God Hates Jedi

I am a firm believer in the philosophy of fighting batshittery with good-natured humor. And I am glad to see that not only am I not alone, but I have an entire movement behind me: Nerdom.

They've faced down humans time and time again, but Fred Phelps and his minions from the Westboro Baptist Church were not ready for the cosplay action that awaited them today at Comic-Con. After all, who can win against a counter protest that includes robots, magical anime girls, Trekkies, Jedi and...kittens?

Unbeknownst to the dastardly fanatics of the Westboro Baptist Church, the good folks of San Diego's Comic-Con were prepared for their arrival with their own special brand of superhuman counter protesting chanting "WHAT DO WE WANT" "GAY SEX" "WHEN DO WE WANT IT" "NOW!" while brandishing ironic (and some sincere) signs. Simply stated: The eclectic assembly of nerdom's finest stood and delivered.

[Transcript by Liss below.]
There are a lot more pictures here at Comics Alliance.

Text onscreen: Comics Alliance. Fred Phelps and the Westboro Baptist Church were outside Comic-Con 2010 protesting the event. They were met by counter-protesting comic book fans.

Video of counter-protestors holding up hand-drawn signs and chanting (I think) "We love comics."

White dude standing with white lady: We're here with writer Gail Simone, who showed up to check out the protests.

Inaudible crosstalk.

Simone, gesturing at the counter-protestors: I think it's awesome, this side. The other side, not so awesome. They infuriate me greatly, to be that prejudiced, to be that vile, towards other human beings, while saying they're for, you know, human beings—it just makes me furious. This side awesome, that side horrific.

Video of Simone posing for pictures with some counter-protestors.

White dude standing with another white dude dressed as Jesus: We're here outside the Fred Phelps Westboro Baptist Church protest with Jesus [Jesus gives the thumbs-up]. Jesus, any thoughts on the protest going on?

Jesus: Fred's got issues. [White dude nods and grins.]

Video of marching counter-protestors.

White dude standing with Jesus: Who do you think would win in a fight between Fred Phelps and (I think) Batman?

Jesus: [Laughs] Well, unfortunately, Batman is not real; Fred is.

Video of counter-protestors.

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Number of the Day

Zero. The number of shits I give that Tom "Totes Racist" Tancredo thinks President Barack Obama should be impeached because his immigration policy makes him "a more serious threat to America than al Qaeda."

Grow up, you stupid hyperbolic baby.

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Today's Edition of "Conniving and Sinister"

[Background. Trigger warning for child sex abuse and homophobia.]

See Deeky's archive of all previous Conniving & Sinister strips here.
[In which Liss reimagines the long-running comic "Frank & Ernest," about two old straight white guys "telling it like it is," as a fat feminist white woman (Liss) and a biracial queerbait (Deeky) telling it like it actually is from their perspectives. Hilarity ensues.]

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WHUT.

[Trigger warning for child sex abuse.]

I just don't have it in me to parse everything that's distressing about this story in the Boston Globe about the "several dozen Pentagon officials and contractors with high-level security clearances who allegedly purchased and downloaded child pornography, including an undisclosed number who used their government computers to obtain the illegal material."

But I will point out three things:

1. Note the number of people busted who are identified as "contractors." Yay, privatization.

2. This is absolutely stunning:

A separate case involves a contractor working at the National Reconnaissance Office, the agency that builds and operates the nation's spy satellites. The individual admitted in 2008 when he was being interviewed to renew his security clearance that he viewed child pornography at least twice a week on his home computer.

As of December, the individual had been transferred to an agency field office in New Mexico and had not been charged. A National Reconnaissance Office spokesman, Rick Oborn, said he was aware of a few cases of agency employees accessing such images but could not immediately say whether the particular contractor was still working for the organization.

So…a dude openly admits in an interview for security clearance that he regularly views child porn, and he's not only not immediately turned over to police and fired, but is just transferred to another office. (Is that because he didn't get the security clearance, or did he get it anyway? Who knows.) It appears the Pentagon has subcontracted the Catholic Church to run its human resources department.

3. I love that the main issue of concern to the Defense Criminal Investigative Service seems to be that, because many of the offenders had security clearance affording them access to sensitive and/or secretive government material, national security agencies were put "at risk of blackmail, bribery, and threats, especially since these individuals typically have access to military installations." I mean, I hate to get all "what about the children" and everything, but OMFG WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDREN?! Yes, the possibility of government agents with top secret clearance opening themselves up to extortion plots is a grave concern, but my primary concern in cases of government agents looking at child porn is nonetheless still the children who were exploited to make it.

I'm funny that way.

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Quote of the Day

"Because I don't take my clothes off, and I'm nobody's girlfriend. The writers are new to the whole tough girl thing, and they don't know what to do with [me]. We've got the dude who's strong, so what do we do with the chick who's strong? We kill her."—Michelle Rodriguez, on why the strong female characters she plays (Lost, Avatar), and others like them, always get killed.

Rodriguez added that increased inclusion of strong female writers and filmmakers would help, because "they're surrounded by those types of characters in real life, so they may know a little better than, uh, the 80% of the writers out there who don't have a clue."

80%. That's generous.

[H/T to Shaker Hel.]

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Poor Dear

by Shaker BrianWS

Again, I'm torturing myself by continuing to read Michelle Malkin's dishonest shit, and I could totally offer the opening line of one of her latest posts (to which I'm not linking, but you can find it easily if you're so inclined) without comment, but you know I'm not going to.

Raise your hands: Who else is sick of the Shirley Sherrod circus?

Sick of the Shirley Sherrod "circus?" The Shirley Sherrod "circus?!" "Circus?!?!"

I'm hoping my memory doesn't fail me from just a few days ago, Michelle Malkin, but if I recall, it was a writer at your site, along with Andrew Breitbart and that whole cabal of dishonest conservatives who turned this into a fucking "circus" to begin with by dishonestly painting her as a racist in a video where she actually tells the story of overcoming initial prejudices and becoming friends with a white farmer—the same one that you all tried to say she didn't help because he was white.

That's why there's a "circus" in the first place, so no, Michelle Malkin, you don't get to pretend to be sick and tired of hearing about it. You don't get to now pretend that it's just time to wrap things up and move on because it's becoming a sideshow act that you've simply had enough of.

You know who has the right to say she's had enough of this "circus?" Shirley Sherrod.

But considering that she's been labeled a racist, will forever be labeled a racist by a great number of people who don't understand context and believe that Andrew Breitbart has an honest bone in his body, and who lost her job because conservatives are so desperate to ignite some kind of "reverse-racism" war in this country and blame Obama for it, I'd imagine that she's unlikely to say that she's sick of it, considering that it's her fucking LIFE we're talking about—a life that's forever tainted in the public eye and forever linked with the word "racist." It's galling that for you, everything that's happened to her is just a "circus" that you've been forced to deal with. Our sincerest apologies for your inconvenience. Just think of all the time you could've spent lying about the administration, smearing low-level government employees and costing them their jobs, and explaining to us how hard white people have it now that Obama and his racist goons are in office if only you hadn't had the misfortune of being distracted by this "circus."

Being fortunate to have the privilege of not having to answer to an employer and not having to worry about losing your job if someone dishonestly attacks you, you've got a lot of fucking nerve to try to play this down.

No, you don't get to take the high road and say you're sick of this "circus" that you fucking helped to start, that your site supported, and is the kind of thing that you habitually traffic in to drive sleazy hits to your website.

No, you don't get to do that.

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About this here lesbian revolution

As I mentioned yesterday, folks in the media have been doing cartwheels over each other in an attempt to say pleasant but non-committal things about that sperm donor movie.

Earlier this week, my sweetie was reading off the movie listings and it didn't really come up. Yesterday I was at the doctor's office reading the paper, and it wasn't one of the dozens of movies reviewed.

This morning, NPR was talking about movies, it got me to thinking...

Apparently the nearest place to see the sperm donor movie is a 4 hour drive from my house. I suppose I can catch it at the art house (er, Landmark) if I go to visit my parents in Minneapolis. So there's that.

So basically, urbanites who spend their afternoons eating sushi* and buying zomg shoes for the next Obama fundraiser are willing to tolerate a movie with two straight women playing lesbians who have kids, act straight, and show no interest in sex except for maybe with that one guy. Yeah, I give it a week before the entire U.S. goes gay.

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*I'm an urbanite and I love sushi, independent film, and shoes. I'm just pointing out that it's a bit odd to portray a (shitty) representation of a lesbian couple in a limited distribution "indy" film as a giant leap forward when it comes to cultural representations of queer people.

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Friday Blogaround

This blogaround is brought to you by Shaxco, owner-operators of Big VagLots. Come for the vag, stay for the box wine!

Coturnix: A Farewell to Scienceblogs: the Changing Science Blogging Ecosystem

Historiann and Tenured Radical host a three-part discussion of Terry Castle's essay collection The Professor: Part I; Part II; Part III

BPS Research Digest blog: The unsung pioneers in the study of prejudice

In The only thing as annoying as colorism..., Samia asks, among other things, "can we stop perpetuating the fair = white-looking thing in modern journalism. That shit is so Brothers Grimm."

Bear Market News: Feds raid goat cheese maker, seize 12-year-old girl’s computer (a third time)

Andy: 'God Loves Gay Robin': Comic-Con Laughs Fred Phelps Out Of Town

Aaron Riccio reviews Snoo Wilson's play about Alan Turing, Lovesong of the Electric Bear (Note: I think framing Turing's court-ordered chemical castration as his being "medically unman[ned]" is a problem; it's an interesting review nonetheless, but be prepared for that language.)

Lakshmi: Somebody's feeling a little snippy

Via Tayari Jones, The She Writes Passion Project contest is open until August 1st.

Mike Lisieski: Neuromuscular Dynamics of Octopus Arm Movements

Leave us your links!

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Two Minute Nostalgia Sublime

Throwing Muses: "Not Too Soon"

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The OFFS Awards: Senator and Concern Troll Jim Webb

Democratic Senator Jim Webb has penned quite the piece for the Wall Street Journal. Titled "Diversity and the Myth of White Privilege," it's all about how poopy-doopy it is that diversity programs have helped Latin@ and Asian and recent African immigrants who "did not suffer discrimination from our government," but don't help poor white southerners, most of whom, even "at the height of slavery," had, according to "eminent black historian John Hope Franklin... 'neither slaves nor an immediate economic interest in the maintenance of slavery'." Webb must have forgotten to mention that many of them supported the Confederacy nonetheless.

There are a very lot of dishonest things in this article. Things like:

A recent NORC Social Survey of white adults born after World War II showed that in the years 1980-2000, only 18.4% of white Baptists and 21.8% of Irish Protestants—the principal ethnic group that settled the South—had obtained college degrees, compared to a national average of 30.1%, a Jewish average of 73.3%, and an average among those of Chinese and Indian descent of 61.9%.

Those numbers are functionally meaningless without any context about the typical standard of living for, say, a straight, cis, able-bodied, white male Baptist born in 1950 who never went to college versus the typical standard of living for, say, a straight, cis, able-bodied Jewish woman born in 1950 who got a college degree. Anyone want to wager a guess on who was likely to make more money?

Webb might argue that comparing men and women isn't fair, which underscores one of other deceptions in his argument: This isn't about white people; it's about privileged white men.

Because the "special government programs" that promote diversity about which he's complaining were designed to help women and/or gay women and men and/or people with disabilities and/or trans women and men. Lots of the "white people" about whom he's writing qualify for, and have been aided by, "special government programs."

You'd think someone who complains about whites being "treated as a fungible monolith" might acknowledge that reality.

Of course, that does significantly undermine his race-baiting argument that white people are being treated unfairly. Ahem.

It's truly embarrassing that a sitting Democratic Senator would write such an appalling piece for national publication. Or for publication in the Poopsburg Daily Cageliner, for that matter.

Then again, this guy was almost Obama's vice-president, despite being an unabashed misogynist. So I guess we oughtn't be too surprised that he's now spending his taxpayer-funded time penning garbagetorials that mask "what about the white menz?!" whinging behind an exhortation to get beyond racial identity politics.

Still. I expect more.

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E-mailing! With Caitie and Kate

Guest starring on this episode: Liss and Deeky

Kate: I was just thinking about booze, and I realized something. If this VH1 lady is a "top shelf transsexual", does that make me, like, the box wine of transsexuals? 'Cause that'd be pretty amazing.

Caitie: Yeah! I think I'm the "homemade lager" of transsexuals. Wait, that doesn't sound right.

Kate: lol! How about bathtub gin?

Caitie: Okay, I guess I'll settle on an English pale ale. ;)

Liss: This makes me a nonalcoholic beer, doesn't it? :(

Deeky: what's that make me? a fruity drink with an umbrella in it?

Kate: Ooooh! Exotic!

Kate: Liss is the designated driver of transsexuals.

Caitie: OMG, you guys are making me laugh so hard I'm crying! :D We should have a poll: If you were a transsexual alcoholic drink, what kind of TAD would you be? ;)

Liss: LOL! Give me your keys.

Kate: LOL! I'm trans, I don't have a car; I'm still saving for a $16,000 vagina.

Liss: Have you checked Big Lots? They have everything.

Deeky: that made me LOL for real.

Caitie: OMG, I can see the packaging now:
VAGYNA*! 100% RECYCLED MATERIAL! COMES WITH REAL FUZZY SOFT CILTORUS!!
YOU WILL SATISFYING YOUR HUSB AND BOYFRIEND WITH GREAT EFFECT!
* Other vulval accessories sold separately. Needs adult assembly before use.

Liss: That's what we call in the biz MARKETING GENIUS. *chomps on cigar*

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It's Delightful, It's Delicious, It's De-Lovely...

...it's De-lurk Day! We haven't had one of these in ages, so all you Shaker lurkers who rarely or never pipe up, don't be shy; say hi!

Cheeky devils!

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Rehabilitating Bush

Krugman uses his latest column to address the Republicans' emergent effort to rehabilitate Bush, now that the requisite period of daring not speak his name, lest it be associated with the enormous national clusterfucktastrope he left in his wake, is over:

[T]he only problem Republicans ever had with George W. Bush was his low approval rating. They always loved his policies and his governing style — and they want them back. In recent weeks, G.O.P. leaders have come out for a complete return to the Bush agenda, including tax breaks for the rich and financial deregulation. They've even resurrected the plan to cut future Social Security benefits.

But they have a problem: how can they embrace President Bush's policies, given his record? ... You know the answer. There's now a concerted effort under way to rehabilitate Mr. Bush's image on at least three fronts: the economy, the deficit and the war.

...Republicans aren't trying to rescue George W. Bush's reputation for sentimental reasons; they're trying to clear the way for a return to Bush policies. And this carries a message for anyone hoping that the next time Republicans are in power, they'll behave differently. If you believe that they've learned something — say, about fiscal prudence or the importance of effective regulation — you're kidding yourself. You might as well face it: they're addicted to Bush.

The Republicans' renewed embrace of Bush would be hilarious, if it weren't so dangerous for the country, given their absurd attempts to distance themselves from him starting around 2006. He was radioactive during the 2006 midterms—none of the House Republicans, nor the Senate Republicans up for reelection, wanted him anywhere near their campaigns—and laughable pieces like Jeffrey Hart's "He's a right-wing ideologue, not a true conservative" in the LA Times were all the rage, making tortured arguments about how Bush wasn't really a conservative and had run the true conservative movement off the rails.

It was bullshit then, and it's bullshit now.

Bush was the Platonic Ideal of the Modern Conservative, the Golden Boy of the current incarnation of the Republican Party—a corporate shill with the demeanor of a country bumpkin, who could hold together the unholy alliance between Big Money and Big Religion, standing at the altar and giving the blessing to the grim marriage between the gullible bigots who pledged to march in lockstep with anyone who promised to protect the children from illegals and feminazis and kissing boys, and the business interests who sought to get rich off those rubes before sending their jobs overseas. Bush didn't just give good speech on Neocon dreams and working class nightmares; he believed that shit. And with a GOP-led Congress and a never-ending stream of media mouthpieces willing to demonize anyone who dared to dissent, he tumbled headfirst into fulfilling every last one of the conservatives' wishes, like a malevolent genie pulled out of a bottle in oil-soaked Texas.

He wrapped himself in the flag and told America to follow him down the Yellow Brick Road. He went to war, and he made his conservative cronies rich. Rich like whoa. And they cheered him all the way, over every last golden cobblestone. Then the nation started getting itchy—and all of a sudden the greatest beneficiaries of President Toad's Wild Ride wanted to pretend they never knew what was there. Why, we had no idea who was behind the curtain! Please.

Bush was a conservative president with no checks and balances, left to pursue every conservative wet dream with abandon. The certain destination for the wanton and unfettered quest for a conservative utopia was always going to be the revelation of the ugly ideology underwriting it all.

It was just embarrassing when conservatives pretended to be shocked by what Bush's policies wrought. And then to claim he wasn't a conservative!

Conservatives believe the free market and privatization is the solution to all our problems. Conservatives believe in social Darwinism. Conservatives believe in defense, defense, and more defense. And maybe, once upon a time, conservatives believed in privacy rights, but once they invited the Gun-Toting Jesus Brigade into their Big Tent to give their corporate agenda the momentum it needed in the voting booths and supported the notion of a unitary executive, they relinquished their claim to privacy rights forever and ever, amen.

There were more than twice as many billionaires in America when Bush left office as there were when the Supreme Court escorted him in, and in the time of their making, we saw soldiers die, felt our rights be stripped away, experienced widespread joblessness and food insecurity, watched an entire American city drown—saw those for whom conservatives have the greatest contempt turn to their government for help in a time of crisis and quite literally be left stranded by the callousness of conservative philosophy. And all the while conservatives wailed about how hard they've got it, and when the hoi polloi turned against Bush and his unfettered pursuit of conservative policies, conservatives wailed some more that their principles were betrayed by the very man they tasked with building their own El Dorado.

But Bush didn't part ways with conservatism; Bush realized its destiny. And in the great tradition of so many martyrs who have gone on before them, that was conservatives' cross to bear, no matter how much they tried to distance themselves from him by retreating into some retro definition of conservatism that hasn't been operable since controlling women became more important than protecting their privacy and bodily autonomy.

But, now, hilariously, after championing a redefinition of conservatism when it suited them to distance themselves from Bush, they're trying to rewrite his presidency and turn it into a legacy of success.

As if the indelible images of the Bush administration aren't just a series of catastrophic failures for anyone who wasn't already wildly successful.

It's breathtaking in its temerity, but it is also terrifying, for the reason Krug says: Republicans aren't trying to rescue George W. Bush's reputation for sentimental reasons; they're trying to clear the way for a return to Bush policies.

Bush policies. Shiver. Like taking this nation to war on false premises; creating millions of refugees; playing class warfare with gilded tax cuts; letting an American city drown; outing one of our own spies; playing wedge issue politics; demonizing immigrants, people of color, LGBTQIs, women, atheists, liberals; promoting avarice above social conscience; relegating philanthropy and empathy to little more than cute, clichéd memories; holding in contempt compassion for those in need; delighting in ignorance; reveling in xenophobic nationalism; pillaging natural and philosophical resources in the acquisition of more wealth; selling We the People piece by piece in massive government-underwritten giveaways to Big Pharma and Big Oil and Big Energy and Big Agriculture; writing more than 1,000 signing statements and using countless National Security Letters to undermine the rule of law; casting aside habeas corpus like day-old bread; treating the Geneva Conventions and our Constitution like suggestions...

Ugh. And braying, thunderously and incessantly, that this country is the Almighty's gift to the world, even though its policies are objectively and demonstrably hurtful for many people in the world, and even despite the reality that it's a still a really shitty place to live for lots of struggling people, and sneering, callously and ceaselessly, that those people are always, only, to blame for their troubles, and that there's something wrong with anyone who doesn't wrap their hands around the throat of American Dream and wring every last bit of life out of it to their own benefit.

Ugh. And calling people who disagree with conservatives America-haters, wrapping themselves in the flag and declaring themselves the True Patriots, the "Real Americans," so it's all but impossible for dissenters to express their abhorrence of conservatism without seemingly attacking America itself, so it's easier for conservatives to do what they really want to do—turn America into a place the people they call "America-haters" really, genuinely do hate, by ridding it of everything that we love.

That's Bush conservatism. That's modern conservatism, no matter what they were saying four years ago. And that's to what they want to return; that's their feverish inspiration for rehabilitating Bush.

Bush, the consummate conservative.

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Open Thread

Hosted by The Breeders and Deeky.

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Question of the Day

Nicked from here: If you were a crayon, what color would you be?

Periwinkle!

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The President Calls Shirley Sherrod

Getting it right the first time would have been preferable:

President Obama on Thursday urged Shirley Sherrod, the black Agriculture Department official whose firing and subsequent offer of rehiring this week renewed a conversation about politics and race, to continue "her hard work on behalf of those in need," the White House said.

You know, I am probably not the most objective person to be writing about a prominent politician who begs someone to come back after shitcanning them in a kneejerk reaction to drummed-up charges by a mendacious rightwing mudslinger and frames it as the shitcanned person's duty to come back and keep working hard toward the just causes zie believes in more than the prominent politician evidently does, ahem, but, man, that really chaps my ass.

I hate the implicit suggestion that it's her obligation to accept her position back and get back to "work on behalf of those in need," and the implicit criticism that she's somehow letting those people down if she doesn't come back. Especially because Obama doesn't give a fuck about the hard work she was doing for those people, except in some abstract way; if he had, she wouldn't have been shitcanned in the first place. But he's consistently set a policy of politics over principle, which is why the axiomatic reaction to Breitbart's edited video was to get rid of her.

And now she's supposed to come back for "those in need"? Bullshit. She's supposed to come back to make him not look a total ass. And he doesn't even have the decency to not try to exploit her authentic compassion and activism in order to try to publicly guilt her back to fix his people's fuck-up.

My advice to Sherrod, not that she's asking, is to tell them to shove it, because she'll probably have to quit that shit after three days back anyway. Ahem.

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Today's Edition of "Conniving and Sinister"

See Deeky's archive of all previous Conniving & Sinister strips here.
[In which Liss reimagines the long-running comic "Frank & Ernest," about two old straight white guys "telling it like it is," as a fat feminist white woman (Liss) and a biracial queerbait (Deeky) telling it like it actually is from their perspectives. Hilarity ensues.]

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Sure. Very Cool Idea.

The only thing that could make news of a sequel to The Hangover any better is the rumor that it will be set in Thailand. Great concept. Very exotic.

I'm absolutely certain that this will not result in some of the worst intersectional bigotry ever put on film.

[In case I'm not laying the sarcasm on thick enough, I believe this is a terrible, terrible idea. Which will nonetheless probably make everyone involved very rich(er).]

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:Yawn:

Maybe I od'd on estrogen this morning and am overly sensitive, but the Times has a yawn-worthy 5-way about the new sperm donor movie, to go along with their boring-ass review.

Here's my sarcastic synopsis of the heated throw-down:

NYT: Gays in the movies?

Dan Savage: Says some things that make sense to me (gasp!), works gay porn into the conversation (no gasp.)

Lady from The Daily Beast: There are so many lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender characters these days! Like on Modern Family! Yay! Problem Solved!

Family History Prof: Makes a good point on the lack of racial diversity in depictions of gays and lesbians. Like on Modern Family! People seem okay with homos, provided they have kids. This movie is about having kids. Kids, kids, kids.

Communications Prof: First there was Liberace, then Will and Grace, and now this. Yay! Problem solved!

New Republic Guy: First there was Will and Grace, and now this. Yay! Problem solved!

I'm tired of this shit. What strikes me about this "debate" is how militantly boring it is. There is zero passion. There apparently isn't a problem with media representation of gays and lesbians (or even bisexual and trans people). Or if there is one, it's no BFD, because it's being fixed, just like all those other problems with media representation of actual human beings.

The important thing is that we got through a heated debate without anyone saying anything. Yay! Discourse is fun!

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Daily Dose o' Cute

[Also at Daily Motion.]
Scenes of Dudley settling in at home, playing with Iain and me, and starting to make friends with his kitteh sisters. Also: Clips from the car of Dudz eating the "doggy cup" of Culver's Frozen Custard he was given at the drive-thru, just for being so darn cute. Set to "These Are Days" by 10,000 Maniacs.

By request, here's an update on how things are going: Dudley continues to be an absolute dream. He's just the sweetest boy—loving and well-mannered and delightfully silly. Wherever we go, he is a spectacular ambassador for retired racers, and everyone wants to pet him and kiss him and give him treats, and he laps up the attention without getting overexcited; he seems to have an intuitive sense to be gentle with children and adults who are unsteady on their feet for any reason.

At home, while Olivia isn't quite sure if she's the boss of Dudley, Dudley is certain that she is. Last night, Iain was on the phone with Space Cowboy, and I was sitting and chatting with KBlogz, who was visiting, and neither of us had noticed that Dudz had emptied his food bowl and was giving us the "I'M STILL HUNGRY!" signal. (He is an excellent self-regulator, and walks away when he's full, so if he communicates that he's hungry, it's because he's HUNGRY.) With neither of us catching his desperate doggy plea, he walked up to Livs, who was sitting beside me, and gave her one big "WOOF!" He doesn't bark often, but, with those giant lungs of his, when he does, you know it. Livsy didn't even flinch; she just gave him a disinterested expression that seemed to say, "Don't look at me. I ain't your keeper." I got him more food.

A week or so ago, I experienced a really nice moment where I was struck by how well Dudley's transition into becoming a part of our family has gone: I was in the kitchen making dinner; Iain was unloading the dishwasher, and the girls and Dudz were all milling about, rubbing up against our legs, angling for dropped food and the occasional head scratch. It was exactly the scene for which I'd hoped when we adopted Dudz—all of us together in the kitchen at dinnertime, all the furry residents getting along, one little happy family. I felt so fortunate and so incandescent with gratitude, so full of joy that I thought my heart might burst.

I hugged Iain from behind, pressing my cheek against his back. He turned around in my arms, and we talked for a moment about how pleased and relieved we were everything was working out so well with Dudley. "It's to'ally the fookin' best, apple cheeks," he said.

Our shared life isn't perfect—Iain's got diabetes; I've got PTSD and some as-yet undiagnosed chronic inflammatory disorder; we've got unpleasant ongoing family issues stretching across two continents; our finances aren't always the best; et cetera blah blah snore, lol. But damn if I didn't feel like the luckiest woman in the world, standing in that kitchen with my inimitable partner, our three beloved cats, and a grinning dog.


WHO'S SUCH A GOOD BOY?! YOU ARE!

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