You can have just as much fun at home sick by yourself as you can in NYC with your old friends and people who like your work! (no that’s a lie i have been such a grump) I hope those of you who are going to the incredible event tonight have a great, great time.
Jenny Diski, on her cancer diagnosis:
Two to three years. Will the battery on the TV remote run out first? How many inches will the weeping birch grow, the one planted by the Poet for my sixtieth birthday (soppy old radical versifier)? I suppose I won’t need another cashmere sweater to keep me warm come the planet’s apocalypse, the ones I’ve already got will survive the moths for a couple of years or even three should it come sooner than my own apocalypse. I very much regret the disappearance of a website I once bookmarked called Sensible Units. It took a scientific unit of quantity and resolved it into units that are much more easily or entertainingly imagined. Who knew that 1 cm of depth is equivalent to 29 human female fingernail thicknesses? Or that 80 gigabytes can be visualised as 110 CDs or 25 human genomes?
Laura Ortberg Turner on Los Angeles:
People who hate Los Angeles are legion. They’re the same kind of person who say they love all kinds of music except for country, which is to say they are happy to dismiss entire genres and places out of hand without ever paying it any attention.
Oh, wow, this heroin/Oxy situation on Staten Island (I do not love how the piece hits this “these are BLUE-COLLAR people like cops and firefighters falling prey to addiction” note sometimes, in which “blue-collar” obviously means “mainly white people who do not live in the projects,” but a lot of it is really great) :
The silent sniper fire of overdoses from pills and heroin that has been picking people off one at a time in increasing numbers all over the country for almost twenty years has hit Staten Island harder than anyplace else in the city. For a number of reasons, this borough of four hundred and seventy thousand-plus people offers unusually good entry routes for the opioid epidemic. In 2012, thirty-six people on Staten Island overdosed on heroin and thirty-seven on prescription opioid pills, for an average of almost exactly one overdose death every five days. Many of the dead have been young people in their late teens to early thirties. In this self-contained place, everybody seems to know everybody, and the grief as the deaths accumulate has been frantic and terrified.
Oh, honey, no. Stop. Back away. If you don’t like the review, do not engage with the reviewer in the comments. Not…like this.
Did you read the amazing profile of Lucinda Williams that Bill Buford did back in 2000?
’tis the season in which I get to feel a mild, unwarranted sense of superiority for just not particularly enjoying pumpkin-flavoured things, which turns into a strong, warranted sense of despair when I am presented with them at all turns
Ursula K Le Guin on the new David Mitchell:
Sketchy as it is, this has to me the quality of a true vision. For all the stuff and nonsense about escaping mortality by switching bodies and devouring souls, death is at the heart of this novel. And there lies its depth and darkness, bravely concealed with all the wit and sleight of hand and ventriloquistic verbiage and tale-telling bravura of which Mitchell is a master. Whatever prizes it wins or doesn’t, The Bone Clockswill be a great success, and it deserves to be, because a great many people will enjoy reading it very much. It’s a whopper of a story. And in it, under all the klaxons and saxophones and Irish fiddles, is that hidden, haunting silence at the centre. Behind the narrative fireworks is the shadow that, maybe, makes it true.
That review of the guy who wrote the teddy bear art thievery mystery is DELIGHTFULLY BATSHIT. For those of you who have not yet clicked on it, may I present:
As Basil pursues various leads and clues, he meets a wealthy philanthropist, an art historian / tour guide with a black belt, a stereotypically clueless police inspector, a helpful singing gondolier, a jet-ski-riding gang member who is also the scion of a respected Venetian family, and a world-famous rap-music artist. Along the way, the narrator recounts various historical and cultural facts about the city known as the Queen of the Adriatic.
Oh, and all of the characters in the book happen to be teddy bears… did I not mention that?
The comment thread goes on for PAGES as the author tries to defend himself as a Keats-level artist (ARTISTE!) and accuses criticizers as never having written anything themselves and it’s HILARIOUSLY INSANE.
(Also the author’s name is Stephen Harper and I like to imagine that the Stephen Harper, the prime minister of Canada, spends his days being exactly this egregiously stupid and avoiding fucking up more things.)
I hope both Stephen Harpers will eventually get so tired of trying to explain their brilliance to others that they will go live in the woods as hermits.
Stephen Harper, the Hermit of Gatineau Park.
Gatineau Park should not be tainted with a thieving hermit like Harper would be!
I bet Thieving Hermit Stephen Harper is the one who really broke into Justin Trudeau’s house a few weeks ago.
If this Stephen J. Harper and Prime Minister Harper turned out to be the same person, the world would not be big enough to contain my glee.
And Stephen Harper, Prime Minister WOULD be the type to write a crime novel with teddy bear detectives. You can tell by his sweaters.
I love the idea of him throwing the middle J in there and thinking no one will suspect it’s him. Stephen Harper, Prime Minister is not clever enough pseudonyms.
No, this one is Stephan, though.
Perhaps they’re cousins, like the Market Basket Arthurs but without one of them sounding likeable.
Ha! True, but it is entirely believable to me that PM Harper’s contempt for human intelligence is so great that he would consider changing a single letter of his name and adding another to be a sufficient pseudonym.
His middle name is in fact Joseph. Hmm…
It’s like watching a trainwreck, honestly, that comment section.
I love how it starts off polite, then offers a mild explanation, then a “in good humor” question about calling his prose “juvenile” and then it goes off the rails. It has the same beats as the garage scene between Walt & Hank in the last season of Breaking Bad.
The crescendo of craziness was just so fantastic. The way it started out so calm, with a couple of comments and then “Lastly…”, and then he just HAD to jump back in with a shitload of quotations, all followed desperately and insanely with IS THIS ‘JUVENILE’, MICHAEL? WHO’S WRITING IS WORKMANLIKE NOW MICHAEL? WHEN WILL YOU APPRECIATE TRUE ARTISTRY, MICHAEL?
It got so bad that I started feeling sick and guilty for continuing to read it, then so much worse that all my guilt evaporated along with whatever scant sympathy I’d been crediting toward Harper.
I think my favorite thing is how he repeatedly quotes huge chunks of text as if to shame us all with their glory. I don’t think it has quite the effect he was hoping.
“Come on. Aren’t I just like Keats? Or Joyce? JUST LIKE THEM??? I invented my own genre of literature, Michael!”
“the bear genre!!!! it’s a genre where everybody is bears!”
I’d just like to point out that this book exists and is actually pretty good, if also batshit. http://www.amazon.com/Amberville-Tim-Davys/dp/B00…
Also this one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fourth_Bear Not all the characters are bears, but there is bearness.
Oh yeah, jerk? “Workmanlike,” eh, jerk? Well CHECK THIS OUT: “However, what struck me immediately upon entering was perfume. It wasn’t Cordelia—rather roses. The scent was unmistakable. There were dozens and dozens of flowers in vases of all descriptions filling the living room…scenting the air throughout like crazy.” BAM, Keats can’t touch me.
Is he replying to his own comments repeatedly or have others simply deleted theirs in surrender to his crazy?
I think he’s just replying to his own? I hope so, that makes it even better. although it would also be funny if people were goading him into replying and then deleting their comments to make him look even nuttier.
On his blog, he also writes a review of his own book, in the character of a Teddy Bear, and compares himself to Fitzgerald, Keats, and Dickens, and literally claims it as one of the best works of “literary fiction” around today. He also basically says what he has done is far more difficult than most books since most books have “relatable human characters” whereas he has artfully created a Venice populated by Teddy Bears.
He also explains, IIRC, that it’s not sock-puppetry because he’s applying objective principles of literary criticism and therefore… something.
Which is especially hilarious since a teddy bear is only, like, one step away from being an actual sock puppet.
Some highlights from the comments section (all by the author) in case you don’t have time to sift through…
“Over the entire two year period spent on VENICE UNDER GLASS, I was certain someone else, some big name author and publisher would beat me to it. I looked EVERY day. But no one did. Do you understand the implications of this? It was up to me – not you, not anyone you know, not a major publisher or big-name author – to write about and pioneer this field for ALL of us. ”
“Excuse me, but I was ALWAYS on the high-road. I just have standards. ”
“Why do you insist on inferring I must be drunk. Have I been unclear in any way? Has my reasoning been sloppy? Have I not given a reasoned-repsonse to ALL comers, including you AT THIS MOMENT? ”
“This is a master-class in literary criticism and textual analysis and they have no idea what I’m talking about + no idea how qualified I am to teach it. It just amazes me that they call themselves writers but aren’t interested in the words. I don’t know any writers like that; and my writer’s group thinks this is DELICIOUS. “
Damn, it’s a good thing no one else secretly beat him to the teddy bear mystery genre or he would look really stupid, RIGHT?
I couldn’t make it past a handful of comments.
Plus this gem:
“That’s straight out of Fitzgerald and Keats, my friend. Straight out….and VENICE UNDER GLASS is more a lyrical prose poem to Venice than anything else!”
“I was laughing at you for your reaction, but if you truly think your drivel resembles anything approaching Fitzgerald and Keats, I now just pity you. Unless you meant Mr. Fitzgerald who ushers at St. Bridgets and Keats the maintenance guy at the library.
Then, yes.”
I find it really…. sad and upsetting. Not attempting an armchair diagnosis, but it is painfully reminiscent of a loved one’s psychosis. Maybe Harper is actually just a pompous ass, but I can’t laugh at it.
It gets even worse! I read the link “François” posted (a small article in a French newspaper about the whole goofy saga), and the only comment on it looks suspiciously like a Google-translated defense of the author by a certain… *sigh*… JEAN_PAUL_CAMUS.
Stephen, please… just stop.
Stephan J Harper’s comments are even better when you imagine all the “Michael?” bits in Gob’s voice. If it were a review devoid of criticism he’d hang up a “Family Love Michael” banner.
“Big Bear”
I read them in Gob’s voice immediately after my first reading and am pleased to see I was not the only one
I didn’t realize this is what I was doing, but you are totally right.
OH ME TOO. I couldn’t stop my brain from doing it.
…
…
… I’ve made a huge mistake.
You can’t understand the nuances of my fiction, you ROBOT!!
You taste these tears! TASTE MY SAD!
If it makes you feel better, Nicole, I seem to have contracted your gastric malaise through the intertubes, so we are sisters in suffering. I spent most of last night in the bathroom and I foresee that today will be much the same.
It’s some O Henry nonsense that I, the only person I know who really, legitimately still enjoys all the pumpkin-flavored nonsense, lives in a country which does not have it.
When I lived in the UK, I had to set up an exchange with an American coworker who would send me cans of pureed pumpkin in exchange for Hob Nob biscuits and black currant jam. I neeeeds the pumpkin pie. Why do these Europeans not understand its glory and deliciousness.
Dutch people seem confused at canned pumpkin, and especially pumpkin as a dessert. You can get pumpkins here, but people use it in a savory way, like you’d use butternut squash or something. Soup is traditional, curry is popular. The idea of “sweet pumpkin” is baffling.
I will happily become your black-market supplier for all things pumpkin! I love pumpkin as well, and every fall I try to cook everything possible using actual pumpkin instead of falling prey to “pumpkin flavored” things.
I made pumpkin bread from real pumpkin twice last year! I kind of wish i could fall prey to fake pumpkin too, but.
Can you get actual pumpkins though? It is surprisingly easy to make pumpkin puree.
Yes, that’s actually easy! They sell cute little eating pumpkins here (pumpkin soup is very popular), and I’ve made puree out of it and made pumpkin bread, which is great. But I love all the artificial pumpkin nonsense too and I don’t get it!
Although I just passed by the Starbucks in the train station and they had a Pumpkin Spice Latte sign so it looks like this year they’re doing it instead of something vaguely similar like gingerbread like my previous years, so I am very excited!
One of the few plus sides to Starbucks international takeover!
I lived in a country that didn’t do sweet pumpkin things for awhile and made pumpkin pie from an actual pumpkin; my non-American friends thought it was pretty good, but the fellow Americans were more suitably amazed that it came from a real pumpkin.
Yes! They finally seem confident enough to try the pumpkin spice instead of some kind of other “vaguely fall spice” thing.
I told my friend about the pumpkin bread, and how proud I was of myself for making it out of a real pumpkin, and he was mystified that there is such a thing as canned pumpkin. What is it for? What’s the point?
Carrot pie tastes a lot like pumpkin pie. You take a pumpkin pie recipe and replace the pureed pumpkin with pureed carrots and I believe decrease the sugar a bit because carrots are sweeter than pumpkins. It probably helps that a lot of pumpkin pie’s flavour is in the spices. It might be worth trying with other pumpkin recipes, though.
Disclaimer: I’ve never actually made carrot pie, I’ve only eaten it.
I’ve got a carrot allergy, so carrot pie won’t work for me. But I can get pumpkins if I want them. I just can’t get ridiculous artificial “Pumpkin Spice” everything. Which is probably good for me, but I want it.
Oh godddd noooo, that author in the comments! All my fingers and toes are curled with second-hand awkwardness.
Somehow the most excruciating part is the way he keeps repeating the reviewer’s name: “So, you missed the satire and social commentary completely, Michael?” “Surely not here, Michael?” “The environmental theme is from Nancy Drew too, Michael?” He sounds like an overheated HAL.
“Make Friends and Influence People” has a lot to answer for.
#banmen or at the very least arrest them with if not extreme then at least a certain amount of justifiable prejudice.
Seriously. You know, every time I think to myself, foolishly optimistically, “Gee, maybe I should chill a little. Surely men cannot be as terrible as they consistently, ceaselessly prove themselves to be, day in and day out.”
Then I step outside my door, or read something on the Internet, and nope. They’re exactly as awful as expected, and frequently even worse. #banmen
it is my personal policy to Not Trust Men until they’ve proven themselves to not be terrible – a ‘guilty until proven innocent’ philosophy, or ‘asshole until proven otherwise’
my male friend list has decreased significantly since the implementation of this policy and, coincidentally, so has the amount of bullshit in my life
and kick them in the crotch!
Mr. Flynn, who is 6 feet, 4 inches tall, “attempted to charge” at the marshal, who is 5 feet, 5 inches tall, according to the complaint. Police said the woman “feared that Flynn was going to assault her again” so she kicked him in the crotch, grabbed him by the shoulder and punched him in the face.
I want gifs of this all day long.
A+ misandry praxis by the officer in question.
American Hero
if only we could all be federal marshals!
I know Clarice Starling wasn’t a federal marshal but that’s who I’m imagining in this situation.
Pixburgh pride right now.
I live quite close to that area 🙁
Tuesday’s Dear Prudence contains the phrase “I’ve told my husband that common sense dictates that you can’t name your child after your ex-wife’s porn name and that any etiquette maven would agree.”
“Call me old fashioned, but…”
“If it weren’t for my horse, I wouldn’t have spent that year at college.”
I have to go to work! In a place without internet! If I have a stroke today, it’s on you. (It’s not on you, don’t worry, there are lots of other things to blame.)
I try to find a reason to use that line at least once a week. I think I love you.
Let’s be friends!
Today’s Dear Prudence contains a letter that can be summarized thusly: “We’ve tried to avoid reinforcing gender stereotypes while raising our four-year-old son. That was fine when he liked boy things like trucks and dinosaurs but now he wants to be Princes Elsa from Frozen for Halloween and a boy wearing a dress, well, that’s just plain wrong! What do I do?”
I saw that one too, and thought about bringing it up. Ultimately I decided to give that LW the benefit of the doubt because it sounds like she’s more worried about what to do if he gets mocked by other kids. idk, I saw the words “ex-wife’s porn name” and everything else flew out of my head.
ex-wife’s porn name is the name of my novel. There’s a Lifetime movie title waiting to happen
I’m pretty sure everyone who’s spent time around preschoolers has known a little boy who likes to look pretty and also play with trucks, etc. It’s nice! My personal example: a little white boy who was Storm for Halloween.
Poor Nicole!
Here is a baby punk Lestrade to make you feel better:
So, ah, what would this be from, exactly?
I think it is from “Different for Girls”, but I am not sure. I found it in Google images.
Also this:
That is 100% from Different for Girls and now I really need to watch that again. *heartface*
It is on Amazon streaming! I know what I’m watching tonight!
AWWW!
IDK about Nicole but I’m sure feeling better, thanks!
HELLO. You have done us all a great service this morning.
Thank you for my new favorite birthday present. Yes, I’m claiming it as a gift to me.
Happy Birthday!
Happy birthday!
Oh happy birthday!
i’ll be in my bunk
oh wait i already am
victory!
HIS FACE
Off topic, but a Dad moment took place in my apartment at 2 this morning, and I have to share.
So Roommate (and the pet rabbit that sleeps in her room) had a visitor last night. Roommate’s dad was visiting for one night and, unbeknownst to us, did not book a hotel room since he reasoned he could sleep in Roommate’s bed, and Roommate could sleep on the couch. So at 2 in the morning, I am awoken by the beeping of the smoke detector in the kitchen. It’s low on batteries, so I drag a chair to the kitchen and am trying to pull its batteries out so it’ll shut up. As I’m teetering on the chair in my bathrobe, I hear the following exchange –
DAD: [Roommate], you know what that chirping is? It’s the smoke detector’s batteries –
ROOMMATE: Yeah I know! [theellsee] is fixing it!
DAD: Okay! Also, there’s a rabbit in my bed.
“Didn’t want to wake you with something as unimportant as a strange animal in bed with me, but since you’re already awake! Because I woke you! To deal with the smoke alarm!”
The sheer arrogance of not only assuming that someone will be totally fine with you crashing at their place for the night, but that you deserve their bed while they sleep on the couch! #killallmen
Yeah, Roommate’s mom had done the same thing earlier in the summer with her permission, so her dad thought it was okay…I was a bit weirded out, but I thought the whole exchange was more amusing than anything else.
hahaha. The poor bunny, I am glad he was not accidentally smushed by your Dad!
My own Dad used to say when I was 3: “Whether the mouse rolls over onto the elephant, or the elephant rolls onto the mouse, it’s the mouse that gets smushed!”)
The rabbit is invincible. He’s survived drinking an entire double rum and coke, and chewing on electrical cables is his favorite hobby. When he dies (which I seriously doubt will ever actually happen), it won’t be a mere Dad that did him in.
Oh, wow, the roommate’s bunny sounds wonderful. I have a pet rabbit too, who used to have a thing for chewing Mac laptop charger cords, to the point that I used to buy special charger warranties just for him and sometimes vary the store that I redeemed the policy in! He has outgrown that now, and he’s nearly 7, so really getting on in rabbit years, and I worry, even though he still does flying leaps in the morning to greet me (and breakfast). It’s good to hear about invincible rabbits!
This rabbit also prefers Mac laptop cords! He’s a connoisseur of electrical cables.
Please all rabbit pics in the open thread tomorrow. (We got one last week!)
Happy to oblige!
I … completely misinterpreted what sort of rabbit you were referring to …
Were you thinking of a compact Volkswagen or a marital aid?
Glad someone else lets their pet rabbit sleep in their room! My two rabbits sleep in my room as well; one will occasionally jump up onto the bed and run laps on top of it in the morning when he’s hyper. The larger rabbit has not yet realized that she is probably also strong enough to do this as well. Their latest hijinks involves trying to open the bedroom door (via biting, because of course) which is loud and obnoxious/cute at 4 am.
OMG, that piece on Staten Island. I live there. Frazier is kind of funny not-funny in how he describes its closeness – everybody really DOES know everybody else. (He should stop marveling at that; it’s an ISLAND, population less than half a million.) And the drug problem is truly horrible (I know one kid going through recovery now, and know about several more), and yes, those ice cream trucks should be banned.
“Population less than half a million.”
That is way too many people to pack into an enclosed space, such as an island. That just goes to show you how differently people perceive the relative smallness/closeness of a place. Give me land, lots of land, under starry sky above.
LOL, Manhattan is an island which has 1.6 million, so more than 3 times the population of SI – on less than half the land area. So on SI, we feel VERY spread out.
So I just looked up the stats of the county where I grew up. It was roughly 5 times the size of SI, with a total population of less than 10,000.
Granted, that was sparse even for my taste. 🙂
Don’t fence me in
Pumpkin and spice and everything nice can go straight to hell.
My personal line is: actual pumpkin is great! Pumpkin pie, pumpkin cheesecake, etc, all great! Anything that you an actual part of a pumpkin in is a-ok. Pumpkin “flavor” is horrible.
See also: bananas.
UGH fake banana is the WORST
Can somebody explain why fake grape flavor tastes nothing like actual grapes. There is no resemblance. At all.
I thought this too and then I tasted Concord* grapes! And that was clearly what Fake Grape flavor is trying to replicate.
* I am pretty sure it was Concord, may have been another varietal
I learned something today!! Are they good, or do they taste like grape flavor?
They are good, but very intense, especially for how small they are. I couldn’t handle eating more than a few at a time.
For me, the association with Fake Grape was too strong. I mean it clearly tasted like a real food, and not like a Jolly Rancher, but it reminded me too much of the fake flavor. ymmv.
Ugh, fake banana tastes like my childhood (i.e. lots of ear/nose/throat infections – lots of “banana”-flavoured antibiotics!)
Eh, still not for me. The texture of pumpkin things is always a bit mushy, and I still don’t like the flavor. But I’m glad you can salvage something edible from the season.
There’s a cafe close to my place that I love, I go there every day because their drinks are delicious and they have stuff like Nutella lattes, and even they can’t do a pumpkin spice latte that tastes good. I had one once and it was like drinking potpourri.
Nutella latte, you say?
I’m sorry, did you say something after NUTELLA LATTE?
It’s because pumpkin doesn’t go with coffee, and should not be combined with it. And while we’re here, neither does eggnog.
The only thing I enjoy about pumpkin spice season is that after it’s over, peppermint/eggnog drinks season has begun.
#teampeppermint
It has been brought to my attention that Dairy Queen currently has a pumpkin pie blizzard. While I was first opposed to this on the basis of #seasonalcreep is killing our society, I think it may be perfect for September, when it is still hot as balls here but is also, y’know, September.
Of course, I haven’t tasted the thing, so for all I know it’s vile. But I can get behind this one thing, in theory.
NO GET ONE THEY ARE FUCKING AMAZING
Noooooooooooo there is no Dairy Queen in my city that is so unfair.
I’m usually opposed to the season creep, but then I found pumpkin ale on the shelves in August and I couldn’t be mad anymore.
You’ve got my number, brewers! I will drink pumpkin ale anytime.
When I worked in a mall, my store was directly across from a Dairy Queen, and the smell of fresh-basked cones would waft throughout the racks the entire day, prompting to me to buy at least 1 pumpkin Blizzard every week. They are amazing – it’s vanilla soft-serve swirled with legit pumpkin pie filling and spices, and chunks of buttery, sugary crust. I am drooling at my desk and not at all excited about the soup and radishes I brought for lunch today.
Oh.My.God. Is this true for every Dairy Queen? I freaking hate soft serve but this sounds pretty tasty. OOH, maybe recreate at home using real ice cream?
Aaand now just realized I’m one of those obnoxious recipe commenters.
But holy shitsnacks, that Pumpkin Spice Blizzard does sound good. Off to check out the local the Dairy Queen; up, up, and away!
The man-grabbing-on-subway piece is absolutely terrifying. One of my main phobias is falling down stairs at the metro/subway, so having a stranger grab me whilst on a staircase would PROBABLY make me pee myself a little bit. Good for Nozlee for yelling at that fool; I’d probably be so afraid that I wouldn’t be able to speak (just like in a nightmare!).
You’re not alone in your falling-down-subway-stairs phobia. Why are they more menacing than regular stairs? Is it the industrial metal edging?
Are they the stairs where there are like bits of the stairs cut out? So that you can see the what’s going on below you as you walk up? More common in malls and the Apple Store for some reason, I guess because it maybe seems ~aesthetically pleasing~ to some, (but I’m scared of heights, so I just find them stressful.) There is a giant staircase at the 74th St stop in Queens, though, that is like that, though, and it is the worst.
Also hate those! Pretty much all stairs, actually! Why can’t we just zoom around in midair like the Jetsons?
I hate those too! With normal stairs, I can at least convince myself that I am standing on solid ground even though I know I’m up high. If the stairs are see through, I can’t handle it and end up taking the elevator, even if its only a couple floors.
I posted that piece on Facebook a day or two ago, and it turns out that one of my high school bffs lived with Nozlee in college! He confirms that she is as awesome as she sounds.
And yeah my typical response to any kind of harassment is to freeze like the dumbest opossum, so I am in awe of people who manage to yell back at those assholes.
Fellow opossum here; I think I spent all my shining moments of shouting at assholes back in undergrad, now it’s all wide eyes and skittering away as quickly as possible.
eeeee hi!! did you go to high school with trevor or cory or ben??
Trevor!
HE IS THE BEST #banmenexcepttrevor
AGREED. I’m so sad he moved all the way across the country and I only see him at Christmas now.
Ugh I had tWO #banmen incidents yesterday and in both cases I just froze and didn’t say/do anything. I always want to respond, but in the moment I am always so shocked that any person would think that whatever they did was acceptable behavior, and then the crucial few seconds have passed and I can’t respond at all.
If anyone’s curious, my two incidents: I was driving and waiting to turn right onto a busy street, where the traffic had backed up so that I could not turn into a real lane. The 40/50 yo white dude in a convertible behind me decided I was taking to long and went around me on my left, to turn right into a nonexistent lane, and he yelled at me for it. Later, I was at a coffee shop, sitting with my back to the front window and facing the rest of the shop. I was on my laptop (luckily, not doing anything too private or security-related), and some dude walked over to my table, looked at my computer screen, then said “just checking,” and walked away. What the actual fuck?
I really want to know how other people in the subway reacted when things went down on the staircase, because I wish someone came to her aid — but since she doesn’t say, they probably didn’t, ugh.
Those things are scary but you can train yourself to shout back when you feel in danger by practicing it with a friend or in your mind a few times so it is ingrained — and your body will automatically harness the adrenalin you feel in a real situation if you have to use it, so the words will come out fierce, like the author here says.
A self-defense instructor told me the best word in such situations, the only one you need, is “No!”, but personally the phrase I use is “Back. Off.” It has always worked. It’s amazing how obedient people become when you bark short, simple commands at them.
This happened to me and it helped that I did not live there, but it was mortifying. (Sorry, I tried to say that it wasn’t that bad, but it was.) The partial good news was that I think I hit my head slightly and was a bit out of it the entire ride back to my hotel. Also, everyone just stepped over me. However, two girls who ended up living about an hour away from my hometown helped me regain my senses.
Middle school was hell on earth for me, being socially awkward, nerdy, chubby AND developed boobs REALLY early and … Uh, amply (the guys jeered at me by calling me “Jugs”. Ugh).
We had 2 mini sets of stairs to go down to the basement cafeteria and one day one of those jerk boys shoved me hard when going down the steps . That was fucking terrifying and the only reason I didn’t fall was I actually had my hand on the handrail and was able to hang on quickly enough.
(Disclaimer that violence isn’t the best way to resolve conflicts, BUT I was SO scared and enraged that when I turned around and saw him and his friends laughing, I didn’t even realize I punched him as motherfucking hard as I could in his sternum until I made contact. He looked like he saw a ghost and apparently started crying after I glared and contined down the stairs. Got him off my back for the rest of middle school.)
I have decided I cannot do anything today until I figure out what to wear to the Toast/Buzzfeed event tonight.
Neon and sequins pls. See you there!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P8mBePCovlU
I went with my green dress with little sharks on it. They will protect me from subway grabbers, right?
Toast T-shirts are an elegant look for any occasion! I will be wearing my Hamlet Ollies Ophelia shirt.
I definitely spent at least 45 minutes figuring this out last night.
When in doubt, wear black.
I’m in red and white polka dots!
So like, this, basically:
I am wearing a blue shirt and a (different shade) blue sparkly shawl and am terrified. Please don’t eat me!
(Not quite social anxiety, just very shy around new people.)
I’m wearing my all-bitch pantsuit, ya’ll.
Is…were comments deleted or something? Is Stephen J. Harper talking to himself for that stretch of thirty comments?
Yes, yes he is. Only one or two comments were deleted from the entire page, and that was because Stephan tried to doxx the reviewer. The situation is exactly as frothing and horrible as it seems.
There was doxxing? I thought it was funny but now it’s sad. 🙁
It is not remotely surprising to me if his very favorite thing is the pleasure of a long conversation with himself.
The article by Jenny Diski is the best thing I’ve read for a long time. I can’t think of anything brilliant to say about it, not the least since I’ve been reading it instead of working and now have to catch up. Just read it.
“In my experience, writing doesn’t get easier the more you do it. But there is a growth of confidence, not much, but a nugget, like a pearl, like a tumour. You learn that there is a process, and that it doesn’t very much matter what you write, but how you do it, that is crucial, and that nothing I wrote, or you wrote, is ever going to be the same as what she wrote and he wrote, unless, as Truman Capote said, what you’re dealing with isn’t writing, but typing. So I’ve got cancer. I’m writing.”
Jenny Diski is reliably wonderful, and I am upset.
From the #banmen Awl subway article:
“I’m glad that I now know my reaction to a situation like this is to ROAR instead of apologize or freeze.”
Among my few regrets in life are the times when people have done horrible things to me and I froze in surprise, rather than let them have it. Brava to her.
I will happily host a thread here for people who adore pumpkin in everything. Pumpkin pie is my One True Dessert. I will gleefully eat pumpkin everything. (But keep the nuts out of it because gross.)
I’m in. My One True Pumpkin Dessert is the pumpkin cookies with maple icing from Giant Eagle (where my Pittsburghers at) (probably in the thread about that badass US marshal)
Oh man those sound amazing, and I will have to get them next time I go grocery shopping! I love the pumpkin cake cream cheese rolls. I eat a slice of that for breakfast for basically two months straight when they have them.
(Pittsburgh what what!)
Awww, yeeea. My extended family is in outer Pittsburgh. The pumpkin/cream cheese spiral cake is the One True Breakfast.
OMG! Those sound delicious. Must go there after work today.
ETA: Perhaps with a pumpkin coffee drink (latte?) from Crazy Mocha! (Way way way way better than the Pumpkin Spice Latte atrocity… less spice, more pumpkin and sugar)
Yep, haters gonna hate, but pumpkin spice is a delight.
I don’t want pumpkin anything now, because it will be 90 degrees today, but as soon as the temperature drops a bit I will be ODing on Pumpkin and Pumpkin Spice. Pumpkin Spice Lattes, Pumpkin Ales, Pumpkin Pie, Pumpkin Cookies. All pumpkin everything.
PUMPKIN ALL THE THINGS.
I figure it’s only fair that if Christmas now starts in October (eeeew) then Halloween should officially start in the end of August. As soon as I get moved my new apartment is going to be all over bats and pumpkins and fake spiderwebs. (Hopefully fake. Fingers crossed.)
I love pumpkin but not in coffee. I will take a pumpkin chai though, thanks.
PUMPKIN! PUMPKIN! PUMPKIN! I’m about to try making a pumpkin ice cream, since although it is September it’s supposed to be 90 degrees here in Boston today. Compromise is the name of the game!
Pumpkin gingerbread awwww yeeeeeah. Sometimes I put in mini chocolate chips and bake it in fat scoops on a cookie sheet to make what Starbucks would call “scones” but what you and I really know are just big hunks of cake or free-form muffins, or I take two of them and stick ’em together with frosting to make PUMPKIN WHOOPIE PIES.
I might make some today. I’m ready to, because I hoarded several cans of One Pie over the winter.
I love pumpkin but only TRUE pumpkin. (supposedly) Pumpkin-flavoured syrups are no substitute for actual gourd, STARBUCKS. Figure out a way to integrate real pumpkin my coffee or GTFO.
Pumpkin cinnamon rolls! I don’t have the recipe bookmarked, but it might have been Smitten Kitchen? Or probably just google pumpkin cinnamon rolls. They were delicious.
The Kitchn has a recipe for no-knead pumpkin rolls with a brown sugar glaze that will no joke guarantee requests for your hand in marriage when you show up at a party with them.
(Settles in, tucks legs underneath, hugs oversized sweater around body, sighs contentedly…)
MY PEOPLE!
God, I love pumpkin.
I feel like winter and fall are the only seasons that really have seasonal “flavours”? Like fall’s is obviously Fake Pumpkin Syrup and winter’s is Sickly Sweet Chocolate Mint Stuff but what of spring and summer? I suppose spring has floral associations but I don’t really know of any food and beverage company really pushing a particular flavour, and summer is just Miscellaneous Fruit?
I used to work at a Davids Tea so I think a lot about this. My least favourite thing they have is Pumpkin Chai tea, which 90% of 17 year old girls accidentally order as a Pumpkin Spice Latte, and we were required to upsell it as a latte so people would pay $4.50 for an inch of black tea with fake cinnamon cookie flavour and two inches of hot milk.
You used to work at Davids? I used to work at Teavana. Let’s be friends.
NO LET’S BE FOREVER RIVALS
(the mall I worked in had a Davids AND a Teavana so we would have this friendly sort of passive aggressive “haha we both sell overpriced tea 🙂 🙂 SERIOUSLY DON’T STEAL MY CUSTOMERS >:( >:( thing going on)
Why would a mall have TWO overpriced tea shops?
…then again, my mall used to have two Bath and Body Workses, one on either end, so clearly malls are strange businesses vortexes.
Nooo! 🙁 Working at Teavana was horrid so frankly if there had been a Davids I would have been ENCOURAGING people to go there.
The people who worked at Teavana did often complain to us about having to push sales a lot and it made them uncomfortable! We were encouraged to upsell but never really got it laid into us if we didn’t.
It was THE WORST and people clearly hated it and we had no choice. I would have def actively sent people to Davids if we had one! Also people tried to return used tea leaves.
…return …used …tea?
I thought I was familiar with the depths to which the average consumer will sink, but apparently I was wrong.
And swear at you at the top of their lungs if you explain that you cannot accept them back.
My personal summer flavor is jalapeño tequila and St. Germain and lime.
Bingo. Buy them in bulk and put them in everything.
Watermelon EVERYTHING is summer’s flavor.
As someone who does not like watermelon in any form, I see it more clearly than those who enjoy watermelon in all forms.
It doesn’t really lend itself to the flavored latte market, though.
One of the things I loved about living in Japan is that the Japanese are fanatical about seasonal foods of all varieties and every season is full of delights. That said, I think in North America, it’s something like this:
Summer: Meat
Fall: Pumpkin
Pre-Holiday/Holiday Winter: Peppermint
Post-Holiday Winter: Liquor
Spring: Dainty Sandwiches
Correct, the only appropriate seasonal food after Christmas but before the snow melts is liquor, sadness, and a bag of Doritos for dinner because this winter is never going to end and we’re all going to die before spring
Red wine and vast quantities of mashed potatoes are the only things that provide a glimmer of hope in the depths of winter. Oh, and hot chocolate spiked with Amaretto.
And maple!
Bourbon mixed with apple cider, while I think back to fall and how all beauty is inevitably followed by death. And maybe gnaw on a hunk of bread.
I will be wintering with you this year.
I work at a tea shop right now, and I always think about this! I’d say our seasonal “summer flavors” are tropical things? We don’t advertise them as such, but our mango + Piña Colada teas get ordered a lot as iced teas in the summer. And we don’t really emphasize anything as seasonal in the spring. We do the pumpkin spice/pumpkin chai/apple cider chai in the fall, and then a peppermint bark in the winter. I gotta say, the fall/winter ones are my favs, though I go more for the apple cider flavors than pumpkin personally.
I also much prefer apple cider flavour to pumpkin! Davids Tea does a slightly different apple-y seasonal fall tea every year and I always enjoy them, haven’t tried this year’s though.
I actually feel like for ages and ages apple cider was really the most prevalent seasonal fall flavour, no idea why pumpkin suddenly took precedent? I’m tempted to blame it all on Starbucks but I’d actually be interested in knowing what the shift was. Apples FTW though.
Same! I don’t remember this pumpkin craze being a thing until I was in college. It was always there, but I don’t remember people LOSING THEIR MINDS as early as August for Pumpkin Everything. I’m sad I live in a place where Apple Cider doughnuts are not a thing. I wish that would become the next big craze. I make my own because no one sells them here and they are fall to me (even though I’ve never had one at a real apple orchard–but that is this Florida girl’s ultimate fall fantasy. One day I will!).
Team Apple Cider for life! Pumpkin spice is a bullshit impostor.
preach it
I LOVE APPLE CIDER/APPLE CINNAMON STUFF TOO.
To the point where I’ll buy packets of apple cider powered mix during all times of the year. Even summer in southern Arizona., because who cares about a little bit of heat exhaustion when you can have the glory of apples and cinnamon in drink form? Mmmmmmm.
In DC some places do cherry-flavored things for spring in honor of the cherry blossoms. And I would say that lemonade is the flavor of summer, but certainly there are also lots of other fruits that are featured.
Yeah, I’ve seen other articles about increased heroin and/or prescription drug addition in rural or suburban areas and many have that “Oh no, WHITE PEOPLE have drug problems now!” tone. :-/
Not that it’s not a problem, but surely it can be discussed without framing it that way.
“Here’s what you don’t understand: the person in this diary was a REGULAR PERSON! Meaning white, like you or me!”
“A white person on drugs? B-b-b-but I’M WHITE!”
Ok so I actually really enjoyed Cloud Atlas and I’m probably going to read The Bone Clocks, but the title makes it sound like a book Liz Lemon would pretend to be reading for a book club as a runner through a season 5 episode.
The Rural Juror!
And she would be driven briefly back into Dennis Duffy’s arms after the two of them simultaneously mutter “More like The Boner Clocks”, then make meaningful eye contact.
Not the Boner Cocks?
I did think of that! And it’s true that Duffy might say it, but then Liz would make that face she makes and back away from his sweaty embrace.
Nicole, your absence is felt by weirdos on the Internet who live in NYC 🙁 Feel so much better soon!
Le Guin reviewing Mitchell makes me happy all over.
I don’t think I could do 600 pages in present tense. I’m breaking out in a hot sweat now just thinking about it.
For further oxycontin reading, the WV chapter in Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt is harrowing. For more on heroin (likewise focused on economically depressed, majority white, rural-ish areas), my hometown paper has more than you want to read.
Edit: I should add that should you choose to peruse the Trib archives, the “black people brought this scourge on our god-fearing town” vibe can be pretty strong.
Wow, that book looks excellent. I’m from the PA/WV border, and the heroin epidemic is huge there now. People like to joke about meth-addled hillbillies (which I hate), but meth is old news at this point. I personally know two people who have died of heroin overdoses. And both drug epidemics are certainly linked to the economic and environmental exploitation of the area.
Whoa, that book looks good but also insanely depressing.
Aw man, that Le Guin review was exactly what I needed to get the taste of the New Yorker review of Bone Clocks out of my mouth. Dude essentially bemoans the death of the modern Serious Novel, with its serious Literary concerns, in favor of (gasp!) plot and the “regality of the boxed DVD set.” Had to stop reading after the first few paragraphs because A) too many plot details and B) rage. Whole thing feels like a jab at genre fiction and “popular” storytelling, and reminds me why I find modern “serious” literary criticism so stultifying.
I love Literary Fiction, but I hate most conversations around it vs. genre fiction because they rarely address how fucking cliche and trite most Lit Fic is (Mallory’s excellent White Male Novelist jokes notwithstanding). Oh, a searing novel/play about a dysfunctional family gathering together at a family funeral? THAT IS SO ORIGINAL TELL ME MORE. Like, I read multiple reviews of “August: Osage County” but NONE of them mentioned how cliche and overused the premise is.
Precisely. There is as much structure and rule and repetition in Literary Fiction as there is in, say, Science Fiction. More books about the dissolution of East Coast academic marriages, plz. Surprisingly, the belief of Woods and others that plot and storytelling are inherently inferior to Meaning and Metaphor can often result in some really goddamn boring books and stories. Mitchell (and Le Guin!) are great precisely because they write both “entertaining” and “meaningful” books. Margaret Atwood is another person I can think of who gets the balance right.
LeGuin is The Best. I love how she can draw you into her vast and intricate imagination with such precise and perfect prose. I can’t think of anyone else who manages to create such amazing worlds while still writing fantastic prose. She’s the Royal Flush of Fiction.
In other Pumpkin News, husband made pumpkin ice cream last night in a moment of fall-flavored inspiration and instead of the commonplace pie spice flavors used Rum and Brown buttered toasted pecans instead and it was awesome.
Drooling.
OH.OH.OH…salivating like Pavlov’s dog over here!
That sounds wonderful!
I believe there’s a vigil tonight in Gloucester, MA for those who have died from opiate overdoses and those who loved them.
Nicole, how did you even find this bear-genre inventor??? I am truly impressed at your broad grasp of internet goings-on and all-seeing internet eye.
I’m also really enjoying the guy responding to the author in haiku form in the comments
as in:
“If you really thought
I cared about the review,
I cannot help you. “
wait, I’m doing a Stephan Harper, aren’t I. OH GOD
Yes, this guy! Total Dadaist perfection.
Same! I don't remember this pumpkin craze being a thing until I was in college. It was always there, but I don't remember people LOSING THEIR MINDS as early as August for Pumpkin Everything. I'm sad I live in a place where Apple Cider doughnuts are not a thing. I wish that would become the next big craze. I make my own because no one sells them here and they are fall to me (even though I've never had one at a real apple orchard–but that is this Florida girl's ultimate fall fantasy. One day I will!).
It got so bad that I started feeling sick and guilty for continuing to read it, then so much worse that all my guilt evaporated along with whatever scant sympathy I'd been crediting toward Harper.
OH ME TOO. I couldn't stop my brain from doing it.
…
…
… I've made a huge mistake.
Wait, David Mitchell the author is different from David Mitchell the guy from Peep Show?
A name-share that led to this delightful little exchange:
Shappi Khorsandi: “Can I just say what was really touching was finding out that Rob refers to you as ‘my David’?”
Robert Webb: “We were in the middle of a conversation about the novelist David Mitchell, so I had to–”
SK: “–no we weren’t–”
RW: “–make some distinction, I didn’t want to say bastard David and idiot David, you know, it’s my David and the other David.”
(from here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkO8Aw1ymwc)
I had this same conversation with my coworker (who was randomly trying to make me read David Mitchell) yesterday! He had never heard of the funny David Mitchell and didn’t light up properly when I brought up Peep Show and Mitchell & Webb.
My absolutely favourite part of the Stephen J Harper story is where he selectively quotes things from the review to make them look like insults, and other commenters point out that in context, it was actually a compliment:
Note where he says:
“[He] limits himself mostly to static artwork placed on the page, and occasionally indulges in a short (2-5 second) video.”
…
However, Mr. Cohen was being disingenuous and perverse: there are 20 animations (one for every 8 pages of the book) and 17 of these are animation loops showing the characters and scenes of Venice (including the MOVING canal waters). Animation loops that require only 48 to 96 frames are NEVER described as 2 to 4 second videos. They are looped animations!”
Anton:
When the sentence quoted is read in the context of the entire paragraph, it takes on a different meaning than you have presented. Paraphrased, he said you chose well and provided a visually attractive book without extraneous clutter. He did not say you should not have used the animation or images that you used, or that they were inferior or unnecessary.
“Harper, fortunately, does not make the mistake that many first-timers do when confronted with an app that provides lots of features: that is, to use and overuse every one of those features just because they are available. Instead, he limits himself mostly to static artwork placed on the page, and occasionally indulges in a short (2-5 second) video. He also makes use of iBooks Author’s Gallery widget to provide samples of artwork featuring Venice between the chapters of the novel. The result is a visually attractive book that doesn’t overwhelm the reader with ornamental overload and extraneous interactive clutter.”
he is absolutely dedicated to being offended by every single sentence of the review. I kind of love him.
So apparently those jackasses who posted the celebrity nudes attempted to make themselves look like the good guys by donating a bunch of money to prostate cancer research (in Jennifer Lawrence’s name, without her knowledge or consent) and the charity awesomely said “no we don’t want your gross privacy-invader money” and sent it all back. http://www.business2community.com/social-buzz/can… Much wailing and gnashing of teeth ensued on Reddit.
I believe this calls for a full-bellied Nelson Muntz “HAW HAW.”
Laura’s LA article…jeezzzz. Does really good writing make anyone else always feel a little homesick, even if you’re at home?
It made me tear up, and made me want to call my mom.
Oh man, there was a basic on Roxane Gay’s Outlander recap this week that literally said she is too stupid to be recapping Outlander, so that was my “you should not be allowed on the internet” comment of the week.
Oh and the dude on a piece from theDaily Dot about not commnenting on women’s appearance where the dude is like, “WHAT DO YOU JUST WANT ME TO CASTRATE MYSELF AND BURN IT AT AN ALTAR FOR YOU!?” (The answer is obviously yes.)
You win my personal internet award for Most Servicey Comment for letting me know that Roxane Gay is recapping Outlander! This is everything I want for my tv-viewing experience, thank you.
LIke most of the commenters there have NO APPRECIATION for what they have.
Ooof that heroin/oxy piece. A friend of mine overdosed last weekend, he’s in a coma, his kidneys are failing, he’s turning septic… It doesn’t look good.
Condolences to you and his family. How awful.
I am so sorry – that is awful. Internet hugs**
Oh no, I’m so sorry. Internet hugs for you, as many as you want.
OH, the eucalyptus ._.
The Laura Ortberg Turner piece was lovely, and she is a lovely writer, and you should follow her on Twitter if you do the Twitter thing. Her style is very different from Mallory’s, but she seems equally awesome.
Oh man, Stephen J. Harper brings in a review written by one of his *characters* as a rebuttal! I am dying! :’D
I have a ticket to the Buzzfeed thing tonight, but can’t make it due to debilitating menstrual cramps. Does anyone want my ticket? The way it works is they check your ID against a list at the door, so if you email me your first & last name at eXhXtXown (with the X’s removed) at gmail I can change the ticket from my name to yours.
The ticket has been successfully rehomed!
Yay! Thank you again, kind internet stranger!
Pumpkin is the devil. It tastes like the mud under a man who sleeps under a bridge. It tastes like entropy. Taste a pumpkin and you taste the eventual heat death of the universe.
I’d like to be irrelevant here–I’m having trouble logging in with IntenseDebate. I’m using Chrome. I click on the little blue box for IntenseDebate, put my username and password in, and click “login”. The page refreshes and looks exactly the same. If I try to submit my comment, it says “Please tell us your name and try to submit again.” If I put my name in, the comment submits, but is “awaiting moderation.” I’ve successfully submitted some comments as a non-logged-in person (and have gone back to the particular Toast article to make sure of it), but none of the comments are connected to my IntenseDebate account. Buh?
Have you tried going to the Intense Debate website to log in? As long as you have cookies enabled, you should be good to go. (I find logging in on the Toast to be..erratic. And it confuses my password manager.)
I have IntenseDebate and the Toast in the list of sites that are allowed to set cookies, but every time I’m on a Toast webpage the “cookie with an x over it” icon appears in the address bar, indicating that the page was prevented from setting cookies. And yet when I click on that icon, it confirms that the Toast IS allowed to set cookies! So I have no idea.
Happy to oblige!
I did think of that! And it's true that Duffy might say it, but then Liz would make that face she makes and back away from his sweaty embrace.