Tuesday, July 28, 2009

My Life in France

Sigh. If only. I would sell all my worldly possessions to live in France and cook and write cookbooks, if I had any worldly possessions to begin with.

I am totally jazzed to see the Julie & Julia movie starring Meryl Streep and Amy Adams. I love Julia Child. She led an amazing life and is one of my culinary heroes. I am reading My Life in France right now and it doesn't disappoint. I have been watching a number of Julia's videos and here is one on early cookbooks in the Library of Congress. She sings! Bon Appetit!

I Can't Take A Pass on Poetry

I know, it's everywhere by now, but it's sooooooooo gooooooooooodddddd!!!!!

Monday, July 27, 2009

You Can Dance If You Want To

Legendary choreographer and dancer Merce Cunningham has died at 90. Instead of writing on Palin's nonsensical exit interview (which was really entertaining, BTW), I think we should have a little dancing today!

Friday, July 24, 2009

On Wisconsin and Gay Marriage




My home state of Wisconsin, with its cows and its cheese curds and its rolling hills and red barns and Frank Lloyd Wright architecture and its Dells and its beer and its Packers and its two Great Lakes and its circus world museum is bucolic and picturesque as a pastoral postcard. Except when it comes to gay marriage. I should add that Minnesota, where I live now, is picking along at a snail's pace, but improving in the same way. Just this week the city St. Paul progressed and established a domestic partnership registry! YAY!

In 2006 in Wisconsin the gays and their right to marry got voted out in a lesser publicized election than California's 2008 Prop 8. I lived in Wisconsin during that time and voted NO against a constitutional amendment declaring that marriage should be only be between a man and a woman. Obviously. Say No to hate, my sisters and brothers.

To allow voters a vote to legalize discrimination is not only anachronistic, it is appalling at the basest level. We can only be defined by our worst, if discrimination is our route.

As it so happens in many of elections, the wording on the WI 2006 ballot was slightly confusing, and if you were not paying attention and maybe just glancing through, your vote may have gone to the opposite of what you believe. I mean, are we voting yes to allow gay marriage or no that we're against it? No, that was not the way it was worded. It was "Yes" to write discrimination into law and no to allow our gay brothers and sisters the same rights as the heteros among us.

All the bigots came out of the woodwork to defend the so-called "sanctity" of marriage and they won. For now.

Governor Jim Doyle (D) introduced legislation to try to combat this bigotry by establishing a domestic partnership registry in Wisconsin for the 2010-11 budget cycle.

But, now, according the the Wisconsin State Journal, three members of different groups of right-wing, anti-gay zealots who say they are pro-family are fighting this in the Wisconsin State Supreme Court. I linked to the WSJ article, but here it is in full:

Group seeks to kill domestic partnership law
By RYAN J. FOLEY
Associated Press

Social conservatives asked the Wisconsin Supreme Court on Thursday to strike down the state’s new domestic partnership law, saying it violates a constitutional ban on gay marriage.

The lawsuit, filed by three members of Wisconsin Family Action, acknowledges the court will not have time to act before the law goes into effect next month but says justices should halt registrations as soon as possible.

Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle signed the law in the state budget last month. Starting Aug. 3, same-sex couples can register with counties to receive dozens of the same legal protections as married couples, including the right to inherit assets, make hospital visits and take medical leave to care for an ill partner.

Wisconsin became the first Midwestern state to enact legal protections for same-sex couples through the Legislature. It also became the first nationwide to allow domestic partnerships despite having a ban on gay marriage and any "substantially similar" relationships.

The lawsuit argues domestic partnerships violate that clause in the constitution, approved by voters in 2006, because they are "virtually identical" to traditional marriages. Wisconsin Family Action led the campaign for the ban and threatened legal action against the law for months.

"This new domestic partnership scheme is precisely the type of marriage imitation that the constitutional amendment approved by Wisconsin voters was intended to prevent," said lawyer Brian Raum of the Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian legal group representing the plaintiffs.

One of the plaintiffs, Wisconsin Family Action President Julaine Appling, called the law "an assault on the people, the state constitution, the democratic process, and the institution of marriage."

The lawsuit notes the steps to register domestic partnerships are similar to obtaining marriage licenses and says same-sex couples will receive "a substantial number of the significant legal rights and obligations historically reserved to married couples."

It names as defendants Doyle and two officials responsible for administering the registry, Department of Health Services Secretary Karen Timberlake and State Registrar of Vital Statistics John Kiesow.

Doyle spokesman Lee Sensenbrenner pledged to vigorously defend the law.

"We’re confident these are, and always have been presented as, just a set of basic legal protections for committed couples," he said.

One hurdle that Wisconsin Family Action members face is proving they have standing to bring the lawsuit. They claim they do because they are harmed by the use of tax dollars to administer the registry.

A memo by the nonpartisan Legislative Council concluded this spring the law should survive a legal challenge because it does not give "comprehensive, core aspects of the legal status of marriage to same-sex couples." Those include the ability to divorce and share marital property.

Another obstacle is that supporters of the ban repeatedly said it was not intended to stop government from providing health, retirement and other benefits to same-sex couples short of marriage. Those statements were a key point in the Legislative Council analysis.

"Legally, it’s clear they have no basis for the lawsuit," said Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Madison, a gay man who sponsored the law. "They simply don’t like a certain group of people."

The lawsuit was filed with the state’s highest court to speed up the outcome by bypassing lower courts. Four of the court’s seven justices would have to agree to hear the case.

Raum said he hoped to have a high-court decision "within a matter of weeks."

Thursday, July 23, 2009

In Which It Is About You

Well, listen. No one is commenting. I realize everyone is busy commenting everywhere else, and that I am guilty of commenting nowhere, but still, I can hear crickets chirping. I can also tell people are reading, but not commenting. I am magic that way.

I bring this up because I like blogging. I have liked it for a long while. Late at night while while I am in my jammies typing away and not a creature is stirring not even my spouse and I am writing and thinking about hot dogs and science and shoes and children and guitars and half finished thoughts and everything else I feel pretty good about the project of the blog, but I become less sure in the light of day when NO ONE IS COMMENTING. My vow to you: I promise to not write about myself in the third person, and I promise that I will try and be funny sometimes, and that I will remain faithful as a blogger. It's my promise to you. If I had a ring I would give it to you. My promise ring. To you. All I ask is that you comment sometimes. Is that really too much?

Initially, I wanted to write about gender, feminism and other fun issues exclusively. But, I think my strength lies in writing what I want to write about. Which is anything I want, really. We've gone over this, so don't break up with me for my repetition. I am going to change things up a little. So we can spice up our relationship. So you're not bored. See, it's about you. Well, and me. It's a reciprocal thing. So, as I announced before I am going to write about more than feminism and gender, but also about cooking and food and eating and movies and The Kid and books and my husband and writing and art and my friends who blog too (but who are clearly too busy to comment over here), and my dog. Because, this is a big change from anything you've experienced from me before, I am changing my name. Don't judge.

Same URL, just a new name. I know you understand. It's better than real life where you have to pay the state to change your name and post a newspaper ad. Here, I can just declare my name changed. So, without further ado....welcome to "Super Mon." Your home away from home where you don't have to take out the trash or anything. Just throw me a crumb once and awhile!

Obama on Health Care

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Misogynist, Bigotted, and Prejudiced much?

I had a piece already to go and then, somehow, I deleted it. It was about a personal experience with misogyny directed right at me. I may re-write it some day, but for now, I want to concentrate on this, which I learned about on Shakesville. Professor Arthur Caplan, PhD, head of the University of Pennsylvania's Center for Bioethics addresses the issue of whether or not Dr. Regina Benjamin is too fat for the job of surgeon general. Yep. Fat. I have heard Art Caplan speak and he is a very smart guy, and I am glad that he is writing publicly about Dr. Benjamin's merits, but why is this even an issue.

Apparently the blogosphere was abuzz yesterday with the fact that Obama's Surgeon General nominee, Dr. Regina Benjamin, isn't skinny enough for them. It doesn't matter that she is the recipient of a MacArthur Genius Grant, or that she runs a clinic to treat the poorest of this country. Apparently, it is her weight that counts. Not the fact that there are 42 million (and growing) uninsured Americans. Not the fact that she was the first African American female physician to sit on the Board of Trustees of the American Medical Association, or that she rebuilt her clinic twice after two hurricanes.

Not only is Regina Benjamin NOT FAT, she is beyond accomplished.

Watch this insane fuckery if you can stomach it. Naturally, it includes images of disembodied fat people walking around and/or stuffing their faces. Because, you know, if you are fat, you should'nt be seen eating.



UPDATE: I keep adding to this post because that guy in the "No Chubbies" shirt who calls Regina Benjamin lazy is possibly one of the most offensive people I have allowed myself to watch in a long time. Bigotry is harmful in all its forms, this is true. And, maybe this item is old news to you, but I can't wrap my head around the fact that the Fox News guy is the reasonable one in this clip.

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

15 Book Meme-y Thing-y

NEWS: Coraline is out on DVD. I am sure you already knew this, but if not, please go get it.

And, Have you been to Google Books? I haven't really figured out how to use it yet, but I intend on working on it tonight.

So, Greg tagged me on Facebook yesterday for a 15 books that have "stuck with you" meme. I posted it there, but why not double dip?

After all, I have already been introduced to at least 3 new books just reading Stephanie's list. Which is what I love about this sort of thing. You know, the high school memes and the what you don't know about me memes, they can suck it. The book memes are like little presents of love and happiness. I am not exaggerating either.

You know, since I can't really resist compiling lists of books together, I've been wondering if I don't have a little bit of a sickness when it comes to books. I would love to start some memes with a theme.

I mean I want lists of must read science books from my science-y friends, feminist readings from my feministy friends, critical theory from those people, and so forth. As well as memes for lists of poetica, art, music, fiction, childrens' books, non-fiction, graphic novels, cook books, parenting, and whatever category floats your boat (except religious conversion and auto mechanics--I don't have much of an interest in either of those disciplines).

It's weird, when I go to the library, I don't just check out one or two books, I check out 6 or 10. And, then I make little piles around where I am sitting. I do this with all my reading material. I barricade myself in with literature and magazines. And, that's just me. Whether he was like this before he met me or not, I cannot say, but Super Steve does this too. We are gluttonous checker-outters and our kid is learning our bad habits. Same thing when it comes to buying books-- I have my favorite sites too-- Powell's is brilliant, Amazon makes me giddy, ABE books also makes my heart race, but there is nothing like going to the bookstore and whiling away a couple of hours looking. It's addiction on a big level, but one I don't feel too badly about, unless we are moving. Then, owning so many books becomes a burden and not so much of a joy.

As you might have seen from earlier, similarly themed posts, I feel most at home in the company of other voracious readers and I like to find out what they're reading lists involve. Which is why I also like Good Reads. Lists and lists of books. The Hennepin County Library website is also excellent, but I find you have to absolutely know what you are looking for otherwise you're done for. Well, here are my answers to the meme. I added 7 or 8 more because who can stop at 15?

1. Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh
2. Love Medicine by Louise Erdrich
3. The Greatest of Marlys! by Lynda Barry
4. Homegrown Democrat by Garrison Keillor
5. Outlander Series by Diana Gabaldon Books 1-6
6. Ida by Gertrude Stein
7. Kaddish & Other Poems by Allen Ginsberg
8. Gone to Soldiers by Marge Piercy
9. The Dubliners by James Joyce
10. The Vintage Book of Contemporary American Poetry, JD McClatchy, ed.
11: Discipline & Punish: The Birth of the Prison, Michel Foucault
12: Lunch Poems, Frank O'Hara
13. Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling books 1-7
14.Directed By Desire: The Collected Poems of June Jordan
15. The Alienist by Caleb Carr
16. Angela's Ashes, Frank McCourt
17. How to Talk Dirty & Influence People, Lenny Bruce
18. Shock Value, John Waters
19. Franny & Zooey, JD Salinger
20. Letters to a Young Poet, Rainer Maria Rilke
21.Waiting for Godot, Samuel Beckett
22. Feminism is for Everybody, bell hooks
23. Gender Trouble, Judith Butler

Monday, July 20, 2009

WTF Monday

A church in Gainesville, Florida has posted a sign declaring "Islam IS of thy Devile" ("thy" and "e" added by yours truly). Because truly, The Dove World Outreach Center is living up to its moniker of peace, understanding, and outreach right there. I am happy to see that that article includes a healthy resistance by the non-ignorant residents of Gainesville including protesting, tearing the sign down, spray painting, etc. I am no Jesus expert, but I am pretty sure love thy neighbor is the opposite of that effing sign. WTF???!!!

Shakesville has more.

According to CNN Men are staying home with their kids. I think it's awesome that there are stay at home parents-- including dads. "Alternative families" is kind of a loaded term. But, my own family unit is comprised thus. Super Steve (aka Super Big Daddy) goes to school, but is also the person at home the most and has done the most child caring of the Super Kid during the daylight hours for the past six and a half years including full-time summer stay at home dad status.

I think what they are getting at in this article is that having a family is hard, or "a grind" as one of the interviewees puts it and that thankfully, the times have changed and some dads actually spend time with their kids as opposed to previous generations of fathers who didn't. I give this article some small props because at least they used a gay family too and managed to get the message out there that all families are not alike. It [the article] gives me a creepy feeling as though as a society we should not expect dads to be caregivers of their child even though they're interviewing dads who stay home. The stay at home dad who was interviewed said his main objective is to go back to work since being laid off. So this really becomes a story about how the economy sucks and some dads have to stay at home, but the other dads in the story say unequivocally that they would not be able to do it, and/or that they would have to be paid. I don't really like operating out of the binary, but how many moms have been paid over the last millennium? Surely, children benefit from quality time with mom or dad or dad and dad or mom and mom or just mom or just dad, or grandma, guardian, and so on. This article which says "Dads reveal struggle to balance work and family is not a revelation at all." It's giving credit for saying they don't want to do it. WTF???!!!


I have had it with the goddamned Huffington Post and their fucking sexist celebrity sensationalistic fuckery. I go there for a dose of liberal news and one of the most read articles is about celebrity boob tape. Fuckwits abound! WTF????!!!!!

I don't see Huff Po being any better than Brian Kilmeade of Fox News who said Americans are marrying other species and therefore impure or some such bullshit. WTF!!!???!!!

And, finally, Liz Jones, a writer for the Daily Mail chronicled her weight gaining experiment. Jones, a self-described "borderline anorexic" writes a very disturbing piece called "For 40 years I have battled anorexia - so what happened when I had to eat normally for three weeks?"

This is a bit of older news, but worth examining over and over again.

Jones writes: "I certainly don't practise what I preach and am in fact secretly proud that I'm still a size 8, a sample size. I love my concave stomach and I can't help, despite my beliefs, but regard women who are fat, who don't exercise, who gorge on things like Galaxy, as somehow lazy. They just don't try hard enough.

That's the thing about being a borderline anorexic: it makes you feel superior, clean, morally unimpeachable."


WTF???!!!!!!!!

Friday, July 17, 2009

"She liked to talk and to sing songs and she liked to change places" --Gertrude Stein, Ida




I am reading a book called The Book That Changed My Life: 71 Writers Celebrate the Books That Matter Most to Them, edited by Roxanne J. Coady & Joy Johannessen. As the title explains this slender book is compiled of (short) essays by well-known writers about one (or more) life-altering books. This is precisely my kind of book. A book with a list of books. Like Nancy Pearl's Book Lust and More Book Lust well-known authors like Dorothy Allison, Dominck Dunne, Frank McCourt, Anne Perry, and many more write in The Book That Changed My Life and tell us of times in their lives when they were in deepest despair and a book literally saved them from their own sense of isolation, loneliness. They also write about the pleasure of reading, of discovery, of learning, of the "come to Jesus moment" a particular book might offer the reader. Literally and figuratively.

In her essay "Saved by Ida-Ida" Harriet Scott Chessman writes of Gertrude Stein's Ida, "I had never read a novel like Ida, so experimental, such a surprisingly giddy ride. Ida's life capitulated me back to my own childhood, when I'd known books really could change the world through the sheer force of imagination." I know what she means. when I first began to study Gertrude Stein in college I was euphoric in my discovery. I had read a poem here and there, "Very fine is my valentine" but then I read everything she wrote, and I learned about her life, and I was star struck for this dead, squat, somewhat ego-maniacal Jewish, lesbian, ex-pat, friend to Picasso and Matisse, friend to Alfred Steiglitz. I was hooked. Forever. Stein is what I read if I am stuck in my own writing, I keep her anthology close by and I just pick a page and read and the repetition of her words often (not always) act as some sort of stimulant. There are recordings of her reading her work. Old, scratchy, and just fine. Stein remains an enigma to me even though I know a lot about her. It's her writing. Her genius writing keeps me in awe-inspired.

There are so many books that changed me and my life for better or worse. I wish I could write long, slavering love letters to all of their authors. I guess I am already, in a way. But, for the sake of space, I will stick with just one.

Harriet the Spy by Louis Fitzhugh. Oh, this book! This was the book that inspired me to be a writer and a girl spy. Both things I have achieved with aplomb. Blogging is very useful this way. It kills two birds with one stone. Harriet, as a character, was brilliant. She wore her orange hoodie and her canvas sneakers and carried her notebook everywhere, and was sassy and smarter than her parents, her teachers, and, she thought, her friends. Harriet, hiding in the dumbwaiter is an image, indelibly implanted in my brain. I have written all these years because of Fitzhugh's Harriet. And, have sometimes gotten myself in a spot of trouble just like Harriet for not having the ability to know who should see what. Lots and lots of people have written on this book, but that doesn't make it any less powerful for me.(See the entire interwebs).

Harriet was an antithesis to the social convention that girls should aspire to only be ladies and never spies. The illustrations are fantastic and add to Harriet's adventures in New York's Upper East Side. Heartbreakingly, Louise Fitzhugh died of a brain aneurysm at age 46 and thus has a very small oeuvre to offer as her legacy.

Harriet speaks to girls and boys who need to be themselves, who have unintentionally (or on purpose) hurt their friends, and need forgiveness, and those who are misunderstood by their family and their classmates.

Harriet reminds us that it is never easy to just be yourself, , as she says "I want to remember everything. And I want to know everything." Like Stein's Ida, Fitzhugh's Harriet, in her own way, liked to "talk, to sing, and she liked to change places." Harriet says to Ole Golly, "I want to remember everything. And I want to know everything!" I know how she feels.

I have misplaced my copy of Harriet the Spy, but as my birthday is weeks away, I have faith that someone will know what to do.

To me, reading, whether for pleasure or pain, is like breathing. As cliche as it is, it is like breathing. The sensory experience of the book, especially a library book, with that smell, the heft of the paper, maybe cream-or egg shell in color, the feel of the type on the page, the history of the typesetting, the plastic cover protector, is real-life magic.

Thursday, July 16, 2009

Hot Dogs, Organs, and Harry, Oh my!



We had Chicago Dogs last night at Chris and Rob's Chicago Taste Authority. They were yummo. A hot dog with veggies and peppers. Perf. We will be returning Tues. Jul 21 for some Chicago dogs for a nickle.

The real news of the night had to be that we saw Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. I may have mentioned that I am a fan of the books, once or 400 times. Not sure. At any rate, suffice it to say that I consider the movies their own operation entirely. BUT, when you leave out or gloss over integral parts of the plot people who have not read the books may have a hard time GETTING IT. I say this because afterward, Super Steve turned to me and plaintively said, "Yeah, but did you LIKE any of it?"

Yes! Of course! I just wouldn't mind it if... well, you'll see.

We saw HP at The Heights theater in Columbia Heights, which neighbors Minneapolis on the North side of things. The Heights is a gorgeous theater with a Wurlitzer organ. It is fancy. The organ was being played last night, the art deco chandeliers were throwing prisms against the walls, there was a general excitement in the air. It's what movie watching ought to be.

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

In Which I Confess An Unnatural Love



I used to write a food blog in which I hardly ever wrote about food. I mean, sure, meals I had made it into my stories about work and my family, but it wasn't really all about food which is what I intended it to be when I started blogging in 2005. That's fine. I mean, we're not married to one idea around here, are we? But, when I felt the luster wearing off that blog coupled with the desire to write more about feminist issues, and other high-minded pursuits I decided on the Survival of the Feminist route with occasional contributions elsewhere.

But then, I started this blog, and immediately questioned myself as to what I was doing. I like writing personal stories, and while I might include some social commentary, writing all social commentary is just not my schtick. I need the personal to be motivated, engaged, and entertained. I feel I write my best when I am writing about my kiddo or Super Mon's husband, Super Steve, and/or food, poems, art, music, friends, life, and even (gasp!) work. When I read something it's the personal that grabs my attention. Well, why can't there be both? I mean, this is totally oversharing, but I have these incredibly difficult decisions to make, and I need your help. Food or Feminism? Personal or Political? Doesn't seem like there needs to be a choice there, does it?

In any event, as much as I care about Sotomayor's confirmation hearings (she is kicking ass, BTW. Did you hear that Senator Fuckery (R-Oklahoma) say she would have some "'splainin' to do" when he was trying to get her to opine on gun control???) and the flogging of women in the Sudan for wearing pants, I really want to write about hot dogs today.

I have a secret confession: I love a good hot dog. The all beef kind, hopefully grass fed, with little-to-no scary bits, topped with A LOT OF STUFF. But, those are hard to get when you're out and about. You can find them at the co-op for about $7 for 8 dogs, but then you have to get all the fixings too. Plain with mustard and onions on a poppy seed-y bun is my favorite low-maintenance way. But, I love a good chili dog with relish, chili, onions, cheese, sour cream. In other words: Heart. Failure. Now, I have to say, just because I love the hot dog doesn't mean I eat them that much, even the grass-fed all beef ones are processed to the point that it's questionable to call it meat. Hebrew National is an excellent lower-cost dog, and Nathan's hot dogs are probably my favorite all time dog. Ever. I like flavor. Not the watery, gray, left to soak in water, or over-roasted on a spit like they have at Target.

Some Hot Dog News of Note:

July 21 is National Hot Dog Day! Go to Chris & Rob's Chicago Taste Authority on Tuesday for a nickle Chicago dog or two when you buy something else. Chris and Robs is my close-to-my-house favorite


Here is the link to the National Hot Dog & Sausage Council


The Weinery is a local favorite. It's right down the street from where I work on the West Bank in Minneapolis and has vegetarian and vegan dogs as well as Vienna beef. Their fries are amazing! I haven't been there in years and years. Last time I was there with Super Steve, there were some flies buzzing around because they had had their back door open. And, that skeeved me out for a long while. But, I think I am willing to try it again.

Serious Eats, my favorite foodie blog, has this to say about America's Regional Hot Dog Styles.
There isn't a hot dog on this list that I wouldn't try, but I am partial to the Chicago dog myself. That slaw dog looks AMAZING.

And, then there is Kramarczuk's (Ka-MAR-checks). Perogies, brats, eastern European salads, and sausages to die for. Arguably, the king of sausage sellers in Minneapolis.

Who's up for a hot dog on National Hot Dog Day??

Tuesday, July 14, 2009

Circus of the Stars: Flashback, Flash Forward

Remember Circus of the Stars when Erik Estrada or poor Dana Plato would do tricks in super-tight tights? Well, I do. And no one did it better than Wonder Woman, Lynda Carter, as introduced by Telly Sevalis.



There's a lot going on here. There is another clip of Lynda having knives thrown at her. It's disturbing. In that video she's in a very tight costume with a plume of butt feathers so she looks like a giant barbie/bird. She stands against a wall with her arms up in a fuck me pose, and then some knives land near her exposed armpit, next to her breast.

I was reminded of Circus of the Stars today when I was thinking of our friend Sarah Palin, for some reason. Could be the circus-like nature of her character. She could have crossed my mind because I read an incomprehensible editorial she wrote in the Washington Post where she claims Obama's cap and trade energy tax will be the downfall of American economics. She doesn't seem to understand what it means to curb our energy use. Conor Clarke, in Andrew Sullivan's Daily Dish as it appears in The Atlantic, sums it up nicely, here.

Or/and, it could be that I am still astounded that anyone, anywhere, is taking what she has to say seriously when she continuously, and without fail, gets it wrong each and every time.

Monday, July 13, 2009

Monday, Monday

Confirmation hearings of Judge Sonia Sotomayor are underway. I am listening on Minnesota Public Radio. There was an anti-abortion protester escorted out after yelling about genocide. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said Sostomayor would be confirmed unless she had a "melt-down."

Obama nominates Dr. Regina Benjamin as the new U.S. Surgeon General.

Neil Patrick Harris to host the Emmys! I don't really care about the Emmys! But, NPH is excellent!

Wednesday, July 8, 2009

Super Mon, the Strange

Hypothetically speaking, if I wanted to move on from my job, for instance, where would I go? Due the spectacular state of our economy, there is nothing to move on to. No great call for communicator positions with great benefits and job security.

Hypothetically, let's say I have tried 6 ways from Sunday to feel grateful about having a job in these tough times. Let's say that during these hypothetical moments I spend a good deal of time chiding myself every time the dark cloud of ingratitude floats above my scowling face. It seems I am an exemplary employee. I have buckled down, chinned (?) up, boot straps pulled, stayed late to just get it done, meet the deadline with class, and sass. I do a good job and move on to the next assignment. Tomorrow is another day, right? So, when I have to deal with a particularly irksome email from my hypothetical boss, I should just be a big girl, answer it, and get busy, right?

Friday, July 3, 2009

Holy Crap! Sarah Palin Quits!


Sarah Palin, Governor of Alaska, former candidate for Vice President, has quit her job as governor of that state. Wow.

She is leaving in 3 weeks. 1 and a half years early.

She said it's "she is keeping her eye on the ball" and that it's "time to pass the ball."

I had a hard time following what she was talking about. I need to re-watch the video. Wow.


Thursday, July 2, 2009

News and More News

This week in the news:

India decriminalizes Gay Sex!

BBC
also reports on this.

A video of a man being harassed at Minneapolis PRIDE has received a lot of attention. MPR reports on the responses.

Camp Pendleton Sailor who was gay found dead on base

Algerian singer on trial for allegedly kidnapping and forcing his ex-girlfriend to have an abortion

American Medical Association finds abstinence only sex-ed ineffective


White House Advisor on Violence Against Women

Read the Executive Order for the Council on Women and Girls here

WWII Female Pilots Receive Recognition Long Over Due

One of my favorite features in the NY Times is the Times Traveler. Looking back at historical moments. In 1909 112 Suffragettes were arrested when they raided The House of Parliament in London.

UPDATE: The NY Times Time Machine is only available if you subscribe to the paper (rotters!) but, your library might have access to their archives