i have returned!
rejuvenated and refreshed from 5 days out of town.

did you know there are vineyards in michigan? had no idea!!
the northern part of michigan is so pretty.

but god i'm glad to be home.
i'd forgotten how totally scary silence can be.

i finally had to do it.
i had to cancel the mysterious US magazine i've been receiving over the past 5 months. at first i thought one of my friends signed me up as a joke. then i thought i got automatically signed up when we bought something at best buy.

who fracking cares now? thumbing through this crap has made my brain shrink!

so i wrote them a strongly worded email asking them to STOP DELIVERING IT, for the love of god, or my head would pop off.

they're so incredibly gross, you know what they give you when you click on FAQ, on their subscriber services page, wanting to know how to cancel your effing magazine? this crap.

What Happens When There Is No Plan B?

did anybody see this??
where was i when this came out?

below is a story about real-life consequences when Plan B isn't available to normal, everyday women. unbelievable.

who is still thinking that women shouldn't be able to retain *full* control of their reproductive lives??

Dana L. What Happens When There Is No Plan B?

senate to telecom: do me, baby.

more news on how big business wants to screw the little guy and our government says 'sounds fine to me!'

Senate Panel Defeats Net Neutrality - 6/28/2006 4:29:00 PM - Multichannel News - CA6348259

the very long 4th of july weekend is almost here and, thankfully, i will be with girlfriends on a road trip to michigan to invade a parental home and sit by the lake. my goals will be to sleep in the sun, not catch west nile, and read serial killer novels, comics and such while getting so brown i will eventually resemble a jimmy dean sausage patty.

i emailed B- to say hi (can't think of anything else to say over the phone...) and to tell him i'm out of town this weekend, though (in our past) this would have been the perfect weekend to Get it On. it's at these crucial boy-junctures in my life that i wish my life coaching sessions about intimacy hadn't ended quite so abruptly when i got this job.

oh, well. must muddle through somehow.
...
in other news, over on my churchgal blog, i've been asked to be the new thursday blogger for a coalition of progressive church folk on their site. when the post is up, i'll point y'all to it. apparently, my technical lack-wittedness is slowing down the process...

i'm sorry, but i don't know what you mean when you say 'post it on Movable Type'! how? where? why? just post it randomly? somewhere specific? huh?

if anyone knows how these weekly contributor things usually work, please clue me in.

and i have other technical questions: how does that whole blogrolling thing work when you sign up with blogroller - so i don't have to keep futzing and endangering my template when i wanna add something? and how can i set up a site meter thing? and how can i put a hyperlink in comments that actually works when you click on it? again, please clue me in.

jp's already making fun of me down below.
...
and has anyone read the new linda hirshman book? i've been getting questions about it and i'm curious.

this 'n that

here's a cranky tip to the bands and djs on myspace music: please leave me alone. i don't know you, i don't want to be your 'friend.' if i wanted your friendship, i'd already be listening to you.
thanks.
...
this was a very good pride weekend.
saturday evening my friends and i went to a pride-warming up in boystown and we had a marvelous time. there is something to be said, once again, for adult parties: parties where there's plenty of seating (absolutely necessary when you're in party shoes), plenty of drink that doesn't come out of a keg or bottles that have the word -meister in it, wonderful food made by actual human hands and laid out beautifully on a well-appointed table, and plenty of interesting, funny, regular people who just want to make funny conversations and have a good time, even if it's just for the night.

no drunk girls crying in the bathroom, no couples fighting in the hallway and no one calling the police. (or having the police called on them.) and not a single drug in sight!

toward the end of the night, i checked my mobile to see if anyone had called and who do i see but B-. it was his second message that day, gamefully trying out that 'friendship' thing i demanded. i wonder if he realizes that 'friendship' at this juncture means 'no sex.' hm. probably not.
...
it's weird, this no sex feeling i'm having. it sort of snuck up on me. i don't mean that i'm not feeling the Urge. oh, the Urge is there. the Urge to snuggle up to someone and feel desired and desiring - that's all there. i'm not saying that, if offered an appropriate opportunity, i wouldn't immediately jump on a boy for a really great makeout session. (kissing is the BEST.)

but the sex. meh. not so much.

this isn't the same as restlessness when no one is paying attention to me. this isn't the same as the cagey feeling i have when i just want to get laid and no one's around. this isn't that. this feels like the pause that exists between exhale and inhale.
...
speaking of which, did you know tomorrow is HIV Testing Day? you should do that. i should do that.

the best bj in town: a follow up and summary

over here you'll find a handy wrap up to all the hullaballoo started by the I Hate the Patriarchy post about giving head i mentioned below. i have no particular thoughts on the inherent politics of giving head.

i do have some thoughts about the phallocentric chauvinism shown in the partners i've had when they effing *expect* it. now, whether their expectation is a sign of the patriarchy, i have nary a clue (though i have suspicions) but it's of our continued acquiescence to that expectation that perhaps Twisty is speaking. nothing turns me off more than some guy who leans back and tries to force my head down into his lap. i remember the incident with 5-Fingered Tom who, while we were in the middle of a very nice snog session on his lumpy couch, whispered raggedly in my ear, 'Can I ask you something?'

and i whispered back, just as raggedly, 'The answer is No, I will not suck your dick.'

(in vain, he tried to change my mind. he said, pointing to his lap, 'But I need to take care of this.'
'So you take care of it,' i said, getting up and taking a chair in the corner across the room.
so i smoked a cigarette and watched poor 5-Fingered Tom wank off awkwardly on the couch and when he finished into a crumpled paper towel, he had a funny look on his face, like 'euww'.

i said, 'not exactly what you had in mind, huh? do not blame me for whatever feelings you might be having right now. that was all you. now take me home.')

and perhaps it's correct to protest the primacy of the blow job in our sexual narratives. though we may feel pleasure in giving them (i have) to the people we care for, there's no doubt that the blow job exists as a sign of masculine privilege and sexual dominance. (don't get me started on the fucking asshats who demand we swallow and the dumb girls who actually do it.)

if you don't like spitting out short and curlies or that slightly musky bj breath afterward, then avoid it. but for those of us who give them, there's nothing wrong with a little bit more introspection to examine why we seem to be getting really defensive about this when the questions about sexual politics should be directed at the guy who's getting blown.

now, i have more thoughts on this but i'm now officially late for work.

noooooo!

to my fellow battlestar galactickers (galacticians?):
the 2nd half of season two won't be released until fracking september 19!

give Big Business the finger: net neutrality now

over near the bottom of my sidebar you'll notice that little Save the Internet thing.

if the scenario below pisses you off, then click on that button and keep abreast of what's going on with net neutrality. i hate it when people tell me what i can or can't do (unreasonably):
...

Take Action Before Your Internet Sucks!

Ok, it's March, 2008.
You go to your computer and open your Verizon-supertier browser, and everything comes at you with blazing speed. You access your bank, NBC news, Andrew Sullivan's blog through Time.com, and check your email. You watch the last five minutes of Scary Movie 7, which you fell asleep watching the night before. Pretty cool.

Then you remember your best friend set up a new blog about her band and asked you to check it out. It's kind of irritating, because she set it up on the slow tier. You minimize the Verizon browser, open up Firefox, and type in the web address. It takes thirty seconds to load. Ugh. The site's fine, and there are some cute pictures of her band performing in a dive bar. You click on a song, and the browser begins loading the first minute of the song. After twenty seconds, you curse the fact that she didn't pay to be on Verizon's internet, and you close the browser.

You're even thinking of canceling your slow-tier internet account, since shelling out the $45/month for that plus the $29/month for Verizon super-tier isn't worth it. Welcome to a non-neutral internet.

The net neutrality fight is coming to the Senate this week, with the Commerce Committee set to mark up the bill on Thursday.

click on that button and see what can be done.

because of something i read over at I Blame the Patriarchy, i'm now in the process of reevaluating my talent for and, heretofore-thought, pleasure at giving oral.

not quite apathetic. yet.

y'all may have noticed that it's been a while since i've gotten all riled up about anything i've read in the papers or heard on the news. it's been months since i've parsed an op-ed column, longer since i've quoted anything from president 'numbers in the toilet' bush.

some possible reasons for this political lack:
my job is taking up alot of my time, only leaving me enough time to grab a few cocktails with girl friends when i get home
i'm distracted by the FIFA World Cup
i've forgotten how to read
or...

i just don't give a rat's ass what our president does anymore.

i find myself utterly indifferent to the rest of his term and the destruction he and his people are still wreaking on this country and every oil-rich nation within reach. the news coming from the white house becomes ever more absurd. the news from elsewhere is just exhausting. i think my brain switched off when that guy said the suicides at Gitmo were an act of warfare against america.

it's wrong and dangerous to feel this indifference toward my country and government. when a person no longer feels anything, when the mind and the heart retreats, it permits the outside world to do all sorts of things a person never thought the world could do. then we become the bystander, purposefully blind while a mugging takes place right in front of them.

misc.

i'm listening to The Roots (ha! gonna get that black card back, yet!) and reading stuff on the internets. thanks to Bitch, who points to Rootless Cosmopolitan, the personal blog from a south african journalist/editor from Time. check it out.
...
speaking of music, i just have to hand it to dave chappelle's Block Party for getting me curious enough to go to virgin and actually go into the rap/hip hop section - for the very first time ever. i am now the proud owner of Homegrown! The Beginner's Guide to Understanding The Roots Volume One and Blackstar's first cd.

what's next?

things i did today:

read a couple green arrow comic books; ollie is mayor of star city!
saw 'nacho libre' because jack black is adorable and makes me laugh till i fart; best line - 'i ate bugs, i ate grass/With my hands i wiped my tears.' heh.
walked to the taste of randolph where i ate 4 tacos, drank 2 beers, met our friend T-, and saw The Bellrays (who did a kickass set and will be at the Empty Bottle on the 22nd.)
got a tan
got a little sticky and stinky
walked back home with roomie and T- for recuperative drinks at our local until, 5 hours later, we left.

summer is the best.
(oh, and B- called while i was out. have yet to decide if i'll check his message.)

sister 'neath the skin: new blog found!

while frustratedly trying to fix the effing template of our new work blog (heh - i convinced them that blogging at work is a good thing!) i took a break and stumbled across this blog.

she's cute, she's in la and she's recording her internet dating. already, i'm hooked.

ok, so now i go back to the Effing Work Blog Template.

maawidge

i was busy last week so didn't have a chance to say Yay over the Senate giving the House the finger over the Marriage Protection Act. So i'm doing it now. yay!

dare we hope the senate is beginning to jerk that leash a little? perhaps, when the house is finished trying to paint the sky purple, our government can actually try passing some laws that mean something.

madigan's 'modest proposal' approach is rather obvious but effective. and while he says that marriage is the 'best way' to raise a family and nourish values, i like seeing it as the 'most efficient.'

And now, FEMA fixes marriage Chicago Tribune

back when tv was good

my roomie is sometimes amazed at the tv that i know. in our apartment, i have the uncanny ability to stumble upon some gem of 1970s or 80s schlock that she has never seen before but i remember from my childhood and can't shake.

like, The Fury, with Kirk Douglas and Andrew Stevens. so good. or, Baron Blood with Elke Sommer. or either of those Hell House movies (the one with Roddy MacDowall is my favorite). or even that movie with bette davis about the house that was alive. (the scene where it starts replacing its own wood framing scared my hair straight.)

well, roomie will be glad to know that i'm not the only one! author scott heim's list of what scared the crap out of him is a list that could have been written by my own hand. i remember every single one of these shows. (and, yeah, that Trilogy of Terror? that's nothing compared to The Manitou.)

Scott Heim's Noise: Scary, Part II: Television

working backwards

my mild freak out over my father has run its course; i should just cop to the fact that i love my dad madly but he drives me nuts, all at the same time. there will always be anxiety and frustration and cross-purposed communication between us.

the Mild Freak Out (MFO) being over, i just feel drained. last week was mentally exhausting, physically draining and just a pile of poo. love my job. love. it. but i snapped at a coworker and i never do that. i never lose my temper. (ok, once i lost my temper.) and i did. i got snippy. thankfully the object of my ire has skin thicker than calloused feet so my bad manners bounced off him like a toothpick off a tank. but work and no vacation, plus having a bedroom that makes me want to crawl into a pit and die, AND not having practiced yoga for months (and now my knees are acting up again) - all this makes me want to rent a dumpster, put it under a window and throw everything out so i can start all over with nothing.

how totally cool that would be. to start over. clean slate. scratch.
...
my roomie's family was in town over the weekend and i realized that my apartment is not child friendly. it is a death trap of exposed outlets, wires, open cupboards, chairs leading to wide windows, barware, sharp edges, carpentry and adult comic books with images far too disturbing for youthful eyes. i found myself 'reading' a catwoman comic book to roomie's niece, turning a violent bank heist into a rather mundane day at the office where selena has to put up with some mild harrassment and i actually ended with a tidy little moral about the need for unions in the workplace.

we felt some mild anxiety about the absolute Adult-ness of our home, but whatever. when we were kids we didn't have baby seats and we survived just fine. on the edge, baby!
...
sunday i finished reading a thriller (must start going back to the library) and spent 3 hours at the church, setting up the dining hall for the supper we feed the homeless. (or is the new social agency term 'under-domiciled'?) People of the Bag, i'll call them. it...wasn't so bad. everyone was sorta cool; there were even a few, if they were totally cleaned up and didn't have meth mouth, would be kinda hot.

(cough)
...
the night is cool. it's the kind of night i sleep under a sheet, my windows are wide open and the little breeze floating in, making the curtains bell out, makes me feel like i'm somewhere where my language isn't spoken. i'm so going to sleep through my alarm.

traveling with dad: the boomers suck

lately, my friends and i have noticed how much our parents' baby boomer late-life crises make us want to slap them. we're not talking health matters or anything like that - just your run of the mill 'why can't you behave like a normal person?' thing.

so my dad and i are going to new york in august and he and i have been exchanging emails about it in preparation. this is what i pictured: jazz, dinner, great views, lots of walking around, harlem - really kicked back. some urbanity, some coffee shops and bookstores, some music and a little bit of night life (while assiduously ignoring the fact that three of the best nights i've had have ocurred in this city.) the plan was to travel together. as father and daughter. to share experiences and bond as adult parent/child.

well, it was a good dream but all dreams eventually die.

this woman he's meeting, well, she's not divorced or nigerian. actually, she seems like a very nice young woman from a really great, large, extremely friendly barbadian/haitian family. a christian barbadian/haitian family. they loove dad. all of them - the woman's mom, dad, brothers and even a cousin or two. (personally, i think they want to convince my dad to move to new jersey to start a church.) they want to pick me up from the airport and drive me and dad all around new york; they want to be our tour guides, have dinner with us, take us to listen to music. they want dad 24/7.

all of this would have been easier to handle if dad's meeting this woman had been a date. a date ends after a few hours. but no. this is a freaking family reunion.

does this bother my dad, that these people are going to monopolize all of our time? no. his attention-whore tendencies (which i share) blind him to one simple fact: i don't know these people and i don't care.

i don't want to hang out with people who are strangers. i want to hang out with my friends. and my dad. i want to walk through central park and washington square with my dad; i want to sit on the Met steps with my dad; i want to hear wynton marsalis with my dad. i want to eat cake in harlem with my dad. i want to smell the icky hot garbage smell the city has and watch my dad freak out at all the people and the subway. i want to finally meet Sid! and i desperately want to introduce my dad to a good friend and his family. (the friend who has generously offered to put us up!)

friends + dad. dad + friends. no strangers.

i want to slap my dad.

perhaps it's selfish of me to whine that i don't want to hang out with my dad's new faith friends while forcing him to spend time with mine, but i'll accept that. i think my selfishness should trump his. he's staying with my friends! how does that make me look - my dad not even acting like a guest, just a random lodger?

so you know what i think will happen? i think my dad will end up staying with this extended barbadian family (or a hotel) and i will stay with L- and C- (with little e-) and my dad and i will have parallel weekends in new york and perhaps our paths will intersect and we'll have dinner one night while i'm there.

have i mentioned i want to slap my dad? cuz i do.

i've just gotten out of the shower and i can just remember the faint outlines of a dream about the weirdest company picnic ever - it had inter-employee toplessness, football, sausage eating and behavior that, if it actually ocurred in the real world, would border on sexual harrassment.

and we're a women's organization!

Why Can’t They Get Storm Right??

Last weekend, while memorializing those who served our country in the military (including my dad – hi, dad!), and trying to escape the stupendous heat over the weekend, I met some girlfriends up in Evanston for X-Men 3. Two hours later I left the theater with a palpable feeling of dissatisfaction in my gut. No, it was more than dissatisfaction; it was a low burn of disgruntlement.

That’s right. I was disgruntled.

How is it possible for them to get Storm wrong consistently?? I can accept (but only a little!) that, in movies, some things get lost in translation. But this…this…fundamental misreading of Storm’s character!! I am boggled!

And I think I’m going to blame the patriarchy for ruining Storm for millions of little girls all over the world.

The Storm I loved when I was in junior high sported a mohawk, wore leather, kicked ass and was a militant fighter for her rights. She never kowtowed to Charles, thought Cyclops was lame (which he was) and was basically the fiercest friend a crazy, mixed up mutant (ugh, Jean) could ever have. She was scary, wonderful, elemental, angry, gentle, violent, funny, stylish, and could hang with Wolverine – she could hang with the psychotic ninja-trained loner! And she led the Morlocks! She was so cool.

Why do I blame patriarchy? Because it’s typical of a system in which a woman’s unique complexity and potential power gets reduced to something non-threatening, nice and serviceable to the status-quo. Who do they give us? They give us teeny tiny Halley Berry, with her kittenish voice and all the fierceness of a pout.

So thanks, Hollywood. Thanks for sucking the life from one of the strongest female characters in the comic book world and turning her into a lame after-thought. Way to go.

(And don’t even get me started on what they did to Calysto.)

updates:
no, B- did not hit my 'booty potato'. (thanks, jp.) some things are left better to die.
yes, i will be going to new york with my dad at the end of the summer. (and new jersey!)
yes, i've been working my arse off.
no, i don't think i'll ever have fun again.

and my sister, cruel cruel wench that she is, said to me recently, "You might as well get used to saying you're 37 now. It's right around the corner." Thus plunging me into a startling and deep pit of anger. bitch!

off for drinks at NoMi with some presbyterians.

he's back. and this time...

no. way.

i open my email and who do i see?

(wait for it.)

B-!

he wants to have a drink. ('drink'=sex)

i can't believe he wants to do all this again!

How Pregnancy Happens: educational video of the week

how can we go whole days without saying 'vagina cam'?

it's great and, uh, disturbing all at the same time.
send it to your nieces and nephews; your sibling will really appreciate it.

How Pregnancy Happens (thanks to feministing.com)

squeaked under the deadline

just finished my piece for Geez.
another all nighter.

when will i learn? when?

on the other hand: YAY! another piece for Geez!

a blessed day off

and what am i doing with it?

well so far, i showered and washed my hair and used my new ginger scented body lotion from roger & gallet. love it. (though i kind of have that tangy ginger thing going on now.)

then i put on my big girl panties and a t-shirt and began to email, filled out a questionnaire from my church, compiled a luncheon list for an organization i volunteer for (trying to decide which of my acquaintances to hit up for money is hard) and called an old friend i hadn't heard from in a while.

i have more phone calls to make (to dad, to Professor L-, to my sis) but i think i want to go outside. i can see the cafe from my window and i need to say hi.
...
so i went to the cafe and hung out for a couple hours while taking the X-Man quiz in my roomie's Time Out and realized something:

my neighborhood needs a bookstore. even if it's a chain. a mini-borders. a tiny b. dalton's. there is nothing here to stimulate the brain, even if you wanted it stimulated. this is what you can do on my street: drink, eat, get spanked. we need a bookstore or we're all going to end up heart attack- stricken alcoholics. (i think it's already too late for some of the guys who hang out across the street at S-'s.)

with all the disillusioned Gen X-ers, boomers and the hipsters moving in, you'd think there'd be some enterprising young thing who decided, 'hey, let's sell comic books!' god, how cool would that be? a comic book store within walking distance. or some retired professor who decided, 'hm, i want to sell all my old books.' that would be great. my landlord even has a couple of neat store fronts available for just the thing - solid wood floors and moldings! i mean, over on craptastic , ugly ashland they have a communist book store - in the middle of Latin King gang territory!

who is reading all the greatest hits of communism on ashland, huh?

so, really. if there's some retail-minded person out there who wants to get in on a fast growing neighborhood, drop me a line. we're dyin' over here. we need a bookstore.

you know you're old when...

i was having a really great, disturbing dream about hugh laurie last night when, around 3 am, voices woke me up. deep in loud, enthusiastic conversation, the 4 people on the rooftop deck across the street from my open bedroom windows laughed, opened beer bottles, smoked, told jokes, related stories about someone's crazy uncle and a drunk girl screeched like she'd never had fun before.

their voices boomed across the empty, quiet, sleepy street. i knew my roomie was useless in joining me in exasperation - she sleeps like a hibernating bear. there would be no support from her room. so i laid there, listening to them for 15 minutes, hoping one of them would realize that their noise was bouncing off my apartment building like great big bowling balls. but, no. they got louder. their stories became more exciting. and the drunk screechy girl wouldn't shut up.

so i had no choice.

'911 emergency.'
'hi. i have a noise complaint.'
'where are you, maam?'
'i'm at [boop], on the corner of [boop] and [beep]. they're across the street from me on the [beep] side and they're having some kind of party and they're loud and it's 3 am. i'm sorry.'
'no problem. we'll send a unit to check it out.'
'thank you.'

and so i snuggled back into my bed and listened to more of their stories. soon, a unit pulled up and a cop-like voice called out 'hey, your neighbors are complaining. keep the noise down.'

one of them said, 'will do.'

and it was quiet for a while, like 10 minutes. i was drifting back to sleep when the stories started again. i waited for 45 minutes. they were still going at it! i shut my windows, but i could still hear them, they were that loud.

all i could think was, 'maybe they're speed freaks. maybe that's why, on a school day, they're on their roof chatting like it's an italian cafe. or maybe they're all waitstaff and this is their after hours gabfest. or maybe they're just inconsiderate art institute students who are pissing me off!'

i called 911 again.
'i'm sorry. i'm calling for a noise complaint.' i repeated my information. 'if this was the weekend, i wouldn't care, but i have to get up in three hours and they aren't stopping.'
'we'll send someone.'
'thanks.'

15 minutes later, a cop car rumbled up. 'hey! pack it in - your neighbors have called about the noise!' there was the slam of a screen door and then blessed silence.

and then the trucks started to come off the highway.
i almost cried.

STILL AT THE OFFICE

there once was a worker named ding-er
whose job once made her sing-er.
then along came the Model,
her brain went to lard...el
-and to the PM? hey, look! here's my finger.


(not one of my best but it's how i feel.)

a writing gig!

so my favorite canadian post modern faith-based-like mag has given me an assignment - a piece on 'shelter porn'.
i'm excited.

fork and spoon! fork and spoon!

pinays of the world unite - a little canadian boy is being persecuted because he used a fork and spoon at the lunch table!

down with single utensil hegemony! down with it, i say!

you don't have to read: Luc Cagadoc: The DoubleSpeak (jp is all over this like a fork over a spoon)

why fork/spoon eating is good:
it is more efficient
you don't have to chase your food around your plate
you don't have to switch hands
it's perfect for scooping the meat with the rice
my mommy taught me to eat like this

AKBAYAN!

afternoon at the movies

i love scary movies. love them. haunted houses, creepy japanese ghosts, serial killers on the loose, children who give you the heebie-jeebies - i love all the old chestnuts, some better than others . (zombies? not so much.)

today i went to see silent hill and while i was generally pleased, i have one complaint: i kept wanting to yell, 'shut the frack up!' everytime rose ran off in search of her daughter, sharon. god, was she annoying. AND she ran like phoebe. but overall, i liked the movie - the ending was a little phooey and sean bean was totally wasted (when will he have his OWN movie, please??) but it was creepy and satisfyingly resolved. i guess since it's based on a game, there was symmetry to the story, to the scary parts. it had religious cults, murder, madness, witch-burning and even a little roasted child. (excellent). i even liked the little story of 'truth' the dangerous little witch girl gave rose after rose followed all the clues to the bottom of the hospital. a happy $7 spent.

then, i snuck into MI3. i excused this little bit of sneakery by saying to myself that at least i wasn't contributing to the cruise box office. it was...feh. i mean, it's saying something that you never know whatever the Object is that everyone is running after. we don't even see ethan hawke steal it!! it all happens off-screen. it's meaningless. instead, we get the reconstitution of the cruise Crate & Barrell relationship (oh, how i wished they'd shot her, sending ethan hawke into trauma forever.) no pattern, just random running around.

so that was my afternoon.

the hypocrite as housewife

i read this essay in the back of my roomie's latest Time mag while taking a morning constitutional and i had a suspicion that something was wrong.

1. the whiny victim tone. sweetie, you're not a victim. the image of ms. flanagan, homey homemaker, being marched back to the protective arms of the GOP while the mean girls of the Dem party hoot bad names and vulgar gestures because ms. flanagan is a nice girl who'd rather stay home than hold a picket sign is ridiculous. from all reports, ms. flanagan is just as privileged as her husband; she is an accomplished writer who earns money with her writing, and has a staff to help her do it. how many traditional housewives get that? (and, frankly, the notion that only SHE gets to have a dead mother whom she misses desperately is sickening and offensive.)

2. the sticking up for the white male. does the White Male (as signifier) really need another apologist? really? is it stigmatizing the WM to reveal the existence of those on the outside, rather than to always cater to those on the inside with ultimate cultural privilege? (like any other upper middle class white woman, she's uncomfortable with having privilege revealed and being called out on it.) i think it's interesting that she chooses to frame her argument like this, rather than say that the Dem party has abandoned the working man - which it hasn't and she'd be hard pressed to show that it has.

or perhaps her allegation would ring truer if she wrote that the 'beer-guzzling, union-dues paying' white guy got the shit scared out of him by the GOP when 9/11 hit. rather, flanagan makes the WM a victim like herself and we all know how much they suffer, don't we?

3. she's wrong. perhaps i'm watching the wrong Democratic party but i've always felt that the party has been abject in its pursuit of the Housewife. it's women like me the party's abandoned - single women, single women of color, single working men and women. in my particular case, the post-election backpedaling on the choice issue is one such example; discussion abounded that perhaps the language of reproductive choice was too scary for those housewives living in places like naperville; it was too angry. and where are the policies that look out for the interests of the people like me in the party - people who don't live in a subdivision, people without children, but still people who work hard and believe heartily in progressive causes? instead we watch as the party fumbles for its nerve and makes concessions to those easily upset.

so if anyone is being alienated by the Dems, it's not a housewife. and it's certainly not because of contempt. to muster contempt, a party must have vast stores of anger and the GOP spits it continuously while we swallow ours and hope no one notices.

TIME.com: We're Here, We're Square, Get Used to It -- May. 08, 2006 -- Page 1
Joan Walsh about Flanagan on the Huffington Post

cheesy confession as i lounge on the couch while the roomie is away:

the end of 'music of the heart' always gets me.
it never fails.

of course, it would be harder to get me if i wasn't also menstrual.

what game? the game of 'crazy'?? (and other matters)

the briskly acerbic manola says tom 'alien' cruise "turns a perfectly good franchise into a seriously strange vanity project, as the simpering brunette is swept into a new world by a dashing operative for a clandestine organization." i only wish i could be sure said brunette wasn't tom.
Mission: Impossible III - Review - Movies - New York Times
...

so my father sends me an email of all the shows on broadway the other day: "help me pick a play! what should i go see??"

i call him immediately. 'you're going to new york? and since when do you like theater??'
perhaps my father's new, mid-life crisis convertible lexus is only the beginning of my father's incipient slide into metrosexuality.

'yeah, girl,' he says. 'new york! whoo!'
'uh, when? and why?'

my father has been talking about visiting new york for years. he's never been and, until now, never had a chance to go. but, you see, my dad has the travel skills of mr. magoo; when he took a cruise to alaska, my sister and i worried he'd get stuck in vancouver or fall overboard. we worry that being a widower for the past 5 years has rendered him incapable of dealing with the big, bad world. and what is new york other than the biggest and the baddest the world has to offer?

my dad says, 'oh, somewhere during the summer. i'm going to the monterrey jazz fest in september so maybe august.'

'who are you going with?' a suspicion has begun to niggle.
'well, i was thinking of seeing [a family friend] while i was here. i thought he and i could go together. maybe catch some jazz.'
'uh-huh. so, you like musicals?' my father wouldn't know the difference between 'bali hai' or a mai tai.
'well, no, but see - this woman...'
'i knew it! you are going to new york for a date!'

let's break for a moment. technically, i am not against traveling to meet an online, uh, fling. my entire dating history between 2001 and 2004 was all about nerve.com-inspired travel. but my 62-year old father last had a date in 1967 - with my mom.

i say, 'dad, you are in NO shape to fend off the advances of an aggressive, older, divorced jamaican woman.' for some reason, jamaican and african women looove my dad.
and my father just laughs which forces me to say, 'she IS older, right?'
he just laughs again.

eventually, my father confesses: an older, divorced african (ha!) woman contacted him over email; a friend of hers had told her about my father's website (don't ask) and she thought his posted photo was attractive. so, they begin an email correspondence and then she offers to pay for a couple of broadway tickets if he comes to visit. he says she offered to buy a pair of tickets for my dad and 'a friend' and then suggested that perhaps the two of them could have dinner - at the ritz, maybe.

all the alarms in my head are sounding. no woman offers to pay for theater tickets for two without imagining herself as one of the two. i was totally right: a woman on the make for my dad! and my father has no idea where he's going to stay, how he's going to get around. i'm worried. my dad - wandering around new york, like a west coast country mouse, chased by a hungry cat!

so long story short: i'm planning a father/daughter trip to new york in the fall. i know. it's weird. i'm sacrificing a really good time in new york to make sure my dad doesn't get roofied, mugged, or married.

who's traveled with their parents before? and where should we stay? i was thinking about a few B&B's in harlem.

missing the good stuff

this is what happens when you spend the whole weekend catching up on season 1 of Battlestar Galactica - you miss stephen colbert ripping the president a new one. to his face.

the transcript of his speech is at the end. it rocks.

The Blog Chris Durang: Ignoring Colbert, Part Two The Huffington Post

ok, i probably shouldn't have called him an idiot

but i couldn't help it. over on my other blog, i've been driven slowly insane by one of the most crazy, mysoginistic commenters EVER. it's strange. i can't even say that i'm angry. i'm not angry at him. he's just nuts. he actually asks to be called Patriarch Verlch.

think i'm exaggerating? read him here:

ChurchGal: Ask your rep to Vote no on S.1955: why? because it's not 1955

or read him here.

and if your head doesn't pop off, i envy you.

alert!

this planned parenthood alert could be important to you if:
you have a uterus
you enjoy having a uterus
you enjoy knowing your health care covers anything/everything uterus related

...
Women in every state will lose benefits. It sounds like a bad joke, but it couldn't be more serious. S. 1955 would allow insurance plans to ignore important state laws that protect patients, directly affecting more than 90 million Americans.

Chances are you're one of them. That's why I'm asking you to write to your senator today anddemand that the federal government protect your health coverage:http://www.ppaction.org/campaign/benefits

You may have heard about this "Lose Your Benefits Bill" before,but now it has passed out of committee and the full Senate willvote on it. It's an insidious attempt by hardline senators to chip away at our basic rights. These lawmakers have tried before to restrict access to birth control and other health care you need.

Their latest strategy? Force women to pay for these benefits out of pocket. We've worked for decades to pass state laws that require insurance companies to cover birth control just like other medicines. This bill would trample those laws, but it doesn't stop there. Besides fair coverage for contraception, here are some of the other benefits that women could lose:

• cancer screenings
• mammograms
• maternity care
• the ability to go straight to your OB/GYN when you have aproblem
• the ability to stay with the same doctor throughout apregnancy
• infertility treatment
• osteoporosis screenings

And it's not just women who will be affected - the bill guts state protections for coverage for prostate cancer screenings, ambulatory surgery, emergency services, and more.

To makematters worse, it will likely also increase the costs of health insurance for older and sicker people who need health insurance most. Please take two minutes to speak out against this dangerous bill- the Senate could vote as early as next week. Contact your senator now:http://www.ppaction.org/campaign/benefits

Think of it as an investment - two minutes of activism now vs. hundreds or thousands of dollars in extra health costs for you and your family.

speaking of Duke...

from darfur, to durham and on to texas it seems that male aggression is expressed through sexual assault and rape.

niice.

CNN.com - White teens accused of brutal racist attack - Apr 27, 2006

sad: blackfeminism.org shutting down?

i can understand tiffany's wish to take a break.
sometimes you're up for the mess and sometimes you're not.

but her posts on rape, the duke case, consent and race and class are all good. i haven't written about the duke case because, truthfully, i haven't had time to follow it but tiffany's posts were really solid.

blackfeminism.org

alas! poesy!

in all the moaning and complaining about work, projects, boys and libidinal death, i forgot that this month was national poetry month.

i'm feeling a little post-war new yorkiness tonight:

Why I Am Not A Painter

I am not a painter, I am a poet.
Why? I think I would rather be
a painter, but I am not. Well,

for instance, Mike Goldberg
is starting a painting. I drop in.
"Sit down and have a drink" he
says. I drink; we drink. I look
up. "You have SARDINES in it."
"Yes, it needed something there."
"Oh." I go and the days go by
and I drop in again. The painting
is going on, and I go, and the days
go by. I drop in. The painting is
finished. "Where's SARDINES?"
All that's left is just
letters, "It was too much," Mike says.

But me? One day I am thinking of
a color: orange. I write a line
about orange. Pretty soon it is a
whole page of words, not lines.
Then another page. There should be
so much more, not of orange, of
words, of how terrible orange is
and life. Days go by. It is even in
prose, I am a real poet. My poem
is finished and I haven't mentioned
orange yet. It's twelve poems, I call
it ORANGES. And one day in a gallery
I see Mike's painting, called SARDINES.

Frank O'Hara

happy equal pay day and other thoughts

yeah, hard to believe that, since the 60s and despite the federal law, women's wages have remained pretty darn flat - still earning only 71-77 cents on a man's dollar for comparable work.

but if you live in illinois and suspect that a wage violation has ocurred at your job, the Dept of Labor will sue for back wages!

all you have to do is call their hotline, file a complaint and they do all the work:
1-866-372-4365

(this is how i spend my lunch hours: at brown bag lunches with other women in the city, in the governor's office, listening to presentations from the department of labor and the dept of employment services. it's not exciting, but they gave us cake. lesson? we have GOT to learn how to negotiate salary.)
...
so have i mentioned that i've cut down severely on my smoking? and that, other than the two obliterated nights last week, my drinking has also gone down? and that my libido has dried up?

i'm turning back into a fricking baptist!

with all this healthier living you'd think i'd be more...relaxed. but no. lucidity makes me tense.

a mugging

the post at the top is a story of a local blogger who was brutally beaten and assaulted quite recently. the police seem to think it wasn't just about what was in her wallet.

it's a reminder, to me, that being a woman in the dark is all sorts of vulnerable.

Gapers Block : Merge : April 2006

it's 2.30 in the morning.
i just finished (sorta) working on a project from the office.

is this what real grownups do?

no wonder i avoided it for so long.

shameless plug: Girls on the Run - Chicago!

a colleague of ours now heads up this organization and, while i've never actually used a pair of running shoes, i've heard that others do!



WonderGirl 5K Fun Run 9 a.m. on June 3, 2006
Join hundreds of girls who will be running their first 5K at this great family event!

Join Girls on the Run- Chicago at one of the most moving and unique events in Chicagoland, the WonderGirl 5K. Hundreds of young girls will celebrate their “girl power” by running 3.1 miles together. Let them inspire you! All men, women, children and superheros are welcome. Run along with them to celebrate health, inspiration and months of hard work at this fun, family event where all girls are number one! All finishers will receive a WonderGirl medal. The family event takes place on June 3, 2006 at Montrose Harbor and will feature kid-friendly entertainment and activities in addition to the race. Event sponsors include Fleet Feet Sports, American Girl Place, Dominick’s Finer Foods, New Balance, Goody and Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes.

Who: Everybody! Hundreds of girls aged 8-12, their “running buddies” and the Chicagoland running community; local, state and federal public officials; sports celebrities; and Tony the Tiger!

What: 5K fun run benefiting Girls on the Run-Chicago. The race is registered by the Chicago-area Runners Association (CARA)

When: 9:00 a.m. CT on Saturday, June 3, 2006

Where: Course starts and ends at Montrose Harbor Beach House, located at 4400 N. Lake Shore Drive Chicago. Plentiful, free parking is available in the Montrose Harbor Avenue parking lots east of Lake Shore Drive


To register for the race or for more information, visit www.gotrchicago.com or email WG5K@gotrchicago.com.

Girls On The Run®-Chicago uses the power of running to change the way girls see themselves and their opportunities. It is an innovative, preventative health education and wellness program that combines training for a 5K (3.1 mile) run/walk with life-changing lessons that inspire a lifetime of self-respect and healthy living

i think i'll have chili for lunch

Cat and Girl
(thanks, twisty.)

i had the cutest bag, at least

These are my observations from spending 2 hours with boys in politics earlier this week (and since it was a very long 2 hours, this is a very long post):

- Where are the women, indeed? Other than the woman who won her primary for a heavily contested city position and the women who worked for the host's office, I was the only woman in the room. (And frankly, I was only there because we're the host's client.) We sat around a big conference table to throw questions at Kos and hear him talk about his new book (which I'm excited to read, I'm not ashamed to say) and I couldn't help but look around at all the earnest, serious, white male faces around that table and think, "Wow. And we're different from the Republicans how??"

(They were all very nice guys, yes. And one had a lovely beard and another sported a cuorderoy jacket that was quite fetching. I'm just saying that the organizer couldn't find a few women in the whole of metropolitan Chicago to go to this lunch?? Nowhere? No women running campaigns? No women in charge of strategic communications for some progressive candidate somewhere? No women working for progressive change? Not even a single woman who writes about politics? As a member of several strategic coalitions in the city and state, I find that hard to believe.)

- Never give a vote to a Republican - NEVER. It's no secret or surprise that when NOW and NARAL threw their weight behind a Republican "pro-choice" candidate a while ago, instead of behind the Democrat candidate who was on record being anti-choice, their decision made Kos and his fellows lose their shit. When this was brought up at lunch (as in 'what are we supposed to do when a less than ideal Dem goes up against a so-so Republican?') The answer was simple - primary them. Find the candidate you want, run them against the candidate you don't want. Or, vote for the Dem candidate anyway, knowing their single anti-choice vote will become moot and you get rid of them next time with a preferable candidate. But never give a vote to a Republican. Why? Because in the end they'll totally screw things up: the conservative candidate, though giving lip service to reproductive rights, later backed all of the conservative judges and justices up for appointment (and basically ignored the two choice groups who backed him.) Those justices and their decisions can make life a hell for the rest of us.

-Strategic thinking isn't bad. I never thought I'd say this but the context of my thinking has changed a little. During lunch it was my impression that Kos thinks that women's groups are wasting opportunities, that they aren't thinking long game and are only working short, reactive games. I question that. I don't think groups like NOW, NARAL or Planned Parenthood were caught by surprise by the Alito nomination at all. (Was it even possible to stop the Alito confirmation from happening? I'd say no; the whole game had been lost when we folded on the whole filibuster deal earlier in the year. After a deal like that, made my Congressional Dems, who has room to maneuver at all? Not the groups' fault - I lay that whole thing at Democratic leadership's feet.) All of us were at the mercy of the extremely small window of opportunity we had.

But back to my point. Kos&Fellows has a point about strategery. And I've only just come to this realization just this year; after working where I work and seeing how advocacy strategy isn't *only* about getting people to follow you and support your cause, I see that it's also about insuring that the right people are in place who will make it easier for you to get your work done over the long haul. Who is most likely to support my organization, one that serves women? Who is more likely to understand what I mean when I talk to them about the needs of low-income working women, single mothers or student mothers? Who is more likely to protect the breadth of my interests? This isn't to say that the big women's groups don't do this. I think they do; I think Kos and his Fellows underestimate just how savvy women's groups are. But I think the strategy question is a question that needs to be asked whenever we engage with TPTB.

Our issues (women's issues) are no longer stand-alone. Economic empowerment, reproductive rights, education and health care - these are all related to one another. The increase in opportunity, or access, in one area depends on the strength of the others. Perhaps that's what K&Fellows mean when they keep repeating the mantra that 'single-issue' advocacy won't get us anywhere. (gasp! am i saying that i think single-issue advocacy is bad? no, just that they're not really single-issue.)

Strategy is not the binary opposite to Values. If done correctly, strategy should be a direct product of our ideological values.

-I want to win. Having said that values define strategy, does that mean that strategy is the only thing that matters? That, as long as we feel good about our values and that we have a long-term strategy in place to spread those values, the work ends there? It was funny, sitting there with my cute bag and cute shoes, listening to the boys use military and sports terms for everything. I don't have that language. I have the language of my old corporate world, which mirrors this language, but that's not really my language. My language is academic. Academics don't win anything. For the past 6 years, we progressives haven't won anything either.

But I want to win. Winning is important. Not everywhere or with everything, but in this context of politics and progressive causes, yes it is. It is very Important because the alternative (Losing) is too awful to withstand. But is winning our end goal? (I think this is where people get hung up. 'As long as we win, whatever's ok.' No, there is no 'as long as we win.' That puts winning first and values last. We spread our values AND we win.) No - our end goal should be a place where our values are lived out and demonstrated at every level - but we can only get there if we win.

-Other observations - Kos is actually very nice and seems to enjoy Corner Bakery brownies.

Crashing the Gate in Chicago!

so i may have missed out on my chance to see hillary last night but today i get to go to a lunch for these guys. no black tie, but should be fascinating.

i haven't been hanging out at kos since the election ended (it just made everything too raw) but the opportunity to ask questions of the 'leaders' of the progressive blogosphere is too good to pass up.

maybe i should ask them where all the women bloggers are...

Chicagoist: Crashing the Gate in Chicago

best line. ever.

'doris, you're a sexual disneyland!'

oh, my kingdom for a black tie!!

argh!!

i just had to turn down an invite to the hillary clinton event tonight.
why?

because i have nothing to wear!!

damn you, black tie events! damn you!
(to tell the truth, the very thorough security check scared the bejeebus out of me, too...who knows what kinds of petitions i've signed in my life??)

a perplexing dilemma has sprung up in the ding-roomie household:

which is the worse movie - xanadu or showgirls?

it's unexpectedly hard to decide.

geez magazine sent out a pitch call for articles. due monday.
i have nothing.
nothin'.

dammit.

um, i think one of these guys installed our cable

ever wonder who's out there paying $20 for a little alley action?

these guys.

and i'm not kidding about the cable guy.
i mean, how many bogdans are out there??

oh, god.
ucla is down. it's the second half.

i can't watch anymore.

so i'm watching amelie. (mathieu kassovitz is ...sigh.)

huh?: Immigrants and the Economics of Hard Work - New York Times

ok, maybe it's because i haven't had my first sip of coffee yet but i'm having a difficult time figuring out the argument from the guy at the conservative think tank if:

illegal immigrants only take up a tiny fraction of our workforce and aren't really taking jobs from citizens but do depress wages for less-educated african americans, therefore...

i'm confused.

Immigrants and the Economics of Hard Work - New York Times

12345678!
U. (clap clap clap)
C. (clap clap clap)
L. (clap clap clap)
A. (clap clap clap)

U-C-L-A FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT!

hee!

just trying to clarify...

i wonder if this is what alabama senator hank erwin meant when he said alabama was 'family friendly.'

control

there's this intern. (yes, i'm about to talk about work, for those who know me and where i work.) she's great. she really is. smart, willing, and down with our cause in a super big way. the perfect person we want volunteering for us. she even has a grad degree.

but there's this project. it's bigger (oops, i almost wrote the n-word) than we originally thought and could lead to some stupendous conclusions; me and the intern made a preliminary presentation on thursday to the project manager. she was duly impressed but it was clear that we had some holes to fill. so we extended this sub-project to fill these gaps. then the PM suggested that we might want to each write a report on our project and draw some conclusions and present it to her (and my boss) because the stuff was turning out to be fascinating.

no biggie. this all makes sense to me. the timeline is sorta tight, but i'm thinking about how we can do this in three easy stages: stage 1 - gap/fit; stage 2 - populate the map; stage 3 - look at the map and report what it's saying to us.

the problem: the Intern is a grad student and likes to make brilliant-sounding pronouncements that ultimately get us off task and she gets caught up in all the details. the map is one such detail. we're putting all these little markers on it, coding them for different things, and the map isn't the best. it's a population/demographic map so it has only the most general outlines of communities. if it was a map with census tracts AND demographic (racial/ethnic) info it would be different. so the Intern, now confronted with how this project is about to get a mite bigger, starts worrying about how far apart the dots are on the map.

this is not the problem i'm identifying, which is how we're going to gather the data for the fracking map complete in just 5 days, with a few more days to do the mapping and then write the report. who fucking cares about what color sharpie to use to dilineate pilsen from logan square??

i said, 'i don't think we should be worrying about this. we need to establish a process for how we're going to cull through the information from all these other sources. we to decide how we're going to divide this job.'
she said, 'but the map isn't accurate.'
'uh-huh - it's accurate enough. we don't need satellite-level accuracy. we need general areas. the dots can come off. the tabs can come off. i can reprint another fricking map. we have to trawl through potentially 400 more agency sources.'
'do you think a silver sharpie would show up?'

aaack! suddenly, i could see her getting bogged down and we'd miss the deadline and who'd be to blame? me - not some volunteer, but ME. no way, dude. not on my watch!

so, on friday, i made a decision that kept me at the office for 5 extra hours: i completed the first half of stage 1, then i sent her what i'd finished and told her what part was hers and when she needed to be finished (wednesday).

we are not going to co-write this report sitting side by side like snow white and rose red, dickering over each word/idea. she's going to write hers and i'm going to write mine; then we're going to see whose report the PM likes best.

clickety-clak! clickety-clak!

my world is split into several tracks: work, the now, and the past that runs silently underneath everything else.
i'm still up at 1.30 in the morning because of work; i'm trying to finish up a project an intern (of sorts) was doing for us for a presentation tomorrow and i feel like i'm pulling an all-nighter for school.

in the now, i'm feeling a little jangly. because work is increasingly becoming important to me and i'm being asked to be more responsible for things, i'm feeling the pressure; and, when i feel pressure, i tend to shut other things down so that i can concentrate. like - friends.

(to the gals, here's an apology. i'm sorry i've been distracted and not totally 'there.' i haven't been Making the Effort! i'm sorry!)

and keeping the work-pressure company is that guy, B* (to distinguish him from B-, he gets an asterisk!). he sent me an email tonight (he's working late, too); it was bowie's 'rock and roll suicide'. i've tried to decipher why he sent it, but i am too jangly.

and from the past there's S-. (and since he's probably reading, i'll be discrete. or is it discreet? i can never remember what the difference is.) S- is from my past and when we unexpectedly got back in touch early this week, it made me go back and trawl through my journals from 2001. (yes, it was that long ago.) i read about our first date and it made me giggle; it also made me wistful for that girl i was. i was so...ignorant.

so, beneath all the other stressors of this week, there are the side trips i've been taking to Nostalgiaville. on the bus, i think about the first time he and i kissed (on the roof of my building); the time he asked me to go with him to find a computer desk and he dithered about it for so long i wanted to chew my fingers off and run all the way home (and then i repeated the ordeal when he needed to buy a sweater and i waited patiently with the nordstrom salesman while S- doggedly looked for the right color white); then there's the time he sat with me and my girl friends and we made him blush at my dining room table and he was shocked (shocked, i tell you!) at our conversation but later...

and then i find myself in the naughty part of town, in Nostalgiaville. that's where i find the things i remember in the dark. those details.
and secretly, thinking about those things on public transportation, i smile.

and the work and the now disappear for just a bit.

just before bed, a post about cnn's coverage of the anti-sensenbrenner marches (i like that frame better):
La Queen Sucia: How Stupid are the US Media?!?!

I think people who drive without seatbelts deserve what's coming to them.

You drove without a seatbelt and now you're crying. You should have known better. You should have made better choices. You're nothing except an irresponsible wanton seatbelt derelict.

How can you expect people to sympathize with you when you knowingly got in your car and drove without a seatbelt? You forgot? Your seatbelt malfunctioned? What a bunch of crap. You broke the law; you chose to break the natural law of good driving that says 'Click it or ticket.' You and that Gary Busey (who doesn't want to wear a helmet) - all you individual rights whiners, 'i wanna feel unrestricted'- well, all you 'this is my life' freaks need to shut up and toe the line.

And what gets me is all these people who want to make 'safe driving' part of our curriculum. Drivers Ed - give me a break! There is no 'safe' driving. Encouraging 'safe' driving encourages irresponsibility and a reliance on untested methods - like so-called 'defensive driving.' Just wear your seatbelt.

I mean, it's consequences, man. You drive without a seatbelt and - wham! You know what's coming. Don't whine. Don't cavil. You deserve it. Natural consequences.

This world would be so much better if people just suffered a natural disincentive for their actions...

[insanity via bitch phd]

just call me jael

This is a double-purposed post: one part about how I want to drive a tent stake through a guy's head; the other part about being progressive.

1. This is our second drink together and he's giving me a rash. Like, seriously. We've just yelled at each other about private vs. public interests, valuing education vs. valuing money, 'consequences' vs. comprehensive sex education, living with integrity and a sense of moral centeredness vs. life being just an existential hellhole. My face is flushed, my neck is hot and my chest itches. I've broken out into an ideologically-fueled rash.

He reminds me of Sidney Poitier in his early 40s. In fact, that's exactly who he looks like - neat, trim, dark, and tidy. We're meeting for a purely casual, this-is-not-a-date, after work drink. Why is this not a date? Because he already has a girlfriend. I'm happy to sit in a crappy bar and chat with a near-stranger about books, work, music, politics, relationships, and growing up odd.

(And, considering my less than stellar boy-record, I don't think I need to be dating anyone right now.)

But he's an utter pragmatist. Having a conversation with him is like talking with the Borg. Or a conservative from Dartmouth. Hence, the tent peg.

2. At one point during our conversation he leaned back and said, 'You really believe all that, don't you? Helping the poor, the brown people. You really swallow all that.'

And I said, 'Yes, I do. Every word of it.'
It makes me an easy read. I mean, you don't really have to think all that hard to wonder how I'll come down on an issue. And I'll trace it back to the book of bible stories I had when I was a kid. There was a fabulous illustrated story about David and Goliath. And that was it. David was a cute Israelite with smarter technology and Goliath was a moron. My ideological loyalties were born.

Political stances birthed by childhood Bible stories perhaps aren't the most flexible. Or the most 'of the moment.' There doesn't seem to be a lot of room for rhetorical maneuvering when you stake out a progressive claim.

fashion friday: you hairy monkey

i used to call the Librarian paul bunyan. he was over 6 ft tall, sported curly dark hair, was broad shouldered, long of limb, had ice blue eyes and a thick bushy beard.

the beard was disconcerting. it would intrude on kisses and, in the mornings, it would nuzzle my face and tickle my neck. eventually, i got used to it. it suited the Librarian's dark germanic face. it gave his face character.

but there were caveats: it could get messy. it could retain smells.

so some words of advice to those who want to sport the most wood-choppingest manly man beard of their desires: trim and clean your beard regularly. a beard that tastes/smells of nicotine/pepperoni pizza/beer is a little yucky.

Paul Bunyan, Modern-Day Sex Symbol - New York Times

uh, it's poverty thursday

I'm about to get wonky on you. Get ready. Bear down.
The point of this post isn’t to make us feel guilty for being well off or comfortable; I’m proud of what I’ve earned and accomplished. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

But I’d like us to start realizing what it’s like for people on the other side of the street. And if poverty is a complex social issue, which it is, then why are we willing to fob off uncomplicated and superficial remedies (like marriage policies, like bashing immigrants, like trickle down economics and tax breaks for the rich)?

Note: Most of the numbers mentioned in this post are from a report that can be downloaded from here.

What's poverty?
There are actually four kinds of poverty, based on our federal index which is based on what a family would need annually to earn to feed them (no, it's not a perfect measure, but it's the way we measure poverty now. If you want to read more about how the index is measured and critiques of how it's measured, go here:

Here's our federal poverty level index for 2006:
Family size - 2006 poverty guidelines:
1 - $ 9,800
2 - 13,200
3 - 16,600
4 - 20,000
5 - 23,400
6 - 26,800
7 - 30,200
8 - 33,600

You are Income Poor if you fall within the parameters of the FPL
You are in Deep or Extreme Poverty if you live at or below 50% of the FPL
You are Low-Income or Near Poor if you live at or below 200% of FPL and have trouble meeting your basic needs because of rising costs (child care, housing/rent, health insurance - if you have this at all.)
A household is Asset Poor if it doesn’t have enough net worth to live at the poverty level for 3 months - if you experience one significant life event (medical crisis, job loss or divorce) you can end up homeless or go straight into Poverty.

(While this index is based on food cost, which probably needs to be changed, here's what the index doesn't include: cost of transportation/commute to work, cost of child care, cost of utilities, or the rising cost of housing. Factor those costs and the number of those who qualify as poor would probably increase rather than decrease.)

Who’s poor?
You might be poor if you are old; nearly half of IL seniors would be in poverty if not for Social Security benefits; Social Security benefits are primary source of income for two-thirds of IL seniors; 70% of senior women living alone live near poverty. Senior men had a median income of $20,363 in 2003 and senior women had a median income of $11,845.
(Dude. Who can live on that??)

You might be poor if you are a child; 37.2% of children lived in low-income families in 2004; 15% of children in IL lived in houses where the head of household didn’t finish high school (an indicator of poverty); 11% lived in crowded housing.

You might be poor if you are disabled; in IL the monthly SSI payment is $564 (the national average is $617.02); a disabled person would have to spend more than ALL of their SSI income to rent a one-bedroom apartment.

You might be poor if you are a woman; IL women have higher poverty rates than men; 13.3% were living in poverty compared to 11.5% men in 2004; 31.4% lived in near poverty compared to 26.7% of men; compound that with the worst gender wage inequity of the 5 most populous states and you have women working their asses off for not a whole lot in return. Most single heads of households in the state are women.

You might be poor if you are Black or Latino: nearly 30% of the black population in IL lives under the FPL; 16% of the Latino population in IL lives in poverty.

Maybe most of us think of the victims of Hurricane Katrina when we try to envision who’s poor – they were visibly destitute, almost sharecropper poor. But that’s just one face of poverty; not the only face.
I argue that the more quotidian face of poverty is probably the face of someone you already see: the woman who provides you with childcare; your company’s receptionist or assistant; the security guard in the lobby of your building; the woman who checks out your groceries.

You might not be poor if 4 crucial areas of your life’s needs are stable:
Economic well-being. Are you earning a living where all your basic needs can be met? Can you live on your wage? Do you have a ‘cushion’ of some sort?
Health Insurance. Does your employer provide them? Are you relatively confident you won’t have to lose your house if your appendix bursts?
Housing Affordability. Can you pay your rent or mortgage easily and without much stress? Can you afford to live where you live? Have you never had to choose between food or rent?
Education. Do you have a college degree? Do you have a professional degree? Have you graduated from high school? Are most of your friends and neighbors literate?

Before indulging in a superficial discussion of poverty ('poor people suck!'/'poor people are saints!') I think it's important to dispel a couple of assumptions:
* poor people are lazy welfare queens who don't work and
* poverty is about bad financial planning

Poverty is about a maelstrom of bad breaks: illiteracy, generational poverty, economic downturns, cuts in social services, no education, rising costs in the standard of living; lowering wage values, no access to health care. Access to work. In Illinois, one quarter of our work force lives below the federally defined 'poverty line.' These are people (most of them single moms) who work full time jobs; they work 40 hours/week just like you and I work. And yet, they're poor. And these are people who, every day, make crucial financial planning decisions – the thing is, they’re making these decisions with less money than you or I can even think of using to even live.

I was at a retreat for an organization for whom I sit on the Board and a woman made the point that, for most of us, we think of low wages as entry-level wages; we think "Oh, I made 28k when I was out of school for my first job! That's totally livable!" But for many of the working poor, 28k is not entry level. That's a life wage. That's a wage that won't change. Ever. No bonus. No signing bonus. No relocation bonus. No holiday bonus. Through children, illness, divorce, and death - that wage won't change.

Think $30k goes a long way? I earn a little over that amount in my new non profit gig. But I don’t have children, I have health insurance, an education and my rent kicks ass. (And I have a roommate who makes triple what I make and is willing to buy me a beer or a movie once in a while.)

But how far does that $30k go for a family of 4?
Or, maybe it’s $25k.
Or, maybe it’s $19k.
If you made $19k/year and had to support a family of four (or even three), what kinds of decisions would you make?

These?

Yeah, Jesus said the poor will always be with us.
But that doesn’t mean their lives have to suck.

hey, breeders!

from a favorite gay:

The GOP's message to straight Americans: If you have sex, we want it to fuck up your lives as much as possible. No birth control, no emergency contraception, no abortion services, no life-saving vaccines. If you get pregnant, tough shit. You're having those babies, ladies, and you're making those child-support payments, gentlemen. If you get HPV and it leads to cervical cancer, well, that's too bad. Have a nice funeral, slut.

What's it going to take to get a straight rights movement off the ground? The GOP in Kansas wants to criminalize hetero heavy petting, for God's sake! Wake up and smell the freaking holy war, breeders! The religious right hates heterosexuality just as much as it hates homosexuality. Fight back!

Straights Rights Update

time to move on?

I'm thinking about closing my ChurchGal blog for a while, if not permanently. I've loved writing for that blog but I have to admit the few times some fundamentalists have strolled on over, I've lost my equanimity and sense of humor. I know - only a few times. I should be glad it's not all the time.

This is what it is: They're rude. Like, I don't care what they think - I'd actually like it more if they talked more about what they thought - not what they think about me but what they think. But they're really crudely rude.

They feel comfortable saying things that, if they were standing in front of my face, in my home, I'd be forced to tell them, Get the fuck out my house.

As it's becoming distasteful to listen to them or engage with them, I also find that I'm becoming as humorless and dour as they and that's unacceptable.

The original goal of the blog has disappeared - I wanted it to be a snarky eyed view of contemporary religion but more recently it's becoming a place where people want to engage in seminary theology debate. If I wanted seminary debate I'd be in seminary, thanks.

Or, maybe I'll just do what the conservative blogs do and close comments. Yeah, that'll do it.

I shouldn't be disappointed but I am. A business trip to meet/greet some politicos was called off for weather. I should be glad I don't have to get up at dawn to take a train to springfield; i should be glad i don't have to haul a bunch of stuff with me for the reception; i should be glad i don't have to sleep in a strange bed.

but...i really wanted to go!!

i was actually excited about it. a lot of this work is tedious - phone calls, emails, tiny detail work, the repetition of stats, the mind-numbing strategy and follow through. (you wanna know how politics gets done? a lot of effing meetings.) but there's a different part i find fascinating - the process, the personalities, the act of convincing someone that your cause is their cause.

i love this stuff.

fathers & daughters

In Los Angeles I saw my twin - and it was my father. For years the Ding Family has said, You're so much like your dad. I shrugged it off. I mean, yes, there is a physical similarity - I look like my dead grandmother, I have the Ding chin, the Ding mole, the Ding complexion, the Ding eyes and fingers. But beneath the skin, there is something else binding me to my father - the Ding Distance.

The Ding Distance is the vast emotional gulf between anyone from the Ding Family and everyone else (except that lucky lucky person we happen to be in love with.) If you are not loved by a Ding Family Member, then we will look at you with all the puzzlement and bwilderment of an alien landing on another planet. But if you're loved, if a DFM has decided to love you, then you can't get rid of us. We love hard and deeply. No matter what. (My sister is proof of this; she ran her husband to ground like a hound after a stag.)

So Dad and I are driving down Sunset, toward the ocean, at the best time of the afternoon when Los Angeles feels like a cool hand across your brow. We're talking relationships:

Papa Ding: I told her. God as my witness, I told her I wasn't
attracted to her.
ding: But then you invited her to a wedding.
Papa Ding: Well, I needed a date.
ding: But you knew she had feelings for you.
Papa Ding: But I told her there could never be anything between
us!
ding: And then you asked her to make tamales for your party?
Papa Ding: I can't cook!
ding: But that's a special thing. You asked her to do a special
thing. You cannot reject someone and then ask them to do special things for
you! That's not right!
Papa Ding: I didn't reject her. I never said that.
ding: You said, I am not attracted to you. That screams
rejection. That's not exactly a big Yes, I want to be with you.
Papa Ding: I never used those words. I never said I rejected her.
ding: Oh, that's right - because you keep asking her to be your secret
girlfriend!
Papa Ding: No!
ding: You need to understand some women's feelings, Dad. You may reject us but what we really do is look at what you do. If you say No but then ask us to be your date and cook you special food for your friends you're either in love with us or you're taking advantage of us. A woman in love - what does she want to believe? That the man she wants returns her feelings? Or that he has a hole where his emotional center should be?

I've had conversations like this before with my friends about a few boys in
my past; I've said I am not responsible for their feelings, even after I've just
stomped all over their little bitty hearts with my stiletto heels. I have said, 'But I made it clear where I stood! It's not my fault they chose to misunderstand me!' It was cool to be so flippant when it came to another person's emotions; my indifference turned me into an impervious tower. I was not moved by emotion. All my liaisons were rational, I thought. Everything was understood.

But then I think about this woman who hankers after my father, who plays by the same rules that I do. (And let me say my dad is not a bad man; he's just a man relearning what it's like to date again after 33 years of marriage and 5 years of being a widower. He has no idea what he's doing.) These are the rules that say, If you don't really care about the other person the most you can do is make sure they know where they stand.

So I think about this woman and these untenable rules and I think about how crazy she's become because of loving someone who doesn't see it or won't see it and can't love her back and how no one is putting her out of her misery.
And I think that I don't want to be the type of person who draws out the pain so much when just a quick snap of the neck will do.

rough morning? yeah. you could say that.

You know when you're in bed and you've just gotten to a point in your dream cycle, and the bed is so toasty, that you feel that there could almost be another person in there with you and you go, 'Mmmm' and then you snuggle under the covers more and wipe the drool? Yeah, I was totally IN that place when I drowsily checked the time on my cell phone.

7.42!?! Motherfucker!
I have a Board meeting in 20 minutes! Shit!

Within 10 minutes, I pulled on fishnets, my brown wraparound dress, the cute brown/white jacket, my slingbacks, shook my hair around, put in earrings, scrubbed on deodorant, sprayed perfume, brushed teeth, grabbed cab fare from roomie and crashed downstairs to hail a cab, rushed to the office, after babbling to my bosses "I'm coming! I don't know what happened! I'm coming! Pick up the catering downstairs!" and ran into the Board meeting.

Where I immediately began to cough like Typhoid Mary and had to stagger *out* of the meeting, feeling my whole torso contract and my little Instead cup totally dislodge because I coughed so hard. Damn! So now I have to fix my feminary situation.

(Note to self: being on period while coughing up phlegm is nasty. Both ends, dude, both ends!!)

But there's no time! The Board meeting must go on and who will know what happened with capacity building if I'm not there to take notes? The meeting will drop into the memory hole of forever and the Agency will collapse from the weight of its amnesia. I can't let that happen.

So, sitting off to the side, I slip out my bottle of Robitussin, unscrew the cap (fuck that little plastic cup), and suck down a huge gulp. From the Board table, where they're giving me the fish eye, I'm sure I looked like an inappropriate drunkard.

Welcome to Thursday, everybody.

carnival!

are you radical?
are you brown?
are you a woman?

then this carnival's for you.

blackfeminism.org � Blog Archive � April�s Radical Women of Color Carnival

taking a little break: learn something about meth labs

wondering if that anti-social, scabby, twitching neighbor of yours has turned your building into a meth lab?

dude.

Drug News & Features Meth Prevention Methamphetamine Information Community Information about Meth

jp's limerick festival!

i'm back from los angeles, where i had a surprisingly relaxed weekend. while i'd love to catch up on everything, i'm too tired. i'm also fighting off some weird cough.

so, go leave a limerick at jp's space. they're fun. (i love limericks. i think they're vastly underrated and, frankly, my favorite way to seduce wordsmithy boys. hee.)

you don't have to read: 2006 youdonhavetoread San Patricio Limerick eFestival!

my flight leaves in 3 hours and i'm still not packed. grr!

will miss you madly but will try to drag myself away from the family to scribble thoughts on L.A, smog and wonder, once again, why i didn't get a car when i had a chance.

play nice.

it's official: i am tired of the 'boomers

yesterday was a long day and i have to blame a 4-hour staff meeting for the crankiness that led me to erupt at a coworker. there we all were, patiently walking down the Appriciative Inquiry path, when our boss asked a question about donor development and looking 5 years into the future.

it was like i saw the light at the end of the tunnel. it was like the craziness that hits the mountain climber when she's about to return to basecamp - she loses her grip and smashes into her trusty sherpa, killing him and everyone on the expedition with her.

our only male colleague kept saying how we needed to pay more attention to baby boomer women and their issues and i just couldn't take it anymore.

'jesus, i can't wait for their hegemonic grip on our culture to end. like the Greatest Generation, they need to die off. god.'

he got ruffled. 'hey, i'm a boomer!'

exactly, i thought. i said, 'when are we going to stop catering to them and actually think about the future? but no. we'll be strategizing around your needs for the next 50 years and nothing's ever going to change!'

you could almost hear the screech of the wheels as our boss tried to wrench the meeting back on track.

i went home, only mildly repentant that i had just made a 54-yr old guy feel irrelevant in a staff meeting. this morning, crossing the bridge on michigan avenue, i even tried to find another way i could've couched my contempt. but i couldn't.

it needed to be said for all of us around that table. (shrug)

Not Wanting to Be Left Out, Men Find Their Own 'Pause' - New York Times

black like me. or, uh, maybe not: how i spent my thursday night

The bar in Redfish almost fell completely silent.
Dropping his bar towel the black bartender said, "What do you mean you don't know who Common is?" He pulled the other bartender, a young black woman, to his side. "She doesn't know who Common is."
"No, she didn't!" she said.

My drinking companion, a 40-ish black man, whispered, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that so loud."
The two black girls across the bar started laughing - and not with me, either.
I shrugged. "I'm sorry! I don't know who Common is! I grew up Baptist! I'm biracial! Uh, I don't listen to the radio!" The bartender said that was no excuse. "Do I have to turn in my black card?"

Guy bartender leaned on the bar in front of me and said, "Well, who's Common Sense?"
"There's no Common Sense," I scoffed.
The whole bar howled. The Guy Bartender threw up his arms and turned away. Even the white guy smoking a cigar across from me was laughing his ass off.
Then the bartender held up his hands. The bar was silent again. "So name me all the members of Public Enemy."
"Uh..."
Bar howled again.

Bartender said, "Okay, how about 3 members of the Jackson 5?"
My mind totally blanked. "Uh, Tito...Michael..."
They waited. "Um...I got nothin'," I said desperate for another drink while the guy next to me (a very buppie lawyer, mind you) laughed and shook his head. Then the white guy across from me took out his cigar and rattled off the names of all the Jackson 5 (AND their sisters) like they were members of his own family. Bar howled again.

"Girl, you are whiter than the white guy," the guy bartender said. "I gotta ask for that black card back!"

unbelievable: alleged rape victim in contempt of court

Chicago Tribune Alleged rape victim threatened with jail

so. though she's been cross examined already and has testified she has no recollection of consenting to sex with this group of men, she's basically going to be thrown in jail if she doesn't watch a videotape of her own rape.

before you write me and say something really idiotic, ask yourself this: if she was your 20 year old daughter, would you want her to watch a tape of her rape?

if you're as pissed off about this dehumanization of a woman as i am, contact the men who should know better here:

call the judge: Judge Kerry M. Kennedy at 708-974-6759
call the presiding judge: Judge Anthony S. Montelione at 708-974-6288
call the chief judge: Judge Timothy C. Evans at 312-603-6000

[update: within minutes of me posting this, the Trib just posted an update - the judge backed down.]

[update2: scott lemieux has analysis here]