…while I step away from the internet to pursue some other writerly things behind closed doors. It’s going to be better than OK. (AP Stylebook says not to use “okay”. OK?)
A taste of electric bass to amp up your day
02/24/2010 § 1
The electric bass has been the channel through which anything became jazz and jazz became everything….. Here’s a taste of a few masters.
A solo a la Marcus Miller:
Justice Groove by Stanley Clarke on the Arsenio Hall Show!
Teen Town by Jaco Pastorius a la Weather Report….
John Patitucci with Chick Corea and Vinnie Colaiuta…. (skip to 2:50 mins for Patitucci solo)
A lot can happen in a year or four or eight
02/17/2010 § 0
These graphs are just so hard to understand! Where’s Ross Perot when you need him?
Oh, wait, now it makes sense. Thank God I kept those 3-D glasses from Avatar, they wanted to recycle them or something.
Make your own (green) lube
02/10/2010 § 3
If there’s one website that has my back it’s Grist.org, a highly recommended site for anyone with a sense of humor (or in need of one), a heart (or in need of one), and a care for the environment (…..or in need of one).
How about a little taste of Grist with the Ask Umbra column (she’s like the female version of me; and she’s BRILLIANT!!!).
NEW RULES for your cell phone
02/04/2010 § 2
Technology is the butter melting into every nook and cranny of our lives. Think Thomas’ English Muffin commercials with the butter slowly dissolving into the soft spongy muffin. Salivate. That’s how you feel about technology whether you’re aware of it or not. We’re hooked on it’s sultry, sweet, salty grip, we’re bathing in its warmth not really knowing what it will do to us, to our behaviors, our thoughts, our relationships. It seems so harmless. Well, too much butter can kill a person, so let’s assume by some elementary logic that something far more complicated than cream and salt ought to be consumed in moderation. (And I must warn you that such “elementary logic” should be used in moderation too as it can lead to chronic pessimism).
If there’s one piece of technology that needs an update on its usage rules it’s that versatile, socially adept, devious little device, your cell phone.
- Your cell phone should never be in bed with you. It should be on silent on a night stand, however, it should be more than an arms length away from you. If it’s flashing or vibrating it shouln’t be a reach away because you will always reach for it. You want to make it inconvenient for yourself. If it’s a call or email or text worth getting, you should have to work for it. If you’re a real master of self control and, perhaps, an exquisite bedmate, you shouldn’t let your phone into your bedroom at all; keep it on the console by the door to your house/apt. Your phone will never make you orgasm but it will interrupt one.
- When you leave your bedroom in the morning your phone should not follow you to the breakfast table. Don’t think you’re going to read the newspaper on your phone with your toast and coffee; you’ll end up on emails and Facebook before you know it. Get a real newspaper or that magazine you’ve been neglecting to open. And work on your breakfast making skills.
- When you go to the bathroom don’t take your phone (even if you consider the bathroom your “office”). When you’re shampooing your hair and that oh-so-important call or text you’ve been waiting for comes through it’s not worth interrupting those brilliant shower-ideas or when you’re hitting that high note in preparation for your debut on American Idol. Even on the toilette, finish the newspaper, finish reading that novel or clip your toe nails but don’t worry about the photo you were tagged in or some video game that will probably decrease your IQ by the time you flush the toilette. And don’t worry about those emails until you get to your real office. The bathroom is your personal space, keep it sacred, keep the phone out. Plus, studies are showing that cell phones interrupt proper bowel movements.
- Driving….when you pick up your phone to answer that text message while driving you might as well be taking a long swig off a pint of whiskey. Don’t drink and drive, don’t text and drive. A handsfree headset does the trick for talking (the old fashion phone device). People have been dying on the roads because of texting, that’s a fact. And if you see a driver creeping over the crosswalk while texting, his eyes darting from phone to you to phone, give him an ear full of go-fuck-yourself-textaholic! Don’t be bashful.
- At work… it depends on your job. Your phone can make you into a task master, it can help you be great at your job. And it’s also a sneaky place to waste time and escape you work. So ask yourself: can I do my job at work without my cell phone? If the answer is yes (BE HONEST), keep your phone hidden deep in a draw or bag. If the answer is no, have it on vibrate on the side of your desk. Don’t keep your phone in your pocket or on your hip, unless someone’s life depends on it.
- It’s not your skin… If your leg or hip tingles when your cell phone is not there, if you feel different when your phone escapes your personal electromagnetic field, then you’re a slave to your phone. Fact is that your body does become accustom to the different electronic waves that move around your phone and many people experience a tingle or muscle twitch where your phone is located. You don’t want to wear your phone like it’s your underwear.
- When traveling/commuting… another birthplace of the world’s greatest ideas and dreams. Turn that piece of plastic off and stuff it in your bag. It’s time to contemplate. Forget “connecting” to other people, connect with your damn self otherwise we’ll be a bunch of ghosts connecting with other ghosts.
- Last but not least, you can appreciate your phone but don’t fall in love with it. Keep it platonic. You don’t need to hate it either, it’s a nice phone.
- Excuse me while I take this call.
The way we were
01/28/2010 § 0
I don’t know about you but I miss being an orangutan. At least some of us still have their hair.
Michael Thomas Speaks
01/27/2010 § 0
At any moment someone will appear with a brilliant piece of literature and speak words of wisdom that will shift the course of many lives and minds. And so it happens again with, my new hero, Michael Thomas, author of Man Gone Down, winner of the 2009 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. Be sure to view this video of Michael Thomas at the Boston Book Festival. And enjoy the book.
Theater’s Novel Medium: The Gatz
01/18/2010 § 4
I’ll admit, I was worried about spending 6 hours in a theater for the production of The Gatz, now playing at the American Repertory Theater. What if I get gassy, have to go pee, or the person next to me has massive armchair-love-handles and garlic breath and insists on sighing regularly. Well, I anted up and dropped over a hundred bucks to sit front row. It would be a journey, a word for word reading of The Great Gatsby, by you know, that writer you heard about in high school but never read, F. Scott Fitzgerald. Being the slow reader I am with a busy schedule of wasting time in various sophisticated ways, reading/experiencing The Great Gatsby in 6 hours for a hundred bucks was a steal!
And there, in the tension of the forward slash between reading and experiencing, resides the beautiful and mysterious crux of The Gatz: the way in which it straddles mediums. With no other word uttered than every single word written in the novel, it’s in part a reading. But it’s a reading that happens, that becomes, that is experienced, part in flesh and part in mind. Yes, it is theater and the words are brought to life. But the expanse of this well known classic novel almost topples any attempt of an actor and a stage; it becomes a production that takes place more in our minds than within the theater. And the genius is that The Gatz gets this; it doesn’t try to play the novel, it lets the novel do the playing. And play it does.
The stage setting is an old scrappy office, really just a source of props fit for everywhere the novel will take them. The actors appear like everyday office folk until they come under the spell of the book. The narrator/protagonist/Nick Carraway begins reading The Great Gatsby aloud in the office. All the rhythm of the words swirl around the theater and start to push and pull the actors into and through the drama of the story. The actors exaggerate the novel’s characters as if self-conscious puppets. The narrator is the puppeteer. And the puppeteer is being puppeted himself by F. Scott Fitzgerald. The actors begin to flirt with the text, mocking and mirroring the almost dualing mediums of theater and literature, until the drama of the story totally consumes them and they become the characters of The Great Gatsby.
While the action drives the plot forward and the actors and settings shift on stage, an audience of 500 some minds meditate on the rich language and deep interiority of Nick’s narration; there’s a sustained palpable wave of wonder and awe flowing throughout the audience from passage to passage. It’s a deeply communal, monkish experience.
“But his heart was in a constant, turbulent riot. The most grotesque and fantastic conceits haunted him in his bed at night. A universe of ineffable gaudiness spun itself out in his brain while the clock ticked on the wash-stand and the moon soaked with wet light his tangled clothes upon the floor. Each night he added to the pattern of his fancies until drowsiness closed down upon some vivid scene with an oblivious embrace. For a while these reveries provided an outlet for his imagination; they were a satisfactory hint of the unreality of reality, a promise that the rock of the world was founded securely on a fairy’s wing.”
The Gatz is ripe with humor too, if not directly from the text it sparks as the cast exaggerates the tall orders of action and descriptive prose:
“I glanced at Daisy, who was staring terrified between Gatsby and her husband, and at Jordan, who had begun to balance an invisible but absorbing object on the tip of her chin.”
To illuminate this moment, Jordan reaches her chin high and shifts like a magician balancing a bowling pin on her chin. The actors masterfully and hilariously bring Fitzgerald’s literary fireworks to life.
And then those Fitzgeraldian moments of insight that send your head spinning:
“Dishonesty in a woman is a thing you never blame deeply…”
Awww, that’s sweet. But I don’t think our last couple presidential candidates would agree. Perhaps he means you don’t blame a woman for dishonesty because you can’t; as if you can’t blame someone for being less dishonest than yourself, and a man’s a mountain of dishonesty right? I’ll buy that for a dollar and sell it back to you for twenty.
Oh, the impenetrable desires and strife of the Gatz in us all:
“No amount of fire or freshness can challenge what a man will store up in his ghostly heart.”
If you haven’t read it yourself, I say go see it first. It’s rare you can say that.
The Gatz is produced by the theater company, Elevator Repair Service, who spent a decade trying to get the legal rights to use Fitzgerald’s text. Ten years was certainly worth the 6 hour experience. Big thanks ERS for keeping with their vision. I will say though, I did get a little gassy (!), luckily it was towards the end. Perhaps the playbill ought to have the disclaimer: flatulence and face masks allowed and encouraged for uninterrupted enjoyment of the show.
All snaps for my new favorite band 3OH!3
12/28/2009 § 0
When your own words just aren’t enough, it’s time for a new favorite band:
3OH!3
GET TO KNOW THEM:
TRY TO ENJOY THE MUSIC, “Holler Till You Pass Out”:
Animals in the lo mein – A picture show (hangover required)
12/21/2009 § 0
It was a dark and snowy afternoon, deep in the lo mein……..
They congregate and talk amongst themselves. Elvis the elephant is fixated on Larry the Lobster’s large claws. “How about that pu pu platter,” says Terry the Turtle trying to break the tension. » Read more… «
Just demons and kids and preachers oh my!
12/15/2009 § 0
(found via Maud Newton via her friend Michael, thanks guys!)
I can’t be saved, he says… because it’s just a game? Oh no. We have to kill Pokemon. And every other fantasy too.
Luckily I found an 8 year old who’s not playing Pokemon. But he’s pretty “sick” to his stomach over homosexuality. He says the gays are “going to hell!” But no sign of Pokemon in the Bible:
Can I get an amen?
Attempted Bar Conversation: Health Care Reform
12/14/2009 § 0
It felt like sabotage: ask the two ladies at the next bar seats over what they think about the health care reform. My vodka beverage came up with the idea and gave me the necessary permission. With the barroom void of any libido or mojo, why not engage in some verbal sparring over a timely social issue. Who knows, maybe it would spark some hormonal surge in the room. Whoever said you couldn’t talk politics and religion at a bar was a complete dumb ass sissy; and he was probably right, or at least had some reasoning.
And so I said it to the ladies: “How about that health care reform huh? Crazy isn’t it? You guys into the public option?”
One girl rolled her eyes (but she wasn’t very good at it, mustn’t have been her usual response), the other appeared to be actively thinking or maybe her nose was itchy. Ms. Nose Itch took the bait, she responded, “Part of me thinks it’s a good idea, everyone should have it. But the other part isn’t sure. I don’t know.”
These two conflicting parts of herself that she mentioned weren’t very impressive. It was like catching a dead fish. The ice in my glass relaxed into a pool of water and vodka. I had to extinguish my attempt at a conversation, toss the dead fish back in the water. There would be no verbal sparring on health care.
The problem could have been my delivery, perhaps it sounded like a sleezy cheezy pick up line. But no, it wasn’t me, and it wasn’t the girls either. It was the damn health care reform.
Part of the problem with health insurance is its lack of transparancy, it’s designed to make you feel safe but not actually save you when you need it. Government’s health care reform shouldn’t sucumb to the same convoluted and deceptive language that has swallowed up the insurance system and kept the masses in the dark. More the reason why we should splay it out at the bars and cafes, drunk or caffeinated we have to shred the political language in search of some morals that make sense to us. It’s all about us anyway. You don’t need to be a scholar or a legitimate politician, you need to be a citizen and there’s a job description for that, it goes like this: AMERICAN CITIZEN: help others, contribute to building healthy communities and families and a good food system, VOTE, and educate yourself on what you’re voting for. That’s it pretty simple. If you can’t do that, you’re not a citizen.
So why are serious topics barred from bar talk? Who wants us to just drink and drug and be dumb? We need continuous debate, and if you don’t have your facts straight, so what, at least you’re trying to connect with the community and not be ruled by a man behind a curtain. Talk shit, but at least start talking.
So lets attempt to break it down and find our way into some simple health care jargon that can be tossed around the barroom……
Health care buzz words for the barroom, defined with moderate accuracy by a savvy laymen with a chip on his shoulder:
PUBlic optiON
So the government essentially becomes an insurance company that is “fair” and “affordable” and doesn’t have all that tricky fine print bullshit. Polls show that most people want this. I mean, could government run healthcare be worse than what these insurance companies are dishing out? Health insurance is a relatively new phenomenon that has run amuck; it only began in a small way in the 1860s, not expanding to the beast it is today until the 1930s. Governments have had more success than health insurance agencies. What’s powerful and new has the potential to be broken down and rebuilt. Still, we don’t know how exactly the government will run it.
CO-Op
The states could have the option to set up co-op insurance plans. You know co-ops, they’re like a PTA (Parent-Teacher Association), a mixture of people who want to do good but only half of them are really trained with appropriate skill sets and the other ones are there because they’re bored folding clothes with their paid live-in-nanny and are seeking purpose and belonging. The idea behind a co-op health insurance is good, but I’d rather an experienced group run a universal plan. Also, it’s not clear who’s going to start these co-ops and if started how would they fair competing in a market against wealthy insurance giants? PTA vs. insurance lobbyists? Good idea. Good effort. But it ain’t going to solve no health care reform no how. Next…
Snowe’s “trigger” vs. Reid’s “escape hatch”
Okay, another example of Democrats pussyfooting around the problem. Sentate majority leader, Harry Reid, pushes the public option with the stipulation that states could opt out of it if they want to. Honestly, that’s fine, I’d be happy to start a civil war. Lots of other countries get out their aggression like that. Americans eat there way through their aggression into obesity and death. Senator Olympia J. Snowe from Maine, says that states should only have to allow a public option if 95% of the state doesn’t receive affordable health care. In other words, Snowe’s saying, why force healthcare to be affordable if it’s already affordable? Sounds like we shouldn’t even be trying to reform anything according to Snowe.
joseph I. LIEberman
Pussy. He’s a pussy. Why would one old man throw a wrench in it for everyone to suffer? Sure, no need to start medicare at 55. Fine. Give him that. But his annihilation of the public option is just plain cheap. I repeat, he’s a pussy. He pulled a fast one on his party status and he’s going to try to do it again on a health care reform that will effect the country….
aFORDability
Are you fucking kidding me? There’s a huge debate over health care reform that hinges on the word “affordability” and we don’t even know what that means? Give us a number! A range at least! Government is a sly SOB. It sounds like I can afford this “affordability” but I don’t write my budget with words. Numbers please. Give us numbers! And no fucking decimal points!!!
preVENTion ~ a cup of D style
This is my favored plan. And yeah the President has mentioned it too, as just a part of the overall reform. I say it should be at the forefront of the entire reform. Simply, an ounce of this stuff is worth a pound of cure. The problem is people know it as a saying but not as behavior. The tools that would allow us to prevent illness aren’t easily accessible, you have to seek it out. A little elbow grease, a little education, a little prevention and we’ll all be breathing a little easier.
In Closing… Last drink for Health.
There’s a need for care.
If you improve my life, of course I’ll pay you in return.
If you save my life, I owe you my life, or at least a ton of cash and some baked goods during the holidays.
This seems to be the general consent. Everyone wants to take care of the doctors, nurses, and hospitals that take care of them.
But the problem is not solely that everyone can’t afford the care they need (we know everyone doesn’t have a ton of cash), the problem is that people don’t think they need to help cover the cost of helping others survive. Illness doesn’t discriminate, people do. How do we mask our discrimination? We invent an entity that shields those who have from those that have not: the health insurance company.
So we elected a young dorkishly smart president who doesn’t want to hurt anyone, he has the sturdiness of Mormon’s morals, an open loving mind of a Burkenstock pot smoking hippie, the contemplative powers of a Buddhist monk, and the seductive tameness of Gandhi if he was brought up in a strict Catholic school. But let’s not digress, President Obama is only a sliver of the solution. There’s a lot of channels the health care reform must travel through, let’s just take a hit off the Obama hope pipe and see what happens.
Answering Michiko Kakutani’s Animal Wonder
11/20/2009 § 0
New York Times writer, Michiko Kakutani, completes an article on Jonathan Safran Foer’s new nonfiction book, Eating Animals, with this paragraph:
It’s arguments like this that undermine the many more valid observations in this book, and make readers wonder how the author can expend so much energy and caring on the fate of pigs and chickens, when, say, malaria kills nearly a million people a year (most of them children), and conflict and disease in Congo since the mid-1990s have left an estimated five million dead and hundreds of thousands of women and girls raped and have driven more than a million people from their homes.
It’s no wonder why people would wonder such a thing, including the esteemed Kakutani. Unless of course they read my previous post, The Pig’s Smart, Stupid. To summarize: how we are treating animals mirrors how we treat each other and ourselves. Our treatment of the environment has the same impact on the world as does our treatment of animals. If countries didn’t spend so much money, resources, and attention on the production, distribution, and processing of animals (as food), we would have more money and food to remedy some of the world’s issues; local food has a global impact. The way we tend to our earth includes how we tend to its inhabitants, we, and the animals, are part and parcel of the environment. We can modify our actions and attention to how we treat animals with good hope that it will transfer into how we treat fellow humans and human crisis. If we are allowed to bastardize the food we eat, it makes sense we would allow our own species to be neglected. I would presume Foer spent a good amount of time and “energy” in “caring” about human suffering in his previous two novels which involved the holocaust and 9/11; he’s probably sick of human suffering, it’s no wonder he’d move on to other neglected species.
You are what you eat—this isn’t just some pre-school proverb, it’s the reality that an obese country prefers to ignore. And Americans are spending more money on trying to lose weight than they are on solving malaria and rape in the Congo. So to the readers of Kakutani’s wonder, A Cup of D says: cut the fat, cut the cowshit, cut out the slaughterhouse dinners, so you can find the energy to go out and stop genocide. Or at least read about it somewhere. When you’re on the treadmill, perhaps?
The Pig’s Smart, Stupid
11/10/2009 § 0
Next time you’re slicing into a moist pork chop try to see if you can gauge how smart that pig once was. Chances are it probably wasn’t a free roaming pig that received a progressive education from nature’s wild kingdom. But what if it did get that top-noch natural education? Could we ingest its intelligence? Smart succulent proteins? Truth is, your pig platter more than likely had an education ripe with flies, mounds of feces, expensive pharmaceutical drugs, cramped cages, and the cheapest feed possible. Sounds like the plight of the rich and poor people across the globe. Pigs, and animals in general, aren’t being raised any different than the majority of the human population. Whether you’re in one of the many slums of the world trying to avoid being sickened and possibly dying because of a non-existent septic system or you’re in a Beverly Hill’s gated community laced with antidepressants and hand sanitizer and are receiving an H1N1 “Swine” flu vaccine this weekend, you can probably relate to the life of a pig. That said, the majority of animals we eat are slumming it all the way to our bellies.
An article by Natalie Angier of the New York Times points to studies that show pigs are smart, they show intelligence because they can use mirrors! I’ll have the mirror grown pork loin please! Finally, proof that cute dumb looking animals can be smart. If given the chance, they’d be going to Harvard School for Pigs and graduation would be a healthy execution, dismemberment and intelligent meal for us. We’re the dumb ones who dumb down our food source and consume it to the point of obesity. Like the holocaust, slavery, and public policies across the globe, we, humans, continue to play a bad game of God. Humans do it to humans, knowingly or not, it appears to be in our nature to distinguish who’s confined to life among piles of shit and who’s on the green pasture roaming free (although I understand some animals like to keep in touch with their feces, on their own terms though). The fact that we’re all eating the doped up pigs bathing in fecal matter doesn’t make sense though. It’s such nonsense that a young fiction writer by the name of Jonathan Safran Foer, was forced (willingly) to write a non fiction book, Eating Animals, about how the animals in our food chain are being bastardized. Elizabeth Kolbert from the New Yorker provides a review of Foer’s book and a keen expose of the conditions and practices of animal farms. There are many ways to skin a cat, the saying goes, just as there are many ways to turn a cow into food, but you’d hope the cow is dead before she undergoes the butchering process, and a quick death at that. Preferably not electrocution. And I’d rather not have the cow milk with the udder infection. Or the chicken with all those leg blisters on the legs that don’t even hold his own artificially induced weight. —Kolbert tells all the lovely details.
Let’s not even go into the debate of whether or not one should eat meat. Simply, let’s just agree that we should know how smart our food is. Don’t just tell me it’s free-range, tell me it’s a free-thinking, intuitive animal with a high IQ—I want the actual IQ, don’t tell me “Grade A” or whatever chickenshit label you’ve been serving us. We all know what fear tastes like—McDonald’s, etc. But imagine what a smart animal who dies happy tastes like. That would make even the most die-hard vegetarian salivate.
Stupid is as stupid does.
101 Reasons not (NOT) to use Facebook (updated)
09/30/2009 § 4
Could there be a reason why you wouldn’t use Facebook?
101 reasons, FROM VARIOUS RELIABLE RESOURCES, in no particular order and without further ado:
- When I have a thought not worth thinking, I’d rather not document it.
- I’m not ready for another internet addiction. I can’t afford anymore Vaseline.
- I’d like to keep my job. And maybe get another one someday too. » Read more… «
Stopping by to remember the payphone and give it some love again
09/30/2009 § 0
Payphones don’t get paid much attention these days. They have become little shoe tying stalls where you can pull away from the sidewalk traffic, put your foot up and craft a nice bow that Mr. Rogers would be proud of. The next time you tie your shoe at the payphone you may also find yourself reminiscing about its heyday… collect calls, listening to those coins getting swallowed up, the occasional free change left in the change dispenser flippy metal thingy that goes clink, operators and their attempts to help and their American accents, wads of gum stuck everywhere, greasy B.O. scented plastic oversized headsets, and that weird feeling that everyone is listening to your phone conversation (yes, there was once a time when people were embarrassed to share a phone conversation with everyone on the sidewalk). Making a phone call used to be so precious.
Baby Facism, Don’t be a victim
09/25/2009 § 4
Have you ever been discriminated against because you have a baby face? Do people look at you and want to pinch your cheeks? Do they scrunch up their face and talk to you in hush coos, do they card you at the bar, do they smile and almost get giddy when you’re trying to talk serious? Across the world people are gifted and afflicted by their baby face, whether you’re in your mid 20s, 30s or, worse, your mid 60s, being subjected to Baby Facism can really assault your confidence and destroy your moral.
I am calling on all Baby Facers to share your experiences with Baby Facism in the comment section below. It’s time we unite (yes, I’m one of them). As more people share their experiences, I’ll include their comments within this post and bump it up to the top of the page.
Before we can defeat Baby Facism we have to first acknowledge its very real presence. Be bold, be brave, and don’t listen to anyone who tells you you have to grow up. It wasn’t your choice to have a baby face, and it’s beautiful anyway.
Finally, people are speaking up! Here are some recent comments, keep it going!
I was at a diner this morning with my wife. She was in the bathroom when the waitress came over. The waitress totally gave me those baby eyes, she put her hands on her knees and bent over as if I was so short my chin only reached the edge of the table. With her standing like this my chin actually was at the same level as her breasts. When my wife came back from the bathroom and witnessed the waitress pointing out the different options of pancakes when all I asked her was whether or not they used fresh or frozen blueberries she thought the waitress wanted to jump my bones and harangued me for looking at her breasts. I joked to my wife that the waitress just wanted to spoon feed me (wifey didn’t think that was funny). This lead to an all night argument with my wife. I don’t think she or anyone understands what can happen with Baby Fasicm. This is some serious shit. Don’t let it mess with you! Next time I’m going to tell the waitress or whoever to back off and treat me like a fast moving 18 wheeler Mac Truck, not some kid on a 3 wheeler.
~Posted by GeV
I can’t tell you how many times what happened to GeV happened to me too! The ladies go goo goo gah gah for my baby face. Don’t get me wrong, it’s nice but come on, they keep getting me in trouble. And for all those knee dropping baby face loving girls, do you think you look sexy when you stare at me like I’m some baby? Ah, no. Not really. You look like you’re gonna put a bottle of warm milk in my mouth. Sorry, I don’t find that sexy. If you want to get with my baby face, you gotta treat me like a big boy, you know, a man.
~Posted by Sal
And it’s ten times worse for a girl with a baby face!!!! Finally a term for it: Baby Facism!!!! I get so many looks where ever I go. Not just the hot girl looks but the cute little teeny bopper baby face looks too. And from EVERYONE! Young and old. I have to wear shades and a hat to the supermarket if I don’t want everyone’s head to turn. I was at a bar last weekend and as usual, no shortage of guys to talk to, and this one guy says “you look just like my little sister”. Fine, I’ve heard it before. Next! But no, this guy stays and hits on me profusely and tries to get my number. Why would he want to go out with his little sister? Disgusting. It’s hard enough for a pretty girl to figure out if she’s loved for who she is. I have to wonder if it’s my baby face they’re after. God why’d you do this to us!!!!!!!!!!!!!
~Posted by VickyB
Dear VickyB, I totally understand. One thing I must stress is that a baby face truly isn’t a curse. I mean would you rather be ugly? (Joking, partially). While Baby Facers may feel like they’re living multiple lives they are really living one unique and dynamic life that opens our sensibility and perspective to people of all ages. That said, we must continue to confront Baby Facism. For those who are truly plagued by Baby Facism, I would recommend my very own Baby Face Mace. And no, you don’t spray it on your beautiful baby face, it’s meant for the Baby Facists. And don’t worry, it won’t kill them, it just burns a little, they’ll get the point and leave you alone. Good luck and keep posting your experiences!
~Posted by A Cup of D
First Impressions, Obama at UN & the Media as usual
09/23/2009 § 0
Major news network headlines provide some interesting choices in language and quotes immediately after President Obama’s speech at the UN today:
FOX News:
Obama: U.S. Does Not Recognize ‘Legitimacy of Continued Israeli Settlements’
Obama’s stark declaration, which drew applause, was coupled with a call for Palestinians to end their “incitement of Israel.”
[Oh, FOX, why are you so filled with hate? Out of the 40+ minute speech you had to go straight for the Israeli - Palestinian conflict. Trying to pick a fight tough guy?]
New York Times:
At U.N., Obama Sets New Tone, but Problems Are Familiar
[Everything is always familiar at the NY Times! They already know everything, past, present, future. They're like an old wisdom keeper with a touch of pessimism; they're the nation's grandpa.]
CNN:
Obama: World failing to deal with challenges
[CNN should be DSHS!, Dismal Shocking Holy Shit! But bravo for brevity as usual.]
Washington Post:
Obama Challenges World Leaders in U.N. Speech
[Simple, neutral, a touch of hope. Nothing like a good challenge.]
ABC News:
Obama to the world: We can no longer go it alone
[Here here! Sounds like a battle cry or folk or soul song? No, we can no longer go it alone. Baby, can we sit down and talk a while, we need to work this world out a little. You know how I like it. Yes, just like that.]
Yahoo! News:
Obama to world: Don’t expect America to fix it all
[Like, OMG! Do you really, like, think I'm going to clean up all this mess?! Yahoo! and News are two words that shouldn't be too close to each other.]
Wall Street Journal:
Obama Calls for New ‘Era of Engagement’
[Clean, big, grand, perfect quote. Don't expect R. Murdoch's lemmings to follow with flattery though.]
BBC:
Obama urges world to stand united
[The BBC always has the "world" and "united" in mind. They're just so nice with their cute little accents.]
USA Today:
Obama: ‘We share a common culture’
[It's not USA Today without something "common" and totally bland.]
LA Times:
Obama urges U.N. to rein in reflexive ‘anti-Americanism’
[Do people in LA really know what the word "reflexive" means? It took them long enough to understand 'anti-Americanism'.]
Obama Speech: Time For A “New Era Of Engagement”
[Huff Po, sleek and easy like an iPhone 3GS, it's hip internet news at its best. Why would I say something so stupid? Because it's not really that stupid. Huff Po conveniently posts the entire text of Obama's speech (it's mammoth and awesome, even if you can't read).]
Somethings are too true to be good
09/02/2009 § 0
So, where do you find a hot date at the bookstore?
08/30/2009 § 0
If you haven’t found a hot or at least bookishly cute date at the bookstore, then you’re probably not working your mojo right. Well, it turns out your chances of getting some action at the bookstore may be slimming. The Espresso Book Machine, a machine that will print you a book on demand at the bookstore within minutes, may put a halt to the physical act of book browsing and the potential for interaction with other book lookers. Like most everything these days, you’ll end up doing the browsing online, and when you find something you want to buy: 1) press print, 2) pick up book, 3) leave? You mean, there’s no chance to lean dramatically against the book case with a lush paper back spilling from your hands, shifting your posture every so often as you assess the literary genius; no longer can you tease the pages and test how it feels in your hands; no longer can you reach high and low for your next paperback journey and a tidbit of hope that you’ll bump into someone who’s going for the same book? And what if you just wanted to read a book in the bookstore without buying it, you’d have to read it on a computer screen. That sucks. Our eyes are already bleeding from all the computer glare.
The Espresso Book Machine (!?!) sounds like a big fat paradox. Espresso is something made quickly, it’s a quick coffee drink, books are not created quickly, they are born slow like diamonds. And machine, while books are duplicated by machines, their true creator, the author, is, like their reader, the antithesis of a machine.
New rule: books aren’t books until they’re printed and you can flip through them with your hands. The physical act of browsing for books among like minded book lookers will never die.
The Non GMO Seal: There may be no seconds for natural food
08/29/2009 § 0
Did you know that most of your food is genetically modified? (It is). Did you know that children today are being genetically modified too? That would be silly, or better, stupid; children are not genetically modified. But if you believe you are what you eat and our food supply is genetically tweaked then you may deduct that we are highly exposed to corporate lab altered genes. Genetically modified organisms (GMOs) are everywhere and thankfully there’s the Non GMO Project to let us in on this little corporate secret.
Unfortunately, given the ease in which GMOs can literally blow over to a field of non-GMOs, they can be difficult to avoid. The Non GMO seal now provided by the Non GMO Project and adopted by the Whole Foods “365″ brand is really stating that there is under 0.9% of GMOs in the product. The Non GMO Project’s website says, “it is estimated that GMOs are now present in more than 75% of the processed foods in the average grocery store.” Don’t forget that non-processed foods, i.e. that scrumptious plump juicy bright neon yellow corn you’ve been eating all summer is also genetically jacked up. Remember, there used to be hundreds of species of corn before American corporations hijacked their genetics. Corn species used to be diverse:
The New York Times reports: “With farmers using gene-altered seeds to grow much of North America’s corn, soybeans, canola and sugar, ingredients derived from biotech crops have become hard for food companies to avoid.”
Scientists, farmers and large corporations, like Monsanto, are playing God with the stuff that makes us who we are. They have snuffed all efforts to require labeling of GMOs. Meanwhile, Europe is regulating, labeling, and, most importantly, discussing openly, free of multi billion dollar corporate influence, the consequences of GMOs.
The Non GMO Project and its partnership with Whole Foods will increase awareness and education on GMOs. We can only hope that we don’t discover our genetic creations to be spiraling out of our control.
Our American freedoms we cherish so much have allowed major companies to keep us less educated and less informed. “Natural” is not natural anymore. Most “natural” corn is genetically modified, and, given its strong presence in the American diet (see the documentary King Corn), it is in fact infiltrating our genetic line.
Go on over to NonGMOProject.org, toss them a donation or arm yourself with some helpful info.
You’ll be as modified as is your food. Know what you eat and who’s messing with it. It’s no longer from the earth to your mouth; it’s from greed to power to money to lab to the earth to your mouth, and beware, it may taste good.
Fresh Colonic Salsa, Spicy …$8.95
08/19/2009 § 0
If you haven’t been lured to get a colonic or flirted with the idea, you probably will someday. Flushing out your colon can be satisfying and healthy if done correctly. It can also be expensive. And for the cheap and squeamish, like me, there’s an any easy, tasty and fun way to achieve the same effect: I’ll have the salsa, and make it spicy!
The Holy Cleanser
A colonic can cost from $55 to over $100 and many colonic hydrotherapists will recommend doing it multiple times over the course of a month. Instead of the traditional colonic irrigation, go out with friends and gorge on some spicy fresh salsa at your favorite Mexican joint. Fresh spicy salsa made to order will cost around $8.95. Throw in a margarita and some chips and guacamole, you’ll probably spend around 30 bucks and have a great time. But your Colonic Salsa is not over yet. You still have to do some work. First, drink plenty of water while downing the spicy salsa. Water, like in a traditional colonic, is key to loosening up the toxic gunk trapped in your colon. And second, you must be prepared for a jarring, tumultuous bowel movement within 6 to 8 hours of consumption. You don’t want to spend the aftermath with friends, possibly not loved ones, and definitely not at work. So plan ahead.
The red chilies in your salsa are the kicker. Literally, if you load up on the spice, you’ll feel it kick its way through your intestinal track. The red chilies will ramp up blood circulation, you’ll feel the burn in your mouth, your face will become electric and so it goes down until your innards are doing a dance that’ll shake loose the toughest toxic plaque buildup ever. If you are someone who is really sensitive to spice, just do it; mix with guacamole and rice if that helps; there are capsicum capsules for the total wimps. But nothing beats the unprocessed fresh peppers, lots of them. Take it on and you’ll feel so much cleaner and lighter, after the burn.
Fresh Colonic Salsa, the ultimate in do-it-yourself colonic. You deserve a little less toxins in your body and it shouldn’t take a doctor or assistant (!) pumping water up your bum to do the job.
And here’s an important tip: when ordering your spicy salsa make sure you say it in a very serious, almost stern manner. You need not say “extra” spicy if you just say it in the right tone. The order in which you use “spicy” and “salsa” is also important, don’t ask for “spicy salsa”, instead, say, “I’ll have the fresh salsa, spicy.” This is a serious undertaking and you want them to know you’re ready, that you are humbled and respectful of the word “spicy”, it stands alone. Also, don’t be afraid to wink at your server/bartender when ordering, they’ll understand you’re asking for them to deliver the pain.