.
But something about the focus on the female orgasm, uh, rubs me the wrong way (pun intended that time,...
I hear the bells
They are like emeralds, and...
reasons i want to HULK SMASH, part 1
A show exists called Bulging Brides. I’m not fucking linking anything about it because I just closed all the windows I’d opened about it in disgust; you can google it on yourself. It’s exactly what you think it is from the title—women trying to lose weight ludicrously fast to fit into their wedding dresses, while being harangued by this really fucking smarmy trainer. It...
bye, faith in humanity. it was nice knowing you.
Somehow all my classes lately seem to have taken a turn for the incredibly depressing. In the past week and a half, I’ve heard and read about: Fritz Haber, the very creepy father of chemical warfare
the effects of chemical warfare in World War I
the making and consequences of the atom bomb
the poison gas used at Auschwitz, which was originally designed as an insecticide
Edward Teller,...
i may be speaking from experience. and by...
Some days, you feel fabulous. Some days, your life is going fabulously. Some days, the weather is gorgeous and you’re on top of everything and the world seems fit to burst from sheer fabulosity.
And other days, you need to bring your own fabulousness because none of those things are true and you are pretty sure you can’t bear another utterly unfabulous day, so you seize an...
“wholly to be a fool
while Spring is in the world
my blood approves,
and...”
– E. E. Cummings. And this is what I miss.
“Life has taught us that love does not consist in gazing at each other but in...”
– Antoine de Saint Exupery. This is why love is worth it.
“Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn’t it? It makes you so vulnerable....”
– A recently heartbroken Rose Walker, in Neil Gaiman’s Sandman, volume nine, The Kindly Ones. This is why I don’t miss love.
must be winter
What I miss (when I miss anything, which isn’t often) isn’t the love, really, because that’s too big to miss, and too specific and broad at the same time. I don’t miss feeling wanted, trusting, feeling safe, having somewhere to turn for comfort, because for me those things, the big deals of love, are inextricably coupled with the terrors of love, the vulnerability, the...
i'm not gonna say this is the best christmas...
but it so totally is:
“O Come, O Come, Emmanuel” - Belle and Sebastian
“It’s Christmas Time” - Yo La Tengo
“Little Drummer Boy” - Joan Jett & the Blackhearts
“O Holy Night” - Sufjan Stevens
“God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” - Bright Eyes
“All That I Want” - The Weepies
“Winter Wonderland” - Liz Phair...