I'm still not sure if my previous post was legit what-the-heck commentary or participating in what i was bemoaning. But fortunately, my friend dirt (whose blog is much more eloquent than mine, even if she doesn't have the privilege of drawing on kid-generated potty humor for content) blogged this article by Robin Morgan today.
As dirt says, she voices issues better than I ever could. Just go read it.
There's no candidate who shares all my views, but more and more I'm getting to like Hillary, and I'm ashamed to say I was surprised to like her. I'm more ashamed to say that the reason I was surprised was that I'd bought into the popular perception of her. You know: the ice queen. The politico who never could be as wifey or maternal as probably she should be. The bulldog.
Why I never saw this as the double-standard and sexism that it is is beyond me. Maybe because it's become the norm. (I was going to describe it as "thinly veiled sexism" in the previous sentence until I realized it isn't veiled at all. Just not looked at.) Maybe because on the few occasions I have brought up such attitudes, I'm quickly shot down with a response that says, you're basically being paranoid. We don't need the gender movement anymore. Does more harm than good. And besides, no one is being denied any on-paper rights, are they? How is it that anyone's being repressed? Aren't you being a little over-sensitive?
Maybe it's because I do indeed have a few views that are considered pretty conservative, pretty red-state. Maybe not most of my views, but I've been in a constant mental dialogue with myself trying to reconcile these few views with the subconscious recognition that this issue isn't settled.
A friend a while back asked me if I was a feminist. I proceeded to talk at extreme length (what, me? I know, shocking) about how of course I was a feminist, but not like you think, not like the raving, shrill voices you hear. How I'm fully justified being both a feminist and conservative in a small handful of issues, because really, as I see it, I'm being more philosophically consistent. (At this point I launched into an extremely long treatise on just why and how I was being philosophically consistent. Again, I know. Shocking.)
But really, I was just trying to justify it to myself. Am I a feminist?
Yeah, I guess I am. And I'm pretty shrill sometimes, even.
Seriously. Go read Robin Morgan's article.
Also, watch this video. It's a few years old, but ... wow. Just wow. If three guys younger than my brother can put words to the issue, I am put to much more shame than I realized.
(Back to our regularly scheduled poopy and pukey humor in the next post.)
Saturday, February 9, 2008
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Bite me (Or: Licentious! Or: Lice in da hood)
(Or maybe Itchy and Scratchy.)
(So very punny today.)
What's the most helpful phone call you might hope to receive when you're writing to deadline, pressed for time, hoping against hope that you can make use of every second from now until it's time to pick up your son from school?
Why, a phone call from the school nurse an hour early, of course. Informing you that your son has an infested head and is waiting to be picked up.
So, the deadlines and the using-seconds-efficiently and all that went on hold, naturally, to be replaced by an odd-smelling spray treatment and highly resistant-to-being-sprayed child.
And after we'd finally sprayed, massaged, soaked, rinsed, dried and were combing:
"What are you looking for?"
"Eggs. I want to make sure there aren't any eggs left in your hair."
"Eggs? Can't we leave them in? I'm like a nest!"
"No, David, we can't leave them in. I need to ki ... er, check to make sure there aren't any eggs."
"Can I see a baby one?"
I'm off now, to wash everything in the house and boil the comb. Every single itch now is making me paranoid. My husband and I agreed to check each other's heads this evening. Should make for a fun evening.
(So very punny today.)
What's the most helpful phone call you might hope to receive when you're writing to deadline, pressed for time, hoping against hope that you can make use of every second from now until it's time to pick up your son from school?
Why, a phone call from the school nurse an hour early, of course. Informing you that your son has an infested head and is waiting to be picked up.
So, the deadlines and the using-seconds-efficiently and all that went on hold, naturally, to be replaced by an odd-smelling spray treatment and highly resistant-to-being-sprayed child.
And after we'd finally sprayed, massaged, soaked, rinsed, dried and were combing:
"What are you looking for?"
"Eggs. I want to make sure there aren't any eggs left in your hair."
"Eggs? Can't we leave them in? I'm like a nest!"
"No, David, we can't leave them in. I need to ki ... er, check to make sure there aren't any eggs."
"Can I see a baby one?"
I'm off now, to wash everything in the house and boil the comb. Every single itch now is making me paranoid. My husband and I agreed to check each other's heads this evening. Should make for a fun evening.
Monday, February 4, 2008
Guess where the snow ended up?
I was reading writing advice a little while back that said something about (I'm paraphrasing here) one of the best introductions to short pieces, like blog entries or short articles, was what they called the "irresistible question." I feel my natural tendencies, probably from journalism training, resisting this, and I'm sure in overuse it is pretty horrid. But maybe there's something to it in some forms. My son's favorite poriferan is introduced thus, as are half the news articles I hear. ("Why is Huckabee a thorn in the Republicans' side?" "Why is this local merchant slimier than a snake in the grass?" "Why are local police walking on eggshells?" "Why do newscasters insist upon using tired, ill-fitting clichés?")
I'm not sure about employing it myself. But I do know my son already seems to be an expert at this technique. He leads off with questions more often than not, and they tend to be irresistible, if not always in a good way and if only because of the connotation.
An example:
On the way home from school: "Guess what happened to Reginald today in the cafeteria?"
Me (pretty sure I didn't want to know what happened to Reginald in the cafeteria today): "What?"
Him: "Reginald must have been hungry, because he ate a lot, I mean a LOT, and then he looked real funny, and then he made a face like this (the rear view mirror revealed a crumpled chin, twisted lips and squeezed shut eyes) and he threw up! All over the place! And it made a splashing sound like this (you don't really want me to describe it, do you?) and it splashed all over!"
Or, following the seemingly innocuous intro question, "Guess what?" at the restauruant with my in-laws yesterday: "Hey. Hey! Hey, guess what? I threw snow at Mom, and she was bent over, and it went in her shirt, and" (here the restaurant went preternaturally quiet as his voice rises to a shout) "AND it went in her BRA!" (Uncontrollable giggling ensued.)
Even if his question is a request for information, he's as likely to contribute to the ensuing conversation as anyone. Which can make for interesting conversation.
Some other "irresistible questions":
"What happens if I spill a lot of something on the couch?"
"Why is the cat putting his ears back at me?"
"Can I get something out if I stick it in the keyboard?"
"If I tell the truth, will you be mad?"
"Why can't I lick that?"
"If I need to wipe up a whole lot of something, where are the towels?"
"What's the difference between feeling like you need to cough and feeling like you need to throw up?"
I'm not sure about employing it myself. But I do know my son already seems to be an expert at this technique. He leads off with questions more often than not, and they tend to be irresistible, if not always in a good way and if only because of the connotation.
An example:
On the way home from school: "Guess what happened to Reginald today in the cafeteria?"
Me (pretty sure I didn't want to know what happened to Reginald in the cafeteria today): "What?"
Him: "Reginald must have been hungry, because he ate a lot, I mean a LOT, and then he looked real funny, and then he made a face like this (the rear view mirror revealed a crumpled chin, twisted lips and squeezed shut eyes) and he threw up! All over the place! And it made a splashing sound like this (you don't really want me to describe it, do you?) and it splashed all over!"
Or, following the seemingly innocuous intro question, "Guess what?" at the restauruant with my in-laws yesterday: "Hey. Hey! Hey, guess what? I threw snow at Mom, and she was bent over, and it went in her shirt, and" (here the restaurant went preternaturally quiet as his voice rises to a shout) "AND it went in her BRA!" (Uncontrollable giggling ensued.)
Even if his question is a request for information, he's as likely to contribute to the ensuing conversation as anyone. Which can make for interesting conversation.
Some other "irresistible questions":
"What happens if I spill a lot of something on the couch?"
"Why is the cat putting his ears back at me?"
"Can I get something out if I stick it in the keyboard?"
"If I tell the truth, will you be mad?"
"Why can't I lick that?"
"If I need to wipe up a whole lot of something, where are the towels?"
"What's the difference between feeling like you need to cough and feeling like you need to throw up?"
Monday, January 28, 2008
Dirty words
A conversation about/with my son recently:
His teacher: I think you might want to talk to your son. Some other students said he said a bad word.
Me: Which word was it?
Her: ???
Me: I mean, I'll talk to him no matter what. I just wondered which word it was so I might know where he picked it up.
(I didn't tell her I assumed it was "damn," owing to a "dammit-dammit-dammit" montage that had slipped past my and my husband's censoring remote control trigger fingers during prime time.)
Her: Well, I think it was ... (Here there was a pregnant pause, then whispering as if he'd committed manslaughter during arts and crafts. I love kindergarten teachers. They're the only people I know cleaner-mouthed than me.) ... shit. The students all said they heard him say the S word.
Me: Really? I have no idea where he would have picked up that word. (I really didn't.)
Her: (Skeptical, unbelieving evil eye.)
Later in the car:
Me: David, did you get in trouble for saying a word you shouldn't today?
Him: Yeah. I'm sorry. (Here he made the breathy, lip-flappy about-to-cry noise.)
Me: It's OK, as long as you learned not to say it anymore.
Him: Oh, I did! (Long, mucusy, relieved sniff.)
Me: Can you tell me what the word was?
Him: ...
Me: It's OK, if you're telling me to let me know it doesn't count as saying it.
Him: Well ... it was the S word.
Me: The S word? Do you know what that word means?
Him: It means someone's not very smart. But I only was talking about what someone did!
Me: Wait a minute. What exactly did you say?
Him: The S word! (More quietly): Stupid.
Me: Stupid?
Him: Yeah. And I'm sorry. I was only talking about what they did, and it was stupid because it was mean, and I know you told me it's different than calling somebody stupid, but at school we can't say it at all, and I forgot. But I won't say that or any of the other letter words any more.
Me: The other letter words?
Him: Yeah. The F word, the S word, the D word, the C word or the M word. (Getting into it now, clearly pleased with his free pass to say verboten words): We can't say freak, or stupid, or dumb, creep or moron.
Me: (Quietly reveling in the extreme privilege that is having a child who is still a child, and is likely to remain unaware of other forbidden F, S, D, C, and M words for quite some time): That's probably a good idea.
Him: But I heard one of the boys call a girl a poopface. I don't think we should say the P word either.
Me: I think you're right.
His teacher: I think you might want to talk to your son. Some other students said he said a bad word.
Me: Which word was it?
Her: ???
Me: I mean, I'll talk to him no matter what. I just wondered which word it was so I might know where he picked it up.
(I didn't tell her I assumed it was "damn," owing to a "dammit-dammit-dammit" montage that had slipped past my and my husband's censoring remote control trigger fingers during prime time.)
Her: Well, I think it was ... (Here there was a pregnant pause, then whispering as if he'd committed manslaughter during arts and crafts. I love kindergarten teachers. They're the only people I know cleaner-mouthed than me.) ... shit. The students all said they heard him say the S word.
Me: Really? I have no idea where he would have picked up that word. (I really didn't.)
Her: (Skeptical, unbelieving evil eye.)
Later in the car:
Me: David, did you get in trouble for saying a word you shouldn't today?
Him: Yeah. I'm sorry. (Here he made the breathy, lip-flappy about-to-cry noise.)
Me: It's OK, as long as you learned not to say it anymore.
Him: Oh, I did! (Long, mucusy, relieved sniff.)
Me: Can you tell me what the word was?
Him: ...
Me: It's OK, if you're telling me to let me know it doesn't count as saying it.
Him: Well ... it was the S word.
Me: The S word? Do you know what that word means?
Him: It means someone's not very smart. But I only was talking about what someone did!
Me: Wait a minute. What exactly did you say?
Him: The S word! (More quietly): Stupid.
Me: Stupid?
Him: Yeah. And I'm sorry. I was only talking about what they did, and it was stupid because it was mean, and I know you told me it's different than calling somebody stupid, but at school we can't say it at all, and I forgot. But I won't say that or any of the other letter words any more.
Me: The other letter words?
Him: Yeah. The F word, the S word, the D word, the C word or the M word. (Getting into it now, clearly pleased with his free pass to say verboten words): We can't say freak, or stupid, or dumb, creep or moron.
Me: (Quietly reveling in the extreme privilege that is having a child who is still a child, and is likely to remain unaware of other forbidden F, S, D, C, and M words for quite some time): That's probably a good idea.
Him: But I heard one of the boys call a girl a poopface. I don't think we should say the P word either.
Me: I think you're right.
Who lives in a pineapple under the sea?
C'mon; you know you know it.
How you know you love your son:
You sit through several, several rounds of SpongeBob Go Fish, knowing you'll be treated to this sound each time he gets a pair.
And you actually like it.
How you know you love your son:
You sit through several, several rounds of SpongeBob Go Fish, knowing you'll be treated to this sound each time he gets a pair.
And you actually like it.
Sunday, January 27, 2008
Inanity in my life and the news
More bona fide blogging to come, but now:
It seems like the news stories I'm reading today were all designed to aggravate me.
Lindsay Lohan is apparently preparing to write her life story. Um, don't you have to, I don't know, live several years of life before doing that?
A family (using the term loosely) was nabbed when three generations, as young as five years old for Pete's sake (yeah, I'm a member of the geezer club now; I say "for Pete's sake" in real conversation as well), were caught shoplifting from Target. Five years old! I never planned to use the acronym, but: WTF? I learned a lot of things from my parents, useful things like "how to drive," "how to wipe oneself," "how to eat Buffalo wings the proper way (with blue cheese, of course)," and "how to read." Also maybe some not so useful things like "how to properly appreciate (and obsess over) Star Trek," "how to make brownies the right way (with frosting, of course)," "how to properly recite the 1983 starting lineup of the St. Louis Cardinals," "how to play every version of poker known to man," "why a pool table is green (you would be too if someone was knocking your balls around all day; har har)," and "how to convince your third grade teacher you didn't learn about poker and the pool table from your dad." But fortunately, "how to shoplift" or "when to remove your class project to free up backpack space for hot electronics" were not among my lessons.
Idiots.
Also making me a little mad, for different reasons, is this story about an idiotic fight that netted a couple $800,000 for their petty douchebaggery. Apparently a guy's girlfriend kept giving him grief about a pair of jeans he promised to get for her at a casino boutique (I didn't even know they had "casino boutiques," save to sell those skimpy dresses like Demi Moore wears in Indecent Proposal), and to shut her the heck up, he finally relented to get the stupid jeans, whereupon he played slots to kill time, and won big time.
What the heck? My husband and I fight about stupid crap all the time. Where's the payoff?
(Seriously. We fight about the normal stuff: sex, money, sex, kid-rearing stuff, sex, scheduling, and sex. But we have some seriously dumb fights as well. Two of our last fights: First, we fought about what size of trash can we should have in the kitchen. Seriously. And last, we fought because we were both unsatisfied with the lack of response from the other when we played the "What do you want to do tonight" game. We both wanted to watch a movie and maybe play a game, but by the time we discovered this, it was too late. I've ended a few such discussions by storming out of the room, whereupon I remember we live in a small apartment, with nowhere to storm to. So I storm into the bathroom, and slam the sliding door, which slides back open, naturally, making me feel like an even bigger dumbass. I then slam it more deliberately, whereupon I realize that hey, I'm in the bathroom, with not much more to do than use the facilities in an angry fashion. I suck at arguing.)
But we've never gotten a payoff like that. So not fair.
Then there's this story, whose subhead says it all: A driver hit a man in the head with an orange, then tried to hit him with his car, deputies say.
Idiots.
My horoscope, meanwhile, claims: "Your brainy side is on display today and you might spend at least a little while lost in deep thoughts."
Yeah, not so much. The brainiest and deepest I've gotten today was either when I discussed (with a vengeance) the virtues of eating one's peanut butter sandwich and not spitting it on the plate in protest, or when I was seriously proud of myself for beating the boss battle in my son's new video game.
More, hopefully brainier, blogging to come.
It seems like the news stories I'm reading today were all designed to aggravate me.
Lindsay Lohan is apparently preparing to write her life story. Um, don't you have to, I don't know, live several years of life before doing that?
A family (using the term loosely) was nabbed when three generations, as young as five years old for Pete's sake (yeah, I'm a member of the geezer club now; I say "for Pete's sake" in real conversation as well), were caught shoplifting from Target. Five years old! I never planned to use the acronym, but: WTF? I learned a lot of things from my parents, useful things like "how to drive," "how to wipe oneself," "how to eat Buffalo wings the proper way (with blue cheese, of course)," and "how to read." Also maybe some not so useful things like "how to properly appreciate (and obsess over) Star Trek," "how to make brownies the right way (with frosting, of course)," "how to properly recite the 1983 starting lineup of the St. Louis Cardinals," "how to play every version of poker known to man," "why a pool table is green (you would be too if someone was knocking your balls around all day; har har)," and "how to convince your third grade teacher you didn't learn about poker and the pool table from your dad." But fortunately, "how to shoplift" or "when to remove your class project to free up backpack space for hot electronics" were not among my lessons.
Idiots.
Also making me a little mad, for different reasons, is this story about an idiotic fight that netted a couple $800,000 for their petty douchebaggery. Apparently a guy's girlfriend kept giving him grief about a pair of jeans he promised to get for her at a casino boutique (I didn't even know they had "casino boutiques," save to sell those skimpy dresses like Demi Moore wears in Indecent Proposal), and to shut her the heck up, he finally relented to get the stupid jeans, whereupon he played slots to kill time, and won big time.
What the heck? My husband and I fight about stupid crap all the time. Where's the payoff?
(Seriously. We fight about the normal stuff: sex, money, sex, kid-rearing stuff, sex, scheduling, and sex. But we have some seriously dumb fights as well. Two of our last fights: First, we fought about what size of trash can we should have in the kitchen. Seriously. And last, we fought because we were both unsatisfied with the lack of response from the other when we played the "What do you want to do tonight" game. We both wanted to watch a movie and maybe play a game, but by the time we discovered this, it was too late. I've ended a few such discussions by storming out of the room, whereupon I remember we live in a small apartment, with nowhere to storm to. So I storm into the bathroom, and slam the sliding door, which slides back open, naturally, making me feel like an even bigger dumbass. I then slam it more deliberately, whereupon I realize that hey, I'm in the bathroom, with not much more to do than use the facilities in an angry fashion. I suck at arguing.)
But we've never gotten a payoff like that. So not fair.
Then there's this story, whose subhead says it all: A driver hit a man in the head with an orange, then tried to hit him with his car, deputies say.
Idiots.
My horoscope, meanwhile, claims: "Your brainy side is on display today and you might spend at least a little while lost in deep thoughts."
Yeah, not so much. The brainiest and deepest I've gotten today was either when I discussed (with a vengeance) the virtues of eating one's peanut butter sandwich and not spitting it on the plate in protest, or when I was seriously proud of myself for beating the boss battle in my son's new video game.
More, hopefully brainier, blogging to come.
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
I'll be back soon
I just wanted to do a quick post to say sorry for being MIA the past several days. I've been busy wrapping up, and subsequently going over, the first (very, very rough) draft of my manuscript, and I've let most other things take a back seat to that. I do plan to return tomorrow or the day after with a post or two, not the least of which is my and my husband's one-year anniversary December 2. And other stuff. Stay tuned.
One thing: I had the bulk of my manuscript, a hundred and forty-some-odd pages, on the table for a read-through. My cat evidently decided I was neglecting him, and when I got up for a drink hopped on the table and promptly shoved the whole mess to the floor, whereupon the unbound pages did that flutter-scatter thing loose pages are wont to do. (Luckily, they were numbered. Still, it took a while to put it back together.) He is very lucky I'm writing so much lately about stewardship of nature and animals, and that I have an abiding desire to not feel like a hypocrite. Otherwise the offending paw might have been in jeopardy.
(I'm kidding, of course. I'm a huge softy. But I did hold him at eye level and lecture him sternly. Which was exactly as futile and foolish-looking as it sounds.)
One thing: I had the bulk of my manuscript, a hundred and forty-some-odd pages, on the table for a read-through. My cat evidently decided I was neglecting him, and when I got up for a drink hopped on the table and promptly shoved the whole mess to the floor, whereupon the unbound pages did that flutter-scatter thing loose pages are wont to do. (Luckily, they were numbered. Still, it took a while to put it back together.) He is very lucky I'm writing so much lately about stewardship of nature and animals, and that I have an abiding desire to not feel like a hypocrite. Otherwise the offending paw might have been in jeopardy.
(I'm kidding, of course. I'm a huge softy. But I did hold him at eye level and lecture him sternly. Which was exactly as futile and foolish-looking as it sounds.)
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