Former Republican congressional staff member Mike Lofgren wrote a truly brilliant piece that should be taught in schools when our democracy has been totally and completely obliterated by our wealthiest citizens, only it won't be because after they're done destroying jobs, they'll be coming after free press, national parks and public land, and then, education. History, as they say, is written by the victors. If we don't do somethi…
Visitors marvel at how often we talk about traffic. The fact is, navigating in and around Boston takes a special kind of grit, and way more than a puny map. Boston sucks the joy out of car ownership. Making it home at a reasonable hour is an accomplishment, and yeah, we wanna talk about it. Don't be mad. Imagine the entire Dunks-torqued citizenry collectively compiling a series. How I Survived My Commute Today, Nobody In History Has Ever Par…
"God gives us our rights, not government." -Janine Turner, actress, Tuesday August 28, 2012, addressing the RNC
My initial reaction to some second-rate actress making such an outrageous declaration was, "Oh for the love of fuck. The chick from Northern Exposure? Seriously?" As is our wont these days, that's just what I posted on Facebook.
An old friend and staunch conservative from small-town Connecticut replied to my po…
"I hope (chicken place)
will make gazillions of dollars. This is a still free country and people
will vote with their money." (August 2, 2012, Facebook, Author Withheld)
I will never craft a response to the "chicken thing" that could surpass the wisdom and clarity of Wayne Self's July 30th essay in his "Self's Fulfilling Prophecies" blog. [ Update: blog change ]. Like Mr. Self, I too acknowledge the absurdity…
" So many of my friends post about how they feel about the present economy. I wonder how they would feel if, in the future, they were one of the fortunate ones who was earning a lot more money. Would you still be angry with them for having more than you? Would you still think they should pay more than they are now? Would you still think your money should support those who don't have, because they aren't ambitious as you?" …
Dear White Christian Lawmaker, I just don't understand how you're getting away with it. Has the nation gone so numb at this point that no one is willing to stop you? Have people forgotten that as state leaders you are not endowed with any sort of divine status? Put simply, you aren't actually allowed to legislate based on your personal religious beliefs, signing bills into law based on nothing but scripture. Not any more.
These things are good: ice cream and cake
a ride on a Harley
seeing monkeys in the trees
the rain on my tongue
and the sun shining on my face
These things are a drag:
dust in my hair
holes in my shoes
no money in my pocket
and the sun shining on my face * Roy Lee "Rocky" Dennis
(December 4, 1961 – October 4, 1978 )
Though people asked the question with varying degrees of d…
One of my buddies confided that he can't stand it when his other single friends goad him into going "tom-catting around" on a Saturday night. I laughed, because I hadn't heard that expression before, yet it so neatly captures what the vibe of that evening was going to be; but then I felt bad for laughing, because the expression really bothers my buddy, here he was confiding that his dick-swinging trim hunter pals would tease h…
T Max had been slipping into despair. His Brian Eno tribute show was coming up, and he was running out of time to find a bass player with the required chops. Then one day in spring, he called. He was very excited. "Have you ever heard of Joe Kowalski?!" I had not. "Lexi, you won't believe it! He nailed it!" This guy we never heard of, Joe Kowalski, apparently came over, auditioned and dazzled on an 8-string bass. I couldn…
Several summers ago I hired a nice, well-mannered person to lend a hand in my high-tech workplace. Pleasant enough, good sense of humor, polite in terms of the pleases and thank-yous. Spoke several languages fluently. More or less showed up for work in decent attire, albeit a tad wrinkly. And SO young. Privileged enough for an excellent education, worldly enough to have needed extra pages added to a well-traveled passport, but too young to rent …
“I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be.”
― Douglas Adams, The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul
Father's Day. My day to reflect upon the fact that I've never turned any man into a father. Certainly not a daddy. Speaking strictly in scientific terms, Ralph is my father. I met him in 2010 just before Christmas. Well, "met." On Facebook. In 1969 he was my 16-year old mom's 17…
Boston Globe writer Christopher Muther has unwittingly sparked another round of heated debate amongst my circle of friends today. No, it's not about the unemployment rate or the high cost of housing. It's not about the way the Catholic church still treats women and it's not about Netanyahu or Chavez, or even Casey Anthony or George Zimmerman.
Some of you pro-floppers may want to click away from Low Budget Superhero now, because yes,…
Whenever I consider machine-gunning my Facebook account, I stay my hand. The problem is that I have some of the most well-read, pop culturally savvy, politically-aware and sharply intellectual friends, and despite the proliferation of the blog as a modern day conveyance of one's thoughts on any given topic, most of these friends do not, in fact, have blogs of their own. What they do have is Facebook, and even though half of what's poste…
So I've got this old -old online diary. Not to be confused with my, um, new- old online diary. It's not all archived here, because a lot of it was crap on a stick. Sometimes there wasn't even a stick. So basically just a pile of crap. At one point in the early 2000s I would leap for my memo pad whenever life turned comical, and so we have, ladies and gentlemen, some fairly verbatim conversational gold spattered throughout those archive…
Title: Doggy Poo Release Date: 2004 Run time: 33 minutes Animated short, Korean
This odd little animated short is a uniquely-crafted fable offering a fresh, inspirational take on the meaning of life. The stop-motion animation is simple yet elegant, and the voice characterizations are delivered with candor, feeling and completely devoid of irony. Now when a film's protagonist is a sad, bulbous mound of excrement, it's easy to summarily dis…
"I have no children."
There was a decent chance that the subject would come up if I were in the company of new parents. The chances would double if there were earshot-adjacent young marrieds who very much wanted children, and if there were older women in the room, forget about it. Aunts and stuff, not even necessarily mine. For the better part of the last twenty years, "I have no children" has been the axis on which conversa…
When I was a kid growing up in a blighted burg in the least interesting part of Connecticut, my mother's take on the world was also my take on the world. She had me when she was just a teenager, and I was super plugged into her.
Never at a loss for words, mom kept up a running commentary on our lives using a particularly colorful lexicon of expressions. Only now that I've opened the door to my 40s have I gotten an appreciation for these…
If you work 21 days straight, and you feel a little bit off, have a tinge of ear pain and think you might be coming down with a sinus infection, go to the doctor. "Hoping it goes away" isn't the horse you want to bet on, just so you know. By Saturday, that's seven days ago today, it felt like my right ear was replaced by a vat of cement inside of which nine demons were stabbing each other with fifty knives on fire.
Presidents of the United States of America had this hit, Lump , in the 90s. I lurves them.
The "Lump" lyrics have long been a source of delight and amusement, even amongst the brilliance of the rest of the POTUSA catalog, this 'un is a fantastic nugget of irresistible pop goodness. BUT, the lyrics are mystifying. I'm sure there's about a kajillion Google results if one were to search for "She's Lump meaning." …
After yesterday's talk of the "ring in the sour cream" incident, which, by the way, I would like to clarify was not intentional -- I really meant to hold Joe's rings, not toss them into the nachos -- I started to think about whether or not our story can be parlayed into a tale that I could write. You know, a mystical tale with virgins and quests and prophecies...okay well at least quests and prophecies. It would be the story o…
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