Bitch. Ph.D.

NO on Stupak

2009-11-07T09:41:00.000-08:00

Whose Leaning on Stupak? Is it Your Rep? RHRealityCheck.org

From RHRCheck:

The House will vote this morning on an amendment to the health reform bill that if passed will effectively ban private insurance plans from providing coverage for abortion care.

Where does your rep stand?

These Dems lean pro-choice but need shoring up. Click here to find your representative and tell them to vote no on Stupak.

Arcuri (D, NY-24)
Bean (D, IL-08)
Bishop, S. (D, GA-02)
Boswell (D, IA-03)
Butterfield (D, NC-01)
Cardoza (D, CA-18)
Chandler (D, KY-06)
Cooper (D, TN-05)
Costa (D, CA-20)
Doyle (D, PA-14)
Edwards, C. (D, TX-17)
Etheridge (D, NC-02)
Gordon (D, TN-06)
Kratovil (D, MD-01)
Langevin (D, RI-02)
McMahon (D, NY-13)
Michaud (D, ME-02)
Minnick (D, ID-01)
Neal (D, MA-02)
Nye (D, VA-02)
Obey (D, WI-07)
Owens (D, NY-23)
Ruppersberger (D, MD-02)
Ryan, T. (D, OH-17)
Salazar (D, CO-03)
Space (D, OH-18)

The Wonk Room reports they have the votes to pass Stupak so we have to shave off support; so even if your rep isn't on this list, send a message.
I know. It's Saturday. But what else you got to do?

In the Name of the Most Merciful God

2009-11-07T07:52:00.008-08:00

We believe in God, and in that which has been sent down on us and sent down on Abraham, Ishmael, Isaac and Jacob, and the Tribes, and that which was given to Moses and Jesus and the Prophets, of their Lord; we make no division between any of them, and to Him we surrender.
-Chapter 2, verses 135-136, the Holy Koran

The splitters, the dividers, the haters, the impious and the blasphemers, the traitorous trolls are trying to exploit the Fort Hood outrage to turn Americans one against the other.

They will, of course, fail.

They know they will fail but, in the interval, they hope to subvert our national grief and turn it into something ugly, something filthy, something they can employ to deface our American people and make us as ugly as them. They want to shame our country but they only shame themselves.

I stand with the followers of Islam against the haters. I stand with the Muslims of our country against the liars. I will not tolerate any slanders against the Muslims of our country because that is a slander against our country.

With our Muslim countrymen and countrywomen, I pray for those lost and wounded at Fort Hood and for their friends and family. With them, I pray for our country.

go 'head on, shoshana johnson

2009-11-06T13:59:00.002-08:00

What happens when you get someone who knows what they're talking about on Larry King? This. Sure, read the post and look at the graph, but click on the Larry King video clip.

Minute 3.00 to 3.40 is beautiousness.

'I'm a POW! I got shot!'

I could look at that again and again. In fact, I will.

A Vacation From Unemployment

2009-11-06T09:33:00.001-08:00

Well, we're coming up on the end of week three of my being unemployed, and so far I haven't managed to write a single blog post. I'm kind of sad that no one seems to be worried about me! But I'm fine. I could blame it on the fact that we don't have internet at home, which I'm waffling on whether we should get, but that's probably not the real reason. The real reason is that I'm unemployed, which is harder work than actually working.

But I'm taking a vacation from being unemployed today. No, today I'm not unemployed--I'm on vacation. Or taking a sick day. Whatever. Because yes, I am on my fucking period and my whole life I have wanted to be able to just take the day off on that dreaded Day One of menstruation where I am lethargic, bloated, tired, and writhing with cramps. But no, there has always been school or work or It's The Weekend And I Must Do Stuff. My last period Day One I had to spend the entire day packing and moving and trudging up and down the 3 flights of stairs to my old apartment approximately thirty times.

Today, my friends, I can take the day off. So far I have reorganized all the apps on my phone, deleted the ones I don't use and downloaded some new ones, and formulated plans to go to a fancy event at an art gallery alone tonight which I will probably end up not fulfulling because no one is counting on me and I am lazy. I have made eggs with the crumbly, salty Salvadoran cheese from the market up the street that I am currently obsessed with. Other than that, I have laid in bed. It is glorious.

This is the first time in my adult life that I've had both nothing to do and no prospects of having anything to do. Since age 18, I've gone from job to school to job and back again in an endless loop of productivity. But right now, there are no future plans for me except 1) I am going to California for Christmas; and 2) I am getting married in Wisconsin next August. Other than that, I've got nada. Zip. Zero. No job interviews, no social plans, no weekend visitors for whom I must prepare the house. No projects to complete, no papers to write, no briefs to file or status conferences to attend. No court dates. No lunch appointments.

But I still feel busy. Because I am unemployed, I feel like I must take care of everything else that is not working. I feel like I must plan the meals, I must do the shopping, I must assemble the IKEA bookcases, I must do the mountain of dishes that keeps on coming and coming and coming, I must do and fold the laundry. I must pay my bills on time and I must, above all, Take Care Of Business. Because there are no clients to call or meetings to keep or memoranda to draft, if I want to feel like I'm getting anything done I must always be sending faxes and sending out resumes and emailing people and networking and running errands of various kinds.

So yesterday I got my DC drivers license, which is unconscionably ugly, and got the car inspected. I did a huge shopping trip and bought a semi-boneless leg of lamb which I cooked up for dinner. I spent several hours trying to find a reasonably-priced flight to California (result: there are none). I certified my claim for unemployment benefits, which I will probably not receive because I worked for three days at a temp legal job which was well-paid and the most boring thing I have ever done. I wanted to lie about it, but papa don't play like that and I am not about to get in trouble. I made calls to the insurance company, the bank that owns my car, and the insurance company again. I filled out forms to get forbearance on my voluminous student loans. I filled out forms to try to get me and my dude admitted to the District of Columbia bar, which I'm really wondering if we're going to be able to do any time soon because it costs a fortune.

Are you bored yet? I am.

And then after all that there are the dishes, which will not stop coming. Seriously. How does a "family" of two produce so many goddamn dishes? Since I am unemployed and we have basically no money, our eating-out frequency has gone from very high to almost zero. Maybe things would be easier if I just fed us lean cuisines or sandwiches or something, but I can not bear to eat that crap and so everything we eat is a production made from scratch which dirties each and every one of the five pans we own.

I feel guilty. I feel guilty for not doing more. The house is still basically in shambles. We have way too much stuff and this apartment is pretty small (although gloriously delightful and in a fantastic location) so there is nowhere to put it. The dresser is overflowing with clothes, there are stacks of books on the floor. There are boxes everywhere, empty and full. We have no couch. And I have no idea where the next money I'll get will come from. But I feel like I should be doing Everything, because hey, I don't have a job. I am realizing that I would make a very, very poor housewife. I like cooking, but I like it in that "event" way, the way that dana says a lot of young men like to cook. I like cooking elaborate things that I have never cooked before. I like a challenge. I do not like things that are rote or routine or things that I am sure will not be a complete failure. I hate all other household chores that are not cooking, except maybe cleaning the bathroom because it is easy and satisfying and disgusting. I hate sitting at home wondering when my boyfriend will get home to entertain me. I hate feeling like I should only go places that I can walk to because why should I spend money on gas or the metro if I don't have to?

There are hardly any jobs. The job announcement pipeline is pretty hollow and echoey. I haven't heard about a position that interests me and that I'm qualified for in over a month. At this point, I'd be satisfied with some more temp work just to get some money in my bank account, but I have no idea whether that will come tomorrow or two months from now.

But I'm done whining. Today is my vacation day, and tomorrow I go back to the "work" of being unemployed. And really, it's good. My health is good. It is joyous beyond description to be back with my best friend and partner again, to share the banal moments of living, to wake up and chatter nonsense at eachother in the dark of morning, to stay up fighting late into the night, to fuck at noon on the weekend before brunch. I kind of like not having anywhere I have to be, and having time to reflect on my career and my goals. The fall weather in DC is beautiful and the trees are shocking colors of red and yellow.

So, it's good. But very different.

Pseudonymous Kid is a poet

2009-11-05T21:18:00.003-08:00

In summer, it's warm.
In fall, everything falls down.
In winter, it's cold.

Flowers are yellow.
Leaves are usually green.
Sticks are brown: the plant.

Standing on a pole.
Octagonally shaped.
White words. Stop sign.

Luna is a cat.
Luna is very furry.
She hates Medusa.

A furry fuzz form
Darting from room to room. Flash!
It attacks! The cat.

gimme guidance: the GOP Health Care Plan

2009-11-04T07:08:00.003-08:00

The Wonk Room reads the GOP Health Care Plan So I don't have to but that doesn't prevent me from being confused (which I'm completely at ease with admitting.)

My main takeaway: this plan screws over women (check out what it might mean for reproductive access), poor people and basically does nothing to 'reform' anything. Right? Or an oversimplification that might be close to the truth?

Anyway, if there's a diligent, apt, and pithy Bitch reader out there who can give a smart assessment/opinion on this plan vs. whatever plan is currently on the floor (there are several?), with a particular eye toward how this and other plans impact women and the poor (because none of the talking heads ever talk about that), I'd be extremely grateful.

Help a Ding out.

An insider’s primer (or rant) on 'pork'

2009-11-03T09:34:00.004-08:00

Work, as usual, is kicking my ass. Tomorrow I’m supposed to take the Metra train out to the end of the Milwaukee West line to pitch a conservative GOP congressman’s staffer on why they should include my organization on his list of projects for the FY11 fiscal year. It'll be my third such meeting in the past month - which means I’m submitting 3 proposals to 3 different congressional offices for earmarks. Yeah, I’m talking about pork!

When folks get upset about 'pork' it's really clear they have no frakking clue what it takes to get it. And when politicians get huffy about it, it makes me even angrier because they should freaking know better. (I'm talking to you, McCain!)

The whole process is a crap shoot - especially if you're not a hospital, museum, research facility, university or extremely loaded agency with juiced up board members and/or lobbyists or consultants. If you’re like my agency, you send someone like me to talk to a staffer, pitch your org, gauge their interest and then fire a short proposal into the air and if it lands, we all cross our fingers.

Because the process doesn’t stop there.

If you're lucky enough to actually get through the district staffer then you have to get through the DC staffer, who'll be creating the priority list for the congressman/senator to review and approve. And then, if you survive that round, you still might not make the final list submitted to the appropriations committee. (If you’re submitting in a competitive district then the office only wants to back up proposals that have a good chance of making it. And if the environment is hostile toward earmarks, staffers want to make sure they beat the odds. So your little bitty proposal is competing with hundreds, when the office only wants to submit four. Nice, huh?) If you make it onto the committee list you might have a chance of making it through to the omnibus bill, but it all depends on how the budget negotiations for that fiscal year proceed.

In other words, when you're not hooked up with a lobbyist or a personal connection to the elected official, if a little org like mine gets 'pork' it is a frakking miracle. And sheer luck.

But once you get it, you don't really 'get' it. The process shifts from being discretionary ('hey, they do good work and could use some support') to a formal grant process, with all the attendant headaches. Have you ever written a grant proposal for a federal agency? They are frakking long, complicated and onerous. Most human services agencies don't have the capacity to write one because it takes an experienced team to do one well. There are budgets, narratives, assurances, logic models, research, and metrics that have to be submitted. In other words, these congressional awards aren’t a walk in the park - they make you work for your pork. They want every staffer or dollar accounted for - if you say you're going to spend $87.50 for a brochure, at the end of the award year your expenses better damn well reflect $87.50 spent for a brochure.

If you survive the grant application process (which could take a while) then it needs to be reviewed by their legal and compliance folks, which takes even more time. Then, if you are up to muster, you finally become a contractor with the federal government. When it comes to pork, you don't just receive a fat check in the mail to do with what you will. They either disburse it in small chunks per quarter or you incur the initial cost of providing the service and they reimburse you for the expense - later.

There is nothing ‘easy’ about pork.

And don't even get me started on how long it takes for this process to roll out. If you're applying for the FY11 appropriations year, anticipate getting money in your hot little hand maybe 18-24 months after you submitted your proposal. That's FY13. Do you have any idea what that does to an organization’s budgeting and forecasting process? How can you plan/hire for that program when the means for that program won't exist for another 18-24 months? And how do you count that money? Is that included in your FY11 budget or the fiscal year of the receipt of the pork?

And?!? This is one-time money. That's it. One year of funding to pilot or support a program and then - poof! Gone. It's a lot of effort for brief relief.

On the other hand, it’s a lot of effort for a community org to get funding to provide services to needy populations. It can mean the birth or expansion of a program, the survival of staff and the strengthening of a community. That's the only payoff that makes pursuing pork worthwhile.

So don't talk to me about how pork is ‘evil’ until you’ve walked over the coals to get it. Grrr.

Ok. Work-rant over. Carry on.

Go Fuck Yourself

2009-11-03T09:23:00.001-08:00

And your mediocre record.

Sexists, the lot of you

2009-11-02T14:00:00.002-08:00

We all know you guys like Taddy best, so I figured you'd want to know that today is his LAST CHEMO TREATMENT. As I write he is either puking up his guts for (hopefully) the last time, or napping like the old man he pretends he isn't, or most likely bugging his caretakers about how damn bored he is.

In any case, here is a thread for everyone to congratulate him on the end of chemo and wish him a speedy recovery. Here's hoping he's back to his old self before the cows come home.

Anarchy

2009-10-31T18:44:00.004-07:00

OK, let's go over this again.

You do not just hand out the trick or treat candy capriciously, willy-nilly, according to whatever comes quickly to hand.

No. No. No.

There is a system and it must be followed. If not strictly followed, I, I mean, you, risk ending the evening with a bunch of candy I, I mean, you don't like, having given out the good stuff in the early going.

So, let's review; hand out the sweeties in the order following: Smarties, Skittles, M&M plain, M&M peanut, Three Musketeer bars, Snickers bars, and then and only then, Reese's Peanut butter cups. Only after all supplies are exhausted do you dig into the Reese's.

Are we clear?

OK, then. Carry on.

Wonderin Where the Lions Are

2009-10-31T10:38:00.007-07:00

Report from the Four Corners:
Booker's calf has been found.

Booker (short for Ubukwele) is queen of our dairy herd. From time to time she asserts the royal prerogative. Like, when there's a gap in the home pasture fencing.

This year, she asserted her self with Tango, the neighbor's bull. Thirty-eight weeks later, she was delivered of a handsome Hereford-Shorthorn crossbreed bull calf.

Now, we think the world of Booker and wish her every happiness but these matches must be carefully planned and even, uh, chaperoned. Romance, even a one-night stand, between lovers who tip the scale at a half to three-quarters ton per each is not a thing to be undertaken lightly. Know what I mean?

And, although one hates to bring up the subject of money where love is concerned, there's a fair amount of cash and income at stake with these critters. Even at current depressed milk prices, Booker will turn over three to four thousand a year. Dollars, that is.

Our dairy herd is only twelve milking cows. Then, there's a couple more freshening and a couple more resting. This is not the Ponderosa, you know. Even if you are not a dairy farmer, you can do the math. Losing Booker's production for the time it takes to wean her calf is a significant loss of income.

But, true love will not be denied. Booker dotes on her calf, Booker T, as do the rest of us. Booker T cause his mama is Booker and his daddy is Tango. Get it?

He's a cutie; full of hijinks and, despite his mixed breeding or, maybe, because of it, shows every promise of being a handsome and muscular prince of the herd.

Rather, he did show promise. Booker's calf disappeared a week ago. Booker has been inconsolable ever since, bawling for her little one at all hours. She does not eat and drinks only a little. She can't even bring up a cud. My niece had to stick a dishrag in her mouth to give her something to work on.

Then, about a day ago, Booker T's remains turned up. They were lodged in a Red Pine, about 20' off the ground. That is lion sign.

Officially, there are no lions around here. Officially.

The old timers say different. Every once in awhile you hear about someone coming across lion sign; scat or blazes on a tree, stuff like that. Myself, I've never seen anything like that and I've been up and down all these canyons and washes.

There are plenty of lion in northern Colorado, of course. They've even been seen in the Denver suburbs, dining on Labradors and German Shepherds. I think it was only last spring that a lion was treed in the backyard of a home in Golden CO, home of Coors Beer.

The Front Range habitat is much different than the San Juan range, though. A lot more cover for a big animal like the Mountain Lion. Here, even the well watered slopes are kind of sparse. Lion are notoriously shy creatures and do not like to move across exposed country of any kind.

Still, hard to imagine what else could hoist a hundred plus pound carcass up into the tree canopy. As if poor markets, depressed prices, down gates, and lovestruck cows weren't enough problems for a hard working dairyman. Now I got to wonder where the lions are.

Thursday Gathering of the Nations Dance Blogging

2009-10-29T07:20:00.020-07:00

The Ojibwe clans are holding an autumn pow-wow in town this weekend.

If my white blood count will permit, my nieces, Meche and Katherine, promise to take me to watch the dancers.

Most Ojibwe dances have healing power, especially the Jingle Dress dance and the Fancy Shawl dance. So, you know, it should be good for me.

I'm nearly at the end of my chemical therapy. One treatment left.

Still, probably be awhile before I'm ready for a Round Dance.

Only Connect

2009-10-29T06:14:00.003-07:00

What do you even say about this? You feel ill, mostly. You feel so sad and ill.

And possibly one might say that you and you are part of the problem:

So what’s your take on Polanski, this many years later?

I really don’t give a fuck. Look, am I going to sit and weep every time a young hooker feels as though she’s been taken advantage of?

Hmm.

“I say that Foer’s ethical charge against animal eating is brave because not only is it unpopular, it has also been characterized as unmanly, inconsiderate, and juvenile. But he reminds us that being a man, and a human, takes more thought than just ‘This is tasty, and that’s why I do it.’ He posits that consideration, as promoted by Michael Pollan in The Omnivore’s Dilemma, which has more to do with being polite to your tablemates than sticking to your own ideals, would be absurd if applied to any other belief (e.g., I don’t believe in rape, but if it’s what it takes to please my dinner hosts, then so be it).”

"e.g." Indeed.

a milestone of the kidney kind

2009-10-27T06:13:00.006-07:00

Around the time that M- dropped the L-word for the first time, and I was feeling a little weird about it, someone suggested going through an 'emergency room' scenario, a mental exercise to clarify my own feelings.

We have exchanged L-words (I just can't say it, can I?) but this weekend sort of cemented things. In other words, you know you love someone when you rush from your cozy apt on a cold rainy night to go to the ER all the way on the north side because a nurse called and said 'Your boyfriend needs you.'

He had called from his house earlier:

M-: So babe. What are the symptoms of a kidney stone? (groan)
D : Sharp pain, hurts to pee, and blood in your urine. (my old lady television viewing habits come in handy, sometimes.)
M-: I might have a kidney stone. I have to pee all the time. No blood, though.
D: Wow. Are you sure? Sharp pain in your lower back?
M-: Yeah, but I'm ok. Maybe it'll go away. (groan)
D: Kidney stones don't go away unless they leave your penis. I think you should go to the ER.
M-: Maybe I'll take a tylenol and then come over for our date when the pain passes.
D : Whatever. Our date is off. You need to go to the ER.
M-: (GROAN)
D: You need to be at the doctor; tell me where to meet you.
M-: (GROAN MOAN) Uh, I gotta go, babe. I just tried to pee and almost passed out.

He called from the hospital parking lot (yes, despite fetal position-inducing pain, he *drove* himself): 'I'm about to check in (groan) so I'll call you later. I'm at Swedish Covenant.'

Really trying not to fret I watched tv, looked up kidney stones on the web, ate a sandwich and checked my Blackberry. When an unknown 773 number popped up, I grabbed it.

'Your boyfriend needs you.'
'Tell him I'm coming and I'll be there as soon as I can.'

I texted my friends ('M-! ER! Kidney stones! I'm out!'), dressed, grabbed keys, blew out candles, flagged a cab, grabbed cash, and rushed to the hospital, where I overtipped the cabbie.

It was novel to rush in and exhale, 'My boyfriend was just admitted and I'm here to see him.' Even more novel was the feeling that I *really* did not want anything to happen to this guy. This was beyond the 'gee, I hope things are ok' feeling; this was 'oh, god, it's only kidney stones but if something happens this will wreck me.'

Weird, huh?

Things fall immediately into place when you face what you really feel. The class bullshit I was still holding onto ('We don't match, he's not like anyone I've gone out with before, I graduated from college and he didn't, I don't know if he fits my circle...'), I dropped.

Priorities realign pretty quickly when you see your guy wearing a sad little hospital gown, hooked up to monitors, drugged out of his head, smiling woozily up at you in front of the nurse, and slurring, 'Gimme some sugar.'

Not once did I think 'Let me examine the gender, class and race implications of my brown self being here while these doctors and nurses look at me hold his lily white hand.'

We hid out for the whole weekend at his place reading comic books, watching classic horror movies, eating ice cream and making jokes about the sexiness of peeing into a filter. Silently, I counted how many glasses of water he drank, watched if he was taking his pills on time, and in a rare moment of domesticity, I even made breakfast. (Who cares if it took me 2 freaking hours and I made enough pancakes for the entire Bears line up?)

When I got back to my place Sunday night, I even had a little bit of a cry, for some reason.

It's frakking brutal, this falling in love thing. The books I studied in school don't even come close.

Feel free to share your own moment of 'oh my god, i lurve them.'

[And if you need a more timely political frame for this post, because you don't want to read pointless, girly journal entries from Ding, shouldn't *everyone* have this same right to rush into an ER and say to the admitting nurse My partner is in there and I need to see him/her! ? Civil rights for all is really just that simple. How the world works for me, as a member of the dominant group, is how it should work for everyone.

Or - Shouldn't everyone have the ability to visit the emergency room and not worry that it will bankrupt them forever? Healthcare for all (with a public option) is the decent and right thing to do. There. Political commentary taken care of.]

God bless America

2009-10-26T17:37:00.004-07:00

Jarndyce v Dead Cat has been resolved.

In our favor.

(In short, we filed a request for the court to amend the judgment with a statement ordering the escrow company to release the money in account #xxx to us pursuant to blah blah; the court sent a copy of the request to DCP with a form giving them a chance to explain why it should/shouldn't be granted, they didn't respond to service any more than they have to the UMPTEEN MILLION TIMES I'VE SERVED THEM WITH PAPERS, so the order was granted.)

Sorry for the otherwise radio silence. Mr. B. was out of town (with his laptop, which I'm sharing these days b/c we've been TOO POOR* to replace mine that died) for two weeks, then I had PK's birthday party over the weekend, and this week PK and I are going way up north to visit his 2nd and 3rd grade teacher and Mrs. Teacher, who moved away last year and are sorely missed. We get back on Halloween, hopefully in time for him to go a-begging. Then Mr. B. goes out of town for another work thingy, doubtless with the laptop again. So basically if I can't do it easily on my phone (which has been acting wonky lately), it ain't getting done. Which basically means see my twitter feed if you want to hear from me between now and, say, Thanksgiving.

*Temporary cash flow problems should be MUCH BETTER once that check is in my hot little hands, because I'm sending it--just like I did our $8k "first time homebuyer's tax credit"--to my credit card, which will pretty much zero it out. We have some other debt, but that was the biggest one, and with those $500/month payments off my damn back, life is going to be a lot easier.

Don't stand so close to me

2009-10-26T07:56:00.002-07:00

The most compelling reason to either stay off Facebook and/or to *definitely* not "friend" people you work with, is that you don't want to know that people you work with are promoting this video.

I'll Eat You Up, I Love You So

2009-10-21T17:25:00.002-07:00

This summer, which was all about selling the house, finding a new one, moving, prepping for a new job, was also all about me and my daughter. We stopped all our childcare in May, leaving me without any help for the first time since she was 4 mths old. While we were selling the house. And moving. Somewhere with no friends. Mostly this drove me insane, but then sometimes, mostly times when I wasn’t actually with her, I realized it didn’t.

I hardly ever see my kid anymore. I wake her around 6:30, we leave for school/work by 7:45. I pick her up between 4 and 5, we get home between 5 and 6, she goes to bed by 7ish. This no doubt looks like a ton of working parents’ lives but it’s new for me. As a grad student mama, I got by with 20-25 hrs of care a week (not something I recommend) and worked a lot at night, on weekends. I was with my daughter a lot. More than I should have been, I used to think.

To be perfectly honest, it’s hard for me to imagine how, in this version of life, I could find the energy to give her more than 2-3 hours of parenting a day. That feels so terrible to admit. I feel like I barely make it through what I am doing. Am exhausted in the mornings, run around dressing myself, dressing her, packing lunches, feeding the fucking CAT. Evening is much worse, as all the working parents know, with the day’s exhaustion and the fucking dinner and, again, the goddamned cat, and trying to hear about the day. I get some details out of her (“Hey, have you ever heard of Johan Sebastian Bach?” “Did you know the sun makes all the weather?” “When it’s time to stop eating, your brain sends your stomach a message to tell it, but I’m not sure if it goes in an envelope or what.” “Today we learned about how Eve ate the apple that was bad and then they had to die because they were naked.” Ummm, what was that one? Yes. Please look forward to my future post about what counts as “secular Montessori curriculum” in some parts of the country.), but mostly what I get is the whining of death. That you think might kill you. The kind of whining that comes from a kid who is herself frazzled and confused and 4 and is made of poison darts of swine flu and mosquito bites. And I spend most of that period of the day thanking the patriarchal God of the Montessori school that she goes to bed at 7.

And then after I put her to bed, and after I spend the next several hours working and PLAYING WITH THE CAT, I get sad about how little of my day involved my girl. And I get sad about how I want her to feel swallowed by love, and I am too tired to wrap all I have around her. And I feel shitty about how mediocre I was, how little attention I paid, how clear I made it that I can’t stand playing those role-playing games for more than a few minutes, how maybe I should’ve just taken her to the park even though I felt like shit, how I didn’t listen enough. And I go to bed vowing to be different the next day, to find something extra to give her. And I almost never can find it, when the next day comes.

I tried today though. I feel shitty, like maybe getting the flu shitty. When I picked her up today, she immediately started asking if we could hit the grocery store before home for juice and some other bullshit. I told her I felt sick, probably not, but we would re-evaluate when we got in town. I did feel better-ish when we got there, but didn’t want to go, so declined. And obviously this was one of those things that was make-or-break for the 4yr old’s day. It shattered her, not getting to go to the grocery store. She let loose the wailing about how unfair everything is, how she needs to do what she needs to do, how she JUST CAN’T DO THINGS and that makes her crazy. Forever it seemed. In the car. And people, my epic victory is that I didn’t scream. I let a few tears leak out quietly, but I didn’t scream. And when she stopped, I didn’t talk about it anymore, I just told her about how I wanted to read her two books tonight in bed instead of one. And she smiled at me in the mirror, sort of.
And then it was the same old bullshit. She needed help with everything, I tried to get some leftovers heated, my sister needed me on the phone. The cat needed food, the bathwater got sloshed everywhere, hair washing a battle, I didn’t bother to tell her that her tooth brushing job was total shit. She picked two books that are long and that I sort of hated reading. And then I held on to her and she said, “I promise to take care of you.” And I felt the whole day fall apart again.
I mean, is this how it is? Is this just what it is?

I don’t know what this is about exactly, and I meant to end it by segueing into why Where Te Wild Things Are is brilliantly interpreted and brilliantly made. Which it is, but I can’t quite get there now. You can probably imagine how that was going to go, so just fill it in and maybe we can discuss later.

this post really isn't about hair

2009-10-16T09:13:00.004-07:00

I love my Girls. I really do. We are like family.
But you don't always agree with family, do you?

The other night we were talking about Chris Rock's movie about hair, the anger some older black women had about the movie 'making them look bad in front of white people' and somehow we're talking about whether white people think about black people's hair. My XRoomie (who is my absolute BFF) said white people don't think about black people's hair at all.

I snorted. 'They may not think about it consciously but they sure do want to touch it a lot.'

XRoomie said, 'What are you talking about?'

I said, 'I cannot go a week without someone wanting to touch it, compliment it or comment on it. It's fucking fascinating to them.'

XRoomie said, 'When does that happen?'

Our friend T- said, 'When I worked at the Center [on the south side] all the girls wanted to touch my hair.'

I said, 'That's totally different. The context is different.' Not that T-'s dark blonde cap of hair isn't soft-looking and touchable.

XRoomie said, 'I've never seen that happen. I've never heard of that.' And she mentioned some women of color she'd worked with who never mentioned things like that happening.

'They wore wigs and weaves all the time,' she said. 'They thought it was hilarious watching their senior partners get confused when their hair changed.'

'I'm sure this has happened to them. Almost every woman of color I know can tell stories about white people wanting to touch their hair - with or without permission. That's fucking problematic,' I said.

'Well,' she said. 'That's your baggage.'

'That's not my baggage, that's our history. and I'm sure that if they weren't talking about how annoying this shit is in front of you, they are talking about it with their black friends.'

We went back and forth about 'baggage' and history for a bit but this is where something interesting happened: XRoomie insisted that the conversations she'd have with these women would be the SAME as those they'd have with their friends of color.

That's when I stopped. I just shrugged and said, 'OK.'

Leaving unsaid, of course, was the admission that there are conversations I only have with my friends of color that I would never have with my white friends. (Or my white boyfriend, for that matter.)

Also left on the ground was whether this habit of splitting conversations was particularly fair. Fuck it. I'll think about fairness later.

So, instead of unpacking all of our racial 'baggage', we went back to watching a show about a white South African family held hostage by a Taiwanese murderer.

[Stuck in my craw because of this and this.

And this is just a good thing for folks to have.

On commenting: please control the cluelessness. Please.]

WHYAMITAKINGCAREOFAFUCKINGCATIHATECATS

2009-10-13T17:41:00.003-07:00

Ok, so right off the bat I want to go on the record saying fuck cats. Seriously. Fuck their superiority and their disgusting saliva hormones or whatever that makes me sneeze and their aloofness. Fuck their tenacious attachment to the cliches of academic, feminist, blogger - get OUT of my identity categories, cats! Fuck them for being pissy and inflexible and generally uninteresting. That's how I feel.

Ok, so. My friend here in this town I live in sees a kitten being throw out of a truck window on her street. A moving truck. And being the bleeding heart cat lover that she is, she goes and scoops it up and snuggles it and gives it food. Christ. But she can't take it in because she has a cranky old cat that will eat it alive. See aforementioned reasons to hate cats. So she calls me and is all, "Sybil, this kitty she's so sweeeeeeet and snugggggly and your daughter can have a pet and you have that BIG garage that she can basically live in until she is a little older and then just come and go, yadda yadda." On and on she goes and because she is slick and I am weak, I assent.

So she brings over this cat, which is - and again, FUCK cats - sort of great looking in a Siamese-y, buttery silver, blue-eyed, punk rock kind of way. Whatever, it's adorable, I admit it. No one ever said kittens are not without their wiley ways. So we give it some food and it, like, snuggles us and purrs and does all sorts of kitten-y things. And the next thing I know I am taking it to the vet and blowing great wads of cash getting shots and listening to the sales pitch about various heart worm products. That whole vet trip was, like, 10% substance, 90% commercial. And so it's bad enough that I am feeding it and vaccinating it, but I have found myself deciding not to let it roam freely outside of the garage area until after it has its second rabies shot. So here I am actually *protecting* it. Gah.

So anyway, there it is. Taking care of a fucking cat. That my kid named Sofia. And which is good looking. I swear to Christ I will never post a picture of the thing though.

*I know someone is going to comment about how inhumane it is to keep an outside cat and how they have way shorter life spans and all of that. To which let me pre-emptively reply that I fucking hate cats, so I don't really care.

Thoughts on the Person From Porlock

2009-10-13T10:40:00.004-07:00

Blogs to the blog I have mentally begun:

- On the Advantages of a part-time Commuter Marriage
- On the Complete Suck of a part-time Commuter Marriage
- On Spending Way Less Time with One's Kid
- On Making Picturesque Chocolate Chip Cookies
- How to Get Handed a GIGANTIC Service Responsibility in your 1st t-t Semester
- How to Ask for Accomodation. And Fail.
- On Re-Orienting a Toxic Classroom Environment
- WHYAMITAKINGCAREOFAFUCKINGCATIHATECATS
- The Vanes Camp: A Comedy of Errors in 4 Acts
- On Being Bullied by a Plagiarist
- Funny Things About My Kid, Including Her Rehearsals of her Miss Hannigan Halloween Performance
- On Giving The First Year A Chance and yet Being Seduced By The JIL. Which Sucks, Anyway.
- Requiem for a Running Game

I don't want you to think I'm not doing anything.

Listen up, Los Angeles

2009-10-12T11:32:00.001-07:00

Get your asses to Espresso Profeta in Westwood.

I used to live in a neighborhood that had *two* places to get coffee this good within walking distance of my house.

I recently discovered that a fellow displaced Seattleite oepend this place in LaLa land--via another former Seattleite, now at UCLA, who used to babysit Pseudonymous Kid when he was a baby. It's more like 60 miles (1 1/2 hours, with traffic) than my old five minute saunter. But it's worth it.

The first time I stopped by, they'd just closed. But the owner opened the door to sell me some beans; he recognized the longing in my eyes. PK cried, though, because I'd promised to take him to a coffeehouse like the one I took him to all the time when he was a baby. No monkey mural here, or table of toys, but there is a pretty little patio.

Clearly PK and I will be back come the weekend.

happy columbus day, bitches.

2009-10-12T08:10:00.002-07:00

"Wherefore, as best we can, we ask and require you that you consider what we have said to you, and that you take the time that shall be necessary to understand and deliberate upon it, and that you acknowledge the Church as the Ruler and Superior of the whole world, and the high priest called Pope, and in his name the King and Queen Doña Juana our lords, in his place, as superiors and lords and kings of these islands and this Tierra-firme by virtue of the said donation, and that you consent and give place that these religious fathers should declare and preach to you the aforesaid.

If you do so, you will do well, and that which you are obliged to do to their Highnesses, and we in their name shall receive you in all love and charity, and shall leave you, your wives, and your children, and your lands, free without servitude, that you may do with them and with yourselves freely that which you like and think best, and they shall not compel you to turn Christians, unless you yourselves, when informed of the truth, should wish to be converted to our Holy Catholic Faith, as almost all the inhabitants of the rest of the islands have done. And, besides this, their Highnesses award you many privileges and exemptions and will grant you many benefits.

But, if you do not do this, and maliciously make delay in it, I certify to you that, with the help of God, we shall powerfully enter into your country, and shall make war against you in all ways and manners that we can, and shall subject you to the yoke and obedience of the Church and of their Highnesses; we shall take you and your wives and your children, and shall make slaves of them, and as such shall sell and dispose of them as their Highnesses may command; and we shall take away your goods, and shall do you all the mischief and damage that we can, as to vassals who do not obey, and refuse to receive their lord, and resist and contradict him; and we protest that the deaths and losses which shall accrue from this are your fault, and not that of their Highnesses, or ours, nor of these cavaliers who come with us." - El Requerimiento

Hmph.

Home

2009-10-12T07:49:00.002-07:00

I'm currently homeless. I moved all my belongings to DC last week, into my new apartment with my lovely partner. But I still have a job in Chicago, at least for the next few days. So I'm staying with friends. I've been couch-surfing for a week or so and as a passive guest, one who doesn't require or even desire much attention, I've been enjoying watching how other people live their lives at home. How quickly they get ready in the morning, what they eat, what they watch on tv, whether they do the dishes right away or leave them for tomorrow, the sort of things they do when they're at home, with no particular agenda.

I'm not used to being around active people. You know, the sort of people who get shit done? Me and my partner, and my family members, and most of the people I've dated, are not those sort of people. The one thing I do at home that does not constitute "lazing around" is cook, and even that is a fairly recent development. I do laundry only when I have worn the last clean pair of underwear. I do not putter around picking things up. I do chores only with great difficulty and mustering of will. No, the majority of the time I am home, I am still. I am reading, usually, whether it's blogs on the internet or a book. Sometimes I watch tv, but not usually. Or I am sleeping. And when I am with my partner at home, we sit and talk. For hours. Sometimes snuggling in the bed, sometimes sitting on the couch. That's what I do. Talk. Read. Sleep. And cook, sometimes.

Isn't that what home is for? What do you do at home?

Melissa McEwan is a national treasure

2009-10-12T07:47:00.000-07:00

That is all.

Happy Coming Out Day

2009-10-11T07:00:00.002-07:00

If you don't know who this guy is, apparently he's a former evangelical Christian who worked at Hallmark for a long time and wrote this book about it. Anyway, so seriously, watch the end of the video, starting at about 3:10 in.

And yeah, I'll second that. Thanks, gay friends, for making me a better person.