Pressing current events accompanied by my sarcastic commentary!

A lot has been happening in the news since I have been buried under a shroud of work and more work and stupid responsibilities which look an awful lot like work. But I check out the headlines on the HuffPo and am up on all the latest news. And I know all y'all are wondering what I, your lovely blogmistress, has to say about them. So, off to the races! 1. Tonight's top story: Were you aware that Michelle Obama wears CLOTHING and has ARMS?! (See: everything on HuffPo's page devoted to Michelle Obama.) Slightly amusing and/or embarrassing anecdote. Remember how I used to be Mormon? Ah yes, well, the Mormons don't let their ladies show their shoulders. So, growing up, I never had tank tops, except to wear under stuff. But when I ran away to live with my boyfriend one summer (when I was 20, so I don't know if "run away" is the right term, but whatevs, it was totes scandalous) and kinda decided I didn't really want to follow the Mormon rules anymore, I bought a couple of tank tops (two words? one?). And I'm not going to lie, the first time I wore a tank top out and about with friends, I felt a little bit weird about taking my sweater off. True story. But now I am a full-fledged shoulder and upper-arm ho. As evidenced by this blurry picture of me from last July 4th.* 2. The Twitter is sweeping the nation! In the comments recently, my friend Matty said Twitter was like blogging-lite for him. However, I have never changed my cell phone plan since I got it a year and a half ago and I still pay for each separate text message. I might be Amish. I also take issue with Matty's assertion that Twittering instead of blogging, "It isn't a replacement, but it's like masturbating to get you through the coital dry spells." Now, I sure do enjoy coitus, but I am a lady with those finicky ladyparts and resent your relegation of masturbation to less than main-event status. That is all. 3. The GOP is totally phat now, G. And Michele Bachmann continues to embarrass the state of Minnesota with her public displays of incompetence and faltering mental health. 4. Rush Limbaugh is still an asshole. No link necessary, that fact is in the public domain. 5. Apparently the economy is not doing well. Whatevs, I already got food stamps. (Still awesome, by the way. Thanks for the organic energy drinks, regular supplies of fresh produce, chocolate Silk, and the occasional block of non-cheddar cheese, State of Ohio! I know, decadent, right?) Though we should probably all be worried about the print media going under, because if it does, we'll be hard pressed to find materials for the roofs of our Hooverville shanties!** Anyway, The Jon Stewart tells us exactly where we should look for advice and information in this time of recessive capitalism:

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

CNBC Gives Financial Advice

Daily Show Full Episodes Important Things With Demetri Martin

Political Humor Joke of the Day

*So blonde! So thin! Ah, those were the days... **Good news: my recently laid-off father is now re-employed (assuming my commie pinko feminist blog posts don't cause his background check to get held up by Homeland Security), but one of my friends here got laid off and is now looking to start a hobo gang. Don't get me wrong, hoboes are great, but riding the rails is always more fun when you've got a day job you can go back to.

Yeah, I'm TOTALLY reading my Lukacs right now

Young Georg tries on the mustache for size. And is all slouch-y. So for my (admittedly awesome) communications class on cultural Marxism, we're reading a big ol' chunk of History and Class Consciousness. Large swaths of this work are completely incomprehensible, despite appearing to have been translated into English from the German or the Hungarian or whatever it was originally written in. But I can feel my smarts growing. You too can watch them growing by reading all my really good sentences. Anyway, a few tidbits to share: -The train just went by (it's maybe a half-mile away) and it is serious about constant whistle-blowing. Apparently drunk college kids wander onto the tracks sometimes and get hit. -I saw a nurse practitioner at the student health center last week, and I'm not going to lie, she was a little bit judge-y. I mean, she works at a university, I don't see where she gets off. Just because she happened to have encountered me at the tail end of Lauren's Ridiculous/Awesome Summer of Promiscuity™ and I didn't feel like counting up an exact number in front of her right then and there doesn't mean she can give me shit about "taking risks." This is why the Sexy Gay Jesus invented condoms. We've been over it.* I think it was a little over the line for her to tell me when I left that she was glad I was in a relationship now instead of "trying to get in one." Trying to get in one? How about, "enjoying being single"? or "I knew I was moving"? or "mind your own goddamn business"? Fuck you, judgmental health center lady. I bet she was disappointed to find out that I didn't have chlamydia OR gonorrhea.** -Only a couple people came to my CSI: Miami season premiere/birthday bash the other night, but Caruso did not let me down. Unlike everyone I know here in town who apparently had "homework" or "a family," an "illness" or "somewhere to be on Tuesday morning." Whatevs. Thrift Store Champion and a couple other diehards made it awesome. Although, take note: do not ever make a "Miami Punch" that involves three bottles of Cold Duck (Annn-dre) per batch. It is gross and will make everyone feel ill. Especially when they eat 2958798 lbs. of Doritos/cookies/pretzels/cake because only four people are at the party and they might as well go at it. Ah, birthdays. *Although she did tell me that condoms with spermicide on them don't do much besides irritate vaginas. So guys, quit buying that shit, it doesn't help; it only hinders. **She also kept asking me if I wanted to take a pregnancy test.

Purity balls: creepy patriarchal fad or CREEPIEST patriarchal fad?

Random aside: I just spilled chicken salad all over the tank top I've been wearing since yesterday. I am a classy lady. No doubt about that.

Lesbian princess orgies totally don't break chastity vows, right?

If you see these words written, stay away: "culture war," "hook-up culture," "personal responsibility," "purity," etc.

But anyway, purity balls.* If you haven't heard about them yet, then you can go ahead and thank The Sexy Gay Jesus for sparing you thus far. But I am not as merciful as SGJesus. Because they are gross. And they need to stop. People write these articles in mainstream magazines and newspapers about these creepy, sex-obsessed patriarchs and try not to be all "judge-y," when really we should all be totally judge-y all the time about men who think they own their daughters' reproductive organs so literally that they have the ability and the "God-given" right to give their little girls' pussies away to another man on their wedding day. Ew. So these guys dress up in suits and take their daughters (some of whom are far too young to even understand what a chastity pledge really means) to an anti-sex prom, vowing to "protect" the girls' purity, and we're supposed to believe that when the girls promise to abstain until marriage, they're really making a free and fully-informed choice. Right.

And can I just say something? I always thought the idea of "daddy-daughter dates" was kind of creepy. Sure, I like(d) doing stuff with my dad, but can we keep explicitly romantic concepts away from said stuff? I'm really glad my family wasn't into the "your first date will be with your dad when you turn 16" shit like some other Mormon families I knew. And guess what? I didn't turn into a big whore (until later, obvs). I didn't really date until college, and barely even kissed a boy until a month into that relationship. I was nineteen. And a half. I know the Mormon/sex/fear thing had something to do with my reluctance to date before that, but most of it was due to the fact that the opportunity never presented itself and I was having way too much fun hanging out with my girl friends to ever start feeling that frustrated about not having a boyfriend. Of course, I am a big trashy whore now. As you know. So we should probably go ahead and blame my dad for not properly guarding my 24 year-old uterus from teh evil unmarried penis. And also, I need to take a shower now that certain words (guess which ones) were used in the same sentence.

Jeff Fecke, the father of a daughter, points out what should be an obvious red flag:

This is everything that is wrong with the “purity” movement in a nutshell: it’s incestuous. And not incestuous in that a small number of people seem to run the whole movement — though that is part of it — but incestuous in that it actively encourages incest. It gives fathers an inappropriate level of control of their daughter’s sexuality. Like, way inappropriate.

Uh, yeah.

Also, in a description of the ceremony itself: "Then Randy and his friend Kevin Moore stand in front of the cross, holding up two large swords, points crossed." I feel like there's something... I don't know, meaningful about that type of imagery. Can't quite put my finger on it. But if I did put my finger on it, I'd have to give back my chintzy chastity ring. Ha! Haha! Hahaha! Gross. And the word "purity," when applied to human beings, smacks of eugenics or something. It should only be used when discussing chocolate, precious metals, and/or snobby musical choices.

TBogg, another non-creepy dad, calls out these purity freaks for making sex into this scary thing that is totally going to RUIN YOUR LIFE blah blah blah bad parenting, because most of these girls are going to have premarital sex anyway, but they'll be too afraid to even look into contraception:

And if you think a vow of chastity made by a twelve year-old during a farcical virgin pageant in a Holiday Inn ballroom is going to hold up against the tidal wave of teenage hormones to come, well, you're a bigger fucking idiot than even your kids think you are.

Pretty much.



*"The Pursuit of Teen Girl Purity"?! Ehhhhh.

Today's links brought to you by a glowing sense of vindication

Sorry to gloat without explanation, friends, but this one's not for the internet. Yet. Just sayin' that I am in a great mood, and only just now opened an energy drink. So happy hump day! Wipe those Cheeto crumbs off your fingers, change into a fresh pair of pajamas, and open up the blinds on that basement window, blog readers!* I gots some linkies.

-First comes from the Boozehound Cinephile (I bow down to the more experienced drunk). The bloggers over at Pajiba have been writing about good TV shows or something, blah blah blah--he talks about screwdrivers. In the involved and analytical sort of way only a true conoisseur can appreciate. Apparently the screwdriver is a telltale "alcoholic's drink." Just because we've kept massive amounts of frozen orange juice concentrate on hand for the past four years and it is a VERY rare a occasion that we have even less than two different bottles of vodka, doesn't make me an alcoholic! Seriously, people. Although I did like Ted's theory that drunks like screwdrivers because they can just pretend that they're drinking juice. I mean, not that I would have ever done that in the presence of some nice Mormons who came to visit me shortly after I left the church and was still letting them come over, pretty much only because I knew them personally and felt like I should let them fulfill their home and visiting teaching callings. That would have been really tacky. For the record: I do order screwdrivers in bars sometimes because I want something simple and not carbonated, but I only consider it a true "cocktail" if we're using vodka at least one step above Smirnoff and orange juice that tastes something like actual oranges and none of that sickly sweet Sunny D shit. The Dirty Dozen. (Ted Boynton, Pajiba)

Mulder likes screwdrivers, take a drink.

-I know I've got her over on my short blogroll and she doesn't update a lot, but seriously, you HAVE to go read Terrible Mother. She is seriously one of the best writers on all of the internet. She will break your heart and patch it up with her poignant, funny, and engaging accounts of an everyday but amazingly beautiful life lived. Yes, I'm being sincere for once. Please don't walk away! She uses sarcasm too! Go check out her latest post (as well as the archives), written on location at her dying grandmother's house in California. She talks about family, love, and relationships with an honesty and an accuracy (if that makes sense) that I've rarely seen in writing. In California, I Dream of Snow. (Terrible Mother)

-So recently GWB was like, "Hey, thinking about maybe possibly looking at the 'family planning' section of Walgreen's** is totally an abortion and we're not going to fund that shit," and HRC and (one of my home state's two awesome lady Senators) Patty Murray were like, "Nice try, assholes." A lot of people are talking about it, but I'll link to Amanda's post because, you know, I like doing that. Everything's abortion. (Amanda Marcotte, Pandagon)

-Speaking of women and choices (esp. vis a vis reproduction), Lisa Kansas spells out clearly how people would just prefer that we not have any, because any choice we do make is WRONG. "'Men' and 'mankind' apparently not being defined to include 'ambulatory wombs.'" (Lisa Kansas, PunkAssBlog)


All right, we'll call this good for now and save a couple links for later. Or tomorrow. Whatever.


*If you do not read enough blogs to realize that these are all stereotypes about bloggers, well then... I just felt really super-nerdy all of a sudden. Goddamn the webernets are an insulated place sometimes.

**So I totally bought (non-fruity) condoms at Walgreen's yesterday, and I swear the older guy (like, in his sixties "older") who works there a lot and always seems kind of patronizing was acting especially jackassy to me. He gave me shit about unloading my own basket (it had other things in it besides condoms, people) because "no one ever knows what to do with them afterwards" and seemed annoyed that I tried to use the pen pointer thing on the credit card screen. I was TRYING to be helpful, asshole. But apparently I shouldn't help you avoid repetitive stress injuries or preserve the integrity of the touch screen. I can't say for sure that he was judging me for being a whore, he does have a shitty job, but I can't say for sure that he WASN'T.

Monday's random tidbits of magic

Another energy drink propping my head up this afternoon. I've been kind of on a hedonistic bender these past few weeks, so my weekends aren't really all that restful, and what with me being an insomniac who compulsively does word puzzles in bed every night, I don't really get to sleep at a decent hour and I am ALWAYS TIRED. One day I will have babies and I will not be able to breastfeed because I will be afraid of passing on the massive amounts of taurine (yum!) I will need to keep me awake because they are crying all night for me to feed them. A vicious, vicious cycle. I would probably also have to quit drinking every night. Perhaps someone like me should not reproduce. -In honor of re-watching my copy of Wandy Sykes' Sick and Tired with my Pal N yesterday, here is a magical clip: I must give credit to Feministing, where I first saw this and was inspired to financially support the Wanda by buying her DVD. N and I had to first go for an energy drink run before we could sit and watch something for an hour and a half, despite the hilarity: I was hungover, and her new kitties had kept her awake all night. Energy drinks only cut your life expectancy in half for every 12 of them you drink every three days or so, right? -My Best TV Friend Forever (BTVFF) Ka$h likes to do about three main things with the newspaper: 1. Pick out the most horrifying stories she can find (you know, the ones I avoid by only looking at the "Living" section) and reading the depressing/gruesome details to me despite my vocal objections. 2. Discuss with me how much we hate today's Pluggers and/or Pajama Diaries. 3. Go to the "Wisconsin news" section, and find the stories that make our neighbors to the east look the worst, and then read the stories to our Wisconsinite roommates in an attempt to shame and humiliate them. Well, I got caught up on QuizLaw today, and saw they had updated everybody on our favorite recent-ish story from Wisconsin: NECROPHILIACS HUZZAH! The ones who dug up the dead girl, not any of the ones who killed deers to fuck. Still, though: Wisconsin: Land of America's Truest Values. Like bars every 15 feet. And creepy sexual fetishes. -And on that note: I sat around a "camp" (in a backyard firepit thingy) fire over the weekend and we made s'mores. Hooray! Of course, when retrieving my jeans from the floor the next morning, I realized that a) that spot on the floor was exactly where I had spilled my re-hydration water glass at some point during the night and b) I had gotten melted marshmallow all over the left leg. Then I proceeded to wear these pants into public. People with hangovers have no need for you and your middle-class "cleanliness" standards. Nope, not when there is bacon to be consumed.