Suggested by Shaker Diverkat: Where's your favourite place to relax?
For me, the physical place itself doesn't matter as much as the company. If I am in the company of people whom I trust, and who are kind (not just to me, but to one another, and to, for example, waitstaff with whom we might interact), I can relax.
In terms of a physical location, I do love a good board game with friends out on my back porch on a nice day. The porch is surrounded by thick trees, so it's outdoors but private and intimate. It's a really nice space to chill out.
Question of the Day
Today in Out of Control Fatties
[Content Note: Fat hatred; dehumanization.]
Currently on the front page of CNN.com, under featured articles:
Yes, whose FAULT is obesity? Who can be BLAMED for the existence of fat people? Obviously, SOMEONE needs to take responsibility for the TERRIBLE SCOURGE of fat people living on this planet!
At the actual story link, the fault-seeking headline is repeated, as is the headless fatty photo, cropped to show a fat man adjusting his belt around his fish-eyed fat belly, because a story about the plague of fatties isn't complete without a dehumanizing image that reduces fat people to nothing but our insidious blubber.
Following is a "round table" about how fat people are a drain on society blah blah yawn "these expanding waistlines will translate into billions of dollars of health care costs." Allegedly. What will certainly translate into billions of dollars of health care costs is an aging populace, although there are precious few articles on CNN or anywhere else wondering who is to blame for aging or how to stop it, despite the fact it makes approximately the same amount of sense to tell people to stop aging as it does to tell them to stop being fat.
This is not true for everyone, but it is true for me and it is true for a fuckload of fat people: My diet and exercise have varied significantly over the last decade, but my weight hasn't. The only thing that changes is my fitness, which is not reflected in my weight.
I can get fitter, and do, without getting thinner. (I can also lose fitness without getting fatter!) It really is just as absurd to tell me to stop being fat as it is to tell me to stop aging.
Yet my fat is still treated like a moral failing. Someone for which someone needs to take some blame.
Here's a fun game: Next time you see a bunch of progressives talking about "the obesity epidemic" under the auspices of being concerned about fat people's "health," count the number of times something they say about fat people and personal responsibility and what a drain we are on the healthcare system and how we ruin insurance rates/food accessibility/airplane rides/everything for thin people, sounds exactly like Mitt Romney talking about poor people and personal responsibility and what a drain they are on the social safety net and how they ruin everything for rich people.
I hear people who loathe Mitt Romney and his contempt for people in whose shoes he's never walked say the same shit about fat people all the time, without a trace of irony.
Quote of the Day
[Content Note: Christian Supremacy.]
"The American family is under siege, traditional values are somehow exclusionary, a simple prayer in our public schools is the basis for these secular attacks; you think about this spiritual warfare that's going on and...going strong as President Obama and his cronies in Washington continue their efforts to remove any trace of religion from American life. It falls on us, we truly are Christian warriors, Christian soldiers, and for us as Americans to stand our ground... It's about saving our nation, it's about preserving the values that make us special, about rejecting the concept that freedom of religion means freedom from religion, about turning away from this growing tide of secularism and atheism, the way they preach tolerance and diversity while they engage in oppression and bullying tactics."—Former Republican presidential candidate, Texas governor, and Dominionist warrior Rick Perry.
Hurry, Christian soldiers! Rick Perry is SO RIGHT! Everywhere I look there is evidence we are about to become a godless society, like: Our Christian president; our last Christian president; their Christian running mates and Christian opponents; their almost exclusively Christian administrations who relentlessly pander to conservative and/or moderate Christians; the two-thirds Christian Supreme Court; an almost entirely Christian Congress who start each session with a prayer; the millions and millions of other US Christians whose day of worship is still respected in various state laws across the country (like in Indiana, where you still can't shop for a car or buy booze on a Sunday), whose views are reflected in various federal laws (like denying same-sex couples the right of marriage in order to protect its "sanctity"), whose holidays are also national holidays, whose holy book must be sworn on in state and federal courts, and whose churches are not required to pay taxes; guaranteed freedom of religion; money that says "In God We Trust"; a pledge of allegiance that describes us as "one nation under God"; television networks who will accept advertising from conservative religious groups but not liberal political groups; schools who are incorporating a religious belief into science classes; conscience clauses for pharmacists and healthcare providers; religion-based residential communities being built; religious museums and amusement parks springing up all over the country; religious leaders being given diplomatic immunity; faith-based initiatives being federally funded; and our national media being constantly embroiled in a debate about in which god the president believes.
We are on the precipice, people!
*clunk*
Wednesday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by fur tumbleweeds.
Recommended Reading:
Pam: So, About Romney's Latino "Joke"… [Content Note: Discussion of racism.]
Mannion: Glengarry Glen Mitt
Elon: Conservatives: Romney Doesn't Represent Us
Elizabeth and Betsy: The Interactive Feminist Bingo Card
David: What's in a Name? (On the re/naming of dinosaurs.)
Maria: PA Supreme Court Rules Lower Court Must Revist Voter ID Law
Jane: SOPA Critics Blocked by US Patent and Trademark Office
Ezra: The Anniversary of the End of 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell'
Spooky: World's Largest Vertical Garden Grows on Italian Shopping Center
Finally: People Holding Baby Nic Cage. Obviously.
Leave your links and recommendations in comments...
Top Five
Here is your topic: Top Five Hobbies You'd Like to Try. Go!
Please feel welcome to share stories about why your Top Five picks are what they are, though a straight-up list is fine, too. Please refrain from negatively auditing other people's lists, because judgment discourages participation.
In The News
[Content note for: homophobia, violence]
All The News In Fits and Spurts:
The Chicago teachers union has voted to suspend its strike.
After writing an anti-gay slur in his eye-black over the weekend, Toronto Blue Jays shortstop Yunel Escobar has been suspended for three days. He will also work with GLAAD and the You Can Play Project as part of the suspension.
A Stanford researcher has found that critical, literary reading and leisure reading provide different kinds of neurological workouts, both of which constitute "truly valuable exercise of people's brains." No doy.
A newly discovered fragment of Coptic writing suggests some contemporaries of Jesus believed he was married. I bet Dan Brown is feeling pretty fucking smug right about now.
Dr Pepper's new Facebook ad campaign featuring an ape evolving into a soda-drinking human has pissed some people off.
French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo published cartoons of Mohammed today. I am sure this will go over well.
Chick-fil-A has officially ceased making donations to anti-gay organizations and has circulated an internal memo emphasizing its commitment to fair and equal treatment of all people "regardless of their beliefs, race, creed, sexual orientation and gender."
A new Andy Warhol exhibit opened in N.Y.'s Metropolitan Museum of Art yesterday. Neat!
Filmmaker Wajahat Ali Abbasi is hoping to spread awareness about the plight of gays in Iran with a film inspired by the 2005 hanging of two gay youths there.
This is basically the greatest thing ever: Universal Classic Monsters Collection: Limited Edition Coffin.
Daily Dose of Cute
This was my view while watching the news last night—Zelda lying half on top of me, her face turned up plaintively wondering why on earth I had stopped petting her head, while Dudley snoozed away in the background, using her thigh as a pillow. LOL dogs.
Today in Mitt Romney Is Terrible
Here's some of what I've been reading/watching this morning about the garbagiest garbage campaign that ever garbaged...
Via Zeke at BuzzFeed, here is an extraordinary moment (staring at 3:46) from an interview an oddly pugnacious Ann Romney gave to Denver's Fox affiliate, in which she argues that people (particularly women) should support Romney because fuck all y'all he doesn't even need this stinking job!
Anchor: Right now in Colorado and nationally, the polls do show that President Obama seems to have some advantage with women voters. Here in Colorado, it's anywhere from 4 points to 8 or 10 points. What would you say to those women out there who are still on the fence and are wanting something more than just the economic argument?HOLY SHIT.
Ann Romney: Well, you know, I think [sigh] from, um, speaking from a perspective from a wife and a mother, um, and from, the things that I know that I care about, I want to know, um, what motivates the guy, the person, that I would be voting for, and I would say what motivates Mitt is that he cares. That, this is a guy that is, um, doesn't, um, obviously need to do this for a job! I mean, he honestly believes he can help many Americans by getting in there.
Don't you ungrateful serfs understand that Mitt Romney is independently wealthy and doesn't even NEED to be president?! Geez, he's doing it FOR YOU. Jerks.
Yiiiiiiiiiikes.
In case you want to read what I'm assuming is Mitt Romney's "eloquent" version of how he doesn't think people are entitled to food, here is his op-ed for USA Today: "I'll Deliver Recovery, Not Dependency." HA HA GREAT TITLE!
In totally unrelated news lulz, Romney's father was on welfare.
Michael Barbaro in the NYT—A Mood of Gloom Afflicts the Romney Campaign: "A palpably gloomy and openly frustrated mood has begun to creep into Mr. Romney's campaign for president. ...[A] flustered adviser, describing the mood, said that the campaign was turning into a vulgar, unprintable phrase. Aides did little to hide their annoyance: on Monday night, a Romney aide cursed loudly as he tried to corral reporters into an impromptu news conference in Costa Mesa, Calif." LOL. Whooooooops your campaign!
Michael Falcone at ABC—Romney Tapes Give Way to the Not-So-Calm after the Storm: "This is easily the worst one-week period Mitt Romney's campaign has experienced so far in the general election." Double whoops!
Jonathan Martin, Maggie Haberman, and Anna Palmer at Politico—Mitt Romney Woes Jangle Republican Nerves: "If political campaigns have nine lives, nervous Republicans feel Mitt Romney has used up at least eight." That is an insult to cats. Cats Against Romney!
Greg Sargent in the WaPo—The Core Distortion Driving Romney's Entire Campaign: Mitt Romney "distorts Obama's entire argument by claiming Obama believes government is the only ingredient required to power the economy and that Obama wants government to take over American society entirely."
"When in
Marcy notes the timing of Republican criticisms of Mitt Romney relative to the Congressional Research Service report that obliterated the GOP's central economic fantasy of the last half century.
Joan wonders if Paul Ryan regrets his decision to be Romney's running mate.
Mary Matalin is still an asshole: "There are makers and takers, there are producers and there are parasites."
And finally! The Onion (a satirical paper/site)—Romney Apologizes to Nation's 150 Million 'Starving, Filthy Beggars':
"First and foremost, I would like to offer a heartfelt apology to all the whores, junkies, bums, and grime-covered derelicts out there who make up nearly half our nation," a visibly contrite and solemn Romney said outside a campaign stop at a local high school. "Let me assure you that I in no way meant to offend any of the putrid-smelling, barefoot masses out there. My campaign is not about dividing this nation, but about bringing all sides together—the rich, elegant members of the upper class, as well as the 47 percent who are covered in flies and eat directly from back-alley dumpsters."LOL! Of course, the real punchline is the pretense that Romney would ever apologize.
...The Romney campaign reportedly scrambled into damage-control mode after the video leaked Monday, issuing a statement late last night stating that the intended target of Romney's remarks was ingrained big-government largesse, not the "hordes of uneducated, loathsome scum who unfortunately populate this country."
..."I know just how hard it must be to get through a miserable, destitute life that is rife with crying babies whose shrieks consistently disrupt the affluent members of society who actually contribute something to this world," said the GOP candidate, adding that he wanted to make amends for his recent statements and reach out to what he called the country's "snaggle-toothed street people" and "hell-spawned savages."
There are probably some people who think that Onion piece is outrageously over-the-top. I would remind them that MITT ROMNEY THINKS PEOPLE ARE NOT ENTITLED TO FOOD.
Talk about these things! Or don't. Whatever makes you happy. Life is short.
Atlas Shrugged Part II Trailer
President Leland Palmer appears on the Times Square jumbotron and says: "To protect the security of our fellow citizens [On-Screen Text: IN THE NEAR FUTURE] for the duration of the national emergency [SOCIETY IS COLLAPSING] that the statutes of directive 10-289 shall remain in effect."
There is very dramatic music. Lots of pensive people look on. Pensively.
[DRASTIC GOVERNMENT MEASURES] Papers are signed. Briefcases are stuffed. Leland continues: "All copyrights shall be transferred to the federal government. [HAVE BEEN IMPOSED] All wages and other forms of income are hereby frozen." [FOR THE COMMON GOOD]
Men in hard hats shake their heads. Also, it seems to me that the authors don't know the difference between copyrights and patents. Or maybe the government really does want to rake in money from all those Jason Mraz MP3s iTunes sells.
White Dude in a Suit: "It's all happening so fast." White Woman: "I won't be a slave." That's nice. Don't be a slave, you!
[BASED UPON ONE OF THE MOST INFLUENTIAL NOVELS OF OUR TIME] Hallways! Trams! Disembodied voice: "You say you and Henry Reardon found it?" Secret passageways!
Just FYI: Most of the dialogue in this trailer happens off-screen, so I can't ever tell you who is speaking.
[A DISCOVERY THAT COULD SAVE US] Ummm... "Us"? There is no "us" in Objectivism, is there? I thought it was all about selfishness, all about "me." And by "me" I mean "Randian dildobrains."
Wait. What the fuck is that?! That white woman who will not be a slave has Christopher Collet's bomb from The Manhattan Project. That can't be a bomb. There are no bombs in this, are there? Disembodied voice: "A device harvesting limitless energy without fossil fuels." Yeah, that doesn't clear it up. Still sounds like an atomic bomb.
White (non-slave) Woman walks with White Man: "We're so close to having something they won't be able to fight." [A SYSTEM THAT WANTS TO CONTROL US] Slow motion guys in suits, who are definitely not the Reservoir Dogs. (Probably Washington Fat cats.) Oh, look, Michael Gross!
Disembodied voice: "They will try like hell to stop you." Dr. Robert Romano of NBC's beloved medical drama ER: "Miss Taggart, I think everyone agrees that capitalism doesn't work."
White Woman looks pissed. I guess she's Dagny. Wait. Whut? That's not the same woman from the first film. Oh, good lord. The entire film has been recast. Nice. That'll be good for continuity. Different actors in every role!
Trains. (Finally!) Bridges. Arches. Bad CGI. Dagny looking pensive. Lots of pensivity in this. Pensivity! Government documents. Disembodied voice: "You don't understand the power they have."
Arye Gross: "The government takes what they want and taxes what they leave behind." Arye Gross! Tru-Fact™: I used to have a major crush on him. Remember when he was on Ellen? I do! *faints*
Documents. Pens! PENS! (A product placement deal from Cross?) That frowny white dude Dagny was with earlier. (I guess Henry Reardon? Let's just say it's Henry Reardon.) [A STRUGGLE THAT WILL CHANGE US] Protesters. (Signs read: "10-289 Sucks", "10-289 robs us BLIND", "Ten Two-Eight SWINE". Oh, they're Teabaggers.) Is this Jason Mraz's cameo?
Henry Reardon: "One of these days you're going to have to decide what side you're on." Boardrooms. Smelting. (Finally some fucking smelting!)
Disembodied voice: "It's obvious that drastic measures have to be taken." Explosions! Or maybe one explosion with some terrible continuity. [ON OCTOBER 12]
Disembodied voice: "If you saw Atlas, knees buckling, arms trembling, but still trying to hold up the world with the last of his strength, what would you tell him to do?" Hardhats! Mops! (Mops?) Esai Morales! Slow-motion Dagny!
Some guy running toward a private jet. Hotel room. Train station.
Dagny in a Limo: "Where are they? Anyone who could make a difference?" Her assistant (maybe): "I'm sitting next to her." [WHO WILL STAND]
Scientific formulas! On glass! Always with the formulas written on glass in movies. Disembodied voice: "I've only got one thing left worth fighting for."
Arye Gross points to his temple: "This." Whut? Hallways. Pensivity. Dramatic music. [WHO WILL FIGHT]
Henry Reardon at a city council meeting: "And if you feel you have the right to use force against me bring guns." Guy (ethnic looking) with a gun! Cheering white people! Trains. Protestors. Disembodied voice: "Time is running out." That guy running for the plane again. He has Weezer glasses.
Jet buzzing some tree tops. [WHO IS JOHN GALT?] Trains! Planes! (No automobiles?) Kissing! Sciency looking shit. Explosion!
Disembodied voice, which I will assume is Dagny since she appears to the only woman in this: "Who or what is John Galt? Is he even a man?" Plane crash! Eep! Disembodied male voice: "Or an idea?"
[AYN RAND'S ATLAS SHRUGGED II THE STRIKE]
A hand reaching out to Dagny. Disembodied voice: "Are you ready?"
THE END
Showtimes here.
An Open Letter to My Fat Father, From His Fat, Trans Son: Or, Fatherhood, Fatness, and Family
by TheDeviantE, a queer, poly, atheist genderqueer trans man and social worker, trying to muddle on through.
[Content Note: Discussion of body image and internalized fat bias; weight loss and diet talk.]
Dear Dad,
I love you. You are the only father I've ever had, and frankly, I feel pretty damn lucky with this particular roll of the dice by the universe.
I love you, and I love your fat body. And I know you don't.
When we went out to dinner, I told you I was happy and ok with being fat, because these days, the way my body looks when fat, it looks like your fat body, and it makes me feel closer to you, makes me feel more like the man I am, and like one day I can be a man like you, someone worth looking up to.
You grew quiet. You became withdrawn. You told me you were ashamed that I would look up to your fatness. But I already knew.
I already knew because you've spent my life youth dieting, counting calories, going to meetings, and exercising with the direct purpose of losing weight. I already knew because when I started to get fat(ter) as a teenage girl, you tried to get me to do those things with you. You wanted me to watch my calories, to write down everything I ate, to exercise more. For my health. You told me when I was only a teenager about how you wished you'd learned healthy habits as a young man, because then these days you wouldn't be fat, and that you were simply trying to help me learn them. You and mom (who is what those of us in the FA movement would call an "in-betweenie" but what she always considered "overweight") were never ok with your bodies, and you in turn were never ok with mine.
We used to fight a lot about this, dad, a LOT. Until I finally started to put a stop to it. I told you I didn't want to hear it. I told you that it stressed me out and that it made me not want to talk with you. I told you I was starting to get into Fat Acceptance. I told you that there were studies out there that showed that constant dieting and restriction and focus on weight were unhealthy. I reminded you again and again that you'd been pressuring me my entire pseudo-adult life to lose weight, that I'd been constantly trying in some way to do that, and that it hadn't worked. I even sometimes reminded you of the fact that you've been trying my whole life to lose weight, and that it hasn't made any lasting change. I moved away from home (because that's what adult children often do), and the lectures became less frequent.
But it all came back when you told me you were ashamed that I would look up to your fatness, that I would embrace my own fatness because it made me more like you.
Dad, I love your fatness, because your fatness is part of you. Your fat body changed my and my sister's diapers. Your fat body sat next to me on the couch when I was just a tiny child and watched Star Trek, both the original AND The Next Generation with me, making me the geek I am today. Your fat lap was the one that, when I was a child and computer games were still pretty damn young, would let me sit upon it as you played (for both of us, me shouting directions gleefully), Designasaurus, and, I admit, often I'd laugh so hard that I would pee my pants with excitement, WHILE IN YOUR LAP. And your fat self was ok with it (not thrilled, but it never stopped us from playing again). Your fat body was the body of the man who let me and my sister put scrunchies, elastics, bows, ribbons, and sparkly hair gel in his hair. Who let us give him terrible comb-overs and pig tails, because you loved us. Your fat self taught me subtraction better than I was learning it in class, and your fat body was the one that helped me learn about algebra (when I was still in 4th grade, and the teacher assigned a project that we went way overboard on, setting up complex algebraic equations to determine supermarket food prices). Your fat body was the one that cooked up all sorts of meals throughout my childhood and adulthood; Indian food, and steak, and eggs just the way I liked them. Your fat belly was the one the cats have used as a springboard all these years, and where they curl up and annoy you (but it's really cute). Your fat self, along with my mother, paid for a substantial portion of my chest surgery when I got it together to start the process. Your fat body is the one on the other end of the phone when I tell you my exciting news (I've been asked to write a book chapter by a professor!), and when I have disappointments (I've been fired).
Your fat body is, frankly, you. You are not merely a brain housed in a body, you are a brain and a body, interacting and growing and changing as you move through time, always part of each other, always in sync, always connected. It's pretty damn poetic, actually, when you think about it.
When I think of you, and of who you are to me, who you have been my whole life, your fatness is part of it. Your fatness is coded in your genetics (c'mon, your mom was fat, your grandmother was fat, this is not rocket science). Who would you have been if you hadn't been fat? Would you have been as kind? As geeky? Would you have married mom? Had me and my sister? Would you be someone I would look up to now? Possibly, but not definitely. Because you wouldn't have been the you that exists, the you that I know. You would have been different.
If tomorrow you woke up and weren't fat, were magically skinny, I'd still love you. But I'd miss the way your belly bumps mine when we hug, the way your arms feel when you say goodbye, the way you sit in your chair, and the way you walk. I'd miss your round face, and all the little sounds and movements that have developed over a lifetime of fatness, the shifts and groans of getting settled just right, the shifts and groans of getting settled just right that I am starting to develop too, as I become a fat man. I'd grow to love your new way of moving and sounding, but it wouldn't be the same as the movement and sounds that were there when I was a child. It wouldn't be the same.
So yes, dad, I love your fatness. And because of it I love my fatness too (sometimes. Sometimes the weight of the world is too much and I sink into those places that you seem to live so much of your life, those places of hating ourselves for not looking like how we've been told to look.). As a trans man, I've spent much of my life feeling like my body was foreign, and wrong. Before I came out to myself, I was envious of those slight, skinny, trans guys and I didn't know if I envied them their bodies or their identities more. I came out, and I still envied them, now because they could be recognized as men so much more easily, because their chests were more bindable, because the curves on their hips weren't so pronounced, because their faces were angular, and spoke of manhood, not womanhood. But now? Now, after YOUR fat body helped me get the money to have my surgery (a class privilege I am constantly aware of), now that I have started to take testosterone, now that my fat has been redistributing itself so it looks every day more like your fat? Now that I have a large, round belly, like my father's belly? Now I know that I don't envy their bodies. Because I get to have a body that looks like my father's. My father who I love. My father who is you. My father who is fat.
I love your, and my, fat bodies.
I love you dad. I wish one day you could too.
Feel the Trans*momentum!
Last Thursday, Washington D.C. unveiled a new campaign in support of trans* people. Trans* people in D.C. frequently (even by US standards) suffer violence, often at the hands of local authorities.
I think the campaign walks something of a fine line—it attempts to show trans* people as "normal" residents of D.C. with typical interests, so there's a bit of gender stereotyping. (I'm generally not a fan of normalcy as a virtue.) There's also the issue of the limits to which civil rights laws are the remedy from institutional discrimination (see Dean Spade's book). So yeah, I'm a bitter, bitter queer.
That said, HOLY FUCK EVERYBODY HOLY FUCK, EVERYBODY. When I came out seven years ago, I had a hard time imaging an American government publicly supporting trans* people. Damn.
From the Washington D.C. Office of Human Rights:
The groundbreaking Transgender and Gender Identity Respect Campaign has been called by advocates the first government-funded campaign focused exclusively on the betterment of transgender and gender non-conforming people. Developed at the DC Office of Human Rights (OHR) in close consultation with transgender advocates and community members, the campaign aims to increase understanding and respect for the transgender and gender non-conforming communities, decrease incidents of discrimination and increase reporting of discrimination to OHR. The five campaign ads feature actual community members, and will appear citywide on bus shelters in the fall and winter of 2012.Read the OHR's full statement here.
Crossposted from A Cunt of One's Own
"If you want to be president, you gotta work for everybody, not just for some."
Last night, President Obama appeared on the Letterman show (oy) and was asked about Mitt Romney's 47% comment. His response is below. As we have come to expect from President Obama, it was eloquent and measured and eminently reasonable. This morning, The Today Show classified it as a "jab" at Mitt Romney. Sigh.
When I won in 2008, 47% of the American people voted for John McCain. They didn't vote for me. And what I said on election night was: Even though you didn't vote for me, I hear your voices, and I'm gonna work as hard as I can to be your president. And one of the things I've learned as president is: You represent the entire country. And when I meet Republicans as I'm traveling around the country, you know, they are hard-working family people, who care deeply about this country, and my expectation is that, if you want to be president, you gotta work for everybody, not just for some.
[edit]
You don't meet anybody who doesn't believe in the American Dream and the fact that nobody is entitled to success, that you've gotta work hard, and so I promise you, there are not a lotta people out there who think they're victims; there are not a lotta people who think they're entitled to something. What I think the majority of people, Democrats and Republicans, believe is that we've got some obligations to each other and there's nothing wrong with us giving each other a helping hand, so if there's a—that single mom's kid, even after all the work she's done, still can't afford to go to college, for us to be able to give them, you know, some help on a student loan so they can end up being, ahh, curing the next disease or making sure that they're starting the next Google, I think that's a good investment for America.
Question of the Day
What is the last thing you ate that left you craving more?
Full Disclosure: I believe people are entitled to food.
Beautiful Day
It is the most beautiful day here today. Seventy degrees with a perfect breeze, sunny, with impossibly perfect clouds piled in white fluffs across the sky.
I love days like this. I spent part of this beautiful day at a local cafe, a place where Iain and I go nearly every weekend, before we do our grocery shopping. The cafe is owned by a couple, one half of whom is a Greek immigrant, Dimitri, and the other half of whom is Puerto Rican. Their son and daughter, who work there, call themselves Puerto Greekan.
I was there today with my friend Ms. A, who is Venezuelan. Her father, whom I'd never met even though Ms. A and I have been friends since high school, was visiting from Venezuela. Her sister and her boyfriend, who is Portuguese, were also visiting from Portugal.
I said to Ms. A it was unfortunate her husband, who is from Mexico, and my husband, who is from Scotland, weren't there, too, just to add a few more accents at the table.
We were there after the normal lunch hour, and it was quiet. Dimitri brought us Greek frappes, which are not on the menu, and a special Greek drink his father makes and brings when he visits. He sat with us at our table, and talked about Mediterranean cuisine, and being an immigrant to the US. It is, the table agreed, a great country full of opportunity, and a country too focused on money, to the detriment of quality of life.
I was the only one at the table who was born here. I sat and listened, and thought what a privilege it is that I have so many opportunities to see my country through the perspective of people who chose this place as their home, and people who haven't.
For a few hours, I forgot all about Mitt Romney's contempt for people who are not like him, because I was spending a beautiful day with people who understand the country of which he wants to president better than he ever will.
In The News
[Content note: homophobia, a Nazi reference, war, animal distress]
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has ordered that the state's new voter ID law be returned to a lower court. Not sure what that means yet.
After 18 months of violent unrest, civil war looms in Damascus.
Toronto Bluejays shortstop Yunel Escobar took to the field on Saturday with "tu ere maricon" ("you are a faggot") scrawled on the eye-block under his eyes. I don't like sports.
The 2012 Folsom Street Fair is this weekend. Get your leather on! (Or, faux leather, if you're vegan.)
The ASPCA Animal Poison Control Center reports that xylitol poisoning in dogs is on the rise. It's in gum and other stuff.
Binge drinking and prescription drug abuse among the nation's military is growing. Yeah, that's not good.
Governor Scott Walker is moving forward with a new measure to remove the requirement for electrical safety measures in state building codes. Safety, who needs it?
Kellogg is trying to breathe new life into its Pop-Tarts line by branding them with school mascots.
Tru-Fact™: I ate a Pop-Tart about two years ago (after a 25 year hiatus) and it was nasty. Tru-Fact™: I nearly burned down my parents house when I was about 14 in a Pop-Tarting mishap.
Atlas Shrugged Part II is looking for volunteers to help promote the upcoming sequel. Volunteering is a very Randian idea. (It isn't. Whoops!) Free markets!
Anyone know where I can get some of this fab sounding new candy??
This is neat: Colour photographs of the Hindenburg's snazzy interior.
You want to see a kind of creepy video of Yma Sumac singing "Chuncho," don't you?
Just FYI: The Boy Scouts still suck.
The best thing you will see today: A Love Story In 22 Pictures.
Daily Dose of Cute
Sophie is such a funny wee thing. She has this very adorable and heartbreakingly sweet habit of reaching out one paw and laying it on you in a gesture I can only describe as comforting.
If she's lying on you, she'll extend one paw toward your heart and lay it on your chest. If she's lying beside you, she'll extend one paw and lay it on your leg, or your arm.
She just rests it there, and if you stroke the top of her outstretched paw with the tip of your finger (which is all that fits on her tiny foot), she'll gently squeeze you with her pads and look at you with her big orange eyes. I got you, Two-Legs.
More LOL
Meanwhile, here is the Obama campaign's newest ad, titled "47 Percent"...
Text Onscreen: Recently, Mitt Romney held a high dollar fundraiser behind closed doors.Ouch. LOL.
Over images of people on the street putting in earbuds and looking at a laptop, text onscreen: We asked Americans what they thought about what he said to his donors...
Video clip of Romney at fundraiser, interspersed with reactions of people on the street who look dismayed. Romney says: "There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right—there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it. That that's an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president no matter what. ... And so my job is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them."
Cut to a young black opposite-sex couple. The man says, "Wowwww," and rubs his chin. Cut to a young woman who appears to be white (Woman 1), who says, "I actually felt sick to my stomach." Cut to a younger middle-aged woman with light skin (Woman 2), who says, "I don't like it." Cut to a young woman with light skin (Woman 3), who says, "It shows that he's out of touch if he thinks that half of the country is feeling like, feels like victims." Cut back to Woman 2: "Victims? I wouldn't say so. I don't think that's part of the American fabric." An older woman who appears to be white says (Woman 4), "I'm not looking for a hand-out." Cut back to Woman 1, who says, "I don't think anybody's ever looking for a hand-out. I think that we all want chances and opportunities." Cut back to black couple; the man says, "If as a president, you try to separate by demographics, separate by classes, you know, you're not really a president." Cut back to Woman 1: "I think the fact that Mitt Romney made all these comments behind closed doors really shows his character." Cut back to Women 2: "I just think that it sends a bad message. I think that it's not the person that I would want representing me." Cut back to Woman 4: "That isn't somebody who I'm thinking, 'Oh, I want him as my president.'"
Text Onscreen: Obama | Biden. Team Truth.
LOL FOREVER
[Content Note: Racism.]
Via Samhita, here is Mitt Romney's tremendous new ad entitled "Dear Daughter," designed to appeal to women (lulz):
Over images of a thin blond white woman and her white baby, and accompanied by piano music, a female voiceover says: "Dear Daughter: Welcome to America. Your share of Obama's debt is over fifty thousand dollars, and it grows every day. Obama's policies are making it harder on women. The poverty rate for women?—the highest in 17 years. More women are unemployed under President Obama. More than five and a half million women can't find work. That's what Obama's policies have done for women. Welcome, daughter." Then, in a suuuuuper patronizing soft voice specially for delicate lady-ears, Mitt Romney says in voiceover: "I'm Mitt Romney, and I approve this message."LOL! Well, I'm convinced!
Full Disclosure: I am not convinced.
