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Monday, December 23, 2013

A Sinnock Thing Happened On Their Way To Ontario!

Hub and Kelly came over with the kids on their way back home from his dad's place. I made a sauce and fried up some eggplant slices, Caprese and green salads and bread. We had an awesome visit, and I need a serious nap now! My face hurts from laughing. Gabe and Lucy are two of the happiest, most expressive and friendly little people.
Gabe found the thumb piano and plucked out a song,
then he sang us a Christmas carol he learned at school.
I don't know about Obamacare but a couple of Canadian kids came over
and checked everyone out.
Dr. Lucy treated Joe for a Wolf Bite.
He's gonna pull through.

Photos: Kelly Sinnock





Saturday, December 21, 2013

Thursday, November 7, 2013

Throwback Thursday: 2008

Election Day.
Joe snapped this one on the way to Jackson Mann School.
That's our polling place.
Ward 21 reporting for civic duty.

Thursday, October 31, 2013

Spotted on my way to work.

Don't worry, Allston Rock City.
He's got you.
The PBR is stocked for tonite.
It's gonna be okay.
You're gonna be okay.

Saturday, September 14, 2013

Marty Lederman came over to tune the piano.
He was early. Joey wasn't home yet, so Marty hung out with me. I was in the kitchen pickling a daikon radish.
So Joe came home to find me and Mr. Lederman just hangin' and talking all the things we like to pickle.
There's a Joe Show about Marty.

Sunday, September 1, 2013

Excuse my dust...

While I am on a Low Budget Superhero hiatus please enjoy the diary archives, explore the awesomeness under the linked sites, and listen to the Voice of Vashon's limitless musical excellence. If you need me, get in touch on gmail (it's my name, no caps, no gaps) or use the contact form below.


Sunday, August 4, 2013

Wakey wakey, Custer Walsh


I am at my Jenny's house in Foley, Alabama. They got good stuff down here. I'ma come back way fatter.
This is Jenny's dog, Custer.
Custer mad because I woke him up when I got out of bed.
Sorry, dog.

(Click to embiggen dog)

Thursday, July 18, 2013

This Is All I Will Say About Rolling Stone

Rolling Stone magazine put the face of the Boston Marathon bomber on its cover this month. The tension is high, the heated discourse is still underway, and of course fire burns hottest at the center so here in Boston it's a divisive issue. On one side of the divide, outrage.  On the other side, here comes the splainy-face, finger-wagging crowd that likes to pretend intellectual superiority. These are "don't be a crybaby" naysayers rushing to mock and denigrate anyone who said "Hey, maybe don't put this kid on the cover of your magazine for the sake of all that is decent." Yes, everyone understands that magazines need to sell in order to stay afloat. We all get that, and it's still the dumbest argument ever, Mr. Splainyface. Here's the thing, naysayers: being on the cover of Rolling Stone once meant you were a cultural icon on the level of Michael Jackson, Bruce Springsteen, the Beatles. Even Al Gore, for his environmental work. It's kind of a big deal to get the cover, to lots of artists and other dreamers. 

"What does a person have to do to make the cover of Rolling Stone?"

The loudest of the naysayer arguments is "But they put Charles Manson on the cover, it's the same thing." No, the Charles Manson cover was not the same at all. First of all, that was 43 years ago. Can we stipulate to some social progress over the past fifty years?  You want to be back in 1970? I don't. In 1970 my boss would be able to call me honey, slap my ass and tell me to fetch him a sandwich. Your central argument is either total ignorance, or else you're deliberately acting obtuse. Manson instructed the girls and Tex to write in blood on the walls in such a way that the investigators would think black people did it. The motive was to start a race war. Even without the morality shift towards today's less shitty social contract than the one that existed in the 1970s, the Manson cover was still completely different.

Why Manson Was Different

Rolling Stone is primarily an entertainment publication. It would have been weird if Rolling Stone had not covered the story from an entertainment point of view. For one thing, Manson was a would-be musician, and certain psychologists have written think pieces suggesting that his being passed over by the music industry set him on a collision course with "the establishment." Add to that the Beatles' "Helter Skelter," a song that Charles Manson wove into his twisted world view as a message that set him on these bloody crusades. "Helter Skelter" was extremely central to the Manson case, later becoming the title of the most famous book about the case (written by lawyer Vincent Bugliosi) and later made into a movie. Then you factor in the tragic victim-hood in actress Sharon Tate, slaughtered along with her unborn baby, the child of her famous filmmaker husband Roman Polanski. So yes, of course the Manson murders devastated the worldwide entertainment community. And finally, and perhaps most noteworthy, unlike the bomber, that Manson cover photo was not deliberately sexualized like this cover. Here, Rolling Stone didn't use a mug shot. They found an attractive, doe-eyed photo of a confused kid looking like he's just beat out Bruno Mars for the top single this week. Like he has fans, like a rock star.

Madmen as Rock Stars

History is cut with a large, crazy stripe of idolizing madness. Volumes have been written by people a thousand times smarter than me about the dangers of elevating madmen to iconic fame. Manson had fans, and does still, as do many a crazed killer from Jesse James to Machiavelli. Now, maybe Rolling Stone putting the Boston bomber on the cover was deliberate. A statement about radical nationalism, showing that just about any young person can be radicalized like this boy was; or maybe he does have fans. Either way, this is another chapter in that discourse, that's all. Let people talk about it. Let people feel their feelings about it. No amount of your uber-cool eyerolling about the relative relevance of Rolling Stone is going to contribute to the situation, so save the superiority for your blog.

At the end of the day, try to realize that being on the cover of Rolling Stone signifies that you're a rock star. And now, say the most outraged, we bow our heads and wait for the next bored, young rebel who does not even understand the cause, to plan and execute his attempt to go out in a blaze of glory. The question is still "What does a person have to do to make the cover of Rolling Stone," but the new answer is terrifying.∎

Tuesday, July 16, 2013

I Am So Sorry, Trayvon

That monster saw a black boy walking in his neighborhood, followed, taunted, confronted and shot that boy for no goddamn reason. George Zimmerman should be in jail.

My heart, my soul, my mind all ache for Trayvon, his friends, his family and everyone in America whose expectations were dashed last weekend. George Zimmerman is a predator who hunted and killed a boy just because he thought he could get away with it, and now the law has shocked us all by approving his actions. Justice died that day.

Tuesday, July 2, 2013

I'm Not a Damn Toucan


Thursday, June 27, 2013

Dear Adults: Reading Is Still Fundamental


Remember bringing home your math book for the first time? Everything was new, there were symbols and fractions and apples being added up and subtracted. It was fun. Most kids start out thinking school is awesome. Some keep that enthusiasm, but a lot of kids lose it, and for those little guys, school is a drag.

But what happens to that early enthusiasm?

Wednesday, June 26, 2013

Holly Crab

Photo: Joe Kowalski

Chris and Joe picked up food from Holly Crab, the new place on Comm Ave.

It's a big Cajun crab boil, with the bibs and gloves.
It's good. I hope they make it.
Good luck, Holly Crab!
hollycrab.com/allston

Thursday, June 20, 2013

Throwback Thursday: 1984

Frank Davis Resort, Moody CT (Photo: Colleen Berry)

Eighth grade class trip. This place closed down, but just envision Dirty Dancing and you've got the idea.
But without any of the dancing or dancers.
Just the vaguely germ-spreading social activities,
and also the pool from Caddyshack.

Me and my best friends all went a different way dressing for the class trip.
That's the problem with having to wear school uniforms.
We get this one single day to make an impression on everybody at once.

The Michelles look like Simone's back-up dancers. 

Michelle's outfit is hard to see - she's wearing a pink Tuxedo ruffled top and pleated pinstriped jeans.
Look at Simone in her Madonna belt and Duran Duran ankle boots!
I look like an extra in a Go-Go's video. That's my mom's red striped swimsuit.

That's our teacher Mrs. Dorozinski on the lounge.

I wish Colleen was in the photo. 
Bonus Throwback.
Left: 8th Grade Graduation.
Right: Simone's house in Thomaston, CT.
There's Colleen!

Tuesday, June 4, 2013

We're Doing "News" Wrong

Maybe it's because I'm a *card-carrying member of the TV-addled generation who can remember a time when "the news" was actually the news, but I am sick of all the crap, know what I'm sayin'? People are tripping. It's too much.

* It's just an old defunct video store membership card.  



In our super low budge deadest-end of Connecticut's ramshackle urban sprawl, we got the daily local, The Waterbury Republican, and my father bought the New York Daily News on Sundays. The paper was pink for awhile in the 80s for some reason, and there was often an athlete or TV star on the front page, plus it had an fat center section with crosswords and Find-Its and advice columns and contests, plus sometimes you'd find a large foldout poster—maybe a New York Yankee. We kids caught bits of info, such as "ketchup is a vegetable" and "trees cause pollution." Because Reagan.

Then there was the radio and TV talking heads who read news out loud to you while you babysat your brother, who sat on the floor in his superhero Underoos and practiced spelling out BOOBLESS on your brand new digital calculator.

The only TV in the house was in the den if you were a reg'luh Amerikun, in the parlour ("pah-ler") if you were Sicilian. The set was the size of a VW bug, and it didn't have to match the furniture because it was furniture. Like all quality technology (including the car) parts of the TV simulated some sort of wood. You twirled that UHF dial when nobody was looking, just to see what happened. When you got a new TV, it just got placed on top of the old TV. Thankfully that meant putting away into the sticky-back photo album all those photos of you and your brother in short-shorts, tall socks and eyeglasses the size of car windshields. 


Before cable television and the Internet ushered forth the 24-hour news cycle, the news was actually news. The news spread when you went to the movies with your friends. That's when you told each other what happened that day, what you read, what you saw, what happened at home, last weekend at camp, last month at your grandfather's funeral, last night on the 25th Anniversary of Motown, did you see that? You didn't!? It was like totally awesome! If only there was a way that you could see it, but it was already on TV, see, so you missed it...but let me tell you all about it...remind me.

Communication Nation

Back in the days when you couldn't wordlessly post a link (which is like lobbing a thought-grenade back over your shoulder as you run by) it was necessary to convey expression every time you communicated with people, and because that contact was either via telephone or in person, people heard your voice and/or saw your face. Expression. As technology has moved more and more of our personal interactions online, we can only do our best at expression in text form. Hence the emoticon, and shortcuts that stand in for our most expressive moments. LOL.

Local calls free, long distance rates better after 7pm on weeknights.

Remember time limits for the phone? Remember stretching the cord so you could talk to your friends as far from the family as possible, which sometimes involved a broom closet. In those days, an exchange with someone that wasn't in the room with you was not a perpetual entity; when you were at home with your family, all of your friends were at home with their families, too. You would call and communicate when you both had time and opportunity for the conversation, and during the communication you were each other's sole audience.

I specifically called Michelle when Dr. Noah Drake appeared on General Hospital for the first time, because she was babysitting her brother too, just like I was, and between making the bologna sandwiches for the little boys, and all their whining, they were always making us miss stuff. "You were my Rick Springfield friend," Michelle told me recently. When I saw Motown 25, I called Simone to make sure she was watching it, then we talked about it for like...twenty years, with a gap in the middle before we found each other...on Facebook. When we were kids, Simone was my Michael Jackson friend. Dude, she had the red jacket. 

Enter Facebook

Social networks, having taken the place of actually having to talk to your friends deliberately, are a vital organ in the gargantuan info-monster that never sleeps. While it's nice to be in touch with everyone that I miss seeing IRL, by the same token, I found out Michael Jackson died on Facebook. I think I would have preferred a phone call from one friend. It's TOO MANY FRIENDS all talking at once about Michael Jackson. It's too overwhelming. Could you imagine receiving 600 phone calls to tell you that Michael Jackson died?  IT'S TOO MUCH, I TELL YOU.

How to NEWS Better
  • Watch your local TV news
  • Read the local paper 
  • Tune into BBC now and then for an unbiased take on how we're doing, they got no "USA! USA!" rubbish
  • Look for community-oriented sources, such as women's news, and seek out black analysts, school-supported sources aimed at parents & families, and so forth...sign up to get info from outside your bubble, whatever your bubble may be
  • Flip it over to CSPAN so you can see what these so-called representatives are doing when they think nobody is watching. 

  

Tuesday, May 28, 2013

The sun is not my friend

Photo: Joe Kowalksi

Going to the deep south, y'all.
My new Coolibar hat got here. It's...big.
Joey says "well, you WANTED to block out the sun..."
#PaleOnPurpose



Wednesday, May 1, 2013

April 15th, 2013

It's been awhile, sorry about that. I had a pretty rough April. Wasn't feeling much like myself. Airports, chaos, sweat, tears, rental cars, exhaustion. Las Vegas, for that work trip. This time I'm not just mouthing off when I say that I am never. Doing that trip. Again. Ever.

In other news, Joe and I got married in Vegas.

You Have The Right To Remain Stupid

I'm really out of patience. Out. The well is dry. I am done tolerating outrageous lies broadcast by one bonehead and parroted by a thousand more. As I sit here writing what should be a wholly unnecessary post, the Boston Marathon bomber has been captured about three miles away, in Watertown. So why is this post necessary? Because people who can't even find Chechnya on a map are suddenly law enforcement experts nattering on about this kid's rights being taken away. An attack on civil liberties. The cops didn't read the bomber his rights, you see. If this is you, shut your mouth, go sit in the corner and listen. The adults are talking. RIGHTS, are you kidding? You know what you also have the right to do? Go cheer on the runners in a marathon without being blown up.

Your rights aren't magically non-existent because they were not read out loud immediately. That's just something crazy people repeat after Fox News tells them it is so. It is not so. If circumstance leads to Miranda rights not being read, that in no way equates to those rights vanishing. You still HAVE the rights. If you're arrested and no one reads your rights, it means one thing only: the prosecutor cannot use anything you say against you in a court of law. That's it. If any concern is due over the lack of Mirandizing here it should be because of this scenario: HAD the killer confessed, it wouldn't be admissible as evidence. This is the kind of technicality that compromises the outcome of a trial. Everyone knows that if he gets off on a technicality he cannot be re-tried under double-jeopardy, so if anything, that would be the only reason to bitch about Miranda here. He could have yelled "I bombed the race!" and that confession would not be admissible in court. If there wasn't enough other evidentiary support and the confession was all they had, it's possible that he'd be set free. Understand? Kid wasn't informed that he had the right to remain silent, because there was a lot going on in that moment.  However, that's not even the crucial matter here. What's more important is that there is allowance in the Miranda warning about when it's acceptable to skip it. In Legalese:
The public safety exception permits law enforcement officials to engage in a limited and focused unwarned interrogation of a suspect and allows the government to introduce the statement as evidence in court. The public safety exception is triggered when police officers have an objectively reasonable need to protect the police or the public from immediate danger.
You can't hide in a crowd if there is no crowd. The cops found the killer hiding under a tarp that was covering a boat in someone's yard during a shut-down of the whole city here. We couldn't leave our houses, get it? That's what they mean by "an objectively reasonable need to protect" everyone from danger. Also of note: don't fuck with Boston law enforcement, they will shut down the whole city to find you. Full stop. ∎

Link: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/19/miranda-rights-boston-bombing-suspect_n_3120333.html

Monday, April 22, 2013

Do you like school uniforms?


Given that Facebook has rendered life quite non-linear, socially-speaking, I've actually got my St. Margaret's School friends at hand. That's weird on a daily basis, but oddly comforting and makes me smile. Today I raise a question that I haven't thought about in years, can't wait to hear your take on it. A friend raised the question recently and I found myself fascinated...School uniforms. Good idea, bad idea, or makes no difference? It's a thing we lived through, but from your POV, what of it? Answer in comments or by email.

Sunday, April 14, 2013

Red Rock Canyon - Nevada
(Photo: Joe Kowalski)

Joe climbs things.
I'm one of the dots in the parking lot.

Saturday, March 30, 2013

Knuckleheads In The Sky

We're pretty much trapped in a sinister new pluto-theocracy where we willfully vote for bible-bangers and billionaires to dictate a rigid societal and economic construct with little hope of resurrecting the faded idea of the American Dream. God and Greed, working side by side, dismantling America brick by brick. But what's really pissing people off is having to remove their shoes at the airport.

Monday, March 25, 2013

Mansplainers LLC

It was Sunday morning and I was performing that universally-endured household ritual of purging the fridge before stocking up on whatever science experiment fodder is passing for food these days.

"You don't want this?"

"No, it's dead," I said, glancing over to see that Joe was holding up a bottle of  Bloody Mary mix I'd just put into the the thanks-for-coming pile, along with a shriveled lump of ginger that had escaped notice for so long that it felt like the hollow corpse of some mummified sea creature. I tossed it, along with a chunk of galvanized cheese and half a cucumber that didn't make it.

"It's expired," I added, unnecessarily in my opinion, given that the inside of the Bloody Mary bottle neck was crusted with a fairly unappetizing brownish, pulpy muck. My man, the love of my life, has never to my knowledge consumed a single Bloody Mary, but at that moment he was very much advocating for this old bottle that, if memory serves, was bought way back in December for our New Year's Eve party.

"Are you sure?" he asked a second time.

"Joe, it's expired. Could you please not keep asking me if I'm sure? You always do that. Don't you think I can tell if the expiration date is in the past or the future?"

Argument ensued. Details unimportant. I apologized later because the fight wasn't even ours. It belonged to me and my coworkers, me and my bosses, me and the electrician, me and the building manager, me and the Peapod guy.

The truth is that my anger has been growing lately over constantly being questioned, second-guessed and talked-over by men, personally, professionally and politically. In Joe's defense, he is not an habitual mansplainer, he was only the bringer of the proverbial last straw for this week. In that moment, I'd had it with having to reiterate, prove and defend my simplest actions because of men hard-wired to assume that women don't know what they're talking about.

Rebecca and the Men Who Explain Things

The term "mansplaining" is a fairly new addition to the modern cultural lexicon, but even if they haven't yet seen any of the numerous articles, all women instantly understand the term the first time they hear it. We live it every day. The expression was coined after a 2008 article by writer Rebecca Stolnit in which she describes an encounter with a party host who, once he learned of her interest in the subject matter, doggedly insisted on educating her about a certain book she must read. It required several tries before "Mr. Very Important" would finally be made to understand that this extremely vital book he was attempting to tell her about was her book.
Being told that, categorically, he knows what he's talking about and she doesn't, however minor a part of any given conversation, perpetuates the ugliness of this world. Several years ago, I objected to the behavior of a couple of men, only to be told on both occasions that the incidents hadn't happened at all as I said they had, that I was subjective, delusional, overwrought, dishonest -- in a nutshell, female.
 -  Rebecca Stolnit, "Men Who Explain Things," Los Angeles Times, April 2008
Talk about "however a minor part of any given conversation." There's Joe with the stupid expired drink mix. There's the Peapod guy, who, I kid you not, just put me through this conversation yesterday morning.
"We have a grocery delivery scheduled for you this morning, ma'am. Did you move?"

"No."

"No?!"

"No, we did not move. We're still at *****."

"But it says here you moved."

"I don't know what you're reading, but we have been at this address nearly three years."

"...ooookay..."
It's important to note that his voice changed on "okay." Where before he'd been persistent, confident in his facts. At the end he exhaled the "okay" in an unmistakable "if you say so, lady" sigh weighted with weary acceptance of the hassle he's resigned to endure once he receives the inevitable call from his driver saying he is at the wrong house. Because when presented with two possibilities, this guy dismissed the one where there's an error in the notes on a customer account, opting instead to immediately embrace what, in his mind, must surely be what's going on: this lady doesn't know where she lives.

It's The Same Old Story

My Peapod example echoes an old anecdote that's been knocking around the web awhile. The story goes that a delivery driver called for directions because he couldn't find the house. The lady of the house was used to this, as she and her husband lived where unfortunate placement of a one-way street meant that she's had to give the tricky directions hundreds of times over the years. The driver, however, kept cutting her off with retorts like, "That doesn't make any sense. That's a one way street. Can I talk to your husband?" Calmly, as we women have learned is the best way to handle these kinds of men, she repeated the directions again, and then said "Do you understand? Or do I need to speak with your wife?"

What's worse? Being "mansplained at" by someone in the service industry (all hail, the customer is always right, unless you're female), or getting some variation of it on a daily basis from a colleague, one at your same pay grade level, only with less seniority by five years? Because I've got one of those. And each and every single time this guy lends voice or action to his opinion of my inability to perform the most mundane aspects of my job, I have to stop what I'm doing and think about how to handle him. When he comes at me with a blitz attack about something that I have handled (and have been doing so long before he came to work here) I have to actually stop working and manage this man's gargantuan ego. I have told him that he need not worry about this thing, about that thing, I have to use a measured tone in reassuring him that I have control of the situation. I have been as clear as I know how to be. I have even emailed him Rebecca Solnit's article. Nothing has worked so far.

Is it a game, or is this for real? 

Every time this workplace mansplainer barrels through, shouldering me aside to take the ball, I have to stand there and decide whether I grit my teeth and keep the peace, or whether I confront him again and request that he get un-involved in my part of the details. Here's the thing: I am the expert. I've been doing logistics for 20 years. I'm the operations person, I helped set up everything in this company since it was a tiny two-person operation in 2004.

The problem becomes this, quite simply: my job is a hard job. I work long hours and I have a dozen fires to put out every day. But not only do I have my job to do, on top of the workload I bear the extra mental stress of having to work out how to handle all this interrupting, questioning and doubting. I have to be the one organizing my thoughts enough to shut him up in such a way that he doesn't have another "mantrum" like the one he had last time.

Mantrum

I hereby define the word "mantrum" as the tantrum thrown by a "mansplainer" brought about by any woman exhibiting that she knows what she's talking about.

Here's a story. This happened about a year ago. I was at my desk in the middle of creating a group email. So the guy came in for something, and when he saw that I had the group email program open on my screen, he said, "I'll show you how to make a group email." I said thanks, but I know how to do it. In fact, I do it all the time. (Unsaid: In fact, I've been doing it for years before you even came to work here.)

He insisted, "No! You have to do this certain thing, I'll show you!"

Once again, I said thanks, but I already know how to create a group email.

He flipped out. Red-faced with exasperation, he threw up his hands and said, "FINE! If you don't want help, FINE," and then he stamped out of my office and off down the hall. In a huff.

That's a mantrum.

What just happened? Friends, this is a whole level-up in the game of mansplaining. It's of some comfort that I happen to share my office with a colleague-- male -- who is also a friend I recruited to work here and NOT a mansplainer. The stunned expression on his face demonstrated that I'm not nuts. It's real. That red-faced huffer-and-puffer who just stalked out is a champion Mansplainer.
Men explain things to me, still. And no man has ever apologized for explaining, wrongly, things that I know and they don't.
-  Rebecca Stolnit, "Men Who Explain Things," Los Angeles Times, April 2008
Bill

Several years ago there was a building manager who gave me a "mansplanation" so incomprehensible that I still give pause to wondering if there is any way I could possibly have misunderstood him.

One  Monday my boss told me he'd come in to work on Saturday, and found our suite door ajar. He asked if I could try to find out what happened. I called Bill, the building manager, to ask if I could get a look at the security tapes and told him the reason why. Bill informed me that what I was saying made no sense -- that our door couldn't have been open on Saturday morning, because he was there on Saturday afternoon, and he saw our door closed. Well...yes, my boss would have closed and locked the door by then...um...?

"Bill," I said, "Andy didn't...leave it open when he left..."  Bill's response was, "Dear, I told you, I was personally there and the door was closed." Then he told me I could view the security tapes, but only if one of his guys was sitting with me, and they're really busy with real work.

This mansplaining phenomenon is not a new one, but the Rebecca Stolnit article did spark a renewed dialogue among women online, triggering a renewed social media sharing of our common experience handling the special kind of presumptuous self-importance that only mansplainers seem to summon when informing women what they need, what they want, and telling them how they feel about themselves and about the world.

War on Women: How much more evidence do you need?

In the myopic Republican war on women this insanity extends to astonishing comments about rape and reproductive rights, and even extends to the GOP insistence that there is no "war on women" at all. So ingrained is this point of view that there remains a significant portion of the American population that refuses to accept the idea that we willfully perpetuate a rape culture, even as situations such as the Steubenville case exhibit the fallout of just such a culture. There is no rape culture? Get on our side of the fence and say that.

It's 2013, but women still have a problem being heard. Even more insulting than that, we're constantly challenged to provide evidence that there's an actual sexism problem.

Provide evidence?

Even as male politicians spend an inordinate amount of time and resources attempting to regulate our vaginas? They're obsessed with vaginas. They're constantly pounding gavels and pulpits and bibles over vaginas, and attempting to unravel two hundred years of progress under the laughable guise of "family values."

Even as these same vagina-obsessed lawmakers constantly pigeonhole us as sluts, troublemakers and lesbians just for asking for a seat at the table?

Even as the subsequent narrative about the Steubenville rapists coming from the media and the community maintained that these guys deserve leniency instead of punishment since they were unaware they were doing anything wrong?
Having public standing as a writer of history has helped me stand my ground, but few women get that boost, and billions of women are out there on this 6-billion-person planet being told that they are not reliable witnesses to their own lives, that the truth is not their property, now or ever. This goes way beyond Men Explaining Things, but it's part of the same archipelago of arrogance.
-  Rebecca Stolnit, "Men Who Explain Things," Los Angeles Times, April 2008
Mansplaining is the stuff of arrogance at best, oppression at worst, whether it be in a political, professional or personal setting.  At its most trivial, it comes down to one thing: respect. In talking about day-to-day life in America, we're not even including Steubenville and the next-level violence perpetrated upon women. On a day-to-day level, we're just talking about any conversation in which the woman has to deal with men interrupting, ignoring, dismissing.

Of course, there are millions of honorable, respectful and professional men out there. But some of you need to take a closer look, because you may not even realize what you're doing. If you think of yourself as a man who respects  women, yet your reflexive first reaction is to doubt her, then you just might be a mansplainer. You're also the worst kind, because you don't know you have a problem, therefore you're my problem.

The guy at work, he's one of those. He thinks he respects women. But he is unable to hear my voice, both figuratively and literally. He has one of those very loud speaking voices. You can hear every one of his phone conversations all over the office. My voice is soft, I don't tend to raise it. Whenever I begin to speak and he interrupts me, if I keep right on speaking (the professional woman's defense that means "I'm talking now") he just increases his volume. It's gotten to the point where it's easier just to let him talk, wait for an opening and try again.

It's too bad, because although this bullying aspect of his personality is offensive, he also has many qualities that I actually do rely on. I'd have a hard time getting certain projects done without his contribution, and I frequently do need his expertise, advice or input. At those times, I seek it out. The difference between us is that once I get his input, I accept the information he provided, confident that he knows what he's talking about. Maybe one day this particularly aggressive mansplainer will grant me that same respect but, to paraphrase Ms. Stolnit, I won't hold my breath.∎


Friday, March 22, 2013

American Borer Story: The Blair Witch Project Turns 15


Fifteen years and a whole bunch of copycats later, I still say that it's a miracle we ever heard of The Blair Witch Project. That being said, if you haven't seen it, go ahead and give it a shot, if only because it's an early bringer of the popular "found footage" motif, and for that it deserves a a nod.

Happy 15th, Blair Witchers!

Okay, I'm on record (somewhere) as saying that the only people terrified by The Blair Witch Project are the jumpy types who are already terrified of the woods to begin with—you  know, the people who cower from thunderstorms, freak out over skeletons, run screaming from bats, bugs, spiders (and webs). They'll never live in an old house in New England or the deep south, and they'll always cross to the other side of the street because of a black cat. None of these things are supernatural (well maybe the cat). Let's break it down.

Thing number one! From the standpoint of pure movie-going enjoy-ability, The Blair Witch Project suuuuucks. It's the opposite of fun. It's hard work watching this thing. It looks and sounds like shit. There's no plot. There isn't even a witch. The story line is a pablum of cliche where smart-Alec young people with more attitude than brains do everything possible to ruin an otherwise ordinary day. Add themes of isolation, at least one asshole, top it off with a goading bitch that you just know will die screaming, and make sure to have them all stumble about a supposedly-haunted place making increasingly worse decisions until something gets them. Or not. Maybe, we don't know. Because, remember? We waited through 81 tedious minutes to find out what happens at the end. Then nothing happens at the end.

And yet, emanating from the tedious shitpile of shameless shammery shines a ray of movie-making brilliance.

It's actually quite clever, the way the creators of The Blair Witch Project put up a serious horror movie on a shoestring budget without going all ironically B-movie schmaltzy, and without apologizing for itself. For that, they deserve respect. Through framing and titles they maintain just enough tension that an otherwise bored, motion sick audience willingly accepts blurred, off-kilter, dizzily swinging spans of nothing-at-all, simply because it's presented as scraps of found footage that might reveal evidence of whatever got these knuckleheads. The problem is that they were so clever about how to tell the story, they forgot to say what the hell we are supposed to be afraid of in the end. Who or what is supposed to be the antagonist, or at least evidence of one, in this thing?

What Y'all Running From?

Is the woods? Heather, Mike and Josh certainly do burn many of the 81 minutes crashing through the brush, gasping and shushing each other whenever they think they might hear something.

Is it the sounds in the woods? Because woods can be noisy anytime, especially at night. You'll hear scuttling, fluttering, snapping, crunching, hooting, screeching and more. It's only snakes and salamanders and various nocturnal rodentia hunting breakfast while dodging bats and owls hunting them. It's natural, not supernatural.

Is it the piles of rocks these three blockheads find in the woods? Because I've seen that, it's nothing. Old farmland markers, remnants of barn foundations, filled-in wells, old stone walls or just piled campfire rocks left by "leave no trace" campers, a naturalist ethic that says do not leave rocks in a ring when you break camp. It's normal, not paranormal.

Is it the bundled branches they stumble across? That happens, too. Dead wood or brush piles gathered by conscientious campers and hikers. A lot of people support the idea that brush piles help the wildlife.

If you've spent any time hiking or camping, you'll have noticed lots of weird things in the woods. Here a rusty iron ring sticking out of a stump, there a frayed rope just randomly hanging from a tree. You will definitely see formerly living things. Bunny bones, skins, bits of bloody leftover house cats.

As a horror story, the movie does have some merit. It's a stand-off between the normal and the paranormal where reasonable, ordinary town folks live with the honest belief that there's a vaguely malevolent threat, set against the cautiously optimistic but dopey antics of young, arrogant and hopelessly amateur investigators. The tension created by that, combined with the maddening camera work, demonstrates that the creators do grasp the concept of what makes a good horror movie. As a plus, the acting is decent. Think how much worse if we had to endure that wooden, sing-songy standard of low budget movie-making.

It's Not That Easy, Guys

Right. But let's just say that I hadn't seen it.
And I said, "I haven't seen Evil Dead II yet."
What would you think?
Horror is hard. The elite creatives make it look easy, but history is chock-a-block with unfortunate also-rans who gave it everything they had but failed to deliver a single thrill. When it goes right, it's awesome, and you get raves like M. Night Shyamalan after The Sixth Sense. When it goes wrong, you get summarily dismissed like M. Night Shyamalan after Signs. Horror fans are particularly tough critics, and it's hard to bounce back from mediocrity. That's the albatross of fame, isn't it? One turd of a project and you find yourself proselytizing with late nite talk show hosts about what went wrong, and whenever your name is attached to a project it comes with a punchline. It would actually be better if your super low budge movie goes really wrong, to the point where it's pure awesome. At least then your name might get elevated in a different way, attached to a weird kind of cult status. People will actually wait for what you do next. And whatever comes after that.∎

Sunday, February 10, 2013

It Girl #1

"It Girl #1"
Pastels on paper
(Photo by Joe Kowalski)


Saturday, February 2, 2013

Archive: Jury Duty

Another Bullshit Night In Suck City

Can you get out of it?" That's what everyone asks me when they find out I've got jury duty. Every person. The same exact reaction from every person! Disappointing, people. Disappointing. Do what you want when you get your summons, but listen to what you are saying. Don't bitch about "the system" if you're unwilling to participate. You ARE the system, sweet cheeks. Why would I want to get out of it? Why would anyone? As a citizen, when it's your turn, it's your turn. 

My turn was yesterday. It was a case brought against a doctor by a woman who claimed injuries during childbirth. I didn't get selected for the trial. Joe thinks the reason I didn't get selected was because of the title of the book I brought to the jury pool. Though Nick Flynn's Another Bullshit Night in Suck City does make for a colorful book jacket, that's not why.

I don't know why I didn't get selected unless maybe it was because I told the judge about my reflexive derision for the kind of people whose petty grievances contribute to an overly litigious society, egged on by greedy, unscrupulous counsel who smell medical malpractice insurance money like sharks smell blood in the water. Then I turned to the four lawyers to my left and said, "Nothing personal." They gaped and grinned like a coifed, pinstripe-suited mummer's parade. Mind you, I had not heard yet the facts of the case. It's just that the judge asked everyone for an honest answer about having an initial reaction. I can't help that I did have a strong initial reaction: I'm sick of everyone suing everyone else. Too many lawsuits, too many lawyers.

"I'm getting the feeling this particular case is not for you."

"Thank you, your honor." 

See you in three years. 🌎

Wednesday, January 23, 2013

Moving Papers Around

See, THIS is the kind of thing that makes me want to just burn all my stuff and walk around the planet with my "desert island" backpack containing five things. Bar of soap, towel, toothbrush, change of clothes and...my ipad.

Sunday, January 20, 2013

I Hate Writing

I had this boyfriend in college. I was 19 and he was 40. I know, I know -- but every college-aged guy I met was a giant brainless douchebag, and this guy was smart and funny and really cool. And a talented singer and guitar player. English dude. I met him at the Irish pub on Division Street, the one that let us in without ID. Though he could play the heck out of that guitar, when he was at home practicing and trying to work out a part, he'd get frustrated and yell "Argh! I HATE guitars!"

Well, I hate writing. And yes, with a somber nod to Ms. Parker, I hate writing, but alas, I love having written.