Bad News Day Continues

Another blast from my past has died as well. Via Heidi MacDonald, whose new RSS feed I hadn't gotten until this morning so I didn't catch up with her till just now, I discovered that Craig Calame, aka Mugsy from the Uncle Floyd Show, passed away last week after a long battle with cancer. My Uncle Floyd days (as one of the coterie of fans known as the "dirty thirty") straddled the period in the late '70s/early '80s between my friendship with Billy Marcinko and my self-publication of INSIDE JOKE (which started out as a Floyd fanzine), and I had a few dates with cast member Skip Rooney, who lived in the next town over, and even performed on the show once (playing guitar and singing a song I'd written about Floyd called "The Last of the Old-Time Clowns"). As was the case with Billy, I lost touch with most of these folks over the intervening years (the last time I saw Floyd was in the green room of a talk show to which I'd been invited because Proctor & Bergman were on, and that had to be about 15 years ago), so the emotional impact is a bit lessened, but it's still weird to lose folks with whom I used to hang out, particularly with my birthday coming up in a couple days and the inevitable thoughts of mortality on my brain. I wish I could say I had fonder memories of Craig, with whom I didn't really get along that well, but I'm glad his suffering is at an end.

Silly Site o' the Day

In memory of Billy, who first introduced me to Doug & co.

RIP Bill Dale Marcinko

Something I never, ever thought I'd write. My best friend from college died in a house fire. We'd been out of touch for decades, despite my trying to contact him a number of times, so I'd been missing him for years before this happened. Part of me is still hoping that somehow this is another one of his hoaxes.

Silly Site o' the Day

Yesterday may have been Jon Stewart's birthday, but today is the umpteenth birthday of Peter Bergman, founding member of The Firesign Theatre and coiner of the term "love-in," among many other accomplishments. So of course I need to plug Radio Free Oz. HB, Peter!

A Day for Ducks



The sun is trying its damndest to peek through the cloud cover now, and they say it's supposed get up above 60 degrees today, but this morning's commute was fairly cold and gloomy. No complaints from the ducks and pigeons in the park I pass, though (click on the pic to see it full size)...

Silly Site o' the Day

No better way to end a relaxing 4-day weekend in which I got a fair amount accomplished despite some weekend stomach ailments and get ready for work again than a somewhat broken night wherein the last dream I remember had to do with me getting fired. Le sigh. Okay, it could be worse, I could be this guy (via Arthur). I'm afraid he lost me at "The word Oz is known to have been used by its author as an abbreviation for Osirus"...

Silly Site o' the Day

Considering the stepped-up spying awaiting us and the paranoid fundie fantasies making the rounds this time of year, I couldn't think of a better silly site to point to than this, via Lauren at Feministe.

Silly Site o' the Day

Oh well, I tried doing a fake magazine cover with this generator (via Cory at BoingBoing) and it came out very cool but I guess I should have saved it to my hard drive first...

Short Shorts

I haven't plugged Elton Beard in awhile, but I haven't been caught up on blog-reading in awhile. Now I'm flipping through the hundreds of feeds on my list and after the sixth person eviscerates a dumbass columnist at length it all starts to blend together. Then Elton comes along and crystallizes it and I don't have to read the dumbass columnist I was never interested in reading anyway 'cause life's too short and I'd rather read people who write well about politics and culture and life and stuff than people who can't even seem to think straight...

Go Go Hayabusa!

The Japanese probe has landed on the asteroid!

Friday Cat Blogging (™ Kevin Drum)

Ah, the unbearable lightness of being Amy! She was up early today wanting us to open the bedroom window, the one that looks out over the county border, so I told her she'd have to let me photograph her. As usual, she brings the cute:







Meanwhile (okay, a few minutes ago actually), the Dark Prince sulks in the corner, awaiting his feeding:



Okay, it's not a corner exactly, it's just the side of the hallway wall, but we figure there must be a heat pipe running through it as Datsa seems to find it quite cozy.

RIP Pat Morita

The Japanese leprechaun has shuffled off his mortal coil.

Five Songs I Currently Love, and Lots of Honorable Mentions

Thanks Tild, your challenge - as well as Robin's new iPod, onto which he's now uploaded all the stuff from his iTunes playlist to which I can now listen - gave me incentive to pay attention to music again during this long weekend. It's not that I don't like music, it's that I haven't paid a lot of attention to it the last couple of decades, ever since MTV and VH1 stopped playing actual videos. Music is something to which I like devoting attention, both because I consider listening to be a more active process than most and also because I enjoy singing along. So when other things require my attention, unless the music is completely in the background (in which case, I reason, what's the point?) it's very difficult for me to multitask. I almost never listen to music whilst writing, for instance.

But when I was younger... ah, when I was younger. My first favorite songs were things like Joni Mitchell's Both Sides Now, which I swore to myself, in the way that children do, that it would remain my favorite song forever and ever, and I'd never pick another one, and still every time it comes on I feel the same twinge of nostalgia and guilt and childhood longing that arises whenever I also hear David Cassidy's voice. I mean, some things don't leave you. So it was Both Sides Now (as sung by Judy Collins) and Circle Game (which I later performed in a contest semi-final at the Garden State Arts Center during my high school years when I learned to play guitar) and Carole King's Tapestry (the first album I ever bought on my own) and Tom Paxton's Marvelous Toy and Puff the Magic Dragon and, oh, I may not have been into the fashions of the era (in the wisdom of youth I'd ask the other kids "if you're dressing that way to show your individuality and everyone else is dressing like that too, how are you an individual?" - I was not a popular kid) but I loved me the kid-friendly music.

Then I underwent my Beatlemania phase, as you do. Hence the name of my fictitious corporation (as I was also writing regularly by that point) and, of course, this blog. I loved puns, I loved Penny Lane, shit happens. I also adored much of the solo stuff from the Ones Who Weren't Ringo - my favorite Lennon song is Imagine, I'd listen to McCartney's London Town as well as Venus and Mars repeatedly, and I quite appreciated Harrison's humor in songs like Crackerbox Palace (great video!) and later songs like Got My Mind Set on You.

And I had musical crushes from time to time, on the lyrical agility of Paul Simon (my favorite of his is probably American Tune) and Billy Joel (Summer Highland Falls), the sheer movie soundtrack madness of Richard O'Brien (Superheroes is still my favorite from Rocky Horror) and Peter Stone (I think Cool Considerate Men is brilliant), the passion of protest singers like Phil Ochs (Chords of Fame, even though not expressly political, is my favorite of his), and the intricacies of Genesis (with and just after the departure of Peter Gabriel), which I guess leads me to my current favorites:

Peter Gabriel - Solsbury Hill - Yes, I know, this is so ubiquitous in movie trailers you'd think it was public domain by now, but I don't care. Who hasn't gone through periods of "I must be an alien changeling and one day they'll be back to rescue me from this strange world?" No? Well, maybe I've said too much. And it's got a 5/4 time signature!! I mean, go wrong.

Renaissance - Scheherazade and Other Stories - Art rock at its finest. I realize this is an album rather than a song, but it's more or less of a piece (three bits on Side A and one long piece on Side B, just like this album) and I love everything on it just that much. I probably wore out this LP in college. Annie Haslam sings like an angel. I still play Trip to the Fair every year before visiting RenFaire, and I've been in love with the Scheherazade myth for ages. This LP quite likely contains the key to my psyche.

The Roches - We - Another LP of repeated playings from my college days. Susie posting the lyrics to The Train reminded me of how much I love these ladies. I wish I'd kept up more with their careers - this song from last year sure sounds interesting.

Indigo Girls - Closer to Fine - Maybe they're kind of the Roches' spiritual heirs, eh? I still don't know all the lyrics but that doesn't stop me from trying to sing this whenever possible. A great little slice of philosophy.

Moody Blues - Your Wildest Dreams - Yeah, I still drool over Justin Hayward, you wanna make something of it? The video was lots of fun too, incorporating some footage of the band's early days into the story of the song.

Well, I'm glad that's done, now I can go back to listening again. After all, there's the whole holiday season catalog to get through (of which I can never seem to get enough of these two)...

Come Out, Come Out, Wherever You Are

Apparently Teignbridge District cannot seem to find any gay people against whom they promise not to discriminate.

Silly Site o' the Day

Happy Buy Nothing Day! I don't think I'll ever get used to the idea of voracious commercial establishments opening at five friggin' AM in desperation to sell an ever-poorer populace stuff it doesn't need by an artificially-imposed deadline centering around the arbitrarily-chosen birthdate of a mythohistoric figure worshipped by millions in order to convince themselves and their shareholders that they've had a profitable last quarter and justify the hyper-consumerist cycle and spiral of greed all over again... but I digress. I'm feeling enough abundance left over from yesterday, so instead of trying to figure out why everyone else doesn't seem to I'm going to share it. Here's an old post from Renee with lots and lots of silly sites; enjoy!

After-Dinner Link Dump

"...now isn't that a load off your mind..."

Still have to tackle reading or skimming over a thousand posts in my News+Views Guys section, and almost a hundred Group Blog posts, but I wanted to pass on these goodies while I remembered. First, a pretty picture that utterly cracked me up:



It's by Eric Gjovaag - click on his photo to read the entry. My caption: "I'm a little muddled; the Munchkins called me because someone dropped a TARDIS on the Witch of the East -- and there's the TARDIS, and here you are, and here's your companion, and that's all that's left of..." Oh, uh, 'scuse me.

Wil Wheaton is da man - da modren man!!

Julia is on fire today. I am so thankful that the blogosphere has enabled me to become friendly with this extraordinary woman and her family.

Lindsay, the platinum powerhouse whom I'm also thankful I've had the pleasure of meeting and greeting a few times, reminds us of some commemmorations coming up next week.

The Poor Man blind us all with the science of wankers and wignuts.

It's not just Natalie Bennett's London, it's My London Your London - makes me wistful to be across the pond again.

*snicker* ADHDTV...

I agree with Susie about the Tao of Steve. I can think of someone else who probably does as well.

At After School Snack, Elise speaks her mind about fatsuitsploitation and Matt puts a cherry on top.

Lance recalls his junior deerslayer days.

And I fear this is so, so me, so I'm going to try writing something for it.

Riggsgiving 2005

As promised, here's my photoblog of our Thanksgiving, particularly our meal:



Whilst I was cooking and flittering about singsonging "I love Thanksgiving, I love Thanksgiving!" poor Robin was trying to work. But he took a couple breaks to help make the mashed potatoes and get out the tablecloth, which we put atop his old desk that we haven't yet thrown out as we (and our landlord) are still looking for a good home for it. And he carved the bird as well.



Left to right, not including the candles: Cranberry sauce/mandarin orange mix in the front, brussells sprouts in the back; the butternut squash soup with a bit too much cilantro sprinkled on it (I like cilantro a lot; Rob, not so much); the turkey breast in front and stuffing in the back; the gravy; the mashed potato/squash mix in the front and, lastly, the apple pie, egg nog and apple cider.



The cats looove turkey, particularly Amy, who couldn't wait until we sat down. Geez, you'd think they'd have been satisfied with "roast turkey" cat food this morning.



But, you know, Datsa wasn't too far behind her. The food's all doled out, ready to eat!



This one's my place setting. Soup in the bowl, natch; and on the plate, stuffing and turkey on top, then round to the mashie taters and squash, then the crandarin orange, and the sprusselbrouts in the middle.



And here's Robin's place setting. Note how the utensils are on the right.



I've been a tad pouty since Rob colored my hair a few days ago and nobody's said a word and I think it came out really nice, so I asked him to take a picture of me in my velour-like dress before I tucked in. This one goes out to my parents in Vegas - happy Thanksgiving, Mom and Dad!



Wow, that was good! And lots and lots of leftovers for tomorrow. But the cats settled in first, while we started putting things away.



Thank goodness for the wonders of aluminium foil! Rob fit all this in the fridge perfectly, all ready for the bubble-and-squeak fry-up tomorrow. (After all, the sprouts are in the cabbage family...)



Dessert calls! 'Night, everyone! Another great thing about today is that I still have a 3-day weekend on which to catch up with things! I hope most of it isn't taken up by all the washing-up ahead of me...

Silly Site o' the Day

Happy Thanksgiving! This is my favorite holiday, for many reasons. As noted on other blogs, it's secular and non-denominational since everyone can give thanks for their own blessings in their own way. Me, I'm thankful for my health, Robin and the cats, my first husband with whom I'm still friends, our first cats whom I still remember with fondness, my extended families (mine, Robin's, my comic book industry friends, my Firesign chat buddies whom I hope to see tonight, the blogosphere, etc.), gainful employment and relative job security (even though I'd rather be gainfully employed and secure elsewhere), a roof over my head and a place to put my stuff - including my car - with reasonable NYC rent, the fact that I'm doing as well as I am compared to so many others in this country and in this world, the ability to finally express myself in a one-to-many format, something I've been doing since I started writing essays and stories over three decades ago, and not pay a single cent to do so (Pen-Elayne, ad-free and bleg-free and proud of it!), and the joy of reading. Among, I'm sure, many other things. It's also my favorite time of the year, what with all the foliage (still sticking around on many trees despite some windy weather of late, although the colors are a bit darker and more muted this time of the season) and the wonderful autumnal smells (crispness and fireplaces and damp or burning leaves) and my birthday being a week away which I always anticipate even after all these years. And even though the holiday itself seems uniquely North American in some ways, the harvest-festival emphasis on abundant food (one of my favorite things- necessary to live and a visceral pleasure to boot!) reflects the celebrations of many cultures throughout history.

As Robin's in the studio working, we're doing dinner for two this year. The turkey breast has just gone in the oven, and in a couple hours I start putting together all the trimmings. Pictures to follow, of course! I hope your day is everything you want it to be. As usual, I'll plug The Firesign Theatre's piece Pass the Indian, Please as mandatory listening today and give a silly site shout-out to Sugar Bush Squirrel (via Tom Peyer), another sign of the season (although I see her Bronkers relatives year-round) whom I'm sure is dressed for the holiday today.

Flashy New Toy

Robin inked a few pages of an upcoming issue of Flash, the payment for which was enough for him to treat himself to a pressie for his upcoming birthday (6 December, if anyone's keeping track). Here's Robin with his two favorite things:



I think Amy's still a bit suspicious of her new "rival," though:



Maybe this will help me finally try to tackle the Five Songs That I Currently Love challenge from Tild, which I usually can't answer because I haven't actually listened to that much music in the past 20 or so years...

I'm Spartacus!

This is the sort of thing that happens when I'm behind in my blog-skimming and therefore in my blog-writing.

I did not tell Bob Woodward that Valerie Plame was an undercover CIA agent.

Expect more catch-up-and-pass-it-on type pronouncements as the 4½-day weekend continues. (I thought I'd be doing more blog reading this morning but I can't shake that pesky work ethic even on a half-holiday, so I've been clearing my windowsill files and in-box and such...)

Silly Site o' the Day

Half a day, half a day, half a day onward! It's friggin' cold outside but I'm wearing my "Thanksgiving sweatshirt," of which I've just taken a picture:



...so I'm nice and toasty even if my office is without perimeter heat at the moment (i.e., the radiator, she cold too!), and we get to leave at 2 PM because, believe it or not, I'm actually nominally in charge today. My assignment to myself: get caught up in your blog-skimming before Thanksgiving! Oh, and draw a pig (via flea). Um, Robin, can you help?...

Silly Site o' the Day

Well, our T1 went down at work yesterday after my coworker who knows what the T1 looks like had left for the day, so I have no idea what's going to happen today, I only know that I feel like death warmed over. It's one of those days I wish I could take off, but two coworkers are on vacation and my boss is in and I'm never allowed to be out when he's in. Would this be a better situation if I were to Become A Republican (making the rounds but I first saw it via the King of Zembla)? Doubtful, as I'd still be sick but I'd also be self-delusional...

Silly Site o' the Day

Via Thomas in email, it's the Internet's hottest rumors... shhh...

Leftover Pics

I know, you're not supposed to have leftovers before Thanksgiving, but I wanted to delete everything from my camera and stretch out my content to match my sidebar again, so here's some miscellaneous stuff:


The only thing worse than putting up Christmas decorations right after Halloween is not taking the Halloween ones down on November 1. But I thought the wee ghostie hanging from the restaurant light was cool anyway.


Sometimes the view out of our front window is heartachingly beautiful.


Probably the last foliage picture I'll inflict on y'all this autumn. Everything is still gorgeous but turning into the muted russets and browns now, and at this point I'd just rather take it in and sigh than try to capture it digitally.


Somebody had asked to see the orange-colored file cabinet in my office, so I'm obliging. Be careful what you wish for!


In the distance is the marching band that caused the blocking off of the one tiny stretch of Riverdale Avenue on which I chose to drive, which I should have taken for a sign that it probably wasn't a good day to go food shopping.


They were still at it when I got back from the second supermarket (neither of which, as mentioned below, had turbinado sugar in stock today)...

Silly Site o' the Day

Yeah, I'm still here. Still exhausted, decided not to venture out of da Bronx today, probably shouldn't have done that pre-Thanksgiving food shopping either only Rob needed sugar to keep up his energy (and put in his coffee) while working, and I had to go to two different places neither of which had the turbinado so I wound up getting him rather expensive demerara packages and I knew I was in trouble when the marching band refused to yield. More about that anon (and on and on and on). Here is my Glitter Graphics greeting for my husband:

Via Keith.

Silly Site o' the Day

Aging and being out of shape are (is?) a real sucky combination. It's not even winter yet and already my body aches make any movement much more difficult than it should be. I suspect the only way to mitigate this is to engage in more exercise (I've been moving things at the office all week with our across-the-hallway relocation) and just work through the increasing pain until it fades, but it's hard when my body is also screaming for rest. I'm going to stay indoors today, gently putter about the apartment, try to get on the stationary bike for a bit, and see how things go. If the outside temps do get above 50 degrees tomorrow I'll consider taking in the National (Robin can't make it, having to work through the weekend), as Carrie Fisher is one of my idols (if you ever have a chance to catch that episode of her chat show when she hosted her mom Debbie Reynolds, do grab it) and I wouldn't mind seeing Peter Tork perform again (the last time was around 15 years ago in a small club in the Village) and of course catch up with all my comic book'y friends whom I never see any more now that I'm no longer working in The City... but it's all going to be dependent on these old bones. Or old muscles, as the case may be. I wonder if someday there will be an IP Fictionary (via Hanan) word for what I'm going through...

After-the-Fact Solicitation Call Response #677

If someone calls to ask, "Can I speak to the owner of the business?", the executive secretary is well within her/his rights to brightly respond, "No, you cannot, but thank you for asking, goodbye!" I wish I'd thought of that ten seconds after I hung up.

Friday Cat Blogging (™ Kevin Drum)

Over and under time! First, Amy crumples up a paper bag in her own special (i.e., cute) way:



And Datsa is, like his "dad", buried in work:



I submitted the above picture to Stuff On My Cat but never heard back from them. (And no, he was not able to destroy the pages with his laser eyes...)

Silly Site o' the Day

Well, it's no "Klingons on the starboard bow / starboard bow / starboard bow" but If Dr. Seuss wrote for Star Trek: The Next Generation... is cool anyway. Via Cory at BoingBoing.

Cool Picture of the Day

Click on this lovely Reuters photo to read the accompanying article:



The article quotes the photographer, which I thought was cool.

Kicking It Old Style

Hey bloggers, remember online chatting? I know, that's so very-late-20th century. But thanks to Firesign chat tonight I became reacquainted with someone from my INSIDE JOKE days, way back before online-anything even existed (well, for the most part). So there you are. Obligatory shout-out to Rick in El-Lay!

Silly Site o' the Day

From Carolyn, whose new photoblog has just been added to the Kultcha section of my blogroll, it's the very, very wrong computer pumpkin, and the still-somewhat-wrong MetroSled.

Checking on my Husband

The Robin Riggs Checklist is up at Scream If You Want To (still with no RSS feed *sigh*), so y'all know which comics to bring with you next time we're at a convention. We're hoping to attend this one and this one, but only as walkarounds, not at a table or anything...

Carnival of Feminists the Third

It's up now at Sour Duck's site, and includes a link to one of my recent posts.

Silly Site o' the Day

Via Mark Evanier, it's the subservient Donald, where Product Invasion asks "Will they succeed in turning our reality shows into infomercials?" like that's a bad thing...

Broad Appeal

Most of the estrogenous zone of the political blogosphere has by now linked to this SadieMAG article about women bloggers. But I'm doing it because I recognize most of the names in the article as women on my blogroll, a few of whom I've had the pleasure of meeting, and I'm delighted to see them getting wider recognition for their work. If Pen-Elayne were more focused or frequent mayhap Stephanie Schorow would have contacted me as well, but in any case it's another excuse to celebrate all the gals on my blogroll (take a look!), the Where the Women Bloggers Are sections of my Bloglines subs, and those blogs I discussed during Estrogen Month.

NOLA Pictorial

Riggsveda has an excellent review in pictures (and words) of her recent stay in New Orleans.

All Hail the Untersexual!

Yeah, I've decided that I'm going to be an untersexual. All the other stupid made-up compound words ending in "-sexual" seem to be arbitrarily assigned to men anyway.

The move, by the way, seemed to go very well, at least as far as my office was concerned. My coworker stayed late to work with our IT contractor on getting everyone networked and online again, but other than that we're good to go. And nobody making as comparatively little as I do (good for an exec secretary salary, low when you also throw in personal assistant work and property management work and constant emotional sturm und drang) has ever had an office as huge as I do, so I'm a relatively happy camper in that one respect. Still not giving up looking, though. :)

Silly Site o' the Day

If all goes well, today's the day we move our workplace across the hallway in the building my boss owns, and I get the biggest friggin' office I could ever have imagined, thus proving the adage that with great aggravation often comes great office space. But our internet (and phones and email and so forth) will be out much of the day, so no blogging nor bloggie catch-up for me. I just hope they don't expect me to haul a lot of stuff around; my back feels a bit better but I don't want a relapse. Maybe they'll let me amuse myself by throwing paper. Via Augie, natch.

Silly Site o' the Day

Back to work, sciatic nerve still a bit pinched, can't shake this feeling of impending wossname... looks to be a looooong day. I don't even think I could pass the Homeless or Jesus? test today (via Lindsay Beyerstein)...

Happy Birthday, Desi!

Many happy returns of the day to one of my favorite Pen-Elayne commenters.

Silly Site o' the Day

Being laid up with a bit of sciatic nerve pain scuttled plans to sit at the computer and catch up on blog-reading (and writing) this weekend, at least so far, but I'm finally through with one of my comics boxes (about 2 months' worth of DC/Vertigo/Wildstorm comps) and I was briefly well enough to rearrange my pot rack so all my cutting boards and oven mitts are hanging from it now as well, so the weekend hasn't been a total waste. And Robin's just finished inking Birds of Prey #89, so I'm going to pop a couple ibuprofen and hope the back pain recedes long enough for a nice drive while a few of the trees still have lovely foliage on them. Y'all can play some Lightning Pool while I'm out... Via Augie, who always finds the best online games.

Silly Site o' the Day

Sorry I haven't bloged earlier; after my mandatory morning errands my body just broke down and I've slept for much of the day. Still can't seem to fully wake up. About to crawl back into bed with the comics. Do chuckle at Scrutiny Hooligans' Comma Sutra.

Friday Cat Blogging (™ Kevin Drum)



Silly me, what was I thinking? I was under the impression that chairs were for humans to sit on...

Silly Site o' the Day

The office move to the suite across the hallway was supposed to be completed today, but one of "our" phone companies that shall remain nameless has dicked "us" over again - "we" had the same problem with them last year when we moved to this building - and won't be coming to transfer the other half of the lines until next Wednesday at the earliest. Meanwhile, Verizon had already done their bit with the other half so we can't operate any of our dedicated lines for the fax machines and so forth until the system is reintegrated which can't happen without the company that shall remain nameless so, no forward (or lateral) movement until they show. Which ain't gonna be on a holiday that everyone else in the building seems to mark except us. How come life isn't like this in the movies? Here are 40 things that only happen in movies, via Christopher at After School Snack.

Silly Site o' the Day

Light blogging continues, and I'm not sure what's going to happen to our internet connectivity at work today and tomorrow as the move across the hall continues, so I don't expect to be caught up again in blog-skimming until the weekend. In the meantime, the weather continues its inexorable march towards winter - yesterday was cloudy in the morning and the foliage suddenly looked muted, lots of dark rich browns and maroons and, along with the yellows, it felt like... childhood. All flannel and hot cider and Thanksgiving, and my birthday which was often celebrated when relatives came over for Thanksgiving because it occurs the following week and we'd have the turkey dinner then birthday cake for dessert. So I'm loving the weather even when it's bleak. Oh yeah, and it's getting to be hat-weather too, so you may want to consider these fine yet ridiculous patriot hats, via Tom Peyer.

Silly Site o' the Day

So yesterday this huge-ass orange 5-drawer lateral filing cabinet was brought up from the basement to my new office for the purposes of holding my boss' hanging files, and today I went to hang the files but discover it doesn't have any rails or bars so I can't actually hang anything in it, which was probably why it was in the basement being used for storage in the first place. So I wasted two hours this morning online and on the phone trying to track down bars/rails, only to discover that these accessories, when they are sold separately (which they usually aren't), are not a universal-fit kinda thing, and the cabinet was made in 1972 and the company that made it sold their business to another place that's no longer in existence and, long story short, I have this huge useless box sitting in my new office and my boss refuses to listen to me. I really, really need a new job. I need a laugh as well. Maybe I can run off and join a secret society, like the Cult of the Eye (via Nona at Ring of Fire).

Update: This is why he's the boss. He took one look at the cabinet, and ascertained that the back part of each drawer comes out (it's riveted in on each side) and slides forward to accommodate letter-sized hanging folders. The cabinet stays. He has assured me it will be repainted in time, but the garish '70s-style orange color is actually starting to grow on me...

Tresy Gets Some Medicine

I love this post.

Truth to Power

I've finally discovered Truthout's RSS feed so I can access their stuff via Bloglines. As you may know, this is the website that's reposting a lot of the lefty blogosphere's favorite NYT columnists, as well as many other worthy voices. The only drawback is that their feed generates a few dozen links a day, and you have to sift through all their headlines to find the columnists (whose names are in the headers so it's really not that bad). But I highly recommend the site as the place to find columns from lots of really terrific op-ed folks.

Silly Site o' the Day

Light blogging continues as I deal with a heavy workload and the office moving across the hallway by week's end. Don't forget to vote today, fellow registered American citizens! It's the dry run for Zod in 2008, after all... Via Len at Dark Bilious Vapors.

Silly Sites o' the Day

Still gorgeous outside, but those darn houses-on-wheels still block too much of my commuting view. Via Mark Morford, there's a site that thumbs its nose, big-time, at Hummers.

Milestone Notes

Happy second blogiversary to Echidne, and happy sixth anniversary to Wil and Anne Wheaton! (Robin and I will be celebrating our seventh in less than a month...)

CR Memories

For the third Carnival of Feminists, to be posted on November 16, Sour Duck asks for posts on a special theme, so since I haven't written anything for the first two carnivals I thought I'd tackle this one. The request is: "1970s feminist thought. However, this won't be a nostalgic look at second-wave feminism.' Oh no. I'm looking for pieces that engage with the themes and ideas of 1970s feminism, while applying them to current events, or looking to the future."

Well, regardless, I'm going to get nostalgic anyway, because my life is just that sort of continuum; things I did as a kid and a young adult still resonate for me today. I still have a love of Jewish rituals, certain hobbies to which I'm attached, a devotion to organization (be it work stuff or personal collections or groups of people), the need to communicate and tell stories, the feeling that everyone I hang out with is cooler and more interesting than me, and of course a feminist sensibility, which most often translates into "Hey, no fair leaving me and people like me out of your view of the world just 'cause we're girls!"

Since at least early adolescence, I've always felt like an outsider and a joiner simultaneously. I latch onto my interest-du-jour with an almost maniacal obsession, playing a "mean game of catch-up" until I reach a sufficient level of expertise to satisfy myself, then wonder why I still feel apart from others who share that interest. One of the things that my Women's Studies classes at Rutgers from 1975-79 (and there were a lot of them, I minored in WS) made me realize was that the "why am I different" thinking was (and would be) often related to the fact that my fellow hobbyists were male. When I discovered science fiction, for instance, my initial reading was Heinlein, Asimov and Bradbury, plentiful in the library but skewed male (extremely so in Heinlein's case). Quite the change from the fairy tales I'd collected and read as a kid, which almost always featured female protagonists, and one of the reasons I started reading only woman-written fantasy books a few years later. In keeping with this newfound consciousness I also began to see how women's opinions, creative endeavors and history were marginalized, even linguistically. (There's even a term used now for the systematic and continual erasure of women from history, but I can't seem to find it as I don't remember on which blog I first read it...)

And it seemed to me that the way to rectify a situation in which women's contributions were being ignored was to become a visible presence. With my girth and booming (often interrupting) voice I was visible enough, but at the time I didn't have the social skills or credentials to effect any substantive change beyond my own consciousness. At the time, though, that was enough. That's supposed to be what college is for, to broaden one's mind and horizons. And so I attended CR groups and took to CR experiments like "pretend for one week that you're a lesbian so you know what it's like to live with the stigma" (that worked very well at the time, so much so that I still remember the initial shocked reactions of my fellow dorm dwellers), and I learned the value of talking things out, of communicating experiences to find legitimacy and common ground.

And I think, more than anything else, that's the part of the '70s feminism I knew that I've taken with me into the 21st century. The need to keep talking with one another - a need that can now be fulfilled without ever meeting each other in person, dragging along the awkward physical baggage that gets in the way of our human commonality. A need that results in the creation of a collective presence too powerful and ubiquitous to be ignored any longer. With online communication and blogs we can set our own agenda, one that welcomes younger feminists so the wheel doesn't have to constantly be reinvented in a "two steps forward, one step back" fashion, one that maintains as permanent a record of our existence and importance as anything can get in these relatively ephemeral times. I'm looking forward to participating in that.

No Matter How You Spell It

Apparently, to paraphrase that annoying ad jingle, if it's Libby or al-Libi, he's a liar liar liar...

Silly Site o' the Day

Try not to say the word "PANEXA." If you do happen to pronounce the syllables, spit thrice and soak your hands in iodine. If you hear the words spoken, live or via recorded medium, cover your ears and immediately see a specialist to try and staunch the bleeding. Via Tom at Backup Brain, which - if you can believe it - just celebrated its sixth blogiversary!

Arrg, Hand Me Another o' Them Rocket-Propelled Grenades, Jim-Lad...

They just don't make pirates like they used to.

Losing Neverland

Or, Why I Am No Longer A Movie Person, Part 821. I figured hey, a Saturday night, a Johnny Depp movie, go wrong. But I knew I was in deep trouble the moment Kate Winslet's character developed that fake consumptive cough (Nicole Kidman camped that ever so much better in Moulin Rouge) and I started rooting for her to die, which by God it took long enough for her to do. My favorite characters in the movie were her mother and his wife. Either I'm missing some point (hard to do since the movie tends to bring across its points with sledgehammer subtlety) or it really just wasn't that good.

Out, Out, Damned Earwig!

Avedon Carol channels Paul Simon. Twice.

How the Royals Avoid Fireworks

They go to Marin County, apparently. Dang. I'd much rather be in Lewes than in New York right now...

Broadway Foliage

We're definitely at peak today in Bronkers! The temperature was balmy, I had just gotten the car washed after the morning's food shopping (so the windshield was clear), there are lots of traffic lights up Broadway along the side of the park and, of course, my camera is never far away.



The bus depot at 242nd.



The other side of the street at 242nd.



Same venue, different angle.



Alongside Van Cortlandt Park. The red light is proof of my paramount focus on safety...



More alongside the park.



The view up Broadway from around the 250's...



Just before the Henry Hudson underpass.



Northward towards the 260's.



Okay, this one I cheated on, it's the "main street" just before I turn into the somewhat hidden driveway leading to our row of set-back houses.



And this is Riverdale Avenue in Yonkers, on my way to get the car's oil changed.

With any luck, I may coax my hard-working husband into coming for a short drive tomorrow...

Silly Site o' the Day

Remember, Remember, the Fifth of November...



Now see, I had no idea that the big Guy had a blog... but that's not the silly site, this is.

Friday Cat Blogging (™ Kevin Drum)

Even though the temperature is supposed to be up around 70 degrees tomorrow, the cats are getting into their autumnal sleep habits...



Okay, that's their year-round sleep habit, actually...



Gad, they do sprawl, don't they?

Silly Site o' the Day

Another pretty day, so let the sun shine! Via Desi back before she was Mia...

Commuter Foliage 2005

I wait all year for this kind of commute. Autumn has finally reached lower Westchester County, and it's more colorful by far than these meager photos can relate, but bear in mind my eyes were fixed on the road (rather than focusing through the camera) at the time a few of these were snapped. As with before, you can click on each individual picture to see it larger. Enjoy.



This is the ground-level view from our house of the driveway leading to the main street.



I was holding the camera above me whilst driving down Broadway towards the Henry Hudson Parkway entrance ramp.



Along the Henry Hudson/Saw Mill Parkway north-bound.



The Cross County Parkway panorama from the exit ramp, as my car is stopped waiting for traffic to move. Take your time, folks!



Stopped at a traffic light along New Rochelle Road. I really liked that red splash in front of the Tudor-style facade.



Heading northward on Eastchester Road, one of New Rochelle's prettier thoroughfares this time of year.



Stopped at the traffic light at the end of Eastchester, by a pretty park that has gorgeous trees and ducks and fountains (ducks and fountains not pictured and sold separately).