You mom bloggers have diapers and drool. But do you have a coprophagic dog who burps a lot?
I didn't think so.
The real action is over at Linkateria today. I can't think of better stuff than that.
07 June 2006
06 June 2006
Angry, ugly, loud...me
Goldie and I took a walk tonight. It was uneventful until we were about 200 yards from leaving the park to come home when a big brown and white dog - pit and boxer mix, it looked like - rushed us.
Aggressive, tail up and still, off leash, it charged right up on Goldie, who was OF COURSE on her leash.
Goldie is not one to run from a fight - she is an Alpha girl through and through (I have no idea where she gets that from).
People at a house across the street began calling the dog, kind of feebly.
"Get your f***ing dog," I yelled helpfully and, oh, one might say a bit forcefully. Ok, I sounded like the drill sergeant in "Full Metal Jacket."
The dog kept charging. I did something I learned from my dear Dad, the WWII vet who has a way with animals.
I made The Big Noise. This is a noise that comes all the way up from your guts and is easily understood by animals, children and anyone else within a mile radius.
"HAH!" I yelled. "GIT! HAH!"
And the dog turned tail and ran. I was pleased with my work up to that point.
Then the dog came back. I proceeded to yell bigger and longer, but this time he would not be persuaded. He had seen through my yelling act.
Along came Miss Skinny Tattoo, apparently the dog's owner. "Quit yelling! You're freaking them out!"
Precisely what I was trying to do, I thought.
"Why are you yelling?" she whined. I am not making this up. She was whining. It was a kind of new-agey, "You're collecting bad karma" kind of thing.
I gave her the opposite explanation than the obvious ("Because you are a jerk with a big aggressive off leash dog") "She can be really mean," I said.
"Why do you have her in a public park, then," she asked.
Let us stop here. This is my favorite part. Don't you just LOVE Miss Skinny Tattoo? Her dog is off leash. Her dog is attacking my dog. And I somehow am the cause of this problem.
I am imagining her as a mother in the principal's office with her kindergardner: "Principal Skinner, I want you to tell me why all the other kids keep sticking their heads in the way of Johnny's wooden blocks."
I said "Why is your dog off leash?" and of course she did not answer. She grabbed her dog's collar and went off muttering and then I heard her whining again to her male friend "She was FREAKING out."
Yes, I was. And I will freak out again if I have to, to protect my lovely Goldie. Spiritual mastery will have to take a back seat to preventing another $1600 emergency vet bill.
I continue to pimp my new blog Linkateria. A perfect mixture of salty and sweet.
Aggressive, tail up and still, off leash, it charged right up on Goldie, who was OF COURSE on her leash.
Goldie is not one to run from a fight - she is an Alpha girl through and through (I have no idea where she gets that from).
People at a house across the street began calling the dog, kind of feebly.
"Get your f***ing dog," I yelled helpfully and, oh, one might say a bit forcefully. Ok, I sounded like the drill sergeant in "Full Metal Jacket."
The dog kept charging. I did something I learned from my dear Dad, the WWII vet who has a way with animals.
I made The Big Noise. This is a noise that comes all the way up from your guts and is easily understood by animals, children and anyone else within a mile radius.
"HAH!" I yelled. "GIT! HAH!"
And the dog turned tail and ran. I was pleased with my work up to that point.
Then the dog came back. I proceeded to yell bigger and longer, but this time he would not be persuaded. He had seen through my yelling act.
Along came Miss Skinny Tattoo, apparently the dog's owner. "Quit yelling! You're freaking them out!"
Precisely what I was trying to do, I thought.
"Why are you yelling?" she whined. I am not making this up. She was whining. It was a kind of new-agey, "You're collecting bad karma" kind of thing.
I gave her the opposite explanation than the obvious ("Because you are a jerk with a big aggressive off leash dog") "She can be really mean," I said.
"Why do you have her in a public park, then," she asked.
Let us stop here. This is my favorite part. Don't you just LOVE Miss Skinny Tattoo? Her dog is off leash. Her dog is attacking my dog. And I somehow am the cause of this problem.
I am imagining her as a mother in the principal's office with her kindergardner: "Principal Skinner, I want you to tell me why all the other kids keep sticking their heads in the way of Johnny's wooden blocks."
I said "Why is your dog off leash?" and of course she did not answer. She grabbed her dog's collar and went off muttering and then I heard her whining again to her male friend "She was FREAKING out."
Yes, I was. And I will freak out again if I have to, to protect my lovely Goldie. Spiritual mastery will have to take a back seat to preventing another $1600 emergency vet bill.
I continue to pimp my new blog Linkateria. A perfect mixture of salty and sweet.
05 June 2006
I have been looking around the BlogHer website to find out who is going to attend and I found something shocking: there are going to be men at BlogHer. Huh?
I mean, I suppose they can't discriminate but the event IS called BlogHer, is it not? And isn't the tag line "Where the women bloggers are?"
Who are these guys and WHY ARE THEY INVADING my sistahood? I'm actually feeling pretty mad at these men. I feel like they have a lot of damn nerve.
Either that or they are clueless, the type of guys that are thinking "Well, I'm not like all those other guys - I'm cool." You know, that same thought that privileged people always have when they think they are being cool by hanging out with the historically oppressed people.
You would think I would be more advanced, more calm, less prejudiced. Like all the worst bigots say "After all, some of my best friends are (insert group here)." Really, some of my best friends are men. Most of them, as a marrafack.
But still. Can't we have ONE weekend alone? A weekend for just the gals? Puh-leeeze? I'm not saying BlogHer should ban men. There are probably legal issues involved. I am saying men should, of their own volition and kindness, stay home and give us a break.
Here's my issue with the BlogDudes: the presence of one man in a group of women, no matter how large the group is, changes the dynamic markedly. We have grown up in such a sexist and divided culture that women almost automatically defer to men, praise men's contributions more highly than those of women, and pay more attention to men.
I'm not blaming the men or the women. I'm just saying that's the way it is. I have seen it in action over and over again.
Two examples: I volunteer at an all-woman organization. A couple times a year we have guest speakers, usually a mixed group of men and women. From the time the men walk in the door, the energy in the room shifts so that the focus is all on the men. What wonderful speakers they are! How fabulous it is that they have come to help lil' ol' us. And so handsome to boot! It goes from being an egalatarian group to a group that is headed, temporarily at least, by the men in the room.
I took a women's self defense class. Three female instructors, three female assistants and two male instructors. After each round of fighting, we went around the circle so everyone could make comments. The male instructors always received gushing comments about how thankful the students were to have them there, while the female instructors almost never did. I may have never noticed it, but one of the female instructors pointed it out as an important part of our training: we are trained to defer to men. This makes us more vulnerable to attack because we lose our power that way.
I suppose this is what I am afraid of when I feel my stomach squinch up at the thought of men attending BlogHer. I feel that, if men are there, it will once again be The Man Show. For one weekend, I would like to have it be different. I don't want to have to think about male-female dynamics. I don't want to have to change my behavior, and I don't want to notice myself changing my behavior without doing it consciously.
I have spewed forth. What do you all think?
My new link blog is Linkateria.
I mean, I suppose they can't discriminate but the event IS called BlogHer, is it not? And isn't the tag line "Where the women bloggers are?"
Who are these guys and WHY ARE THEY INVADING my sistahood? I'm actually feeling pretty mad at these men. I feel like they have a lot of damn nerve.
Either that or they are clueless, the type of guys that are thinking "Well, I'm not like all those other guys - I'm cool." You know, that same thought that privileged people always have when they think they are being cool by hanging out with the historically oppressed people.
You would think I would be more advanced, more calm, less prejudiced. Like all the worst bigots say "After all, some of my best friends are (insert group here)." Really, some of my best friends are men. Most of them, as a marrafack.
But still. Can't we have ONE weekend alone? A weekend for just the gals? Puh-leeeze? I'm not saying BlogHer should ban men. There are probably legal issues involved. I am saying men should, of their own volition and kindness, stay home and give us a break.
Here's my issue with the BlogDudes: the presence of one man in a group of women, no matter how large the group is, changes the dynamic markedly. We have grown up in such a sexist and divided culture that women almost automatically defer to men, praise men's contributions more highly than those of women, and pay more attention to men.
I'm not blaming the men or the women. I'm just saying that's the way it is. I have seen it in action over and over again.
Two examples: I volunteer at an all-woman organization. A couple times a year we have guest speakers, usually a mixed group of men and women. From the time the men walk in the door, the energy in the room shifts so that the focus is all on the men. What wonderful speakers they are! How fabulous it is that they have come to help lil' ol' us. And so handsome to boot! It goes from being an egalatarian group to a group that is headed, temporarily at least, by the men in the room.
I took a women's self defense class. Three female instructors, three female assistants and two male instructors. After each round of fighting, we went around the circle so everyone could make comments. The male instructors always received gushing comments about how thankful the students were to have them there, while the female instructors almost never did. I may have never noticed it, but one of the female instructors pointed it out as an important part of our training: we are trained to defer to men. This makes us more vulnerable to attack because we lose our power that way.
I suppose this is what I am afraid of when I feel my stomach squinch up at the thought of men attending BlogHer. I feel that, if men are there, it will once again be The Man Show. For one weekend, I would like to have it be different. I don't want to have to think about male-female dynamics. I don't want to have to change my behavior, and I don't want to notice myself changing my behavior without doing it consciously.
I have spewed forth. What do you all think?
My new link blog is Linkateria.
Technology Folly
From the Not Clear on the Concept file
I went to a meeting on Saturday where there was supposed to be a PowerPoint presentation. The projector did not, however, show up.
The speaker read the slides one by one, word for word, saying, "Here in slide 3 we see the historical trends..." etc.
Adapt or die, people. Adapt or die.
I went to a meeting on Saturday where there was supposed to be a PowerPoint presentation. The projector did not, however, show up.
The speaker read the slides one by one, word for word, saying, "Here in slide 3 we see the historical trends..." etc.
Adapt or die, people. Adapt or die.
04 June 2006
Smut-free cookies
As promised, while I take a break from mowing the maldita lawn:
Brown Sugar Cookies with Sesame Seeds
This recipe came from the China Moon Cookbook by genius chef Barbara Tropp. She passed away far too early a few years ago.
Hint: Buy the sesame seeds in the bulk section of your natural foods market. The ones in the spice jars will cost you waaaaay too much. This is also pretty with those black asian sesame seeds.
1 stick cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces.
1/4 cup dark brown sugar
1 cup flour
1/4 cup sesame seeds
Using your most powerful mixer, cream together the butter and brown sugar until light and fluffy, about 4 minutes. Add the flour and mix for another couple minutes until it is all well-blended. Gather the dough together and make a flat disk out of it.
Dust a large sheet of parchment paper or rolling mat with flour and roll the dough out to about 1/4 inch thick. Dip a pastry brush in water and lightly brush the dough all over. Sprinkle the sesame seeds evenly over the dough and press them down a bit.
Cover the dough with plastic wrap and refrigerate for about an hour.
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and move the rack to the middle of the oven. Line baking sheets with parchment or silpat mats. Cut the dough into shapes. You can just make little rectangles or use cookie cutters. I like small hearts myself.
Bake for 15 to 17 minutes, just until the edges start to brown slightly. Cool on wire racks.
Check out my new link blog, Linkateria
Brown Sugar Cookies with Sesame Seeds
This recipe came from the China Moon Cookbook by genius chef Barbara Tropp. She passed away far too early a few years ago.
Hint: Buy the sesame seeds in the bulk section of your natural foods market. The ones in the spice jars will cost you waaaaay too much. This is also pretty with those black asian sesame seeds.
1 stick cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces.
1/4 cup dark brown sugar
1 cup flour
1/4 cup sesame seeds
Using your most powerful mixer, cream together the butter and brown sugar until light and fluffy, about 4 minutes. Add the flour and mix for another couple minutes until it is all well-blended. Gather the dough together and make a flat disk out of it.
Dust a large sheet of parchment paper or rolling mat with flour and roll the dough out to about 1/4 inch thick. Dip a pastry brush in water and lightly brush the dough all over. Sprinkle the sesame seeds evenly over the dough and press them down a bit.
Cover the dough with plastic wrap and refrigerate for about an hour.
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and move the rack to the middle of the oven. Line baking sheets with parchment or silpat mats. Cut the dough into shapes. You can just make little rectangles or use cookie cutters. I like small hearts myself.
Bake for 15 to 17 minutes, just until the edges start to brown slightly. Cool on wire racks.
Check out my new link blog, Linkateria
03 June 2006
No, It's not THAT kind of blog
I feel dirty after reading what people were searching for when they found my blog. Who knew the world was so full of sick fucks. "men pooping pictures"? Eeew. "Excessively long pubic hair?" Likewise. And now "Red Snatch Crotch." I mean, come on, people. I am going to delete all my old posts and start just posting excellent butter cookie recipes.
02 June 2006
How is my blog changing my life?
The BlogHer question of the year is: "How is your blog changing your life?"
This is my attempt to answer that question.
Blogging is what I have always wanted. I didnt know it until I started doing it, but it was the precise thing I always craved.
It started like this: I learned to read early. I clearly remember getting my first library card at age 6 after we moved into town from out in the sticks. I asked my mom how to spell my name and was embarrassed when she told me the letters - I already knew that - what I wanted was to write it in cursive, because I knew that a cursive signature meant something was Serious and Important, and this was as important a thing as I could imagine at age six.
Getting the library card was my first step toward being someone grown up. I could be trusted with books.
The library was only about 25 feet square but to me it was an endless magical wonderland where I wanted to be all the time. I made my mom drive me there every day they were open - three days a week.
I read constantly and I fell in love with authors. I had deep, intense relationships with books and authors. I was in love like a teenager, mooney and obsessive.
Laura Ingalls Wilder, Louise Fitzhugh, Walter Farley and his endless Black Stallion series. I loved them and dozens of other authors and read my favorite books over and over until the words were a bigger part of my life than what was right there in front of me. In my head, the authors were my friends, my family. I held inner conversations with characters and with the authors who created them.
I always wanted meet the authors, too. We lived in a tiny town where author appearances and book signings weren't common. The closest person to a real author I met was Danny Rife's mom, Joanne, who wrote for the local paper, which was published once a week.
When I was 12, I wrote a gushing letter to Ray Bradbury and was thrilled when he wrote me back a one-word answer "Thanks." That letter was more precious than a sheet of pure gold to me. I carried it around in my school binder and showed it to all my friends. It had come folded in half lengthwise and I kept it that way, until it almost tore in half from all the folding and unfolding, the crease growing soft and furry.
At 16, William Goldman possessed me with his book The Princess Bride. I loved the story, but the parts where he spoke directly to the audience were what intoxicated me.
An author, revealing his life and the story behind the story - breaking the fourth wall and speaking directly to the reader - that was a new one on me, and I fell hard, reading that book dozens of times in the next five years. It took me longer than that to realize that the "author" who was speaking was just another character in the book, that his dad was NOT from Florin, that there was no wife named"Helen" or fat kid called Jason.
Looking back, I seem so frightfully immature. At 19, my mom was having her first baby. I was carrying around a tattered paperback copy of The Princess Bride and quoting it to my friends. Oh well. I have always been a little slow.
But Goldman had given me a taste of what I wanted. I wanted to read an author and not just absorb their words. I wanted to be able to ask them questions and have them answer. I wanted them to know me and how they had affected me. I wanted them to...blog.
I remember reading Anne Lamott's Operating Instructions and being struck by her absolute honesty and her wonderful humor. I thought "There is no one else out there doing this." I thought she was amazing.
Now a dozen years later, I know that thinking Anne Lamott was unique was sort of like what a friend told me about the singer Marian Anderson - it wasn't that she was so uniquely talented. It was just she got to use her talent at a time when so many others were prohibited from doing so.
There are plenty of people out there as talented as Anne Lamott. Funnier, too. Its just that something in their lives kept them from getting an agent and publisher and a book deal. Now if they have a blog, they can hop on the internet and write a post and two minutes later I can be reading their words and nodding my head and laughing or crying. Then I can write them a comment and eagerly await a comment back.
Blogging has made writing and reading so much more rich and satisfying for me. I read new content from my favorite authors every day. (Some of them are over there in my sidebar.) I know about their real lives. They know about me. This is what I have always been searching for, and I feel like I am a teenager in love all over again - in love a hundred times over.
Check out my new linky blog, Linkateria
This is my attempt to answer that question.
Blogging is what I have always wanted. I didnt know it until I started doing it, but it was the precise thing I always craved.
It started like this: I learned to read early. I clearly remember getting my first library card at age 6 after we moved into town from out in the sticks. I asked my mom how to spell my name and was embarrassed when she told me the letters - I already knew that - what I wanted was to write it in cursive, because I knew that a cursive signature meant something was Serious and Important, and this was as important a thing as I could imagine at age six.
Getting the library card was my first step toward being someone grown up. I could be trusted with books.
The library was only about 25 feet square but to me it was an endless magical wonderland where I wanted to be all the time. I made my mom drive me there every day they were open - three days a week.
I read constantly and I fell in love with authors. I had deep, intense relationships with books and authors. I was in love like a teenager, mooney and obsessive.
Laura Ingalls Wilder, Louise Fitzhugh, Walter Farley and his endless Black Stallion series. I loved them and dozens of other authors and read my favorite books over and over until the words were a bigger part of my life than what was right there in front of me. In my head, the authors were my friends, my family. I held inner conversations with characters and with the authors who created them.
I always wanted meet the authors, too. We lived in a tiny town where author appearances and book signings weren't common. The closest person to a real author I met was Danny Rife's mom, Joanne, who wrote for the local paper, which was published once a week.
When I was 12, I wrote a gushing letter to Ray Bradbury and was thrilled when he wrote me back a one-word answer "Thanks." That letter was more precious than a sheet of pure gold to me. I carried it around in my school binder and showed it to all my friends. It had come folded in half lengthwise and I kept it that way, until it almost tore in half from all the folding and unfolding, the crease growing soft and furry.
At 16, William Goldman possessed me with his book The Princess Bride. I loved the story, but the parts where he spoke directly to the audience were what intoxicated me.
An author, revealing his life and the story behind the story - breaking the fourth wall and speaking directly to the reader - that was a new one on me, and I fell hard, reading that book dozens of times in the next five years. It took me longer than that to realize that the "author" who was speaking was just another character in the book, that his dad was NOT from Florin, that there was no wife named"Helen" or fat kid called Jason.
Looking back, I seem so frightfully immature. At 19, my mom was having her first baby. I was carrying around a tattered paperback copy of The Princess Bride and quoting it to my friends. Oh well. I have always been a little slow.
But Goldman had given me a taste of what I wanted. I wanted to read an author and not just absorb their words. I wanted to be able to ask them questions and have them answer. I wanted them to know me and how they had affected me. I wanted them to...blog.
I remember reading Anne Lamott's Operating Instructions and being struck by her absolute honesty and her wonderful humor. I thought "There is no one else out there doing this." I thought she was amazing.
Now a dozen years later, I know that thinking Anne Lamott was unique was sort of like what a friend told me about the singer Marian Anderson - it wasn't that she was so uniquely talented. It was just she got to use her talent at a time when so many others were prohibited from doing so.
There are plenty of people out there as talented as Anne Lamott. Funnier, too. Its just that something in their lives kept them from getting an agent and publisher and a book deal. Now if they have a blog, they can hop on the internet and write a post and two minutes later I can be reading their words and nodding my head and laughing or crying. Then I can write them a comment and eagerly await a comment back.
Blogging has made writing and reading so much more rich and satisfying for me. I read new content from my favorite authors every day. (Some of them are over there in my sidebar.) I know about their real lives. They know about me. This is what I have always been searching for, and I feel like I am a teenager in love all over again - in love a hundred times over.
Check out my new linky blog, Linkateria
My favorite blogging of the day.
I am often advised to be less picky about my explicit criteria for who I will date. (I am advised to be more picky about who I actually date, but that's a different story.)
- From Flooded Lizard Kingdom
Check out my new linky blog, Linkateria
- From Flooded Lizard Kingdom
Check out my new linky blog, Linkateria
Now with a new blog
I have a new blog, Linkateria, just for all my linky link posts. I find so much wonderful stuff but my stats show that no one sticks around long enough to click them, so they will be banished to a new area.
01 June 2006
Link-o-rama
A little something for everyone. This is such good stuff that I could not wait to get home and post it for you.
Crafty. And hilarious. Make some of these lovely yarn things for your loved ones and they will never forget you. "I don't know if it's the parched, dangling tongues or the crudely shapen appendages, but something just isn't sitting well."
Don't mess with her. Hysterical post about what can go wrong when your husband decides to invite a film crew to use your house as a location...."I do admit to being the owner of a sharp tongue. I am also anal, bossy, and on a deadline."
Sweet. Greater love hath no one than a friend who helps out in a time of crisis. Warning: made me cry. "Much of that time in my life is a blur but I will always remember the overwhelming feeling that someone cared enough to help me out like that."
Caustic. And funny. This writing kills me. "...she found the nearest pile of mulch and did a bellyflop into it. When she got up she looked like she had been tossed around in a giant bag of Shake-n-Bake (Baby flavor)."
Scary. More news of malfeasance from the Bushies. Is anything they will stoop to surprising anymore?
Idiocy. Weren't we just talking about the Bush administration?
Smart. A really fine, simple explanation of net neutrality. What it is, why it is important. "The deepest pockets are not the deepest sources of innovation -- to the contrary...When was the last time a new telephone service was introduced? Call-waiting?"
Ranting. Supafine in high feminist dudgeon, and it is worth reading. "The "Mommy wars" and all these books about motherhood focus on a different class of people than the one I belong to. I don't have the luxury of choosing whether or not to work."
Crafty. And hilarious. Make some of these lovely yarn things for your loved ones and they will never forget you. "I don't know if it's the parched, dangling tongues or the crudely shapen appendages, but something just isn't sitting well."
Don't mess with her. Hysterical post about what can go wrong when your husband decides to invite a film crew to use your house as a location...."I do admit to being the owner of a sharp tongue. I am also anal, bossy, and on a deadline."
Sweet. Greater love hath no one than a friend who helps out in a time of crisis. Warning: made me cry. "Much of that time in my life is a blur but I will always remember the overwhelming feeling that someone cared enough to help me out like that."
Caustic. And funny. This writing kills me. "...she found the nearest pile of mulch and did a bellyflop into it. When she got up she looked like she had been tossed around in a giant bag of Shake-n-Bake (Baby flavor)."
Scary. More news of malfeasance from the Bushies. Is anything they will stoop to surprising anymore?
Idiocy. Weren't we just talking about the Bush administration?
Smart. A really fine, simple explanation of net neutrality. What it is, why it is important. "The deepest pockets are not the deepest sources of innovation -- to the contrary...When was the last time a new telephone service was introduced? Call-waiting?"
Ranting. Supafine in high feminist dudgeon, and it is worth reading. "The "Mommy wars" and all these books about motherhood focus on a different class of people than the one I belong to. I don't have the luxury of choosing whether or not to work."
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