OK, another breather between the didactic babblings of your favorite stalker...
Read About My Neighborhood's Mythical Monster
the 'Devil of the Marsh', described as having a "snake-like body, dark greenish skin and a very large head with small horns."
This cool site also has info on my local free "liberation drive in" - hosted in a local parking lot near me!- and other nifty Oaklandcentric goodies. What a find!
Monday, November 25, 2002
Sunday, November 24, 2002
OK, finally the
Slacker Stalker Guide to Shoebox Abuse
...an addendum to My Gender Identity Shoe Key
If you have shoes - i.e. a gender identiy - it's a metaphor, work with me - then you have a shoe box that you don't want to trap yourself or anyone else in.
Shoebox Use:
Safe storage for your ex's sex toys (borrowed permanently).
Shoebox Abuse:
Embarassing drag show photo storage- take them out! Let your little light shine!
Shoebox Use:
Starting element for diorama about what your life would be like if you were a football player or cheerleader.
Shoebox Abuse:
Starting element for diorama about your dark evil revenge fantasies about people who have made fun of your fashion choices.
Shoebox Use:
Handy storage for your spirit gum, fake facial hair, rhinestone bindis, glitter gel, false eyelashes, dressy polkadot bowties and cigarette holders.
Shoebox Abuse:
Unsanitary storage for the unfortunate mishap about which you are still in denial involving the Martha Stewart homeade vanilla soy sauce peanut brittle recipe when you were having a feminine nesting urge. Own your fabulous failures! How will you find a way to link to your inner feminine side if you don't find out how NOT to?
Shoebox Use:
House for your baby guinea pig named Thor, or your little garter snake named Penelope. Or your girl rat you named Boy.
Shoebox Abuse:
Carefully hidden home for that one ostentatious pair of platform latex glitter boots that you bought on a dare but haven't had the guts to wear and are hoping your friends forget about. Flex your feet, flex your gender!
Coming soon: ten new spiritual rules to live with, including spiritual spelling rules.
Slacker Stalker Guide to Shoebox Abuse
...an addendum to My Gender Identity Shoe Key
If you have shoes - i.e. a gender identiy - it's a metaphor, work with me - then you have a shoe box that you don't want to trap yourself or anyone else in.
Shoebox Use:
Safe storage for your ex's sex toys (borrowed permanently).
Shoebox Abuse:
Embarassing drag show photo storage- take them out! Let your little light shine!
Shoebox Use:
Starting element for diorama about what your life would be like if you were a football player or cheerleader.
Shoebox Abuse:
Starting element for diorama about your dark evil revenge fantasies about people who have made fun of your fashion choices.
Shoebox Use:
Handy storage for your spirit gum, fake facial hair, rhinestone bindis, glitter gel, false eyelashes, dressy polkadot bowties and cigarette holders.
Shoebox Abuse:
Unsanitary storage for the unfortunate mishap about which you are still in denial involving the Martha Stewart homeade vanilla soy sauce peanut brittle recipe when you were having a feminine nesting urge. Own your fabulous failures! How will you find a way to link to your inner feminine side if you don't find out how NOT to?
Shoebox Use:
House for your baby guinea pig named Thor, or your little garter snake named Penelope. Or your girl rat you named Boy.
Shoebox Abuse:
Carefully hidden home for that one ostentatious pair of platform latex glitter boots that you bought on a dare but haven't had the guts to wear and are hoping your friends forget about. Flex your feet, flex your gender!
Coming soon: ten new spiritual rules to live with, including spiritual spelling rules.
Thursday, November 21, 2002
OK, I can't RESIST sending you all to check out the Wide Pancake Week schedule of events
...hosted by the City of Moscow Government Committee for Tourism. Turn up your volume for some not-to-be-missed cheesey techno Russian folk fusion.
Really, the tract on shoebox abuse prevention is still on the docket for this week, I promise.
...hosted by the City of Moscow Government Committee for Tourism. Turn up your volume for some not-to-be-missed cheesey techno Russian folk fusion.
Really, the tract on shoebox abuse prevention is still on the docket for this week, I promise.
Wednesday, November 20, 2002
Two Good Articles Someone Who Opposes the War or Someone Who Likes Cyborgs Should Read
There are two articles in today's Bay Guardian by people I know. One is by my good old pal and role model Pratap (pronounced like "Prothap"), someone who has his issues, as do we all, but whose political opinion I really respect. In this Op-Ed he talks about a trip he took to Afghanistan in January of this year, and his thoughts on the aftermath of our soon-to-be-waged war in Iraq. He's so smart the SFBG keeps a standing offer open to him to publish anything he gives them. Sometimes he researches a piece for years before submitting it. I could go on and on about him, but you know, that might start making me sound like a REAL stalker.
The other person I know who has something in the SFBG today, Annalee, in fact has a regular SFBG column that I have read for years: Techsploitation. She's a girl geek and writes about gender and technology and shit. To be truthful, she is more a friend of friends, but we do technically know eachother. I'm just a big starfcker and have a compulsion to drop names and call them "my friends." But anyway, her column today is a sad remembrance of her mother, who became a cyborg. It's just something that cyborg supporters should read. She's still a fan of cyborgs, I'm still a fan of cyborgs, we're ALL STILL FANS OF CYBORGS, just read the article anyway.
Tomorrow- Shoeboxes and Their Many Uses and Abuses.
There are two articles in today's Bay Guardian by people I know. One is by my good old pal and role model Pratap (pronounced like "Prothap"), someone who has his issues, as do we all, but whose political opinion I really respect. In this Op-Ed he talks about a trip he took to Afghanistan in January of this year, and his thoughts on the aftermath of our soon-to-be-waged war in Iraq. He's so smart the SFBG keeps a standing offer open to him to publish anything he gives them. Sometimes he researches a piece for years before submitting it. I could go on and on about him, but you know, that might start making me sound like a REAL stalker.
The other person I know who has something in the SFBG today, Annalee, in fact has a regular SFBG column that I have read for years: Techsploitation. She's a girl geek and writes about gender and technology and shit. To be truthful, she is more a friend of friends, but we do technically know eachother. I'm just a big starfcker and have a compulsion to drop names and call them "my friends." But anyway, her column today is a sad remembrance of her mother, who became a cyborg. It's just something that cyborg supporters should read. She's still a fan of cyborgs, I'm still a fan of cyborgs, we're ALL STILL FANS OF CYBORGS, just read the article anyway.
Tomorrow- Shoeboxes and Their Many Uses and Abuses.
Tuesday, November 19, 2002
Stalking Gender Identity with the New Gender Identity Shoe Key
Argue if you will, but I'm pretty sure it's unimproveable. With all available information, that is.
OK. Whatever. Behold the glory. Inspired by the ESPN rerun of the national cheerleading championships, which reminded me of the fact that outside the San Francisco Bay Area people actual engage the extreme ends of gender and take it seriously.
Starting at the masculine end and working towards the feminine, find that shoe that suits you:
FOOTBALL PLAYER
100% 24/7 passing male with an unchallenged gender identity
Adidas Running Shoes
STONE BUTCH
The can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em kind of guy/ FTM/butch who nevertheless is at the mercy of the HIGH FEMME.
Lace Up Hiking Boots
These tend to set the tone of the butch (male, female, trans, gay-les-bi, whatever) discourse, because they are the most likely to draw attention to their own gender identity, willingly or not.
SERVICEY BUTCH
The fop who likes to make all the ladies at ease, aware of his/her effect on people and voted Most Likely to Bring Flowers.
Penny Loafers
SOFT BUTCH
Voted Most Likely to Have a Political Agenda, and/or a Sarcastic Sense of Humor, and/or a Women's Studies Degree.
Classic example: Mo from Alison Bechdel's Dykes to Watch Out For
Skechers or Other Vanity Pseudo Sport Shoe
AND Voted Most Likely to Wish S/He Set the Gender Discourse, Butch AND Femme
FUTCH
This category confounds gender identity. From pixies with bald heads to bodybuilders with long hair, from superheroes to performance artists. And bloggers.
Anything 'tall. From Jellies to Moon Boots.
LOW FEMME
I have a bit of a blind side about this category because it's where I fall most of the time. But it is my ASTUTE opinion that you can tell a low femme by her
Sensible Shoes, like Doc Martens or Blundstones.
Voted Most Likely to Wear Hand Me Down Shoes. (She can be a bottom feeder of a sort, she has no glamour to lose.)
HIGH FEMME
This is the one the Stone Butch can't live with but can't live without.
Duh. Pumps.
SUPERFEMME DIVA
These tend to set the tone of the femme (female, male, trans, gay-les-bi, whatever) discourse, because they are the most likely to draw attention to their own gender identity, willingly or not. Like the Stone Butch.
Open Toe Spike-Heeled Pumps or Other Extreme Toe-Cleavage-Revealing Shoes
Voted Most Likely to Own More Than One Each Wig and Boa (Feathered).
CHEERLEADER
100% 24/7 passing female with an unchallenged gender identity
Adidas Running Shoes
Voted Most Likely to Become a Vampire Slayer or Demon Goddess and Start Wearing Leather Pants.
...OK at least in my universe.
AND NOW THAT YOU HAVE THE TOOLS TO MEASURE YOUR GENDER STRENGTH:
go practice flexing your gender muscles. Try out a new gender presentation. Learn a cheer. Throw a football. Buy new shoes.
Or, if you want to try out Low Femme, scavenge them.
And for chissakes check out the Gender Terrorist's website. My friend Del-- who doesn't believe s/he is transitioning gender, but creating gender art every day with her/his own body. If you only knew the look on my 94 year old great uncle the Methodist Minister's face when he pulled Del's book off my shelf.
Here's Del defining Gender Terrorist:
A Gender Terrorist is anyone who consistently and intentionally subverts,destablizes and challenges the binary gender system.This is the notion that only two genders exist, male and female. The fact is, while this system might work (and that's a matter of opinion) for most people it doesn't work.Too many people are harmed both physically and mentally,in the attempt to force themselves into a shoe that doesn't fit.
Happy shoe shopping/ stalking/ scrounging, Cinderellas!
Thursday, November 14, 2002
In Praise of a Beautiful Single Bi Girl with Cash who Has Grown Up into a Philanthropic Feminist
Everyone Take a Moment to Ponder the Loveliness that is Angelina Jolie
Everyone Take a Moment to Ponder the Loveliness that is Angelina Jolie
Wednesday, November 13, 2002
From the Department of What the Fuck
Ya'll deserve a treat for pondering the nature of life, death, compassion, and vengeance with me.
Please to Try Your Hand at Harnessing the Awesome Power of the Mysterious Singing Horses of Latvia, and Their Runaway Hit Single "Dum Dum Dum, Tim Tim Tam"
From a Latvian Blogger. You want to try your hand at reading the comments people wrote about this little ditty?
My favorite comment is the one that goes "aaaaaaaaaa, shallallallaallaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAA, vai arii pum pum ã ã."
It looks like war is about to break about between Poland, Latvia, and Lithuania over these horses, though. That would be a pity.
Ya'll deserve a treat for pondering the nature of life, death, compassion, and vengeance with me.
Please to Try Your Hand at Harnessing the Awesome Power of the Mysterious Singing Horses of Latvia, and Their Runaway Hit Single "Dum Dum Dum, Tim Tim Tam"
From a Latvian Blogger. You want to try your hand at reading the comments people wrote about this little ditty?
My favorite comment is the one that goes "aaaaaaaaaa, shallallallaallaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAA, vai arii pum pum ã ã."
It looks like war is about to break about between Poland, Latvia, and Lithuania over these horses, though. That would be a pity.
Monday, November 11, 2002
Q. Why Is Compassion so Damn Hard for the Witty and Charming?
A. Because you are afraid it will make you into a fanatic.
Fact is you are already fanatically avoiding feeling compassion, every time you unthinkingly give the less fortunate people (there are ALWAYS less fortunate) a hand-out just to get them away from you, rather than because you think someday you might end up that way. Or every time you unthinkingly blame the more fortunate people for not helping you more often (my family's speciality). Or else you are fanatically avoiding all people so that nobody can ever criticize you or make you feel uncompassionate, which makes you feel bad. But think-- fanatically avoiding ever feeling bad means that you never know when you really feel GOOD.
I know, I know, it's not an exact science, but here are my inane equations anyway. There has to be a way to explain why people, seeing me dealing with grief over my dying girlfriend's suicide, are actually repulsed and even TELL me that they have a hard time feeling compassion for me. So here's my wild ride down the slippery slope of character equations.
YOUR AVERAGE PEOPLE PERSON + inner child (id) or inner optimist (desiring anything and acknowledging it takes optimism)= someone who will seek faith, a faith, something to direct their choices, a code of right and wrong, so that people will like her/him. This person seeks ways to ingratiate her or himself through wit (not just knowledge, but discernment, knowing what's funny when). This person is a natural flirt, even if they couldn't hold up their end of a conversation with a saw horse.
NON-PEOPLE PERSON + inner child = my sister, never quite getting a joke, never quite understanding why the choices of words she makes sometimes infuriate people, someone basically not open to leading an examined life because she gets it "wrong" so often. She knows how to want, and how to seek faith, but she condemns herself so often without seeking remedy, that she generally avoids people and got herself a heinous husband who people generally avoid. He thinks he's infallible, he criticizes her to the point where she categorically dismisses all his criticism, and then she lashes out at people to make herself feel superior because she doesn't really know what she's worth anymore.
OK. I had to open up a shelf in the hierarchy where I could leave my sister. What do you do with someone you don't trust to make good choices who specifically doesn't have compassion for anyone, even herself? What do you do with a drunken sailor? I'm just going to say call this a NON-PEOPLE PERSON and leave them to their slurred little Song of Theirself.
Moving on, let's say you are a PEOPLE PERSON SEEKING WIT (the highest expression of ego: discernment) but you have forgotten your optimistic side. You are rootless. You can't remember why you got up this morning, or came out of the womb in the first place. You are reading T.S. Elliot "The Wasteland" with your breakfast every morning and you can't quite grasp why HE got up every morning. Nobody reads poetry anyway. Nobody cares. You don't even care. Why try?
This is the state of mind that I think most people are in. From this state it is impossible to overcome your need for a right/ wrong answer, extend yourself beyond the few things you believe to be true, and be compassionate to a stranger who looks as though they've made at least a few choices that you would not have made.
I'll characterize this as: PEOPLE-PERSON - inner child + wit = your average twit. Myself on a bad day. The egoist with her latte and a bus pass but no way to see that the soulless bus driver is not actually TRYING to spill her drink, because it's technically illegal to drink on the bus. This person is prone to feeling permanently wrong, permanently punished, and that everyone's expectations are Too Damn High.
Then there is the PEOPLE-PERSON + inner child + wit = someone seeking routes to transcendence, new expansive ways of thinking, access to compassion. This person understands the role of the responsible citizen, the inner-parent / super-ego. They believe in parking laws, even if they sometimes break them. Then, they pay the ticket and don't act like that 28 dollars makes them Broken Down By The Man. They accept that they are tools, or better yet, cogs in the machine, and they aspire to understanding what this machine might be up to, and since they are bringing their inner child along for the ride, this machine might just be up to something Good.
Then there are the NON-PEOPLE-PEOPLE + inner child + wit, which equals the reclusive artists like Edward Gorey. And the NON-PEOPLE-PEOPLE - inner child + wit, which equals Andrew Dice Clay, back in the day.
And this brings us to the Compassionate Person.
PEOPLE-PERSON + inner child - wit + compassion= someone who follows blindly, like your average local 19 year old Mormon "Elder." Or someone at Jonestown. Someone who can't sit down and make a cost benefit analysis about a moral choice to save his life. These folks serve in the interest of whatever piques their interest that day, giving them good, optimistic feelings, like a child in a room of phones and a telepromter telling them what to say when they make those fundraising calls and a fearless leader there to offer them a glass of kool aid as a reward for their excellent work.
PEOPLE-PERSON - inner child + wit + compassion= I think a lot of existentialist liberals end up here. They understand service to a Greater Good. They understand a set of rights and wrongs. They just can't see the Why Try of things. They read the Tao of Pooh and the Te of Piglet and end up like Eeyore. They become graduate students and eventually become lawyers and eventually end up becoming the life of the wine and cheese party only quoting book and movie reviews and never books or movies. Snore. I think this is the place I am most in danger of ending up.
PEOPLE PERSON - inner child - wit + compassion = a Methodist minister. My grandma, for example (who is a Methodist minister). She can't tell a joke. She takes herself incredibly seriously. She is almost militaristically "at service" to any and all. She doesn't visit, she steam rolls various parts of the family on a seasonal basis. Sigh. Two weeks until her 84th birthday. I have a completely wholesome low-fat anti-war pity-drenched dinner to look forward to this Thanksgiving. Not that I need fat, or war, or dry wit to keep me going. OK fat and wit, but not war. All I'm saying is that it is hard to have prolonged conversation with this person.
NON-PEOPLE-PERSON +/- inner child +/- wit + compassion= the non-people person's compassion is only theoretical: they don't actually leave their safety zones to test it, so I'm not going to count it. Let's just call this person My Sister That One Time She Nailed a Non-Abusive Joke And Had Intended to Do So To Show Someone Who Was Having a Hard Time that She Understood. A rare bird indeed.
So what's my bottom line here? To keep from getting stuck in a rut in life you might work harder to be aware of all these three-- optimism, discernment, and compassion. To realize when these three things come and go takes practice and discipline. And practice doesn't make perfect, it just makes less imperfect. And more daily practice.
1. Hold and enjoy the moment in your mind when you know you're feeling optimistic.
Me, trotting out to get a Gingerbread Latte without even thinking that they might screw up and burn the espresso.
2. Sit back and enjoy watching yourself make a decision. Take advantage of your ability to make good choices.
Hm, I want to save money, so I'll get a small Gingerbread Latte and use the rest of the money for bus fare. And I won't offer to buy the Gingerbread Latte of my friend in line behind me.
3. And then be kind to yourself and others in a conscious way, if only in your inside voice and not your outside voice.
That bus driver didn't mean to spill my latte on me, I think I won't imagine Buffy jumping out of a seat and killing him. Stab stab stab stab stab stab stab.
Well, I said it was a practice.
A. Because you are afraid it will make you into a fanatic.
Fact is you are already fanatically avoiding feeling compassion, every time you unthinkingly give the less fortunate people (there are ALWAYS less fortunate) a hand-out just to get them away from you, rather than because you think someday you might end up that way. Or every time you unthinkingly blame the more fortunate people for not helping you more often (my family's speciality). Or else you are fanatically avoiding all people so that nobody can ever criticize you or make you feel uncompassionate, which makes you feel bad. But think-- fanatically avoiding ever feeling bad means that you never know when you really feel GOOD.
I know, I know, it's not an exact science, but here are my inane equations anyway. There has to be a way to explain why people, seeing me dealing with grief over my dying girlfriend's suicide, are actually repulsed and even TELL me that they have a hard time feeling compassion for me. So here's my wild ride down the slippery slope of character equations.
YOUR AVERAGE PEOPLE PERSON + inner child (id) or inner optimist (desiring anything and acknowledging it takes optimism)= someone who will seek faith, a faith, something to direct their choices, a code of right and wrong, so that people will like her/him. This person seeks ways to ingratiate her or himself through wit (not just knowledge, but discernment, knowing what's funny when). This person is a natural flirt, even if they couldn't hold up their end of a conversation with a saw horse.
NON-PEOPLE PERSON + inner child = my sister, never quite getting a joke, never quite understanding why the choices of words she makes sometimes infuriate people, someone basically not open to leading an examined life because she gets it "wrong" so often. She knows how to want, and how to seek faith, but she condemns herself so often without seeking remedy, that she generally avoids people and got herself a heinous husband who people generally avoid. He thinks he's infallible, he criticizes her to the point where she categorically dismisses all his criticism, and then she lashes out at people to make herself feel superior because she doesn't really know what she's worth anymore.
OK. I had to open up a shelf in the hierarchy where I could leave my sister. What do you do with someone you don't trust to make good choices who specifically doesn't have compassion for anyone, even herself? What do you do with a drunken sailor? I'm just going to say call this a NON-PEOPLE PERSON and leave them to their slurred little Song of Theirself.
Moving on, let's say you are a PEOPLE PERSON SEEKING WIT (the highest expression of ego: discernment) but you have forgotten your optimistic side. You are rootless. You can't remember why you got up this morning, or came out of the womb in the first place. You are reading T.S. Elliot "The Wasteland" with your breakfast every morning and you can't quite grasp why HE got up every morning. Nobody reads poetry anyway. Nobody cares. You don't even care. Why try?
This is the state of mind that I think most people are in. From this state it is impossible to overcome your need for a right/ wrong answer, extend yourself beyond the few things you believe to be true, and be compassionate to a stranger who looks as though they've made at least a few choices that you would not have made.
I'll characterize this as: PEOPLE-PERSON - inner child + wit = your average twit. Myself on a bad day. The egoist with her latte and a bus pass but no way to see that the soulless bus driver is not actually TRYING to spill her drink, because it's technically illegal to drink on the bus. This person is prone to feeling permanently wrong, permanently punished, and that everyone's expectations are Too Damn High.
Then there is the PEOPLE-PERSON + inner child + wit = someone seeking routes to transcendence, new expansive ways of thinking, access to compassion. This person understands the role of the responsible citizen, the inner-parent / super-ego. They believe in parking laws, even if they sometimes break them. Then, they pay the ticket and don't act like that 28 dollars makes them Broken Down By The Man. They accept that they are tools, or better yet, cogs in the machine, and they aspire to understanding what this machine might be up to, and since they are bringing their inner child along for the ride, this machine might just be up to something Good.
Then there are the NON-PEOPLE-PEOPLE + inner child + wit, which equals the reclusive artists like Edward Gorey. And the NON-PEOPLE-PEOPLE - inner child + wit, which equals Andrew Dice Clay, back in the day.
And this brings us to the Compassionate Person.
PEOPLE-PERSON + inner child - wit + compassion= someone who follows blindly, like your average local 19 year old Mormon "Elder." Or someone at Jonestown. Someone who can't sit down and make a cost benefit analysis about a moral choice to save his life. These folks serve in the interest of whatever piques their interest that day, giving them good, optimistic feelings, like a child in a room of phones and a telepromter telling them what to say when they make those fundraising calls and a fearless leader there to offer them a glass of kool aid as a reward for their excellent work.
PEOPLE-PERSON - inner child + wit + compassion= I think a lot of existentialist liberals end up here. They understand service to a Greater Good. They understand a set of rights and wrongs. They just can't see the Why Try of things. They read the Tao of Pooh and the Te of Piglet and end up like Eeyore. They become graduate students and eventually become lawyers and eventually end up becoming the life of the wine and cheese party only quoting book and movie reviews and never books or movies. Snore. I think this is the place I am most in danger of ending up.
PEOPLE PERSON - inner child - wit + compassion = a Methodist minister. My grandma, for example (who is a Methodist minister). She can't tell a joke. She takes herself incredibly seriously. She is almost militaristically "at service" to any and all. She doesn't visit, she steam rolls various parts of the family on a seasonal basis. Sigh. Two weeks until her 84th birthday. I have a completely wholesome low-fat anti-war pity-drenched dinner to look forward to this Thanksgiving. Not that I need fat, or war, or dry wit to keep me going. OK fat and wit, but not war. All I'm saying is that it is hard to have prolonged conversation with this person.
NON-PEOPLE-PERSON +/- inner child +/- wit + compassion= the non-people person's compassion is only theoretical: they don't actually leave their safety zones to test it, so I'm not going to count it. Let's just call this person My Sister That One Time She Nailed a Non-Abusive Joke And Had Intended to Do So To Show Someone Who Was Having a Hard Time that She Understood. A rare bird indeed.
So what's my bottom line here? To keep from getting stuck in a rut in life you might work harder to be aware of all these three-- optimism, discernment, and compassion. To realize when these three things come and go takes practice and discipline. And practice doesn't make perfect, it just makes less imperfect. And more daily practice.
1. Hold and enjoy the moment in your mind when you know you're feeling optimistic.
Me, trotting out to get a Gingerbread Latte without even thinking that they might screw up and burn the espresso.
2. Sit back and enjoy watching yourself make a decision. Take advantage of your ability to make good choices.
Hm, I want to save money, so I'll get a small Gingerbread Latte and use the rest of the money for bus fare. And I won't offer to buy the Gingerbread Latte of my friend in line behind me.
3. And then be kind to yourself and others in a conscious way, if only in your inside voice and not your outside voice.
That bus driver didn't mean to spill my latte on me, I think I won't imagine Buffy jumping out of a seat and killing him. Stab stab stab stab stab stab stab.
Well, I said it was a practice.
Saturday, November 09, 2002
Buffy the Vampire Slayer Could Branch Out For a Change
More Important than Compassion: Personal Vengeance
Buffy the Irresponsible Dog Owner Slayer
Making the Parks Safe for Children and Their Picnic Blankets Everywhere
Buffy the Drivers of SUVs Who Turn Left At Red Lights While Talking On Their Cell Phones and Not Signalling Slayer
These People Even Scare the Shit Out of Vampires
Buffy the Purveyor of Insufferably Cute Poetry Chain Letters and Concerned Citizen Petitions Slayer
The Taliban didn't ever read your petition protesting the treatment of women, and I will lose my few remaining friends, not a hallmark of good luck, if I forward them all your horrible poem about the child whose father died in the World Trade Center, OK?
Buffy the Uncaring Medical Professional Slayer
Can't Afford to Get a Bedside Manner Transplant in Time for Your Next Appointment With the Sick and Vulnerable Woman with Cancer Who Needs Help With her Pain Management? You Can't Afford Not To Get One!
Buffy the Overzealous Arbitrary Parking Law Enforcer Slayer
Soulless Creature, Nobody Likes You and Nobody Will Miss You
Buffy the Grammar Snob Slayer
You the Middle Management of the Literary Art World, Humanities Majors Gone Wrong, Underemployed and Taking Out Creative Insecurities on the Innocent-- Be Warned! Obsessively pointing out bad spelling to a short blonde cheerleader may be the last thing you do! I mean, I like a typo-free piece of text as well as the next person, or maybe more than the next person, but especially men who like to make women feel stupid by reading only a woman's typos and dismissing her ideas need to be stabbed more than once with a stake in the heart.
Buffy the Everyone Who Voted for Bill Simon Slayer
What was it, you liked his criminal record better than Grey Davis'? Repent and vote Green for chissakes. Or better yet, Meet Mister Pointy!
{Imagine Stabbing Noises Here}
Next, More on Compassion!
More Important than Compassion: Personal Vengeance
Buffy the Irresponsible Dog Owner Slayer
Making the Parks Safe for Children and Their Picnic Blankets Everywhere
Buffy the Drivers of SUVs Who Turn Left At Red Lights While Talking On Their Cell Phones and Not Signalling Slayer
These People Even Scare the Shit Out of Vampires
Buffy the Purveyor of Insufferably Cute Poetry Chain Letters and Concerned Citizen Petitions Slayer
The Taliban didn't ever read your petition protesting the treatment of women, and I will lose my few remaining friends, not a hallmark of good luck, if I forward them all your horrible poem about the child whose father died in the World Trade Center, OK?
Buffy the Uncaring Medical Professional Slayer
Can't Afford to Get a Bedside Manner Transplant in Time for Your Next Appointment With the Sick and Vulnerable Woman with Cancer Who Needs Help With her Pain Management? You Can't Afford Not To Get One!
Buffy the Overzealous Arbitrary Parking Law Enforcer Slayer
Soulless Creature, Nobody Likes You and Nobody Will Miss You
Buffy the Grammar Snob Slayer
You the Middle Management of the Literary Art World, Humanities Majors Gone Wrong, Underemployed and Taking Out Creative Insecurities on the Innocent-- Be Warned! Obsessively pointing out bad spelling to a short blonde cheerleader may be the last thing you do! I mean, I like a typo-free piece of text as well as the next person, or maybe more than the next person, but especially men who like to make women feel stupid by reading only a woman's typos and dismissing her ideas need to be stabbed more than once with a stake in the heart.
Buffy the Everyone Who Voted for Bill Simon Slayer
What was it, you liked his criminal record better than Grey Davis'? Repent and vote Green for chissakes. Or better yet, Meet Mister Pointy!
{Imagine Stabbing Noises Here}
Next, More on Compassion!
Wednesday, November 06, 2002
The Agenda of the Extreme Optimist
or, why people are afraid to be compassionate
The theme for this week is compassion and optimism. I think these are actually the same thing.
People fear that being an optimist (i.e. having compassion) will cause them to:
1. Lose their credit cards
2. Wear ugly shoes
3. Meditate
Solution:
Encourage optimism where you see it by:
1. Spreading optimistic information (noticing that we are barraged by negative information)
2. Noticing optimistic moments out loud
3. Finding out what causes optimism, like alcohol.
Later I will address the sport of Extreme Compassion and why it threatens, in particular, people who are witty and charming.
or, why people are afraid to be compassionate
The theme for this week is compassion and optimism. I think these are actually the same thing.
People fear that being an optimist (i.e. having compassion) will cause them to:
1. Lose their credit cards
2. Wear ugly shoes
3. Meditate
Solution:
Encourage optimism where you see it by:
1. Spreading optimistic information (noticing that we are barraged by negative information)
2. Noticing optimistic moments out loud
3. Finding out what causes optimism, like alcohol.
Later I will address the sport of Extreme Compassion and why it threatens, in particular, people who are witty and charming.
Friday, November 01, 2002
Haitian Homebrew from Hell
or, the Story of Miss Zora and the Zombie Makers
In 1937 the anthropologist (and African American/ Caribbean storyteller and story-collector) Zora Neale Hurston suspected a chemical poisoning to be behind the high Haitian zombie population... fifty years before science proved her right. Read a little about the amazing Miss Zora and the Recipe for Making Your Own Zombie Slave. Stock up on tetrodotoxin, atropine, and scopolamine, kids!
There are still some of those zombie folk employed by SF Muni as busdrivers... I guess it beats a labor camp. Won't someone please organize a zombie liberation movement? If only for the sake of all the fun acronyms you can make with the letter "z"?
or, the Story of Miss Zora and the Zombie Makers
In 1937 the anthropologist (and African American/ Caribbean storyteller and story-collector) Zora Neale Hurston suspected a chemical poisoning to be behind the high Haitian zombie population... fifty years before science proved her right. Read a little about the amazing Miss Zora and the Recipe for Making Your Own Zombie Slave. Stock up on tetrodotoxin, atropine, and scopolamine, kids!
There are still some of those zombie folk employed by SF Muni as busdrivers... I guess it beats a labor camp. Won't someone please organize a zombie liberation movement? If only for the sake of all the fun acronyms you can make with the letter "z"?
Wednesday, October 30, 2002
Getting in Touch With Your Inner Undead Person
...through blue eye shadow abuse.
A year and four days ago my girlfriend died. I misspoke for a long time and said that I had died on that date instead of her. I still can't say her name plus the word "died" and believe my own words. But, well, I lived. She died.
Last night I danced at a local bellydancing restaurant, and made myself polished, glittered, and inky-eyed for the occasion, since someone was videotaping and that always washes out your features. Last time I just did mascara and lipstick. This time I tried out the eyeshadow that I found in a makeup bag alongside the road I walk to public transport in the morning. I have a personal rule: I don't buy any makeup besides coverup, I always have such good luck FINDING stuff. It's like all these femmes are walking around tossing brand new lipsticks into couches wherever I go. Well, anyway, I am not very good at putting on makeup and I don't want to waste my money on something I don't know how to use.
So, I made the mistake of mixing a lightish blue and a darkish blue on my eyelids just before going on stage last night, and the SHIT DON'T COME OFF. I came home and I looked in the mirror and there I was: me as a zombie. I don't know how many times in the last year I FELT just like I looked last night in that mirror.
For now I'm at peace with sticking it out with my cat and my various tattered lives that keep me busy, but I know that it is only a matter of time before I will be with my girlfriend. Meantime, I will try to live mostly as a living person and give my inner-undead-person a chance to express herself through a little occasional abuse of blue eyeshadow so that she won't EVER show up in my mirror unannounced and scare me like that again.
For the record, when I go I don't want to be one of the Walking Dead. I expect the Dancing Dead will let me join them when I show up at that great undead parade, marching towards the light.
...through blue eye shadow abuse.
A year and four days ago my girlfriend died. I misspoke for a long time and said that I had died on that date instead of her. I still can't say her name plus the word "died" and believe my own words. But, well, I lived. She died.
Last night I danced at a local bellydancing restaurant, and made myself polished, glittered, and inky-eyed for the occasion, since someone was videotaping and that always washes out your features. Last time I just did mascara and lipstick. This time I tried out the eyeshadow that I found in a makeup bag alongside the road I walk to public transport in the morning. I have a personal rule: I don't buy any makeup besides coverup, I always have such good luck FINDING stuff. It's like all these femmes are walking around tossing brand new lipsticks into couches wherever I go. Well, anyway, I am not very good at putting on makeup and I don't want to waste my money on something I don't know how to use.
So, I made the mistake of mixing a lightish blue and a darkish blue on my eyelids just before going on stage last night, and the SHIT DON'T COME OFF. I came home and I looked in the mirror and there I was: me as a zombie. I don't know how many times in the last year I FELT just like I looked last night in that mirror.
For now I'm at peace with sticking it out with my cat and my various tattered lives that keep me busy, but I know that it is only a matter of time before I will be with my girlfriend. Meantime, I will try to live mostly as a living person and give my inner-undead-person a chance to express herself through a little occasional abuse of blue eyeshadow so that she won't EVER show up in my mirror unannounced and scare me like that again.
For the record, when I go I don't want to be one of the Walking Dead. I expect the Dancing Dead will let me join them when I show up at that great undead parade, marching towards the light.
Tuesday, October 29, 2002
More Undead News and Resources
Duke University Study Recommends the Living Wear Bicycle Helmets Around Undead-Americans
Georgegore Albush Declared President - A Red-Letter Day for All Composite Undead-Americans
A Nice Interview with Spike and Drusilla - The Vampire King & Queen of the Bon Mot
Duke University Study Recommends the Living Wear Bicycle Helmets Around Undead-Americans
Georgegore Albush Declared President - A Red-Letter Day for All Composite Undead-Americans
A Nice Interview with Spike and Drusilla - The Vampire King & Queen of the Bon Mot
Continuing the Honor Roll of Undead-Americans and Other Undead Role Models
Amelia Earhart
Buffy
Superman
Xena & Gabrielle
The Six Million Dollar Man
The Bionic Woman
Robocop
Note that I've expanded my definition of the Undead to include cyborgs, i.e. everyone with an artificial vital organ; actually, I'm including everyone who wears glasses or any other life-enhancing prosthesis, has no magazine subscriptions, and wears out-of-style clothes. You yourself my unwittingly be eligible for my Undead Honor Roll. I think the Undead Continuum can be roughly outlined as this:
|- LESS UNDEAD (MORE DEAD-DEAD) ---> MORE UNDEAD (MORE DEAD-BUT-LIVING) -|
|-Residual Floating Energy Presence ~ Bottle-genie ~ Patron Saint/ Spirit Guide/ Deified Dead Person ~ Poltergeist ~ Zombie ~ Vampire ~ Cyborg ~ Basic Standard Issue Geek ~ Librarian -|
Amelia Earhart
Buffy
Superman
Xena & Gabrielle
The Six Million Dollar Man
The Bionic Woman
Robocop
Note that I've expanded my definition of the Undead to include cyborgs, i.e. everyone with an artificial vital organ; actually, I'm including everyone who wears glasses or any other life-enhancing prosthesis, has no magazine subscriptions, and wears out-of-style clothes. You yourself my unwittingly be eligible for my Undead Honor Roll. I think the Undead Continuum can be roughly outlined as this:
|- LESS UNDEAD (MORE DEAD-DEAD) ---> MORE UNDEAD (MORE DEAD-BUT-LIVING) -|
|-Residual Floating Energy Presence ~ Bottle-genie ~ Patron Saint/ Spirit Guide/ Deified Dead Person ~ Poltergeist ~ Zombie ~ Vampire ~ Cyborg ~ Basic Standard Issue Geek ~ Librarian -|
Honoring Our Inspiring Undead-Americans and Their Role Models
For the next few days I'm going to try to make a list of Inspiring Undead for us to think about as we approach the Day of the Undead (Oct. 31) which is followed by All Saint's Day (the day to honor the Goody Two-Shoes Undead, aka Hallows -- the 31st is Hallow's Eve, or Hallowe'en), and then the Day of the Dead (those who may be eligible for the Undead roster if they play their cards right).
Here we go. Some of my Favorite Undead (see definition of Undead in yesterday's blog entry if you need to):
Buddha
Jesus
Elvis
Lazarus
Angel and Spike, Buffy's lovely boytoy Vamp camp-followers
the Virgin of Guadelupe
to be continued...
For the next few days I'm going to try to make a list of Inspiring Undead for us to think about as we approach the Day of the Undead (Oct. 31) which is followed by All Saint's Day (the day to honor the Goody Two-Shoes Undead, aka Hallows -- the 31st is Hallow's Eve, or Hallowe'en), and then the Day of the Dead (those who may be eligible for the Undead roster if they play their cards right).
Here we go. Some of my Favorite Undead (see definition of Undead in yesterday's blog entry if you need to):
Buddha
Jesus
Elvis
Lazarus
Angel and Spike, Buffy's lovely boytoy Vamp camp-followers
the Virgin of Guadelupe
to be continued...
Monday, October 28, 2002
The Undead Continuum
A coworker friend of mine used the word "Undead" today as he was describing the plot of a little play he just saw "Attack of the Living Dead Drag Queens." I contended that "Living Dead" was redundant for "Undead" and that if I were a Zombie Person I'd prefer to be called a Living Dead Person, rather than the dismissive-sounding Undead (which is also a confusing term-- aren't you really Resurrected rather than Undead?). He opened my eyes and got me to think about all the myriad ways you could be Undead.
So, welcome to the Undead Continuum:
UNDEAD-- umbrella term for the differently dead.
If you are "undead" you have a living-history and are now identifying with the post-living. However, you could be living with many different "undead" identities.
"Undead" does not include you if you are a Werewolf, Mermaid, or other seasonally/ environmentally changing creature, because you never technically died.
THE LIVING DEAD-- also called THE WALKING DEAD. These are the undead (formerly living) who are experiencing something like a life while actually not technically having a beating heart and traditional human dietary habits. Among the living dead you can find undead people who identify as any of the following:
ZOMBIES
VAMPIRES
They tend to dress a little out of step with fashion, but that's a beautiful thing too. It's ok to be different. It's not easy being green, as Kermit says.
DO NOT ASSUME THAT ALL LIVING DEAD REQUIRE:
* Nourishment from blood
* Protection from sunlight, holy water, or crosses
* A coffin for a bed
* A soil sample of her or his homeland to rest
* An invitation to enter a non-living-dead person's home
DO NOT ASSUME THAT ALL LIVING DEAD CAN:
* Survive anything
* Hear your personal conversations from miles away
* Do triple flips in mid-air from a standstill
* Heal themselves with blood (yours or someone else's)
DO NOT ASSUME THAT LIVING DEAD CAN BE "KILLED" by:
* Wooden stakes
* Decapitation
* Sunlight
* Any recitation of biblical source texts
Most of the above points are copped from this site---
I have no idea what it is.
If you are Undead, but not Living Dead, then you may identify as any of these...
GHOST (a category that includes Poltergeists, Ancestor Spirits, Casper-the-Friendlies, etc.)
GHOULIE
WILL O' THE WISP
MONSTER (Frankenstein's, etc.)
DEMON
PATRON SAINT
The more you dwell among the Currently Living (signified by the number of magazine subscriptions you have), then the more you may identify as a Living Dead person. There is no reason why a Ghost could not be living among us completely unnoticed and undifferentiated from the Currently Living. Look at your bus driver tomorrow morning-- could this person really be alive? Couldn't s/he be a Ghost? Would you really notice if s/he was?
The more you are tied to place or object (such as a genie in a bottle), the less likely you are to identify with the lifestyle of the Living Dead. However out of step with the world of Currently Living you may be, I'm sure you will be welcomed and supported among your Undead peers.
More than ever it is time to stop saying "EVIL" and "UNDEAD" in one breath without giving some consideration to the rich lives, uh, lifestyles these folks live. Are they reeeeally Evil or are you just envious of how they don't have to pay taxes?
Here are Some Resources for Undead People:
Care and Feeding of Undead Pets
Zombie Guide 2002
A Vampire-centric View of the Undead (for you Vampire fundamentalist-separatists)
An Actual News Article About Undead Banks in Russia ...slightly Vampicentric but a good read nevertheless.
A coworker friend of mine used the word "Undead" today as he was describing the plot of a little play he just saw "Attack of the Living Dead Drag Queens." I contended that "Living Dead" was redundant for "Undead" and that if I were a Zombie Person I'd prefer to be called a Living Dead Person, rather than the dismissive-sounding Undead (which is also a confusing term-- aren't you really Resurrected rather than Undead?). He opened my eyes and got me to think about all the myriad ways you could be Undead.
So, welcome to the Undead Continuum:
UNDEAD-- umbrella term for the differently dead.
If you are "undead" you have a living-history and are now identifying with the post-living. However, you could be living with many different "undead" identities.
"Undead" does not include you if you are a Werewolf, Mermaid, or other seasonally/ environmentally changing creature, because you never technically died.
THE LIVING DEAD-- also called THE WALKING DEAD. These are the undead (formerly living) who are experiencing something like a life while actually not technically having a beating heart and traditional human dietary habits. Among the living dead you can find undead people who identify as any of the following:
ZOMBIES
VAMPIRES
They tend to dress a little out of step with fashion, but that's a beautiful thing too. It's ok to be different. It's not easy being green, as Kermit says.
DO NOT ASSUME THAT ALL LIVING DEAD REQUIRE:
* Nourishment from blood
* Protection from sunlight, holy water, or crosses
* A coffin for a bed
* A soil sample of her or his homeland to rest
* An invitation to enter a non-living-dead person's home
DO NOT ASSUME THAT ALL LIVING DEAD CAN:
* Survive anything
* Hear your personal conversations from miles away
* Do triple flips in mid-air from a standstill
* Heal themselves with blood (yours or someone else's)
DO NOT ASSUME THAT LIVING DEAD CAN BE "KILLED" by:
* Wooden stakes
* Decapitation
* Sunlight
* Any recitation of biblical source texts
Most of the above points are copped from this site---
I have no idea what it is.
If you are Undead, but not Living Dead, then you may identify as any of these...
GHOST (a category that includes Poltergeists, Ancestor Spirits, Casper-the-Friendlies, etc.)
GHOULIE
WILL O' THE WISP
MONSTER (Frankenstein's, etc.)
DEMON
PATRON SAINT
The more you dwell among the Currently Living (signified by the number of magazine subscriptions you have), then the more you may identify as a Living Dead person. There is no reason why a Ghost could not be living among us completely unnoticed and undifferentiated from the Currently Living. Look at your bus driver tomorrow morning-- could this person really be alive? Couldn't s/he be a Ghost? Would you really notice if s/he was?
The more you are tied to place or object (such as a genie in a bottle), the less likely you are to identify with the lifestyle of the Living Dead. However out of step with the world of Currently Living you may be, I'm sure you will be welcomed and supported among your Undead peers.
More than ever it is time to stop saying "EVIL" and "UNDEAD" in one breath without giving some consideration to the rich lives, uh, lifestyles these folks live. Are they reeeeally Evil or are you just envious of how they don't have to pay taxes?
Here are Some Resources for Undead People:
Care and Feeding of Undead Pets
Zombie Guide 2002
A Vampire-centric View of the Undead (for you Vampire fundamentalist-separatists)
An Actual News Article About Undead Banks in Russia ...slightly Vampicentric but a good read nevertheless.
Wednesday, October 23, 2002
Stalking the Sparkling Ms. Dynamite
She makes me happy.
"Dontcha know there's no such thing as superstars, you leave this world alone, so who gives a fuck about the things you own." --It Takes More.
Her Dynamitishness' Explosive Web Home where you can watch the video that I saw on the international TV channel that got me hooked on her song Dy-Na-Mi-Tee.
And a link toher first single Booo! - a reggae dancehall supergroove-- "feel tha bad girl bass injection..."
And lastly, the fansite that, despite the Angelfire plague of popup ads, is actually more user-friendly/ informative than Ms. D's own site Ms. Dynamite Online.
I might be a widowed old lady at 29 polishing my tarnished silver at home with my cat late into the night, but at least I am not reduced to being a fan of lite rock love songs.
She makes me happy.
"Dontcha know there's no such thing as superstars, you leave this world alone, so who gives a fuck about the things you own." --It Takes More.
Her Dynamitishness' Explosive Web Home where you can watch the video that I saw on the international TV channel that got me hooked on her song Dy-Na-Mi-Tee.
And a link toher first single Booo! - a reggae dancehall supergroove-- "feel tha bad girl bass injection..."
And lastly, the fansite that, despite the Angelfire plague of popup ads, is actually more user-friendly/ informative than Ms. D's own site Ms. Dynamite Online.
I might be a widowed old lady at 29 polishing my tarnished silver at home with my cat late into the night, but at least I am not reduced to being a fan of lite rock love songs.
Tuesday, October 22, 2002
The Poet in the Weather Room
Where can an English Major get work where you don't have to wear a funny hat and a grease-stained uniform? Either in social services, education, or, apparently, writing the San Francisco Chronicle weather report. Sitting at a burger joint-- where I do NOT work, thanks for asking-- reading yesterday's leftover paper I noticed that the forecast summary for yesterday, today, and tomorrow are all the same IDENTICAL forecast. But, written as artfully as a sestina, so that you would not know that the weather will not change a whit for three days. Notice how they change the temperature one degree each time to keep it exciting.
Witness the genius:
Today -- Mostly sunny skies after morning fog. Highs, 59 - 77. Lows, 44 - 53.
Tuesday-- Areas of fog, then mostly sunny skies. Highs, 60 - 78. Lows, 45 - 54.
Wednesday -- Clear to partly cloudy after morning fog. Highs, 59 - 75. Lows, 46 - 52.
This person clearly cares about the reader, wants the reader to have an interesting reading experience even though nothing is happening. This writer inspires me and makes me feel like a careless brute for cutting-and-pasting identical passages, missing opportunities to flex and glory in my English skills.
Grief has turned me into an old lady. At 29, I am checking the weather report every day, spending my evenings (lately) polishing my tarnished silverware, and doing Latin-- for fun.
Sunday, October 20, 2002
Useless Knowledge to Live By
Things I have inadvertantly recently learned.
About 16% of women have extra taste buds that are specifically in the bitter range.
Alligators have a weakness for marshmallows.
Jell-o is made from such vile stuff that they won't allow the manufacturing process to be filmed.
Romania has closed its borders for adoptions because of the problem of poor people selling their prettiest children.
Civet juice comes from a dead civet cat and ambergris comes from dead whales. (These are both common perfume ingredients.) Also, civet cat shit is harvested for the coffee beans it selects to eat in the wild. Since it's a picky eater people pay 200 dollars a pound for the beans it has excreted.
Is that enough information for everyone for today?
Things I have inadvertantly recently learned.
About 16% of women have extra taste buds that are specifically in the bitter range.
Alligators have a weakness for marshmallows.
Jell-o is made from such vile stuff that they won't allow the manufacturing process to be filmed.
Romania has closed its borders for adoptions because of the problem of poor people selling their prettiest children.
Civet juice comes from a dead civet cat and ambergris comes from dead whales. (These are both common perfume ingredients.) Also, civet cat shit is harvested for the coffee beans it selects to eat in the wild. Since it's a picky eater people pay 200 dollars a pound for the beans it has excreted.
Is that enough information for everyone for today?