holler

Let’s just cut through the chaff and the chatter and the bull. It’s scary to be a woman. It’s not any scarier than being anything else, but it’s still scary as hell. When you’re a woman, you’re told from the start that you are born with something that will make other people want to harm you or chase you or put you in their car or trap you in a room or put their bodies inside you when you don’t want them to. You’re told that this thing you are, whatever this is you have, means you have to be super careful. You can’t bring the wrong kind of attention to yourself so you can’t be too loud, too friendly, too smart, too dumb, too happy, too sad, too pretty, too ugly, too fat, too hot, too … anything. The desire to act against you begins outside of you but somehow you’re in charge of deflecting it.

Being a woman is scary because you begin as a girl who knows that she’s prey.
…
Today in the lunchroom, a coworker said that they’d found Nailah Franklin’s body in the forest preserve in Calumet. A lump formed in my throat and my coworker’s eyes teared up. The lunchroom was silent while we thought about that beautiful woman’s last moments being at the hands of some fucking violent nutbag. Someone hunted her down and then killed her.

It’s a puzzle why this case should affect me when other missing woman cases haven’t quite. Maybe because it’s a Chicago woman; maybe because she’s black like me. Or was it that, by the black community’s standard of middle class success, she did everything right and I identified with her? Or that her family and friends seemed tight and loving and worried; or that Nailah looked like I could have worked with her or been to school with her or she could have been a friend. Whatever the reason, I felt this sad discovery keener than most.

I felt it because the discovery of this nude female’s body became an emblem of all the other nude female bodies found dumped in dense forest preserves across this country. Right now I’m feeling resigned sort of anger. Resigned because violence against women is a stamp of our DNA; it’s a sad recognition that, across all cultures, ideologies or nationalities, even if men stop making war against one another, they’ll always find time to kill or rape a woman.

Anger because my lizard brain wants to make some guy pay.

How can I explain what it’s like to live with the threat of violence against you?

· It’s like thinking, when you’ve had a particularly bad, nasty, bitter fight with your lover, you should be careful for the next few days just in case he shows up at your office and tries to throw gasoline on you and set you on fire.
· It’s like going on a date and deliberately writing down the guy’s name, phone number, address (which you’ve Googled) and his email address for your friends, just in case you disappear for a few days.
· It’s like being in the middle of making out and randomly thinking, if he tries anything I’ll smash his larynx. And then wondering if you really could.
· It’s like a reflex: when you get home, you turn completely around before opening your building’s door just to make sure a guy isn’t going to bash your head in and rape you in your foyer because all you can do is remember the Chicago woman who was raped and beaten 9 years ago exactly the same way, coming home from work in the middle of the afternoon in Wrigleyville.
· It’s like looking at my 7 year old niece and imagining everything that everyone is going to try and put on her narrow, innocent shoulders; how boys who think she’s pretty might get mad if she rejects them, how older boys and men might just look at her in ways that a grown man shouldn’t be looking at a girl and want to 'break her in', how she’ll be 'fresh meat' on a college campus, and wondering what the hell you can do, short of turning her into a ninja, that can prevent any of that from happening.
· It’s like looking at almost every guy and, though unfairly, expecting someone whose first recourse upon rejection will be to fuck. you. up.

It’s like turning into a soldier stationed in a hostile desert town seeing insurgents everywhere and feeling fucking pissed off because all you want is to fucking go home and not feel so beseiged like this anymore.

ManSanta

in offices across the country, around holiday time, a ritual grinds into motion - that of pulling names from a hat and buying gifts that don't exceed $20 for people you sit with for 8 hours a day. Secret Santa.

well, today i started a new office tradition: ManSanta. with the idea that it's easier to pick a guy for someone else than for ourselves, we picked names out of a hat and vowed that we would, by christmas, find a guy for our person to have a holiday cocktail with.

the rules?
take it seriously, be thoughtful and really try to find a guy for the person you picked out of a hat.

let the ManSanta games begin.
try it in your office and let me know how it goes.

i wrote the letter to my high school self today.
(nothing like doing your homework at the last minute.)

it went something like this:
pluck your eyebrows; boys are dumb (just kidding); accept you're a dork; stop listening to dad.

see? all better.

father, may i?

it's no secret that i have an 'issue' with authority: dads, pastors, cops, bosses, presidents, boyfriends, bus drivers. it's all one thing: Authority. seeing the world divided into sheep and masters, i guess i'd rather not be a willing sheep.

some people think differently. some people think being a sheep is really great.

amanda marcotte has a link to a post by some waay fundamentalist sisters about the dangers of sending your christian daughters to college. her fisking is sharp and funny.

then i read from those two sisters about maturity and the role of an adult daughter still living with her parents and i had to fight down bile:

The sign of maturity isn’t that we simply “obey” our parents’ commands, but that we understand deeply what our parents’ hearts and goals are, and can anticipate and even exceed what they expect of us. A mature, adult daughter who deserves her parents’ trust most certainly isn’t the one who says, “I’m not a child anymore, Dad! I’m an adult! I’m old enough to decide for myself when to get up, and it’s not something you have authority over anymore!” (Literally, “I’m mature enough to demand my own way, and throw a tantrum and threaten to run away if I don’t get it!”) But she also isn’t the one who says, “Ok, ok, Dad, I’ll get up when you tell me to.” The mature daughter is the one that takes the initiative and says, “Dad, what time would you like me to get up? I know that spending time with your family before you leave for work is important to you, and I love that about you… so how can I help make it happen?” This is one thing that makes us different from mindless automatons with no wills of our own (which some girls seem mortally afraid of becoming.)

why does this make me spew?

because this is exactly what makes a great executive assistant (which i was for a while before i came to my senses and got the hell out.) to be the ideal assistant you have to completely evacuate your own identity; your ways, needs, sensibilities and wants are completely replaced by the routines, habits, desires and enmities of your Executive. the line separating the two of you, if the relationship works out to the Executive's advantage, begins to disappear.

your day begins by asking yourself, 'what will upset Executive this morning and what can i do to make sure that it doesn't? what will make Executive happy and what can i do to facilitate more of that happiness? who is Executive going to fire today and how can i make sure that person isn't me?'

your day is filled with wondering what Executive will want for lunch, if Executive knows how to get to the airport, if Executive can find his/her way to baggage claim without step by step directions and whether Executive will have to stand in line longer than necessary once Executive gets to the hotel. you even ponder the possibility of traveling with Executive just to make sure everything gets done the way Executive wants it.

you will be consumed with wondering if Executive noticed how long your lunch break was, if Executive will buy you a birthday gift and if Executive will notice that you supported the whole team and made that presentation happen at 10 pm while the rest of the team went home and Executive went home to Executive's spouse. the idea of taking a day off scares you; what will happen to Executive if you're home or on vacation? how will Executive accomplish anything?

you will know details of the Executive's life only a partner or family member would know and you would order the world of the Executive to cater to those details: favorite foods, allergies, likes/dislikes, anniversary dates, birthdays, number of children, second home location, social security number, credit cards, taxes, personal finances. as ideal Assistant it's your job to care for these things just like they're your own.

while the Executive is proud of the fact that 'his Susan' or 'his Ali' or 'her Cathy' runs the Executive's life for them, they are also unaware of the seething resentment and anger that will slowly build in their assistant until it's bribed away. at least, if Susan, Ali or Cathy had any sense of self-preservation, they'd be filled with resentment and anger. if they know no better they will acquiesce and sink into a gray little nothing who doesn't exist unless they have an Executive to serve.

those of us who quit being an assistant did so because we hated every single frakking minute of it; being subservient was foreign to our sense of identity and purpose. whenever we interviewed with other firms we were forced to say, honestly, 'i don't do deference very well.'

the sisters have an odd way of defining 'independence.' though they say that the virtuous daughter asks her Executive - uh, Father - what his wishes would be for her, the end result is that she obeys. the virtuous daughter's will is entirely subject to that of her patriarch. in history, we'd call that kind of social organization a fiefdom.

and that's what these two sisters are advocating: deference. service. servility. servant.

who would groom another human being to glory in that kind of personal abnegation?
and why would you say that it's what God wants?

agatha has returned: again, i share too much

technically, my fibroid has never gone away. i just liked the idea of ignoring it while pretending my low hemoglobin levels made everything a-ok. i also liked taking these neat birth control pills that would only allow me to ovulate 4 times a year. i had visions of uninterrupted sexual discourse. silly goose.

doctor's office called and now my entire holiday season (aka, the sexiest season of the year) will be a nightmare of stitches, cramps, pain medication and, uh, limited naked social interaction.

mark it, people. november 13. extraction day.

doctor's office also determined that whatever weird, thick, gloopy, bright red viscous-y period i'm on now is dangerous to my health and must be stopped, RIGHT NOW, like an Al-Qaeda operative on the lam. so they're going to give me something that will make my entire reproductive system shut down completely.

i wouldn't be so icked out if i didn't suspect that the forthcoming 'menopausal side effects' are going to make me completely insane:

hot flashes and night sweats
fatigue
emotional changes such as mood swings or a change in sexual interest
sleep disturbances (insomnia)
drier skin and hair
increased growth of facial and body hair
aches and pains in the joints
headaches
palpitations (rapid, irregular heart beats)
generalised itching
vaginal changes – dryness, pain during intercourse, increased risk of infections
urinary symptoms – inability to control urination (incontinence), increased frequency of urinary infections

niiiiice.
i'm basically going to transform into my dead, crazy mother, circa 1992, for the next two months. frakking fuck!

the west virginia attack: more commentary on the blogs

Black Woman Attacked, Sexually Assaulted, and Held Captive in West Virginia : Rachel’s Tavern

i'm going to keep an eye on this story because it is so very gross and heinous and i think it's a bizarre mark of something happening in our country.

i mentioned this story to a bunch of coworkers (and we're all progressive and feminist) and played up the whole Deliverance thing to make it a little more palatable for after-work drinks, but i think there is more to this than simple disgust with the South's Otherness.

i'll try to write more about this over the weekend, when i'm not at work.

is this man supposed to look like an oompa loompa?

Tenor Takes Time Off, Cites Health - New York Times

yes, i've hit the proverbial 'work wall.'

am brain dead and must go home.

bitch talks shame and i share too much

Bitch Ph.D. had a fascinating thread about shame last week.
what things are Other People telling us to be ashamed of?
folks wrote about their abortions, their class conflicts, their secret envies, their bad habits, secret dreams, their lack of ambition, their overweening ambition. it was like eavesdropping on confessions.

so here's mine, in all their tawdry, shallowness - (some) things i really feel/want yet am ashamed to feel/want on some level because i think that I Oughtn't.

i should be ashamed of...

1. wanting to be hot. like super, duper, jennifer lopez HOT. (what feminist wants to be hot? i do.)
2. not being nurturing enough toward...others. (okay, everyone.)
3. being totally indifferent toward the welfare of children - like, when people say 'think of the children' i really really don't give a shit. not in some hipster ironic way. i really don't give a shit about kids.
4. not wanting to get an affordable condo in the southside of chicago because i know i would hate every second of living down there (and not really wanting my broke down aunt to know where i live.)
5. having no debt but still not being able to pass a credit check for an apartment.
6. being hyper competitive at work and wanting to WIN all the time.
7. REALLY wanting to be hot. like, make men drop in their tracks hot. if i had a fairy godmother, i'd ask to make me hot.
8. having a cleaning lady i write instructions to in spanish.
9. obsessing over things like Real Simple, Domino, Blueprint and Lucky mags and trolling for cute clothes online. i should be ashamed i'm a capitalist piglet!
10. secretly thinking of ways to be a progressive terrorist. (really. my mind goes there. 'if it was my personal mission to rid the world of anti-choicers, racists and misogynists how would i do it? hmmm.' you think i'm kidding but i'm not.)

i should tell my life coach about this exercise.

what the FRAK is this??

Woman tortured for at least a week, officials say - CNN.com

stereotypes about the south aside (did you see the photos of the people arrested?), what the hell - ??!!

between the Jena 6 thing and this craziness, i'd say the south is experiencing a serious timewarp.

Update: a little more on the story here. it seems the folks who held her prisoner had more than one brush with the law. serious banjo-picking craziness, here.

and shakesville has a rather ranty post about it over here and someone wants to know why 'hate crime' and not 'act of terrorism'? (there's also a fleshed out baltimore article that you can find on shakesville, too.)

alas, a blog has a post on it here, too.

so the coaching thing is in its third month. our last session was less than emotionally satisfying. in fact, if i had to put a word on it 'excruciating' would be exactly right.
revisiting the past is not good for me; not because there's Trauma, but because it's just...unproductive. who cares that i was a self-conscious dork in high school who hit the books hard rather than cultivate a spirit of openness and popularity? who cares that my emotional development seems to have hit the skids at about the same time that U2 played a concert on the roof of a building downtown?

(sidenote: my roommate and i have been avoiding more packing by watching season one of Dexter. more than once, she has whispered, 'if you turn out to be a serial killer, i will be really pissed off.' she has also taken to calling me Empty Vessel.

i'm not empty, i just react to things at a much lower frequency than other people...)

but my coach thinks it's something, so my homework assignment is to write a letter to my high school self. gack. just ... gack.

about not looking back to high school - there's nothing wrong with avoiding that period of one's life. unless you were at the top of the food chain, high school was fraught with fraughtness. every day was a social test: working in groups, lunch socializing, dances, school spirit days, presentations, performances. the only thing i liked doing was hanging out with my few friends, hanging out in the journalism room and listening to Monsy tell us about being a dyke in east la. (ok, and i liked to secretly compete with josh g. boys were either unrequited crushes or academic competition. they still are.) i liked going to class and being the dark horse that eventually skewed the curve; i liked being alone.

hm. no, i guess it's more accurate to say i accepted being alone.

anyway, my point is that i RESENT having to revisit a version of myself i've deliberately erased.

aurora becoming new battlefield for reproductive health access

Groups join growing protest of Aurora Planned Parenthood clinic -- chicagotribune.com

400 folks who like fetuses more than they like women to maybe 36 pro-choicers.
what's wrong with this picture?

why are there always more of them than there are of us?
is it because we don't have as much leisure time to cross state and county lines to hold a picket sign?
is it because we all have day jobs?

frak.

throw Planned Parenthood some support.
they need all the help they can get.

the bitch has spoken: how the hell do people do this??

Bitch Ph.D.

the lovely Bitch verbalizes my every fear. the frak am i going to pull my Generation X bullshit together when everything is SO very out of my reach?

my only hope is for a flaming meteorite to land on my father and pray that he hasn't signed everything over to his church ministry.

but thank you to Bitch for letting me know that i'm not the only one.

(oh, and the housing market on the west coast is outrageous. when my sister and bro in law decided to move from their duplex condo into a house, they spent over $650k for a tiny, post-war bungalow in mar vista, right under the flight path of the santa monica airport. it's a cute little house but my kitchen, my chicago apartment kitchen, is 3 times the size of theirs; they have two bedrooms and two kids; and for what they paid, they could have bought a penthouse condo in the middle of the city with enough left over to send one kid to peyton prep. or at least a very cute prairie style bungalow in oak park.)

but, really, how do people do this?

there's a couple in my office and they've been mooning about this fabulous condo they've seen. they're both in their early 20s and both of them are probably going to ask their parents for the downpayment. lucky them and their very liquid parents.

(yeah, i'm a little bitter.)

frak, man. the time to ask my parents for a downpayment loan was when dad was still working for the lapd and about to get a big promotion - back when i was in junior high, dude.

work vent

a certain foundation for women in town has decided to take on economic empowerment...after other direct service (or more knowledgeable) organizations have been pretty much saying the same thing for years now.

(who knows this landscape better?: heartland alliance, united way, my organization, the eleanor foundation who at least did original research to earn their street cred, the urban league, women employed, the wbdc...what are these organizations? chopped liver??)

ok, it's a little bit of a peeve. but i can't help it!
last year they launched a $2 million dollar PR campaign about what it will take to stop violence against women (a project with doubtful impact since it just seemed to be about hosting kickass events but whatever) but now they're jumping on the economic empowerment issue - like they're the ones who discovered the issue! it so makes me mad.

this is what burns me up about them. they clearly have great media outreach (and i would be lying if i wasn't envious of that for the sake of my own organization) but they also come off like plantation mistresses. (yeah, i said it.)

they want to be known as THE advocate for women's issues - all of them. but they sort of just stand on the shoulders of the small, store-front organizations in communities of need (usually staffed by overworked and underpaid women of color) that actually do the WORK. they want the credit for being an advocate for women's issues but all they do, really, is hand out money and get great PR. let's not confuse that with getting the work done.

they're like that mad tv sketch about the 'nice white lady'. (thanks, feministing!)

but what's even worse about this foundation for women is they're the advocacy version of a big cock block; the attention that should be going to the organizations who do the work gets sucked up by the foundation that has nothing to do with the work other than the fact they want to co-opt it. as a result, smaller and needier women's organization have to fight for the crumbs the foundation deigns to brush off the table.

clearly, i'm not a fan. i don't care how many appearances a certain foundation makes on Chicago Tonight.

(cough)

how many times can one man say 'i am not gay?'

FOXNews.com - Transcript: Sen. Larry Craig - Politics Republican Party Democratic Party Political Spectrum

in other news, this is the transcript of sen. larry craig's press conference yesterday that had me and Roomie laughing our asses off while we were driving home yesterday listening to NPR.

i love his second-to-last-sentence.

'Let me be clear: I am not gay. I never have been gay.
Still, without a shred of truth or evidence to the contrary, the Statesman has engaged in this witch hunt.
In pleading guilty, I overreacted in Minneapolis because of the stress the Idaho Statesman investigation and the rumors it has fueled all around Idaho. Again, that overreaction was a mistake and I apologize for my judgment.
Furthermore, I should not have kept this arrest to myself, and I should have told my family and my friends about it.
I wasn't eager to share this failure, but I should have anyway, because I am not gay.
I love my wife, my family. I care about friends and staff and Idaho.'

cue uproarious laughter.

holy discipline!

edmontonsun.com - World - Hubby charged in minister's beating

so. bishop thomas w. weeks (the 3rd) put the beat down on his wife, gospel singer/televangelist, juanita bynum in a hotel parking lot. he chokes her, 'stomps' on her, flees the scene, she ends up in the hospital, he's arrested and released on $40,000 bail, and then he goes to church.

his supporters, instead of fleeing a so-called spiritual leader who has poor impulse control, have instead chosen to circle their wagons and say totally sheeplistic, insane things like:
"There are three sides to every story. Nobody has the right to judge anybody. God is in the midst of that and will work it out."
"We all make mistakes. He deserves another opportunity."
"Let's love and pray they stay together! It may be a blessing to us all!"

and then there's this love letter from a commenter on an aol board:
"He might have a short fuse. He was obviously tryna walk away from the situation and SHE followed him. A man can only take so much from a nagging ass wife."

ah, yes. the 'nagging ass wife.'
in my community she's the mouthy, back-talking, sassy, 'don't know her place' emasculating jezebel that all men must beware.

according to church folk, here's the lesson for all us single church gals out there:
if our man has a 'short fuse,' it's no one's fault but our own nagging ass self for making him stomp us so hard in the face a parking lot attendant has to pull him off us.

i hate ignorance. i really really really do. and ignorance crossed with self-hatred and misogyny? even worse.

it's making me flashback to my old church where attitudes like this grew like rotten fruit on a tree.
...
more than slightly related to holy folks smacking around women, this morning i came across a piece discussing Christian Domestic Discipline!

it made me a little mad. i really can't take the church's fascination with disciplining women. the official CDD site is apparently not open to the public anymore thanks to all the attention it's been getting lately; but there are plenty of other blogs talking about, including feministing.

i love how the CDD folks make a point of saying this activity is consensual but i think there is a huge difference between consent and acquiescence. one implies enthusiastic participation, the other implies more than a hint of coercion.

let's repeat that: consent = enthusiastic participation

it's a useful distinction that could shed light on all sorts of situations, don't you think?

i am a sucker

shh. i have a confession: i am obsessed with the Weddings & Celebrations - New York Times section.

every day, i check on it, scrolling down through the newly-nuptialed couples (concentrating on the couples of color or interracial couples, of course) and after i cathect a little, i put it away to research things like domestic assault. sometimes the 'how they met' stories make me laugh (like the one about the couple who met during yoga and babbled on about their 'third eye' connection); sometimes, they make me tear up (like this one about the ex-con and the ex-drug addict who found each other and finally got married in their middle life.)

this one made me mist up a little. i mean, it's so freaking perfect, you know?

i would attribute all this misting and choking to last week's coaching residue, but i've been reading this column longer than i've been in coaching/therapy/whatever. so that doesn't work.

it's a little incongruous; the girl who's too emotionally blocked to fall in love or have an intimate relationship moons over stories of true love well met.

or maybe it's not so incongruous.

[a few minutes later...

ok, i just read this one and now i cannot finish my letter to the editor about domestic abuse in professional sports. i actually slipped into a brief fugue state wherein i imagined i was getting married to...well, married! bizarre! weird! incongruous!
it must be my new birth control doing this to me. all those freaking hormones.]

on the move

i think i wrenched something.

my back is all stiff from bending at awkward angles and lifting boxes.
i stink.
i'm covered in dust and grime.
i really stink.
my hair looks like i've been pulled through the underbrush.
the apartment is totally jacked up.

i got a text message from a boy wanting to get together later today/tonight.
there's no way in hell that's going to happen.

the road to intimacy

eesh. coaching/therapy (whatever) was really tough today. came close to tears more than once and would RATHER not be forced to think about the years between 1984-1989. there's a REASON i don't talk about it, lady! but now that's she's honed in on my weak spot, guess what we'll be talking about for a while?

aagh.

i know our past plays a part in how we become who we are but who knew that my past was quite so ... present. complete blowage.

in case anyone was wondering, the Summer of 3 is over. it was a nice experiment and forced me to actually give a shit about being a bit more social; i never attained the holy trinity of boy-wrangling but i Made an Effort.

S-, a player in the Summer of 3, was a summer-long demonstration of diminishing returns; not only were his ED issues never resolved, after a while even the fantastic foreplay became...perfunctory. lest you fill your imaginations with visions of a rambunctious ding and her anonymous booty-call, imagine, instead, two half-clothed people talking about their issues. we'd repose on my bed with some XRT on my stereo, we'd sip water and chat for 90 minutes about why relationships failed us. (the irony was not lost on us. we're not dumb.) we'd romp a little more (he was a very skilled kisser) then go back to talking. at the end, i'd walk him to the door, we'd sort of shrug and say 'see ya!' and he'd walk downstairs, my door already closing behind him.

as for the other points of the triangle...well, the less said the better.

the summer is almost over and the Autumn of 1 approaches.
meh.

am currently lost in the weeds trying to compose a sternly worded, yet non-inflammatory, letter to a network about an unfortunate choice of words in one of their shows.

sigh.

all i want to do is send them a postcard that says, "we think you suck!"
...
am also preparing to go home and begin packing.
yesterday, i came home to find that Roomie had practically built a fort of boxes and had filled the apartment with so much Oust (to cover the stress smoking) that i could taste it. i could barely see Roomie's head over the top of the fort.

'hey, lady,' i said. 'building a fort?'
the boxes were so high i just heard a mumble.
'huh?'
then came the pitiful reply from Roomie:
'mumble mumble ... tired.'

it had begun, people. the slow, exhausting process of extricating two people from one domicile to move into another. (don't even get me started on how long i've taken to choose my paint colors for my bedroom and bathroom.)

blaaaaand

Jenna Bush gets engaged - CNN.com

(unworthy, i know. but i can't help it.)

this just in...

More Black Women Consider 'Dating Out' - washingtonpost.com

this is news??

much as i hate to admit it, a war goes on

anyone catch the Daily Show last night?

there was a really sobering moment when jon stewart confronted the author of dick cheney's new biography and it was a thing of beauty.

earlier, he'd played the clip of Cheney being eerily prescient, but then he said that the difference between the liberals and the conservatives on the iraq war was that the right lied and used their lies (even when they admitted they knew the truth) to brand those who didn't believe their lies as traitors and un-American. then he wondered why we should believe anything this administration, especially cheney, has to say about their accomplishments when they've been wrong about everything.

when the author tried to mitigate all this and say that the right never really did any of those things, they just have a different way of viewing solutions, he was booed by the audiience and Jon Stewart got super serious:

Stewart: Let me say this: I think there's a real feeling in this country that your patriotism has been questioned, by people in very high-level positions, not fringe people. You know, I myself had some idiot from Fox [News Channel] playing the tape of me after September 11th, very upset, and them calling me a phony, because,
apparently, my grief didn't mean acquiescence. So, I think that it's a fair point to say—
Hayes: I think we can agree that we shouldn't be questioning other people's patriotism; on the other hand, I think it's totally legitimate to talk about different ways of handling the war on terror and for them to make their case.
Stewart: If they were to make their case on that, I'm saying to you, I think we'd have a fair argument and agreement on how to move forward. They haven't done that, and the evidence that they haven't done that is, he made that case in 1994, he knew those were the problems, and they never brought it up in the run-up to the war. (snip)

the segment was very sobering. no laughing. no jokes. just really disappointed resignation that our administration just screwed the pooch for the past 6 years and turned against its own citizenry to do so.

you can find a transcript here.

my nappy nappy hair

'Glamour' Editor To Lady Lawyers: Being Black Is Kinda A Corporate "Don't" - Jezebel

1. does that even look like latifah on the cover??
2. i thought a secret memo went out to everyone - don't tell a black woman what she should/shouldn't do with her hair. period.*

and 3. really, Glamour, really??

[*since i'm always telling folks to pick up a frakking book before asking really stupid questions, here's a selected bibliography on the politics of black hair, taken from Kitchen Tales: Black Hair and the Tension between Individual Subjectivity and Collective Identity, Shawan M. Wade:

Ashe, Bertram D. “Why Don't He Like My Hair?: Constructing African-American Standards of Beauty in Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon and Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God.” African American Review 29.4 (1995): 579-592.
Banks, Ingrid. Hair Matters: Beauty, Power and Black Women's Consciousness. New York: New York University Press, 2000.
Benthall, Jonathan, and Ted Polhemus, eds. The Body as a Medium of Expression. London: Allen Lane Penguin Books, 1975.
Bundles, A' Lelia. On Her Own Ground: The Life and Times of Madam C.J. Walker. New York: Scribner, 2001.
Byrd, Ayana, and Lori Tharps. Hair Story: Untangling the Roots of Black Hair in America. New York: St. Martin's Press, 2001.
Cade-Bambara, Toni. The Black Woman: An Anthology. New York: Penguin Books, 1970.
Chinzera, Ayoka. Hairpiece: A Film for Nappy-Headed People. 1982.
Clarke, Cheryl. Narratives: Poems in the Tradition of Black Women. Second ed. New York: Kitchen Table Women of Color Press, 1983.
Cleage, Pearl. “Hairpeace.” African American Review 27.1 (Spring 1993): 37-42.
Cobbs, William H. and Price M Grier. Black Rage. New York: Basic Books, Inc., 1968.
Craig, Maxine. “The Decline and the Fall of the Conk; or, How to Read a Process.” Fashion Theory: The Journal of Dress, Body and Culture 1.4 (December 1997): 3999-419.
Davis, Angela Y. “Afro Images: Politics, Fashion and Nostalgia.” Critical Inquiry 21 (Autumn 1994): 37-45.
Dent, Gina, ed. Black Popular Culture. Seattle: Bay Press, 1992.
Driskell, Murray and James E Webster. “Beauty as Status.” American Journal of Sociology 89.1 (July 1983): 140-165.
Gates, Henry Louis. “The Trope of a New Negro and the Reconstruction of the Image of the Black.” Representations 0.24 (Autumn 1988): 129-155.
Gayle, Addison, ed. The Black Aesthetic. Garden City: Double Day and Company, Inc., 1971.
Harris, Juliette, ed. Tenderheaded: A Comb-Bending Collection of Hair Stories. New York: Pocket Books, 2001.
hooks, bell. “Appearance Obsession: Is the Price too High?” Essence August 1995: 69-73.
hooks, bell. “Back to Black: Ending Internalized Racism.” Outlaw Culture: Resisting Representations. New York: Routledge, 1994. 173-182.
Kelley, Robin D.G. “Nap Time: Historicizing the Afro.” Fashion Theory: The Journal of Dress, Body and Culture 1.4 (December 1997): 339-351.
Mercer, Kobena. “Black Hair/Style Politics.” Out There: Marginalization and Contemporary Cultures. Eds. Russell Ferguson, Martha Gever, Trinh T. Minh-ha and Cornel West. New York: The New Museum of Contemporary Art, 1990.
O'Neill, John. Sociology as a Skin Trade. London: Heinemann Educational Books Ltd., 1972.
Piess, Kathy. Hope in a Jar: The Making of America's Beauty Culture. New York: Metropolitan Books Henry Holt and Company, 1998.
Riggs, Marlon. Black Is, Black Ain't. 1995.
Rooks, Noliwe M. Hair Raising: Beauty, Culture, and African American Women. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1996.
Rushing, Andrea Benton. “Hair-Raising.” Feminist Studies 14.2 (Summer 1988): 325-336.
Sagay, Esi. African Hairstyles: Styles of Yesterday and Today. London: Heinemann, 1983.
Smith, Feilpe. American Body Politics: Race, Gender, and Black Literary Renaissance. Athens, Georgia: The University of Georgia Press, 1998.
Ture, Kwame and Charles Hamilton. Black Power: The Politics of Liberation. New York: Random House, 1967.
Tyler, Bruce M. “Black Hairstyles: Cultural and Socio-political Implications.” The Western Journal of Black Studies 14.4 (1990): 235-250.
Wade-Gayles, Gloria. “The Making of a Permanent Afro.” Pushed Back to Strength: A Black Woman's Journey Home. Boston: Beacon Press, 1993.
Walker, Alice. “Oppressed Hair Puts A Ceiling on the Brain.” Living by the Word. San Diego: Harcourt Brace Javanovich, 1988. 69-74.
Ward, Margo Okazawa-Rey and Tracie Robinson and Janie Victoria. “Black Women and the Politics of Skin Color and Hair.” Women Studies Quarterly 14.1 & 2 (Spring/Summer 1986): 13-14.
Welsh-Asante, Kariamu, ed. The African Aesthetic: Keeper of the Traditions. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1993.
White, Shane and Graham White. Stylin': African American Expressive Culture from its Beginnings to the Zoot Suit. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1998.
Willis, Susan. “I Shop Therefore I Am: Is there a Place for Afro-American Culture in Commodity Culture?” Changing Our Own Words: Essays on Criticism, Theory, and Writing by Black Women. Ed. Cheryl A. Wall. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1989. 173-195.
Wolfe, George C. “The Hairpiece.” The Colored Museum. New York: Grove Press, 1988. 19-23.

or you can just search 'black hair politics' in google scholar and see for yourself.]

isn't vera wang the chick who also turned her snooty nose up at sarah jessica parker and her Bitten line in an interview with the nytimes?

well, it seems that ms. wang has been bitten (heh) by a slavering need for cash and has chosen to cater to the previously snitted-against middle america masses and created her own line for Kohl's (also debuting in O Magazine).

Inexpensive Shit: Simply Vera Leaves Us Simply, Um, Excited? About Fashion? - Jezebel
...
in other shopping news, i was with my sister yesterday (sniff, she went back to LA) and we stopped in GAP on michigan avenue, where i haven't shopped in a really long time. they changed the place around some and their early fall stuff was already on the floor.

some thoughts:
1-sporty is back. we saw some cute rugby-inspired shirts that we remembered from the early 90s or late 80s but this time they're snugger, less sporty looking and more 'girly'.
2-80s nostalgia isn't always a good thing. my sister, a size 2 or 4, tried on a striped button down that had a ruffle down the middle and we both gagged. we totally wore that same shirt in 1982; remember, if you're old enough to have worn the trend when it first came out, avoid it now!
3-their sizing changed. hard to believe but i think something happened. i found a cute military styled jacket and sniffed that the their XL is never big enough for me. 'why can't they just add another X?,' i snitted. well, i tried it on and it FIT. my arms didn't get stuck in the arm holes, the jacket could close over my boobs (which are a 40D, thank you) and my sister even said, 'looks cute.' (she never says that.) either they changed their fit models or i lost some weight in my whole upper half of my body and i don't think i did.
4-patent leather handbags for fall might just be necessary. maybe. perhaps.
5-their maternity section is totally cute. yes, i said maternity! where else can you get a nice fitted, stretchy t-shirt that hugs your girly curves and goes down far enough so your belly doesn't show? or where can you get a dress or shirt with an empire waist that has enough room for the boobs?

snort. are you a 'special snowflake'?

'The Pick Up Artist': Extreme Makeover Edition - Jezebel

believe it or not, i found this through another church gal.
i was at work so i couldn't laugh as loud as i wanted to.

EC in Illinois: pharmacists still pushing to refuse to dispense

Feministing has a corrected post about a federal court case to decide whether pharmacists have the right to refuse to do their jobs and dispense emergency contraception.

there is a chance proponents of reproductive health access can still win this one but it means that we still have to be really vigilant about our (women's) ability to have access to the medication we need when accidents happen (because they do!).

i, for one, would be really pissed if, because a condom split/tore/got jammed up in my girly parts/slipped off, i needed EC and some asshat refused to dispense because of his asshat church beliefs. really really really pissed.

like, psycho-pissed.

really.

that's like having a ticking bomb strapped to my uterus and some smug baptist tells me i can't cut the wire. that's enough to make a grown woman wanna take a hammer to someone's penis.

Orange Tangerine: Skinny girls

this post from Orange reminded me of a reality tv show with petra nemcova called a model life in which she hand picks 6 very young girls to put them through their paces while dangling a modeling contract in front of them as a prize.

on the surface it's a less campy version of America's Next Top Model; it's supposed to have a gushy heart at its center but i think the heart that beats inside this show is more of the same hard-nosed misogyny that makes up the whole of the fashion industry. (and the more i watch shows like this, that hardened, cynical, sexist face becomes more visible.)

while the people who inhabit the world of NEXT modeling are, in typical fashion, shallow and bitchy, there is a level of conscious hatred for natural female bodies that seeps through and makes my mouth purse in a really distasteful moue. the two 'handlers' for the girls end every show with stern words of advice for the week's winners and losers ("your photo shoot went really well and you can really pose" or "you're stiff and need to do whatever the photographer tells you") but they also enjoy a private review session that is an object lesson in How to Make a Woman Hate Herself (a paraphrase):

[two unlovely new yorkers looking at a photo of a pretty girl in a red bathing suit showing lots of cleavage]

BitchyBritishGuy: ugh. lucy. she's cute - incredible eyes - but there's just nothing there. she's so bland.
BlackBitchyGirl: yeah. she's just...ok. and her body...
BBGuy: yeah, a lump. unacceptable. she really needs to tone up.
BBGirl: yeah. she needs to learn that if she wants to make it in this business her body has to be really...you know.
BBGuy: yeah. fashionable. we have to want to wear the clothes. but i look at her body and all i see are curves and tits. unsubtle.
BBGirl: exactly. we need to see the clothes. she needs to learn that. let's tell her to get with a trainer, like, immediately. we need to take care of it. NOW.

[photo switches to pale genocide victim in a bathing suit]

BBGuy: well, no curves to speak of here. love it.
BBGirl: me too. she photographs so high fashion. this might not be the best suit for her but it still screams 'editorial', you know?
BBGuy: exactly. she's so unusual looking. you'd think it wouldn't work but it does. we should bring her in and tell her to keep doing what she's doing. i can't wait to see how she progresses.
BBGirl: me too.

[they smirk at each other]

the most disturbing thing about this show is its cognitive dissonance. maybe it's not cognitive dissonance. maybe it's just plain hypocrisy. the industry folks clearly prefer the two most sickly looking girls because they photograph 'high fashion' but are brutal to one girl because she's a (gasp) out of shape size 2; even so, they make a feeble stab at encouraging 'healthy' body images.

in an earlier episode, the woefully thin michelle was berated by their fitness trainer for having the lowest BMI he'd ever seen and lucy was declared 'perfect' for having a BMI that fit in her range for her height, weight and age. michelle insists she's normal and has always been like this (which she may be but it's not the point) and lucy is excited that she received approval. but by the end of the episode, fashion reasserts itself (not normalcy) and we see lucy chastised for being 'out of shape' and borderline fat while michelle moves up the list of frontrunners.

in this horrifically crazy world, size 2 = horrifically obese and unacceptable.
where can women go if a 2 is considered obese??

i don't think this whole thing can be laid wholly at the feet of those who choose or 'create' the image of the model. the designer is an active collaborator. while part of me (the part that watched Project Runway) can sympathize with the practical struggle to make fabric hang in a pleasing way, we need to stop using the designer's struggle as an excuse to shield an industry that consistently proffers a really whacked image of female bodies. the designer has no concept of women, real or otherwise. and any enterprise that ellides the presence of the woman i call misogynist and patriarchal.

their vision (and ours as well because we see through their lens) is becoming skewed in such a way i'm afraid the designers, critics and all the attendant folks in the fashion industry won't be satisfied until there's just a hank of hair and a pelvic bone moving down the runway.

Orange Tangerine: Skinny girls

Focused Ultrasound - Uterine Fibroids - New York Times

oh, if only the Agathas of the world would just go away permanently.

are you ready for superbad? i am.

if Roomie and i were to have a buddy film, it would be something like this:
it's a day in the life of two 30-something women who spend their time watching old peter o'toole movies about incest and madness, buying comic books, grilling everything in their refrigerator because Roomie bought a new grill, drinking beer, 'solving' crimes at the museum of science CSI exhibit, maybe going to the arlington race track to 'bet' on the ponies and drinking more beer while wondering where the boys are.

exciting, no?

anyway, Superbad. get ready, ladies. i sense a group outing.

It’s, Like, a Buddy Film by, Like, Buddies - New York Times

i rock.

no, no. it's true. they told me.

today, at a regional conference, i totally rocked my panel presentation (How Advocacy can be a Tactic in Your Overall Internal/External Strategic Communications Strategy.) barely looked at my hastily cobbled notes, delivered my message, kept the energy level up, elicited some laughs and made my office look really really good.

i. rock.
...
of course, i'm also horribly cash poor right now (thanks to bad budgeting math) so my head won't get too big anytime soon.

thank goodness my Roomie lent me cab fare, or i'd be in northbrook, selling my blood to get back to the city.

wow. prayer really DOES work

OMG.

my doctor's office just called and told me my surgery (which i was totally freaking out about below) has been cancelled!

why?

because, apparently, i'm so freaking anemic (6.8 out of 11 scale) it scared them and now i have to spend the next 4 months raising my blood levels.

mysterious ways, folks.

a last hurrah before agatha-extraction: the simpsons

how much do i love a.o. scott?

“The Simpsons Movie” is rated PG-13 (Parents strongly cautioned). It has what the official advisory describes as “irreverent humor throughout” as well as brief cartoon nudity. Won’t somebody think of the children?

snort.

The Simpsons Movie - Movie - Review - New York Times

ysex? let me count the ways

you may have heard on the news this morning that researchers have found (big surprise) that college students have sex for all sorts of reasons. 237 of them, in fact.

well, you could plow through all the numbers and stats here or you can zip directly to page 27 and take the survey yourself.

i know i will. i'll consider it part of my coaching journey.

bad mommy monday: celebs have moms, too

over on Church Gal, i wrote this morning about a piece in the nyt mag on family leave and workplace discrimination and how it focuses on working mothers (though working fathers are also targets).

then i came across this article in the style section. (note: really good articles on gender and society can be found in the style pages, i think.)

it's more on the way our culture judges and scrutinizes mothers - even celebs' mommies:

But the amount of derision directed at mothers seems out of proportion.
“We still have a virgin-whore binary in American pop culture, and this governs motherhood as well,” Professor Douglas said. The same way in which girls are labeled either good or bad, so are mothers. The same level of censure does not seem to apply to sons, whose risky behavior is often seen as merely a rite of passage.
Professor Douglas thinks the reproach directed at some celebrities’ mothers speaks to the particular kinds of lessons that mothers are supposed to teach their daughters — lessons Lindsay, Britney and Paris seem not to have learned. “It’s supposed to be a mother’s job to train her daughter into how to domesticate her various desires,” she said. “If we see a young woman who hasn’t done that, the mother has failed her tutorial.”

i love that phrase: 'domesticate her various desires.' good mothers are supposed to teach us how to tame desire, make them homey, safe, appropriate. let's put a frilly apron on those rampant desires and make them 'feminine.' i also like the connection the piece makes to bourgeois class values and idealizations of womanhood. so victorian.

and it's clear that these attitudes aren't just fodder for literary or academic smart-assery; if you go to these different gossip sites (where female judgment runs rampant), you'll read that these lessons about appropriate motherly/daughterly behavior are well-ingrained and often-expressed. (though, apparently, easily discarded, as well.) whether we like to admit it, we LIKE judging other women, women's behavior, women's mothers and their behaviors. it's the first place we go to when we wanna snark on someone.

but, as the article notes, scrutiny of the father and of sons is avoided - and perhaps this is a serious cultural oversight. where is the surveillance of fatherly behavior? where is the constant preying on the behavior of sons gone bad?

(where is the chastising of joe francis' parentage, for instance? why has his home training gone unnoticed, while the parenting skills of the girls he preys on becomes fodder for vicious speculation? i.e., 'what kind of parent would allow their underage daughter to go to spring break blah blah blah?' come on. you know you've said it. i have.)

how would our popular discourse change if we, for instance, began to take a hyper-close look at sports figures and their daddy issues? (or their absent daddy issues?) would we say that doping and cheating and violence and dog-fighting and sexual assault could be laid at the feet of these athletes' fathers? (even if the fathers aren't present, their absence IS a presence, one could argue.)

but no. that's not as much fun as looking at a woman self-destruct and then blaming her mother. so much better to kick a woman than scrutinize a man.

Sometimes Mothers Can Do No Right - New York Times

huh. nerd=white?

who knew?

Nerds - Dress and Apparel - Intelligence - New York Times

2 weeks

it is two weeks until Agatha-extraction. against my will and despite my best 'think positive-ness' my imagination is full of those awful NBC Deadline-esque news stories: Stone Philips fills the tv screen with his big impassive face and says, 'It was an ordinary procedure. One performed millions of times before on millions of ordinary women just like her. But, sadly, the family and friends of Ding would soon realize that sometimes tragedy strikes despite the ordinary."

or something lame like that.

i can't help but think that if the next two weeks was a plot point in a novel bought in the checkout lane at the supermarket, i'd be worried about Me about now. reading about the protagonist who has made some questionable decisions over the past year and blatantly flaunted a 'whatever' face to the world at large, i would be worried that the author would take this opportunity in the narrative to 'teach Me a lesson'.

in such a mass market novel, this would be the moment in the story where the hard drinking/smoking/sexing wench would be given the opportunity to learn something valuable about strength in perseverance as i recover from the stroke i've had because my anathesia was wrong and i struggle to read or form basic words; or i learn the love of a good man as the doctor, who accidentally removed all my reproductive organs because he's a drunk, falls in love with me as i sue him in a malpractice case that will change the shape of litigation forEVER; or maybe i learn the identity of the 5 people i'd talk to in heaven after i bleed out on the operating table because i forgot to tell my doctors i've been taking an aspirin a day to stop a toothache.

these are the stories that fill my days when i'm not paying attention.

needless to say, i'm a little stressed out.

(reading the above, i realize that this is exactly the whole point of that annoying TNT series with Holly Hunter: the drunk, adulterous lady cop gets a divine intervention and mends her hard drinking/smoking/sexing ways.)

a new find: The Urban Beauty Source - Home

are you tired of that thrill of discovery every time you find that RARE mention of a product made specifically for brown girls in Lucky magazine (or Glamour, or InStyle or whatever)?
and the beauty section in essence is too small?

thrill no more. go to ambermag.com - The Urban Beauty Source - Home.

[h/t sid]

'haven't you heard of a thing called amazon?': oh, the wit of the border patrol

i'm back from windsor, ontario and our harry potter book-buying trip. had a lovely weekend reading, eating, reading, discussing various plot points and wondering where all the people were in windsor. (i mean, it's 9.30 pm and all the restaurants are empty! what's up with that?)

on the way back we encountered snitty attitude from the U.S. border guy who'd rather hassle a bunch of lawyers and such in a mini-van. you may scoff at our desire to READ, american border denizen of the booth, but at least we're not letting folks with TB enter the country.

(and the book? awesome. awwwsommme.)

love love love: Endless.com: Shoes & Handbags

Endless.com: Shoes & Handbags

i was hanging out with a gay friend once talking about shopping.
i said, 'you know, i only really care about 3 things: shoes, bags, and coats.'
he said, 'you mean the most expensive things in a wardrobe?'
'yeah.'
'way to be frugal.'

who in their right mind can be frugal when you have a righteous website of affordable, hot shoes and delivery is FREE?? huh? who?

not me.

(you have to check out the pumps. soooo cute. so fricking cute.)

how to ruin lumpia: make them 'american'

Meat and Potatoes Lumpia - Allrecipes

oh, gack.
mayonaise? ketchup?
the filipina in me rises up in protest.

but the flowers are so pretty: on why da mayor ain't so great

Chicago Reader Blogs: Clout City

this post from the political writer at the Reader says better what i struggled to say to some friends during a cookout over the 4th: i like the mayor (as personality) but i'm not going to say he's the best mayor ever. in my job, i'm learning more and more about internal city workings and it's taking a lot of bloom off the rose; i think chicago is still a great place to live, but it would be great if things actually changed around here. it's not enough that the downtown areas and certain neighborhoods of this city are 'progressing'. it would be great if that kind of energy were spread around. but, the response is 'hey, it's not daley's fault! it's a corrupt system! he's doing the best he can! he can't do it alone!'

really? i mean, really? it's not his fault? he's been mayor an awful long time, it seems to me. i mean, we keep voting for him. you'd think something would change year after year. i appreciate the point made in the post about the mayor tolerating the CTA mess while his friend frank kruesi ran it; again, the response is, 'hey, CTA is part of MTA! it's the state's inefficiency! it's not the mayor's fault!'

we seem to be willing to forgive the mayor for a lot:
badly performing schools and craptacular test scores - not his fault, it's arne duncan and the CPS' fault!
police brutality - not his fault, it's the culture of the CPD and a few bad apples (though the sun times seems to think otherwise)!
the CTA mess - don't criticize ron huberman! he's cute and he's just trying to clean up the mess frank kruesi made!
the public housing mess - it's CHA, not the mayor!
the hiring scandal - hey, he had some out of control staffers!
the still flat economy for most working families - hey, the city council and that big box ordinance killed economic growth!
the TIF stuff - uh, what's TIF? (Commissioner Mike Quigley can tell you.)

anyway, like i said, i like the mayor. he makes me laugh when he loses his shit during a press conference and yells at a utility. but he's not a saint. he doesn't walk on water. he's neck-deep in bullshit just like the rest of us.

when the boss is away...

you hang out on MySpace all day and read blogs about comics.
for your consideration: (postmodernbarney.com)

g'morning, kids.
something i've learned since leaving a breakfast meeting at the Drake: don't have breakfast at the Drake. $108 for 4 people?? what the hell?!

jeebus. they really ding you on the orange juice...

so i'm doing some late night cleaning last night and i have the television on for some background noise. i had no idea that vh1 turns into weird skeevy-land on sunday nights. first i endure the final 15 minutes of Rock of Love while I scrub the counters (depressing AND distasteful); then came Scott Baio is 45...and Single.

wow. televised mid-life crisis. though it probably killed several brain cells in the process and made me one of the slack-jawed masses, i watched the whole episode because:
1) i was cleaning and there was nothing else on and
2) i felt intense curiosity about what he was going to hear from all the women from his past. (one word: ouch.)

i hesitate to make it a recorded event on the dvr, but that's ok. i'll watch it online.

send me in, coach!

so, uh, i've embarked once again on the road to self-discovery.
my first coaching session was last night and i already have homework:
list 5 emotional requirements i ask from relationships (hard!)
list 10 mistakes i've made in relationships and any lessons i've learned (i've actually already made this list)
...
there was a moment during my chatty blathering my need for a coach when she said, 'Ms. Ding, you know that coaching isn't therapy; we aren't here for therapy and the framework is different. but sometimes it's necessary to deal with things in a client's past that might help illuminate the present. well, i think we may have to do that in your case. are you ok with that?'

'uh, sure. like what patterns?'
'your intimacy issues.'
'they're like neon, aren't they?'
'mm, yes.'

giggle

talk about a 'hard line' policy: China Executes Ex-Food and Drug Chief

China Executes Ex-Food and Drug Chief
yikes.

let's compare this with how we deal with government incompetence and/or corruption:
we tell them they're doing a 'heckuva' job (Katrina, FEMA and 'Brownie')
we commute their sentence (hello, Libby)

we ignore reality (no benchmarks hit, yet, assholes)

we vote for them - twice (frakking Shrub)

details mag: the lads are gross

i'm at work so i'll be brief: yick.

if there are ever guys who lurk here, some simple words of advice:
it's never ok to 'demand' a sexual act. that just makes you a pig.
and liking a sexual act (not because it feels good and brings pleasure to both people) because it strokes your ego and hurts your partner just makes you a bigger pig.
and recognizing that you can only do it when your partner is loaded off her ass and can't (legally) give consent just makes you a date-raping pig (who rapes ass.)

sex is supposed to be a mutual thing, you know?
if i want to stick my thumb (or any other implement) up some guy's butt, i'll make sure he's ok with that.

Feministing

summer of 3: this one's for atalanta

my bloggy friend, atalanta, is a wonderful, smart gal who experiences a small agonzing death every time a potential online suitor sends her a horrific missive. i love her for her sensitivity. (she's even written about it on her blog.) yeah, sure; it makes us lingua-snobs but that's why english majors exist.

though my dating luck seems to have cooled as we enter a hot hot hot july, i'm pleased to say that i have yet to date/have a drink with/sleep with/exchange emails with someone who does not have a fluid, correct and witty relationship with the english language. from S-, to S-, and including the current S- (and even the maligned B-), my boys have been bright. sure, some suffered from clinical depression and lacked a few social skills but, generally, they've been verbally acute.

counts for something...

Jaimie Esptein - On Language - Dating - New York Times

i have no deep thoughts today. nothing probing to say about politics, the state of freedom or reproductive health.

instead, i'd rather think about how much i love the summer.

tuesday night, i left the office early and dropped by the dominick's by navy pier to pick up some things for the, frankly, unsanctioned barbecue we were having at a friend's house while she and her boyfriend spent the holiday in cabo. we spent hours in a bacchic fog on her balcony, our bodies languid in the humid evening, but as the thunderstorm rolled in, stretching our legs and hands, thrilling to the lightning. not caring even we had to run through puddles to get back to the car. summer is for feeling the body get mucky.

i don't mind the long lines at the checkout, i don't care that the bus is crowded and slow. i like standing in the close air of the bus, stretching up to grasp the handrail and feeling the press of bodies against me while there's music in my ears and i can slip into a drowsy daze while the streets speed and lurch past my eyes.

anyway, summertime. if i had my wish i'd 'work' from home, take naps in the middle of the day, walk around in loose dresses and low slung white pants and forsake shoes. it's such a cliche - the sensory memory that plunges you back into a crystal clear image of a nostalgic past.

but that's what summertime does for me. things like walking across the river around 3.30, or sitting in the back garden at my local bar staring up at the trailing ivy, or sticking my feet into a square patch of sun in my apartment, or drowsing on my antique quilt in the middle of the afternoon.

they make me want to be a little girl in los angeles again.my sister and i would make a hammock on our front porch, climb in, and she'd chatter while i would read nancy drew or stare at the wooden beams overhead and pretend i was stowing away on a pirate ship hiding with the potatoes and crackers. (for some reason i thought that's what pirates ate: potatoes and crackers. or oranges.)

driving down lakeshore drive with my roommate yesterday and passing through the park, smelling all the charcoal. it was like the whole city was grilling. and this brings back the awesome (so over-used, that word) church picnics from back home. the scratchy blanket on the grass, some contemporary gospel on a boombox, and the smell of chlorine and sun mixed with tangy sunblock on sweaty skin, while recovering from thin white bread sandwiches filled with barbecued pulled pork, or baked beans, buttery corn, peach cobbler with real crust, or greens or really eggy potato salad.

missing the grit inside my red keds from running in the sand pit, the contrast of my nuttier dark tanned skin with my sister's tanned gold. the shadow play of my wild hair, big poofs of hair on the side of my head that only got bigger the more i ran around or played in the pool. (not that i could swim. but man i loved the shallow end.)

but there are advantages to a grown up summer that i never could have imagined when i was a kid. (am i the only one who's fascinated by how cool a kiss can feel even when it's 98 degrees outside?)

yes; things were fun back then, but summer's just fine now.
...
(was really looking forward to a date planned for tomorrow night and he has to travel for the next two weeks; he'll be back in the country when i'm about to go under the knife. am alarmed at how disappointed i am. like - REALLY disappointed. like - despondent disappointed. hm. that's a surprise.

NOW, what??)

horror, gore and misogyny

Jill Soloway: Remove the Rating for Captivity - Living Now on The Huffington Post

goodness knows i'm a fan of a certain kind of horror film.

self-referential horror that makes fun of itself while it scares me? check.

well-written old school ghost stories, vampires, haunted houses, monster flicks, scary cemetaries? i'm all for. (like, The Haunting, The Changeling, Ghost Story, Scream, and even The Exorcist because it was creepy as all hell.)

but there's a certain kind of film i can't stomach anymore: the Saws, the Hostels, the Turistas. all of them. can't. take it. the torture, the eroticized killing, the elaborate fetishistic murder just skeeves me out and makes me hurt the way looking at porn now makes me hurt.

just lately, i've been watching the quick tv ads for Captivity and it turns my stomach: stalker capturing a woman and some guy and torturing the hell out of her. this is entertainment? this is what we need to see to get our rocks off now? woman-hating death porn.

gross.

and, if you read solloway's column, you'll see the grossness isn't an accident. it's done on purpose; it's a thoughtful kind of 'accident'; the misogyny is how the film will succeed. it's built into the marketing and business plan.

sick, really. and if you read here, you'll see that the disgusting dude who created it is counting on our shock and repulsion to drive more people to the film. well, i don't want to drive folks to see the film. i want the film to disappear. so we're thinking about that at the office - how exactly to make it disappear.

i mean, if the fundamentalists can make a regular old movie about evolution disappear, can't we make a piece of woman-hating crap just fizzle out of existence?

jp in china!

my friend jp is off to china today. and perhaps indefinitely. sadness.
but i'll be reading his travel blog over here.

wish jp luck! (not that he needs it but you never know...)



(and my other friend, liza, has a travel blog about being a professor/corporate wife in india over here. fascinating and also affirming my opinion that, because i am soft and american, i would die in india.)

a lesson in credit

i found my perfect bed at macy's and sears today. i bounced, i rolled, i laid, i stretched but, alas, i could not buy either one of them because my credit is less than stellar.

and now i am demoralized as i face adulthood. apparently, adulthood also includes kick ass credit, despite there being no actual debt.

this is what i don't get: there are people out there with thousands of dollars in credit debt (hello, i saw you on oprah) and here i am, with perhaps $100 in credit debt and a few delinquents. they can buy houses and cars and i can't get a freaking bed?

sadness. so much sadness, i bought comic books and spent the afternoon reading them and watching videos on vh1.

i think i might have to buy my bed from the skeevy guys on milwaukee avenue.

so...
today at the office we saw someone take truly unprofessional behavior to a whole new level.

not going into details but beware the wrath of a HR professional who has been let go.

dude.

election 2008: first donation of the cycle

ok, all that elizabeth edwards v. coulter business made me go over to john edwards' site and make a $50 donation.

baby daddies are dangerous

first, did you know that the biggest killer of pregnant women is homicide?
amazing.

i'm sure you've read the news stories about that pregnant woman in ohio, jessi davis, who was killed by her boyfriend and found in a field. and then about that woman and her kids killed in illinois by her husband. what's up with men?? you have issues and the first thing you do is murder your girlfriend and kids?

it boggles the freaking mind. these stories of murdered women build up and sometimes it makes you look at the other half of the population all aslant.

this woman wrote her boyfriend a note in response to these latest stories of domestic violence against women:

If for some reason I am pregnant, and you suddenly realize that I am just days away from delivering, don't kill me. I know you might not be "ready" to be a father, but there are better ways out of it. Of course I would prefer it if you were a loving and supportive husband and father, but you might freak out. Maybe you're having an affair. Now being a man, you won't think things through. Killing me is NOT an option. Counseling IS an option. You do realize you would be the first person police questioned if I were to go missing right?

If you must be rid of me, just up and leave. I'll go home to live with my dad, or find solace in the arms of a best friend. But I will be alive, and that's the clincher. I'd rather be a single mom on welfare than found murdered in the wilderness.

...
when my dad was visiting, he got embroiled in a rather heated group discussion with my girlfriends about our singleness. it's a futile conversation but we keep having it and my girlfriends are gracious enough to indulge him. but his constant refrain, which kept puzzling us, was "be a woman."

we had no idea what that meant. we have ovaries. we're women. there's no escaping that simple, biological fact.

but to look at the larger culture, i guess 'being a woman' also means 'being killed.'

thanks, i'd rather not.

adulthood blows. no, it's great. really.

Roomie just bought a place and the purchase puts in high relief that i need to get my adulthood act together. sure, i'm an adult and everything, with a great (burgeoning) career and friends, but perhaps it's time to finally get off the roommate train that i boarded back in 2000. it's been fun, supportive, fiscally feasible and wonderful to have a partner in crime but i'm almost 40. maybe i've been using it like a crutch. (and Roomie and i have talked about this so this isn't something she doesn't know has been kicking around. she sometimes sees things before i do.)

but i was looking at my so-called options yesterday and it gave me a stomach-ache. financially, nothing can happen before italy (I-TAL-IA!) but i still need a plan, right?

what is it that i want? what do i imagine the next stage of my life becoming?
is it a single, 40-something life in a streeterville studio? (affordable but depressing for me)
is it a single, 40-something life in a west town apartment? (not depressing and affordable if i get a whopping raise)
is it a financially strapped single 40-something life in a condo in west town or logan square? (stressful and totally not affordable)

i'm trying to think about these things as clear-eyed as possible, with as little emotion as possible. (i think i do my best thinking when i'm not emotional about it.) but, very viscerally, i have one image in my head of what i don't want my life to look like: the female version of B-'s life. one fork, one spoon, one plate, one towel. i may have made fun of it but i should have paid more attention to how alike we actually were, because right now, i'm pretty much one fork, one spoon, one plate, and so on.

(we can include one bed, two bookcases, one bench, two chairs, tiny tea cups, one tv, one bench...you get the picture.)

but while i also feel the pull to be adult (i.e., accumulate) i also don't want all that stress-inducing work, you know? setting up a household. it sounds so daunting. i'm certainly not one of those die-hard folks who want to lessen their 'footprint.' my footprint is what it is: less than other people's, more than a homeless guy's. but i also want to throw a sop to my vanity and live a life that's really wonderful, you know? that's not chintzy. one that's full. self-indugent? perhaps. but that's what it is, too.

but, hey. at least my fibroid will be gone in two months. yay.

the summer of 3: frolic boy

so. had another fun, exhausting, relaxing, intense evening with S- last night.

i would try and characterize our rendezvous with more poetry but i can't find the poet who would fit exactly. i mean, when someone has taken the role of Dominant Teacher, donne or browning doesn't match the occasion.

'how do i frolic with thee?
let me count the ways.
but first let me put
my thumb in your butt.'

see? not really poetic.

if anyone knows an appropriate poet for this kind of action, let me know.

[thanks to shrinky, i've found appropriate versification from Avenue Q, "You Can Be Loud as the Hell You Want":

Princeton:
Oh, my God, Kate, no one's ever touched me like this
before - you can't put your finger there -
OOH! PUT YOUR FINGER THERE!]

it had to happen sooner or later, pt. 2

YOUR PRIVACY IS AN ILLUSION: Six creepy things I can learn about you - Valleywag

orange was kind enough to send me this helpful link about the ways people can follow your online breadcrumbs.

um, yeah. guess what i've been doing the past hour or so?

goodreads : or, another great way to waste 3 hours

goodreads see what your friends are reading

if you're home, have no desire to watch tv or surf videos on youtube and you want to feel really really smart, sign up for goodreads and keep track of your reading habits.

i've just wasted one hour at work thinking about all the books i've read recently and i haven't even kept an accurate tally of what's on my bedside shelf, yet.

(and if you sign up and would like to share reading lists, send me an invitation! i hate wandering around bookstores wondering what to read. i'd much rather go off my friends' recommendations.)

the plan, pt 2.

i'm on my way out the door so this is a quickie.

the plan is in process. met the newly transplanted C- for drinks last night which turned into dinner and an awkward hug before we took our separate cabs home. he was nice, funny, normal and, well, isn't normal the most important thing?

hello, Hang Out Guy.

(boys remaining for summer plan to fall completely into place: the Backup)

another dove winner: evolution

my thighs are too big.
i have a big ass.
i have a flat ass.
my neck is too short.
where's my chin?
my belly pooches out.
i'm not tall enough.
i wear glasses.
i have a round face.
my hair is too frizzy.
i'm too dark.
i'm a pancake.
i hate my freckles.
my lips are thin.
my lips are big.
my nose is crooked.
i'm too pale.
i need to lose weight.
my thighs don't meet.
i wish i looked like jennifer lopez.
i need to work out more.
i'm not disciplined enough.


we all need to stop the chatter about how much we hate ourselves.
which is why i love the new dove ad.

compromised or, it was only a matter of time

one day, the skeins of my online life were going to cross. one day, i was going to underestimate the intrepid skillz of a man who had a lot of time on his hands and an uncanny knack to piss me off. one day, myspace was going to make me rue the day...blah blah blah.

the thing is, i don't use myspace for anything. it is a placeholder. and now it's connected to my work blog (yikes) and even though i've since made it private, so that no one can see it unless i've made them my friend, it's kinda been breached.

oh! and we were just talking about this today during a meeting - what happens when someone comes across your blog that you never intended to, in the first place. aaargh!

so, yeah. i check my myspace acct tonight and B- sent me a message there, inviting me to a show last week. of *course* he's on myspace! and of course he can find me - i used my real name!! my freak out isn't because i'm 'hiding' from him; that's not the issue. i just don't want to leave any crumbs that might lead back here, to Screed.

(because if he saw this? lord jesus. just look for my body in the chicago river.)

now i have to go back and scrub my myspace page and then try to make sure there's no trail to follow. (if he figures out Real Name=ding=Screed then i'm totally screwed. this blog is #2 when you google 'screed'! i mean, yay, but frak!)

i dedicate this link to my Roomie, of whom i shall never, ever make fun:
My Crazy Roommate: George Lucas ain't got nothin'

ok, thanks to shrinkykitten, i now know how to make ice cream in a bag.

absurdity, meet the chicago public school district

when you're on different boards you learn lots of interesting stuff about how incredibly stupid some institutions are.

for instance, during last night's board meeting, i discovered that CPS has absolutely no idea what it's doing. i mean, what's the point of designating a school a magnet school when it barely even qualifies for it? sure, studies have shown that kids at magnet schools do better - but not because it's called a magnet! they actually have a curriculum and magnet teachers to actually teach it!

anyway, i'm sitting in the meeting listening to one of our literacy task forces report why their results have been mixed and i thought i was in the twilight zone. the conversation sort of went like this:

'reading scores are down at schools AB&C.'
'but don't we have a program there to help with literacy?'
'yes, but the teachers don't like it and aren't using
it.'
'ok, but that's the district's reading tool. are we using
something different?'
'no, we're supporting the district's reading tool.'
'but they hate it. the teachers hate it.'
'yes.'
'and we're giving them money to not use something they
hate?'
'apparently, yes.'
'but aren't they a magnet school? aren't they supposed to have higher
reading scores?'
'well, yes. but they don't. they're in the 20th
percentile.'
'then why are they called a language and fine arts magnet?'
'because parents wanted a magnet.'
'but they don't have a magnet curriculum that supports higher
literacy.'
'well, right.'
'so it's a magnet in name only. underneath, it's still a crappy
chicago public school.' (this was my question)
'in effect, yes.'
'so what are we doing there, again?'
'we're supposed to be helping them read.'
'but they don't have a reading program.'
'yes.'
'and so our impact is basically zero.'
'yes.'
'why are we there, again? i don't get it.' (me again)

if i understood what the poor guy who led this task force was telling us, the city decided to create a random cluster of magnet schools in an inner city area without actually making them a real magnet school (like on the level of a peyton prep or new trier). the schools chose what kind of magnet they wanted to be but didn't actually have any standard, higher level curriculum in place so that it could actually be supported - and, apparently, the classes that are supposed to be 'magnet' level aren't comprehensive at all; they don't have the student scores to justify being a magnet and they don't have the teacher capacity to be a magnet. so why are they a magnet?

that's like saying 'i want to be a genius' and then i go up in my tree house and put out a sign that says Genius and then waiting for my geniosity to strike.

is it just me or is that utterly ridiculous and absurd?

of fibroids and elevators

so i'm leaving my gynecologist's office today. it was a day like any other pretty spring day - except that i got the news that most of my tangerine-sized fibroid (aka, Agatha) is in my uterine wall. frak! so, dealing with the knowledge that i'm going to have to work from home for almost a whole month while i recover, i push the down button for the elevator.

my gyno is in one of the oldest buildings in the city; it's a gorgeous pile of stone, brick and marble. but, as i stepped onto the elevator and noted how the doors vibrated and closed with more of a jerk than a smooth slide, i realized that it made me a little nervous.

(remember The Overlook?)

the elevator made its way down in fits and starts. it stopped once between floors and when i hit the 1 button in panic, it started down again. by the time it shuddered to a stop on the 30th floor i was through. a bearded man stepped inside and when nothing happened for long ominous moments, i took that as my cue to exit.

'this is weird,' i said. 'i'm taking another elevator.'

i stepped off and soon after the doors closed behind me, alarms within the elevator began to clang. the man inside the elevator pounded on the doors yelling 'For god's sake get me out! Get me out!' the alarms kept ringing.

going into the nearest dentist's office i said, 'There's a man trapped in the elevator and someone needs to call down to security!'
the tiny filipina receptionist said, 'what elevator?'
'this elevator!'
'he's trapped?'
'call 911!'

my phone wasn't working for some reason so my 911 call didn't go through and the man was still pounding on the door and the alarms were still clanging. putting my face really close to the seam where the elevator doors met, i yelled, 'help is on the way, sir! don't worry! they're coming!'

muffled now: 'for god's sake! get me out!'
'ok, sir! they're calling 911!'

then i set off down the stairwell - 30 floors down to the lobby.
what a day, you know?

Isebrand.com

from reading it, i can't tell who writes it but i know they have a major thing for gore vidal. in fact, that's one of the reasons i stumbled upon it; i was looking for an article about timothy mcveigh that had appeared in vanity fair and here it was! it has a good collection of vidal articles, essays and its politics are a little left of center. (ok, it may be more than a little.)

gear up for 08, kiddies!

strange yet cool

this might be one of the coolest (and most useless) things ever. hours, i tell you. hours.

the plan's the thing

the summer of love* has kicked off with a bang. lest you worry that this means that ding will shoot off into all sorts of random trouble, fear not. ding has a plan. sort of.

rather, ding has a goal: 3 boys to be kept in rotation over the summer. the 3 boys would be for different things (the romping boy, the hang out boy and the...extra if any of the other two get broken.) it's ambitious but what else is summer for than to make up for all the 'nose to the grindstone' work that defined the rest of the year?

i figure, 1 per week, 3 weeks a month (1 week off for menstrual issues), and the whole 'dating' thing is taken care of. see?

besides, i bought all these cute tops at F&T and need a reason to wear them.

[*summer of love=the name given to the summer by a co-worker who, despite her own prettiness and kick assedness, despairs of finding a boy and so uses this as a way to inspire her self to action - even though all she has to do is snap her fingers and the boys magically appear.]

you know you're a grown up when...

slowly but surely, i'm getting my act together.
it started with paying off my school debt, then my tax debt and now, it's about securing my retirement. my father would probably look at this as 'worrying' and not trusting in the Lord but that's why we have IRAs, so i won't have to bother the Lord about my retirement.

i spoke with a fund guy this morning and felt mature while doing it but also like i was totally faking it. but the long and short of it is now i have a diversified fund that will grow aggressively over the next few years and then we'll start taking it back a notch as i get older and more risk-averse. the end point? i think the goal is to accrue as close to a million dollars by the time i retire (if i remember the prospectus correctly.)

a bonus: next year, i can access some money for italy (which i've also started saving for) and the penalty actually isn't that bad if it's under $1000. heh.

what's next on the adulthood checklist?
perhaps buying property (only after italy and figuring out my next job move, which may have just presented itself at work)
perhaps, uh, another person (however, the likelihood of that is remarkably slim; i have more chance of going around the world than that)

or perhaps the next step in my march toward adulthood is just buying a grown up bed.

anything you can do i can do better

a scene in one upmanship:

B-: nice pics on your profile.
Ding: don't look at my pics.
B-: i can look at your pics.
Ding: you make me tense.
B-: you're hostile.
Ding: what do you want?
B-: just thinking fondly of you.
Ding: you make me tense.
B-: you're the one who talked about me to my sister.
Ding: not me. i just blurted out our ex relationship during a
staff meeting.
B-: you're shallow and cruel.
Ding: whatever.
B-: i got promoted, live in a great apartment in uptown and am
no longer depressed. whaddya think of that?
Ding: i'm still great and i'm going to italy.

yeah, we're mature.

it's not often that a few hours with a guy can move Ding to poetry, but last night's romp with the newly met S- made me think of these lines from Donne:

thou, angel, bring’st with thee
A heaven like Mahomet’s paradise; and though
Ill spirits walk in white, we easily know
By this these angels from an evil sprite,
Those set our hairs, but these our flesh upright.
License my roving hands, and let them go
Before, behind, between, above, below.
O my America! my new-found-land,
My kingdom, safeliest when with one man manned,
My mine of precious stones, my empery,
How blest am I in this discovering thee!
To enter in these bonds is to be free;
There where my hand is set, my seal shall be.
Full nakedness! All joys are due to thee.

here's to more summer poetry.