As the flipside of yesterday's QotD, and without passing any judgment on the people who do the work, but basing it on your own particular set of skills and preferences... What vocation would you never want to try, even for a day?
This is so the worst thing you're going to read all day.
How to survive as a SAHG (stay-at-home girlfriend).
This certainly had the potential to be a good article and yet it reads as if it was satire, playing off the ideas of a Maryland county commissioner who voted to chop Head Start funding because "women should be married and at home with the kids". Yet, it's not satire.
It's potential could have been used to assist people who were once going-out-to-work get used to having days of, well, not going to work. It can be a tough transition for some. It could have highlighted various resources for people to find book clubs or volunteer work or something like that. It certainly could have done all of that and included some relationship advice because there IS a change--internal or external or both--when a partnership goes from two people earning to one person earning and the other being at home. Yet it doesn't really do that. Taking a page from Gwyneth Paltrow's School of Inane and Asinine Advice, this writer doles out stuff such as:
Don’t sleep in: When my boyfriend wakes up at 6, I get up with him, turn on the television, chat with him, and try to make him a simple breakfast, maybe scrambled eggs or just cereal and juice. It’s bad enough that he knows I’m home all day, no need for him to think I sleep until noon.And he gives a shit if you sleep until noon because....?
Keep the place clean: When I was working, the cleaning usually didn’t get done until Saturday — now it’s part of my daily to-do list. Like any other busy person getting ready in the morning, he throws his clothes on the floor, takes a shower and leaves the floor wet etc. Why leave it there for him to take care of when he gets home? To be spiteful? I’d much rather pick up behind him — I don’t want to live in a messy home either. It also gives me something to do when my brain reaches its resumé-submission limit.Why leave it there? Maybe because you aren't his mommy and he can pick up his own damn clothes? I totally get wanting a clean house. I do. I, however, also get the fact that I'm not the only one responsible for it being that way. Why didn't the cleaning get done until Saturday when you were working outside the home? Because only you were doing it then, too? Barf.
There are more precious gems in that post. This one, however, really takes the cake. The shit cake, that is:
Sexy Time: Everyone knows there is nothing more important in a relationship than that special time between the sheets. I have eight to nine hours everyday to send out my resumés and clean and make dinner, by the time he comes home from work I am well rested. Frankly, there’s no real reason (time of the month aside) why I shouldn’t be ready and willing when he is. I try very hard to keep my boyfriend happy and this is a key part of doing so.No. This is just NO. It doesn't matter how many hours you have to do whatever you damn well want to do. YOU DO NOT OWE HIM ANY "SEXY TIME". Ever. There is always a reason, a REAL reason: how you feel. If you don't want to, you don't want to. He needs to respect that. If he doesn't, that's a huge, huge problem.
Look. I've been a stay-at-home parent for a decade now. I actually do the majority of the housework because, well, I have the opportunity to do so. I also do whatever I want (hence, now, blogging instead of, say, cleaning -- and no one is even home but me! *gasp*). It works for me/us. I obviously have no real issue with the general idea of "being at home doing most of the cleaning and cooking and wev" being one way a partnership works. I have a real big problem with the idea of having to do "X" to please (or, worse, appease) someone who is ostensibly your partner because that partner is the one who brings home the money. That's just unmitigated horseshit and very, very bad "advice".
Many Hats: James Franco Wears Them!
James Franco considers sleep an admission of failure and is unacquainted with the concept of relaxing. He is like a SHARK! If he does not keep making art at all times, he will die.
This is a True Fact.
That's why James Franco is simultaneously a movie star, a television actor, a soap star, a Gucci model, a writer, a director, a producer, a singer, a student, a professor, a Twitterer, an Oscar host, an Oscar nominee, a curator, and still doesn't have enough to do.
So, no doy, of course he collaborated with Gus Van Sant on an exhibition for the Gagosian Gallery in Beverly Hills.
"Unfinished," which runs Feb. 26 to April 9, features two films, "Endless Idaho" and "My Own Private River," created by Franco using dailies and other footage that Van Sant shot for his 1991 movie "My Own Private Idaho." The gallery said that "Endless Idaho" runs a Warholian 12 hours and features edited outtakes, deleted scenes, alternate takes and behind-the-scenes footage from the movie. The score is by Luke Paquin and Tim O'Keefe.Obviously.
"My Own Private River" focuses on the late actor River Phoenix, who plays a narcoleptic drifter in the original movie. The film features edited footage of Phoenix to create a portrait of the young actor at work. Music for the movie is by Michael Stipe of R.E.M.
The movies will be accompanied by eight works on paper by Van Sant, including watercolors.
Gagosian said that the idea for the exhibition was born when Van Sant worked with Franco on the 2008 movie "Milk." The director showed Franco unused footage from "Idaho" and the actor was inspired to turn it into works of art.
Here is another True Fact: If you ever see James Franco resting on his laurels, it's only because the leading scientists of laurelology at UCLA secured his participation in their cutting-edge laurel research.
Daily Dose of Cute
For a slight changeup today, I give you Dawn, beloved pack-member of my partner1, snuggled up on the shoulder of none other than Your Humble Narrator. I'm wearing a robe and a big towel on my head because I was just finishing up stripping my hair-colour down to the lightest (silver-grey and blonde), with an eye to tonight's encore: dying it bright blue. Pictures of that may follow shortly.
What's odd about this is that, despite my nick, I'm really not a cat person. Or rather, maybe because of my nick. I mean, the one thing cats hate most is usually other cats! :)
But Dawn has melted my icy wall of disdain for cats, at least enough for this little bag of bones to peek through. She's teeny because she's on anxiety meds, and she doesn't like to eat when she's on them, but when she's not on them, she's a balding bag of slightly-less-exposed bones, because she licks her own fur off, poor wee thing. The picture also fails to capture that she is purring on all cylinders (in and out!), as she always is when she gets near me. I fell for her because she's (when she's not on the anxiety meds) the chattiest kitty I ever heard: she has a vocabulary of about fifteen different noises she makes, and she strings them together like sentences you could understand if you only knew the language. Thus, I call her Squeaks, as she is a very squeaky little creature.
So yeah: extremely rare photo, of the CaitieCat with a four-legged type of kitteh. Note also similarity of Dawn to one of this space's more usual residents, the lovely and talented Sophie of Shakes Manor.
1 When I met her five years ago this coming summer, she had eight cats and two dogs, from her days as a frontline rescue volunteer. Since many were similar in age, and they are now all in their teens, they're beginning to go to their final rest; with one cat (the Maine coon) leaving to spend time with another food-monkey, she's down to five cats and one dog now.
Whoooooooooops
I am not a fan of pranks, as a rule. But if you're going to prank someone, it should definitely be Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker.
Who is apparently very gullible in addition to being very terrible.
Woot!
The anti-union legislation introduced in the Indiana state legislature has been withdrawn.
The Indianapolis Star reports that Republican lawmakers have withdrawn a so-called "right to work" bill that drew thousands of Indiana workers to the Capitol in protest this week and spurred Democratic lawmakers to boycott state Senate proceedings to prevent a vote on the anti-worker bill.This would be way more awesome if it weren't because Mitch Daniels wants to be president and doesn't want the bad press and told them to lay off.
But it is unclear if the senators will return, because the Star reports: "Last night they issued a statement saying they had concerns about 11 bills, including other labor-related bills, education reforms and the proposed next state budget. They singled out two in particular: the right-to-work bill and one which lets state tax dollars pay for private school tuition for some families."
But wev. I'll take it.
[H/T to Shaker Mod Aphra_Behn.]
Let Me Tell You A Story
[TW for hostility to consent and agency]
A couple weeks ago, Liss wrote about a Georgia state legislator, Bobby Franklin, who intro'd a bill that would change the word "victim" to "accuser" in relation to certain crimes. Those crimes being: stalking, rape, obscene telephone contact with a child, and family violence.
Well, this peach of a human has another bill. Before we get into the details of this new horror show, I'd like to recall something I wrote quite a long time ago when ND tried to make it so that "life begins at conception". You know, the whole "a fertilized egg is a citizen with full legal rights" bit. Anyway, this is what I wrote:
Since a woman's body is giving life to the embryo or fetus via the placenta/umbilical cord/blood/uterine environment and this embryo or fetus has full rights of personhood, how will the woman then be monitored? If she eats something like, oh, sushi...will she be fined? After all, you aren't supposed to do that as it could be dangerous to the embryo/fetus and the embryo/fetus is a full legal person that one cannot submit to harm. How much is too much Starbucks? Again, how will this be monitored?Bringing this up is relevant because the whole "investigate miscarriages" thing? That's exactly what Rep. Frankin is proposing. His bill, in fact, calls it "prenatal murder" and is trying to rewrite the language in all GA legislation that references abortion and/or fetuses--who are now "prenatal citizens".
[...]
Speaking of harm, what about miscarriages? If an embryo/fetus has full legal standing as a genuine/individual person, the its 'death' will need to be investigated via autopsy. When I miscarried, I started bleeding on a Wednesday. I went in for my ultrasound on Thursday where it was confirmed. I couldn't get into see my ob/gyn until very early Friday morning, which by then I had naturally passed everything (into the toilet). Should women who face the same situation straddle a bucket to bleed in? Keep her pads? Take the contents to the police? The contents of such will need to be investigated to make sure that there was no foul play involved, as again, an embryo/fetus is a full legal person whose death would warrant an investigation and, eventually, death certificate (which, btw, are not given for miscarriages now). How much more money will this cost? These ideas were submitted before the VA state legislature some time back, btw, if you recall. But also necessary if declaring embryos full-fledged people which you are doing.
So. An embryo is a person of legal standing and abortion is murder. Ok then. Murder is a very serious crime. So, somehow or another, a woman is 'caught' trying to abort (or aborted). Perhaps the tox screen of her miscarriage contents show black cohosh. Maybe she showed up septic at the hospital with a partially done abortion like so many women in the mid-late 20th century. Either way, she's guilty of trying to or already committing murder under your new legislation. Where are you going to put all these new prisons? How are you going to pay for them? If "abortion is murder" there must be criminal investigations, trials, more prisons, and it all has to be paid for.
Some lowlights from the bill:
To amend the Official Code of Georgia Annotated so as to provide that prenatal murder shall be unlawful in all events and to remove numerous references to such procedures; to amend Title 16, relating to crimes and offenses, so as to make certain findings of fact; to define certain terms; to provide that any prenatal murder shall be unlawful; to provide a penalty; to repeal certain exceptions to certain offenses; to provide for severability; to provide an effective date; to repeal conflicting laws; and for other purposes.And it goes on and on and on repealing or replacing language regarding abortion, contraception (!), health care facilities, death records bureaucracy, and criminal code in Georgia.
(a) The State of Georgia has the duty to protect all innocent life from the moment of conception until natural death. We know that life begins at conception. After nearly four decades of legal human prenatal murder, it is now abundantly clear that the practice has negatively impacted the people of this state in many ways, including economic, health, physical, psychological, emotional, and medical well-being. [...]
(1) A fetus is a person for all purposes under the laws of this state from the moment of conception;
[...]
12) The United States Supreme Court had no jurisdiction to hear or decide the case of Roe v. Wade or any other case pertaining to a state's punishment of the crime of prenatal murder;
(13) As it had no jurisdiction to hear the case, certainly the United States Supreme Court lacked the authority to pass, or order all states to strike or refuse to enforce, a law that is outside of its subject matter or federal jurisdiction;
(19) However, denying to a state the right to define and punish a crime not specified in the United States Constitution is a per se legislative act;
(20) The nullification of a state's properly promulgated laws is specifically delineated as an offense committed by King George III against the states, for which separation became necessary; The Unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America;
(21) Compliance with, and continuation of, a fiat determination of the Supreme Court from nearly 40 years ago will cause the basis of this Union, and eventually the Union itself, to fall;
(22) Georgia was not a party to the suit in Roe v. Wade, and is not bound by a decision in which it did not have right of participation;
[...]
25) The act of prenatal murder is murder and conspiracy to commit murder per se;
(26) The act of prenatal murder has caused a significant reduction in the number of citizens in this state who would serve as workers, entrepreneurs, teachers, employees, and employers who would have significantly contributed to the prosperity and continuation of this state; and
(27) The failure to prosecute a violation of this Code section is a violation of the obligation of this state to provide all of its citizens with an equal protection of the laws.
(b) As used in this Code section, the term:
(1) 'Fetus' means a person at any point of development from and including the moment of conception through the moment of birth. Such term includes all medical or popular designations of an unborn child from the moment of conception such as conceptus, zygote, embryo, homunculus, and similar terms.
(2) 'Prenatal murder' means the intentional removal of a fetus from a woman with an intention other than to produce a live birth or to remove a dead fetus; provided, however, that if a physician makes a medically justified effort to save the lives of both the mother and the fetus and the fetus does not survive, such action shall not be prenatal murder. Such term does not include a naturally occurring expulsion of a fetus known medically as a 'spontaneous abortion' and popularly as a 'miscarriage' so long as there is no human involvement whatsoever in the causation of such event.
(c) The act of prenatal murder is contrary to the health and well-being of the citizens of this state and to the state itself and is illegal in this state in all instances.
(d) Any person committing prenatal murder in this state shall be guilty of a felony and, upon conviction, shall be punished as provided in subsection (d) of Code Section 16-5-1. The license of any physician indicted for an alleged violation of this Code section shall be suspended until resolution of the matter. The license of any physician convicted of a violation of this Code section shall be permanently revoked. The provisions of this Code section shall be in addition to any other provisions relating to the killing of a fetus or any other person."
[...]
SECTION 2.13.
Said title is further amended by revising Code Section 31-10-1, relating to definitions relative to vital records, by deleting the words "product of human conception" and replacing them with "prenatal human person" in paragraphs (4), (9), and (15); by deleting the words "induced termination of pregnancy" and replacing them with "prenatal murder" in paragraphs (7) and (20); and by deleting the words "an induced termination of pregnancy" and replacing them with "a prenatal murder" in paragraph (15).
Which brings me to my story. Let me tell you a story, Mr. Franklin. A story about my spontaneous abortion of my "prenatal human person".
In mid-July of 2001, I got the good news via positive pregnancy test that I was expecting my second child. Much rejoicing as it was turning out to be a banner year--my husband got a great job, we were in contract to build our own house, and now this great news. At the end of August of that year, the lease on our apartment was up and my in-laws generously offered to let us live in their house until our house was finished (in December). They had plenty of space, there was just the three of us at that time, and it made the most financial sense. Now, I got along with my in-laws ok. We were friendly but I wouldn't say "like family". Not at that point. So living together for a few months was just...all right. Tolerable, is the best way to describe it, I think--for everyone.
On Tuesday, September 11th I had my first prenatal appointment for that pregnancy. Oh how strange it was, to me, to be going to an appointment regarding new life when at that very time tragedy and death were occurring a few states away. I distinctly recall thinking that--and that it was the most gorgeous September day I had ever seen. Anyway, all was well at the appointment. Just too soon to hear the heartbeat on the doppler, next appointment definitely.
The next day, around mid-morning, I started having cramps. This isn't unusual in early pregnancy, so I didn't think too much of it. Until I started spotting bright red blood that afternoon. I was, of course, very concerned. I called my OB and he got me scheduled for an ultrasound at the hospital the next morning.
By the time I went in for the ultrasound, I was bleeding heavily. I sobbed my way through filling out the paperwork and I could barely speak to the receptionist. I knew when I looked at the monitor that there was no hope for this pregnancy. My OB, who was off that day, had requested the radiologist to call him right then to let him know and he talked to me on the phone for about half an hour. I scheduled a D&C for the next morning.
The D&C turned out to be unnecessary. That Thursday afternoon I sat sobbing on the toilet, because I was bleeding and cramping so much, and with one horrible cramp, everything passed. It was both painful and then, as what essentially was labor ended, the cramping stopped and I felt physically better. I just sat there. Mentally and emotionally numb. My in-laws were judiciously avoiding me, though it was the only bathroom in their house and I wasn't exactly quiet in my sobbing pain. My husband...well, he wasn't there either at that time. Eventually I left the bathroom and my joy just a few months before, literally, went all down the drain. I went into a bleak, horrible depression after. It was a traumatic experience that has taken me several years to be able to talk about openly, not because I was ashamed or any such thing, but because of the sheer pain.
I tell you this story, my story, Mr. Franklin, because you obviously have no clue. You're an arrogant ass who thinks he knows but he doesn't. You want to "protect" so-called "prenatal citizens" but you don't have a fucking thought for the women you'd torture with your investigations into their miscarriages. Now I know my experience is not necessarily universal. Not all women feel as I did. However, even if a miscarriage is not more than a blip on a woman's emotional radar and an investigation wouldn't be tortuous, it would still be a gross invasion of privacy.
Let's discuss the logistical nightmare of your legislation. What the fuck do you expect women who miscarry to do, exactly, with the contents of their uterus as they bleed out at home? Keep it in a bucket to take in for autopsy? Does she turn herself into police so they can start an investigation. Yeah, I see that happening. Are you proposing special hospital rooms that women would check into so they can be monitored and the blood and tissues kept with more ease? Will you start up some preemptive monitoring of your prenatal citizen incubators (I mean, let's call women for what they are to you, eh)?
Have you even remotely thought this through besides your evident "concern" for fertilized eggs potentially becoming future tax payers? Yeah. That's what I thought. Your evident crusade against abortion and againt women is an abomination.
Fuck you.
Quote of the Day
After careful consideration, including a review of my recommendation, the President has concluded that given a number of factors, including a documented history of discrimination, classifications based on sexual orientation should be subject to a more heightened standard of scrutiny. The President has also concluded that Section 3 of DOMA [which defines marriage for federal purposes as only between a man and a woman], as applied to legally married same-sex couples, fails to meet that standard and is therefore unconstitutional. Given that conclusion, the President has instructed the Department not to defend the statute in such cases. I fully concur with the President's determination.—Eric H. Holder, Jr., Attorney General of the United States, in a statement regarding the Defense of Marriage Act's federal definition of marriage as only between a man and a woman, announcing that "this Administration will no longer assert its constitutionality in court."
Consequently, the Department will not defend the constitutionality of Section 3 of DOMA as applied to same-sex married couples in the two cases filed in the Second Circuit.
Blub.
Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, Mr. Holder.
Assvertising, Part 131 in an Ongoing Series
As part of the obnoxious trend of masculinizing shit by adding or substituting "man" or "bro" as a prefix, which has already brought us such delightful terminology as man-cave, man-date, man-purse, mancation, mandals, manscara, and bromance, Dove—a property of Unilever, which also owns Axe, progenitor of the most execrable adverts this side of beer commercials—has brought us the "man-hide."
Footage of gnarly old leather boots, an old leather glove, a leather jacket. Voiceover: Cow-hide dries out. So can your man-hide. Footage of white dude lathering up in the shower. Voiceover [over image of shrinking leather patch washed with some other soap and leather patch retaining its shape washed with Dove]: Dove Men + Care has micromoisture to help keep your skin from becoming dry and tight. This unique micromoisture technology activates on contact to fight skin dryness. [Over more dude lathering in shower.] So that man-hide of yours stays clean and moisturized. No matter what you put it through. Dove Men + Care: Be comfortable in your own skin.The exhortation to "be comfortable in your own skin" at the end of an advert pandering to the basest masculine insecurities would be hilarious if it weren't emblematic of the insidious (and tragic) mixed messages the Patriarchy delivers to men all the time.
When we first saw this commercial recently, Iain remarked that the absurd phrase "man-hide" is not merely insulting to secure men, but is also inherently misogynist, embedded with a distancing from the feminine: "Fates fucking forfend that a man would use a product for WOMEN on his precious fucking MAN-HIDE!"
It is a well-known fact around the classiest of dudely locker rooms that using a lady-soap on your man-hide can turn you gay. Or female.
Note the implicit assumptions of a campaign for body soap that feels obliged to pander to men's masculinity, assuring them that they are indeed still MEN even if they clean their bodies with soap like women do (?): Men are sensitive and their delicate sense of security is precarious and fragile and must be reinforced at all times.
Yet the narrative is that women are the hypersensitive ones, the weaker sex.
There are plenty of men whose male identity is not frail, not in constant need of nurture and reassurance, not held in thrall to a compulsion to display their masculinity in order that it may be acknowledged and admired.
Those men, however, tend to be feminists.
It's the men who listen to the dictates of the Patriarchy whose male identity is most insecure—and adverts like this one underscore precisely why that is. Dove diligently reassures men that they're manly, explicitly to counter its own subtext that caring for one's skin is sort of silly and feminine. But no it's not! YOUR MAN-HIDE NEEDS CARE! JUST NOT IN THAT GRODY LADY WAY!
Compare to a frame like, "Taking care of one's skin isn't something men have been encouraged to do, but skincare is important for every person who cares about his or her body." Men, you've been ignored. We're not ignoring your needs anymore. Your skin is worth caring about, too. Blah blah blah.
Of course that model is wholly without an embedded subversion of confidence, so THAT'S NOT GOING TO WORK. It continues to be profoundly depressing that the beauty/hygiene industry took a long look at gender inequality and thought, "Well, we can sell shit to men by preying on their insecurities, too!"
Which perfectly underlines the point that the solution is not more Patriarchy—which, no doy, is no picnic for men, either—but more Feminism.
Patriarchy limits the definitions of manhood and masculinity; Feminism throws them wide open. And as Feminism successfully redefines womanhood and femininity every more expansively, reactionary patriarchal imperatives to define manhood and masculinity in contradistinction to womanhood and femininity are necessarily closing more and more doors to men who hew to traditional manhood.
"Well, now that WOMEN are doing something, it's not MANLY anymore! So DON'T DO IT if you still want to be considered a MAN!"
When your definition of manhood is "anything that isn't female," it's no wonder traditionalists are so hostile to feminists. We keep encroaching on their territory, with our inconvenient insistence on comprehensive humanity.
The Overton Window: Chapter Thirty-Seven
"Could you remove any metallic items and step back through for me, ma'am."Despite this being the Celebrities-Only No-Hassle VIP Waiting Room For Celebrities, Fanboy is giving Fake Natalie Portman a hassle. Oh, Kyle, won't you interject! These VIPs need your manicured hands to intervene. Maybe you could clear your throat meaningfully from where you're standing. Or not. Just stand there like a buffoon, taking crap from some nerd. I'm sure that's what Noah is paying you for.
Polite and professional though it sounded, it was a command and not a request.
Okay, so, Kyle takes her cell phone and jewelry and blah blah blah she walks through the metal detector again.
The vertical line of indicator lights twitched upward from dark green to barely yellow—maybe in reaction to the tiny hinges in her sunglasses—but this time there was no audible alarm.Private relief? Sounds like some sort of polite way of saying she went pooh. (Is this post gonna need a "butts" tag? We're gonna need a "butts" tag!) But seriously. What does "private relief" even mean? Who is writing this garbage? A less awkward sentence could have easily been constructed. Should have been constructed. I mean, this works better, just off the top of my head:
Noah was the only one in a position to notice a touch of private relief on Molly's face.
"Noah noticed a subtle expression of relief flicker across Molly's face." See? That's not so hard! I'm not even a professional writer or nothin'.
She was nearly to the end of the exit track of the detector when she was stopped by the officer's voice.Molly must have seen what Noah was seeing. Well? Did she? Or not? You're the author here. Why is it unclear, Narrative Voice, what the main fucking character may or may not be seeing? Ugh. What garbage. What fartful, unrepentant garbage.
"Miss ... Portman?"
When Molly turned around she must have seen exactly what Noah was seeing. The TSA man wasn't focused on her at all. He was staring down at her possessions in his plastic tray.
What everyone is (or perhaps not) seeing is Molly's silver cross necklace. "I thought that you were Jewish," comments the nerd. For No-Hassle VIP Waiting Room staff, this guy is really fucking nosey. Kyle, why don't you do something to stop these shenanigans? If I were Noah, I don't know that I'd give Kyle a tip.
It felt like the temperature in the room suddenly dropped by fifty degrees. Noah's mouth went totally dry, his skin tingling as though all the moisture had flash-frozen out of the atmosphere, settling into a thin layer of frost on everything exposed, suspending those six words on the air.To whom exactly did it feel like the temperature dropped? Noah? Ah, nevermind. I don't care.
Cops know liars like plumbers know leaks. They encounter them every day, all day; they know all the little signs and symptoms, and they're trained to understand that where there's even a little whiff of smoke, one should always assume there's a fire. As they challenge a person they study their reactions, pick apart the little telltale movements, listen to the timbre of the voice, and more than anything else, they watch the eyes. Most suspects have already made a full confession by the time they begin their denial.Why are we talking about cops? There are no cops here, are there? This is the No-Hassle VIP Waiting Room For Celebrities. I thought the staff consisted of an x-ray tech, a bartender, maybe a couple of fluffers. Certainly the x-ray tech nerd fanboy isn't a cop. Is he? Oh, I know, he's a Stormtrooper! Which is why he demands Molly take off her sunglasses. Just like that scene in Empire Strikes Back.
Molly turned to the officer, pulled back her hood and let it settle onto her shoulders, removed the baseball cap and let it fall to the floor at her feet, and then slow and sure, began to walk toward him.Oh, for fuck's sake. You're joking right? This is a fucking joke, isn't it? No one puts garbage like this into their little espionage novel. Do they? No. No, they don't. Yoda help me, this is a terrible, terrible book. What the fuck is the point of this? Is it supposed to be funny? I think it is supposed to be funny. But it isn't. It's not funny, it's not clever. Fuck, it isn't even timely.
"The Force is strong with this one," Molly said, as calm and smooth as a Jedi master. Her accent was gone, and her voice was just breathy enough to obscure any other identifying qualities of the real McCoy.
The TSA man's cheeks began to redden slightly. A power shift was under way, and as Noah had learned firsthand, when this girl turned it on you never knew what was about to hit you.This isn't the ghostwriter you're looking for, Beck.
She continued nearer, put a finger to the frames and lowered her sunglasses partway down her nose, tipping her chin so she could look at the officer directly, eye to eye, just over the top of the darkened lenses. As she stopped barely a foot away she subtly passed an open hand between their faces, and spoke again.
"These aren't the droids you're looking for," Molly said. After waiting a moment she gave him a little nod, as though it had come time in their close-up scene for his own line of dialogue.
There was an eternal pause, and then before his eyes Noah saw this big, intimidating young man begin his grinning transformation from the TSA's most vigilant watchdog into Natalie Portman's biggest fan.
After holding his rapt gaze for a few more seconds Molly pulled out the secret weapon more fearsome than any light-saber—that sweet, wicked smile that made your knees feel like they could bend in all directions. She slipped the pen from his pocket protector, clicked it, took the hand that still held her necklace, and autographed his palm with an artful flourish.Oh, barf. Then Kyle whisks them away to the safety of the tarmac. Whew! That was close! Or something. It was stupid. Definitely stupid. And a waste of time. Pointless, stupid, hackneyed garbage. But, guess what: It gets even stupider!
"I need to ask you something," Noah said.Why? Why does he love her? Because he's the hero and she's the heroine? There is no other reason for them to be in love aside from them both being characters in this book. They are complete fucking strangers, brought together not by fate but through manipulation, deceit, treachery. Take away all the lies, the murder, the NWO, the poisonings, the burglary, espionage, treason, et cetera et cetera, the two have had a couple breakfasts together and little else. I tell you what, if some dude I met three days prior told me he loved me after one date, I'd not be flattered but a little fucking unnerved.
"Sure." It seemed she could see that he'd become more somber.
"When we were there in Times Square, when we kissed that time ..."
She took off the sunglasses and hooked them on her pocket, moved a little closer to him, brushed a windblown lock of hair from his eyes. "I remember."
"Is that when you pickpocketed my BlackBerry?"
Molly smiled, and pulled him willingly into her embrace. It was no real surprise, but this kiss was every bit as stirring as that first one had been, and as he realized then for certain, as good as every single one would be thereafter.
She stood back a step, her face as innocent as a newborn lamb, and held up his wallet between them.
"I love you," Noah said.
Molly looked up at him with all the courageous resolve of the doomed Han Solo at the end of The Empire Strikes Back.
"I know," she replied.
Garbage. This book is total garbage.
On the plane, Molly sleeps and Noah reads some Jefferson quotes as he wonders why they're heading to Vegas. Good question. Didn't Danny text her and tell her to stay the fuck away from Nevada? Ah, well, I'm sure there's a perfectly reasonable explanation.
But Blah Blah Anonymous Commenter Blah at RedHerring.com!
[Trigger warning for violence and eliminationist rhetoric.]
Let's get this straight: Both sides are, in fact, not "just as bad," when it comes to institutionally sanctioned violent and eliminationist rhetoric.
Case in point:
On Saturday night, when Mother Jones staffers tweeted a report that riot police might soon sweep demonstrators out of the Wisconsin capitol building—something that didn't end up happening—one Twitter user sent out a chilling public response: "Use live ammunition."There is more about Jeff Cox's public political opining at the link, much of which is violent, racist, and misogynist in nature. And, quite obviously, his exhortations to use live ammunition on pro-union demonstrators is even more ominous now that the same issue has moved to Indiana.
From my own Twitter account, I confronted the user, JCCentCom. He tweeted back that the demonstrators were "political enemies" and "thugs" who were "physically threatening legally elected officials." In response to such behavior, he said, "You're damned right I advocate deadly force." He later called me a "typical leftist," adding, "liberals hate police."
Only later did we realize that JCCentCom was a deputy attorney general for the state of Indiana.
Bryan Corbin, a spokesperson for the Indiana attorney general's office says that Cox's conduct will be reviewed to see if he violated "the standards of professional conduct expected for all licensed attorneys and for employees of the Indiana Attorney General's Office" laid out in their personnel handbook. If he didn't, time to rewrite the handbook!
UPDATE: Jeff Cox is no longer employed by the Indiana Attorney General's office.
[H/T to Shaker Mod Scott Madin.]
Ugh
Chicago's next mayor: Rahm Emanuel.
That sound you heard is Spudsy's head exploding.
The problem with Emanuel isn't that he's rank with cronyism. Cronyism is a way of life in Chicago. The problem with Emanuel is that his cronyism, and all the associated questionably ethical and dubiously legal goings-on that are inevitably associated with cronyism in Chicago, is built around exclusively benefiting him and his cronies.
The Daley Model was built around benefiting the city, with a little grift to go around for everyone's trouble.
Chicagoans don't care as long as the trains run on time.
While Emanuel's mayorship was being preordained and preemptively celebrated, especially by all his suburban donors, ahem, no one seemed to notice that his campaign slogan was "Fuck those trains."
Good luck, Chicago. You're gonna need it.
Question of the Day
If you could try one vocation (other than your own, if you've already got one) for a day, what would you try?
For the purposes of this question, figure that any of the prerequisite knowledge you'd need to competently do the job was Matrixed straight into your brain for the day.
I'd be a vet.
Or I'd be president, if I could get 535 Shakers to play along for the day!
Quote of the Day
"Stories of hardship and desolation can be found throughout Vermont and the rest of the nation. The true extent of the economic devastation, and the enormous size of that portion of the population that is being left behind, has not yet been properly acknowledged. What is being allowed to happen to those being pushed out or left out of the American mainstream is the most important and potentially most dangerous issue facing the country."—Bob Herbert, in his latest column, "At Grave Risk."
Photo of the Day
Rescue workers search for survivors in a collapsed building on Manchester Street in Christchurch, New Zealand on Tuesday, where a 6.3-magnitude earthquake hit during the lunchtime rush, killing at least 65 people and leaving many others trapped beneath debris from crumbled buildings. [Getty Images via CNN]My thoughts are with the New Zealand Shakers, many of whom reside in or near Christchurch. It seems coarse to wish that you and your loved ones are all okay, when we know that there are people who are not okay, but there it is. I am hoping you are among the people who are physically unhurt, and you have my profound compassion and sympathy for the hurt you are all certainly feeling amidst the aftershocks.
Both Sides Blah Blah Fart
Digby has the energy to take to task future conservative Jon Stewart for engaging in more of his increasingly tiresome equivalency bullshit.
All I have the energy for is linking to Digby.
Because I've already tread this path.
Daily Dose of Cute
Before & After Edition.
So, the thing about greyhounds is that they sleep like 18 hours a day in some absurd position, and spend most of the other six hours lying around staring at you, trying to Jedi your ass into giving them a treat. And the thing about the specific greyhound that is Dudley Q. McEwan is that he is quiet and calm and chillax, even by greyhound standards.
We had him for months before we ever heard him bark at all, and even now, he almost never barks. He looks out the front window when someone pulls in the driveway, and runs to the door when someone rings the bell, but no barking. He virtually never even barks when he's playing, even outdoors with other dogs.
I'm not complaining. It's just important to convey how much he doesn't bark in order that one might appreciate this video of him BARKING!!!!!eleventy!! while we're getting ready to go to the dog park because we are NOT MOVING FAST ENOUGH!!!1! and he wants to go NOW!!!!!11!!!1!
I don't know how he bloody knows; he never does this if we're getting ready to go to the grocery store. We've tried to figure out what the "tell" is and change up our getting ready ritual. We've tried speaking in code. Nope. He knows. We can't fool him.
And as soon as he gets to the car, he calms right down until we're about 30 seconds from the park, at which point he whines with the urgency of a creature who is convinced that it is exclusively his whining that fuels the vehicle those last 400 yards.
Meanwhile…
After he's had a run about the park, he sleeps like the dead for two solid days. This weekend, we were at the park for about an hour until some other dogs arrived for him to play with. And not that he doesn't have fun running around with us, but it's not the same as socializing with other dogs. So we spent another hour or so while he played with his good pals Uma the German Shepherd and Sophie and Ellie the Newfoundlands, all of whom are really sweet dogs.
And this was the scene across which I stumbled in the living room about a half hour after we got home from the dog park:
[Iain lies on the floor with Dudley, who's all curled up and looking very sleepy.]
[Iain lies on the floor with Dudley, holding his paw in his hand.]
Ridiculous. That's some professional grade cuteness, right there.
No barking. Just snoring.
Priorities
The GOP has them. They are terrible.
Unless you're a robber baron. In which case the GOP's priorities are you. Which is not so much "terrible" as "awesome." For you. And the other robber barons. And nobody else.
