Hi ducks! I have been in CANADA for the last few weeks, hence my lighter link roundup schedule, but am now tucked up happily in my large bed with my climate control at 63 degrees, as is my personal preference, about to watch the Tinker Tailor miniseries with Alec Guinness. Now that I have finished ALL the George Smiley novels, I am finally confident in a good outcome. Not for the protagonists, obviously!
It was great to be in Canada for the publication of the Truth and Reconciliation report, which we talked about earlier, and also to hear Toronto’s mayor John Tory come out against carding, which is a repulsive and useless and racist practice that has no place in modern policing. It’s a good start to solving a much bigger problem. I have also acquired enough new gossip for a fresh installment of Blind Items of Rural Southern Ontario, which will grace these electronic pages later this week. Let’s just say that a certain propane company got caught not charging HST to their customers on or OFF the local Mohawk reserve! WATCH THIS SPACE FOR MORE. Oh, and Martin Sheen is gonna play Matthew Cuthbert, as Nikki already told you, but it bears repeating.
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We are running a few amazing and difficult pieces on Canada’s missing and murdered indigenous women around Canada Day (July 1), and it’s been a real privilege for me to work with such great writers. In the meantime, Maclean’s just ran this, which is well-worth your time, and Tits and Sass had a HORRIFYING account of Cindy Gladue’s death, which says everything I would want to say about her murder, honestly. Speaking of Tits and Sass writers, Charlotte Shane drew my attention to a great piece about why the New Zealand model of sex work decriminalization runs circles around the Swedish model:
In contrast, New Zealand has decriminalized sex work (the terminology is confusing, but the distinction is important). Instead of focusing on creating bureaucratic hoops for sex workers to jump through, decriminalization prioritizes sex workers’ safety and health —for example, making it possible for up to four people to work indoors in an informal collective without needing to do any paperwork, and, of course, without needing to fear arrest. The New Zealand model has been extensively praised by the U.N: The director of the U.N. Development Programme’s HIV, Health and Development Practice observed, in accidentally amusing phrasing, “I would like to be a sex worker in New Zealand.”
The mythos of the Swedish model is that it is producing a better, more feminist society. But a better society for whom?
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GOOOOOD MORNING, STAR SHINE, THE WORLD SAYS HELLLLLOOOO.
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This, mostly about horrible awful racist serial killer Eugene de Kock, was a really interesting read. I believe in the value of restorative justice, and many of his victims’ families have forgiven him and feel he is truly remorseful. I personally think he’s a stone-cold manipulative lying murderer without an ounce of empathy, but his information has been invaluable for families who want to know where their loved ones are buried. Honestly, I just wish that more white South Africans had gone to prison for apartheid atrocities (it’s remarkable how few did!), so it’s hard to see this one back out on the streets.
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Jenny Diski always:
“Because I’m a writer,” she said, gesticulating with her good arm, when I asked about her decision, in spite of her qualms, to go ahead and write a cancer diary anyway. “I could either shut up, that’s the end, get on with dying. Or, get gripped, which is what happened.” We are the richer, if less impregnably complacent, for it. A marvel of steady and dispassionate self-revelation, Diski’s cancer essays are bracingly devoid of sententiousness, sentimentality or any kind of spiritual urge or twitch. (Ten have appeared in the L.R.B. over the past nine months.) Mary-Kay Wilmers, the magazine’s enthrallingly soft-spoken editor, told me that she encourages writers “not to pretend they’re more distant from themselves than they are.” Diski, who is close friends with Wilmers, was keen to stress her debt to the L.R.B.; it is hard to think of many other major literary publications that would have given her the space to pursue her personally inflected investigations over so many years.
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Why Judy Garland Still Matters:
I love movie musicals, but I admit that for years I had somehow avoided those that Judy Garland had starred in — beyond her iconic role in The Wizard of Oz. The style of musicals in which she starred have gone out of favor as pop music has evolved through the years; showtunes, once the defining pop music up until the early ’70s when bands you’d now hear on classic rock stations were recording songs from Hair, now resemble what’s on contemporary radio rather than informing pop songwriters. I didn’t quite understand the gay obsession with Judy Garland, not quite understanding the term “friend of Dorothy” as a euphemism for someone who had something to hide, something about himself that he was ashamed. (Consider, please, the song that the Cowardly Lion sings when he meets Dorothy Gale and her ragtag crew of misfits, the scarecrow without a brain and the tin soldier without a heart. “It’s sad, believe me, Missy, when you’re born to be a sissy,” he sings. “I’m afraid there’s no denying, I’m just an awful dandy-lion: a fate I don’t deserve.”)
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Gretchen McCulloch just sent me this piece of vintage misandry (obviously it meant PEOPLE, but if you read it as a misandrist, it takes on a certain flair):
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Deleted comments of the week from a person who doesn’t understand simple instructions:
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Tags: canada, feminism, link roundup, the internet
“Oh man, my recipe didn’t go through the first time, so I definitely need to try again. But I should probably change the words around a little and since it probably got deleted because she was busy ~texting~, I should warn her not to do that while cooking.”
Not to presume on the gender of the commenter, but that’s probably why people don’t care if men go to hell.
Who just bites a hole in the bread?! That’s what cookie cutters/ drinking glasses/ knives are for! I mean, I sometimes eat on paper towels/ over the sink but if I’m making egg-in-a-hole I’m doing it the right way.
Also if you bite a hole in the bread you can’t cook that piece to dip in the yolk which would just be wrong.
No, cause it’s yummy to eat the soft buttered middle of the bread, then the rest of the bread gets all crispy-eggy-buttery & you smear the yolk on THAT, is why.
We call it toad-in-the-hole, dunno why, but I taught the youngest kid to make it years ago so now it’s what I get every Mother’s Day and my life is the best.
(And toad-in-the-hole is NOT fried egg, so why even does the commenter think he’s being useful, if misguided?)
And the SHADE cast in cutting a hole? “If you’re that way.” Like what way? A civilized human being who walks on her two legs and not a wild raccoon who eats garbage?
I am HERE for Blind Items of Rural Southern Ontario as it is my neighborhood! (HI NICOLE DID YOU ENJOY ALL THAT RAIN? My plants are drowning and I have not been able to spend nearly as much time staring blankly at Lake Ontario as I would have hoped!)
Also, I fucking hate toast with a fried egg in the middle and anybody who serves that to me can go straight to hell. It’s like saying “I know you would like a recipe for cake, but here is a recipe for pie! Ta da!” NO IF I FUCKING WANTED TO MAKE PIE I WOULD MAKE PIE. I WANT CAKE AS YOU CAN TELL BY MY REQUEST FOR A CAKE RECIPE.
(Also I have noticed that I have substantially less patience than I used to.)
Patience and precipitation are inversely proportional in Southern Ontario.
Really, really excited for Blind Items. Mostly because I then imagine the blind items I could come up with for my hometown and it’s a wonderful way to pass the time.
So. Much. Rain.
All I want is to sit in the park or on the beach with a book in shoes that aren’t saturated with mud and water.
Oh God, I’m here for Blind Items, too! Living rurally for the past 15 years has given me total appreciation for small town titillation. “SOMEONE’S bull is running amok AGAIN in the village, not naming names BILL” and “whose partner was seen leaving the lake house with a suspicious Tupperware container at 2:00am?”
What happens at the Brooklin Spring Fair stays at the Brooklin Spring Fair!
Deleted dude: that’s NOT a fried egg. That’s what my kids call “Turtle in the hole” and other wrong headed people call Toad in the hole.
So. Not only incapable of reading instructions, but obviously ignorant of classic egg dish terminology.
I mean, I call it “egg in a basket,” but regardless of what you call it, that’s not a fried egg. Definitionally: one should be able to make a sandwich out of a fried egg. If the egg is already adhered to some bread, and then you try to make a sandwich out of that, you look like an idiot who doesn’t know that a sandwich involves two slices of bread with some not-bread between them.
It would end up as a egg version of a Toast Sandwich, a la Mrs. Beeton
http://www.seriouseats.com/talk/2011/11/mrs-beeto…
What about snake eyes? We called it snake eyes. My husband’s family calls is chicky in a basket. Which is sad.
We called them Oopsies in my family! Whether that is due to too many burned toasts or broken yolks, who can say.
Recipe for love: use heart-shaped cookie cutters to cut out the middle bit, and toast those too. Romance!!
Just to add another name for this recipe: My family always called it a Popeye. I never knew it was the same thing as Toad in the Hole, which I always thought was some bizarre British creation like Spotted Dick.
Toad in the hole is sausages cooked in batter. YOU ARE CORRECT.
Egg in frame!
Me too!
Confession: Our family called it Toad in the Hole growing up but in college my UK friends yelled at me until I switched to Egg in a Hole because apparently TitH involves sausage http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/5822/toad-in-t…
My father called it “Mary Jane eggs.” No idea why.
Confession: I learned about this dish / method from the V for Vendetta movie. It is delicious though (and not a fried egg).
Confession: I learned about this dish/method from “Moonstruck.” Yay for movies?
It was something I remember having as a child, but after V for Vendetta came out, my best friend and I started calling them Stephen Fry Eggs to the point where now I have no idea what I actually called them as a kid anymore.
My dad calls it spit in the eye, which is a gross name for a delicious food. Still not a fried egg, though.
IT IS TOAD IN THE HOLE. I WILL DIE ON THIS HILL.
We grew up with it as “man in the moon”, though I’ve also heard the term “bird house” which I quite like.
My partner calls them hurricane eggs. She has no idea why, other than that’s what her family has always called them.
Egg in a nest round here
To be fair, “egg in the hole” IS delicious
truth.
Does the bread go butter side up or butter side down?! I can’t deal with this ambiguity.
Yeah, is the deleted commenter a Yook or a Zook?
You have to butter BOTH sides. As in grilled cheese sandwiches. Unless you’re going to truffle it…
Do you actually butter the bread for grilled cheese? I just melt like, you know, as an estimate, half a stick of butter in the pan, and THEN stick the sandwich in and let one side soak up as much butter as possible and then flip and let the other side soak in as much butter as possible. Then I basically use the spatula as a panini press until the cheese is melty. So usually the bread part is about 1/8 mm thick at that point, and the sandwich is delicious because it’s basically fried, buttered cheese.
Wow. I apparently have feelings about grilled cheese.
YES. I’ve tried t without buttering the bread, and I’ve tried using that weird “spray margarine” stuff (seriously it’s just butter-flavored oil???) and I’ve tried different styles of buttering, but I find that I get a better over-all golden tone and less burning if I butter the bread directly. If I just put butter on the griddle, only one side tends to get properly golden and the other is drier and more likely to get burnt.
BUT I also use margarine and not actual butter, so that could be an explanation. I find that actual butter is harder to spread evenly and enough on bread.
(I agree that by the time you finish, though, your grilled cheese sandwich should be as flat as possible. How else can you be certain that the cheese is properly melty???)
I’m sure fried egg in toast is delicious and comforting classic fare for some people, but I feel an involuntary lip-curl coming on whenever I see it. Not my fault; my city had its comfort food revival around the same time it had a love affair with too much truffle oil, and consequently I’ve only ever had toad-in-the-hole truffled.
christ
ewwwww
There’s a reason it’s in here: http://the-toast.net/2014/11/05/signs-contestant-…
Whenever I see them pull it out, I yell NO NO WHAT ARE YOU THINKING at the TV. They do it anyway.
I’m pretty sure it’s on my family’s Chopped Bingo cards too (at least one of them?)
Oh noooooooooooooooooooooooo. 🙁
Are the deleted comments the same person, or can I believe that Deleted Commenters are so unoriginal that they just naturally alight on nearly identical phrasing?
So happy for little Philae! It’s also fun because the article states the operating temp is -35 C– the company I work for guarantees parts down to -40 C, and sometimes I’m like “what possible application needs that kind of guarantee?” SPACE, friends. SPACE needs that guarantee. Also, considering that it’s running at 24 freaking watts and still only -35 C inside? Really puts the temperature of space into perspective.
I think one might charitably conclude the person thought his/her comment hadn’t posted and tried again.
Space, and also Canadian winter.
I’m not sure that -40 C is sufficient for Candian winters in general. I mean, it would be ok in Edmonton most years, but there are historical lows below that recorded, and there is a lot of Canada that’s further north than Edmonton.
I guess it’s probably fine for space, though.
Yeah, fair enough. So space, and winter in most of Canada below the Arctic Circle, though you’re frankly touch-and-go on the prairies.
There’s no windchill in space.
Space sounds like a pleasant vacation destination from Saskatchewan in January, then.
In Fort Mac piping is designed for a minimum metal temperature of -45C if it’s outside and the fluid isn’t colder. That number comes from the steel specifications and is used pretty widely throughout Canada. The coldest temperature on record isn’t used for design since it’s usually a one-off, and steel doesn’t feel windchills 🙂
I knew someone who went winter camping when it was almost that cold! The group’s sleeping pads crumbled and one guy’s knife shattered and the tent shrank so it didn’t fit the pegs. I guess their equipment was only certified to -20 or something.
Worse feeling when your winter gear is only certified to – 20 and it drops below that. I feel for your friend.
As a southern Californian born and raised, this story is going to give me nightmares. WTF cold??? I don’t understand?? if anyone needs me I’ll be out in the parking lot letting the sun roast me nicely from above and the asphalt toast me kindly from below.
Winnipeg. Winnipeg is the application that garuntee is meant for and -40 is still not enough. I ruined my bikes hydraulic brake system by leaving it in my unheated porch over night, and it used DOT fluid rated to -60.
I’m so goddamn glad I moved
Tim Hunt says that the reaction to his “jocular, ironic” comments made him cry. “Just and perfect is the Wheel, swerving not a hair!”
“He cooks! So he can’t be sexist!”
Bye Tim, at least you can’t cry in a lab anymore.
Excuse me while I don’t go off crying about his “unfortunate” fate into my highly distracting lab coat.
What I can’t glean from that article is whether or not he actually employs women in the lab, in the form of grad students or post-docs. That’s not a minor detail. Can I assume from him and his wife not mentioning it in his defense that he doesn’t? To me this is so much more important than his nonsensical statement. I mean, I know male professors who can be very slick in justifying their *illegal* and stupid sexist hiring practices and I have much bigger problems with those dudes than with idiots who say idiotic things. Not trying to start a ruckus- I do understand why people are super pissed at him.
I don’t know that him employing women in the lab is super helpful knowledge. Just employing them doesn’t mean he didn’t hire them because they were pretty, or he thought they’d be easy to boss around, or he assumed they’d step in and be the “lab mom” who does the lab cleaning and maintenance. Employing women doesn’t mean that he mentors them they same as men and doesn’t stare at their chests or make jokes about PMS. Employing women as students and post-doc doesn’t mean he supports women as his peers or superiors.
He is/ was an honorary prof, so he might be semi retired and not employing anyone.
This article has a quote from a woman who is a former student of his. She says positive things about him.
I very much doubt that a grown man with a long history of science advising should be so “very nervous and a bit confused” to think that those remarks would be at all appropriate for any conference, let alone one specifically focused on women in science.
GAME OF THRONES? SHALL WE DANCE?
Discussion in-thread lest ye be spoiled.
Okay, SO: I have not read the books, so usual disclaimer about not knowing anything (much like Jon Snow), but the debates I’d personally like to have today are:
1. Sansa and Theon: suicidal jump? or fifteen-story drop into melting snow that will magically cushion them?
2. Jon Snow: ehhhh, what can you do?
3. Davos: man, is it wrong that I want him to punch that fire monster right in her face?
4. Tyrion: I am STOKED to see mf’er run Mereen.
Re: Sansa and Theon–I interpreted it as a Butch and Sundance thing…the fall will probably kill you, but if you stay up here, you’re dead anyway. May as well jump.
I’m *hoping* the snow inexplicably breaks their fall (even though that fall looked WAY too long for even a super-deep snowdrift to really help, I think) because the “they both died trying to get out” option is an exceedingly depressing end for Sansa.
The show doesn’t kill people off screen. I’m not even convinced that Stannis is dead. Jon Snow has Melisandre and hopefully R’hllor just casually showing up right before he gets stabbed a whole bunch. So I’m pretty sure Sansa and Theon both live.
Also, this made me lol last night. Our favorite white guy who decides when too much twitter criticism is too much has a trenchant observation, “The jeering crowds of King’s Landing are basically just Twitter.”
also in the books it’s even more explicit, where Melisandre keeps trying to read the signs in her fires but only sees Snow (capitals intentional).
1. Yeah, that has got to be magic snow.
2. You can bring a guy back to life using the power of your evil fire god
3. No, it is not.
4. Yeah, FINALLY someone can just give Tyrion the resources he needs to just do a good job at the thing that he is best at.
Tyrion in charge of Mereen is a show choice I really liked over the books. Tyrion is so much more interesting than Barristan Selmy, especially as a political leader. I thought the storyline was ok in the books, but I’m looking forward to Tyrion, Missandei and Grey Worm working together.
Sansa had to get out of Winterfell one way or another. She’s not close to done Sansa-ing and they will have to get her back into the story somehow. Good job to her on getting Theon out, though.
Jon Snow is definitely not dead. Not a chance.
I’m a book reader, but re. 1: I feel like they could’ve maybe found a lower part of the castle to jump off of. Maybe? Winterfell is pretty big, guys.
I don’t think the snow was that deep either, judging from the Battle of Winterfell? Also, you know what’s really fantastic when you’re trying to escape a psychopath with a pack of crazyass dogs? BROKEN LEGS.
Doesn’t Winterfell also have secret tunnels that you can escape from? Isn’t that how Bran and Rickon got out? I feel like I would have tried “secret tunnels” before “maybe this snow will break my fall.”
YES. I was thinking of the family crypts while I was watching the show, but pretty much anything but “let me just walk around as a very tall, well-dressed woman wearing very nice clothes around the ramparts of this castle.”
“Sansa…Sansa Stark? What? Oh, hahah, no of course not, no no, I could be any tall beautiful woman who was unusually clean and wearing a fahionable hood to conceal my identity while skulking about the courtyard. Sansa Stark! Gosh, why would you even THINK that?”
The main problem with that is that Ramsay is crazy-canny when it comes to stuff like that. Theon didn’t think to look there because he’s not that bright (not actually developmentally disabled, but not particularly smart–his substitution of a couple of farm kids for the Stark boys was about the extent of his cleverness), but one of the first things that Ramsay would do would be to ferret out nooks and crannies to do the sort of cruelty that even his dad would disapprove of.
yeah, I agree that this is reasonable, but on the other hand a theme that I would like to see is that Winterfell is OLD. Older than the Boltons; if there was anywhere that could keep it’s innermost secrets hidden even from Ramsay, it’d be Winterfell.
One way or the other, though, I wish it was just established; either the secret tunnels that we know exist, or at least some indicaton that those secret tunnels are not viable.
What would be great is if Ramsay gets it in his head to rip up the godswood because Sansa and Theon are out there somewhere raising the North against him and he needs to hurt something. He’s about to start chopping at the weirwood with an axe, when a noise distracts his men; when they turn around, Ramsay’s gone. He finds himself in an underground cave with roots all through it, and Bran walking toward him in a sort of rooty exoskeleton about twelve feet tall. “‘sup, asshole?”
I assume it’s the same kind of snow as in Frozen, where they jump 200 feet into 20 feet of “fresh powder” and are 100% totally fine. Now I’m just really hoping that Sansa has mystical snow/ice powers.
DA QUEEN IN DA NORF
Sansa has ice/snow powers and can control the white walkers. The final showdown is Sansa+white walkers vs. Dany+dragons.
I would 100% be on board with this, GRRM, if you’re reading this.
1. I’m not sure why people are thinking that the jump was so high. Plus, falls from that height are survivable; my alma mater has the world’s tallest dorm, and a student survived a fall from the 18th floor back in the eighties. (Local joke: she ordered a pizza, and when the deliverer called from the lobby, her response was, “I’ll be down in a second.”) She didn’t have a big-ass snowbank to cushion the fall, either.
2. Have Melly use her R’hllor mojo on him; she sure didn’t burn it on helping Stannis. (Although Kit Harington says he’s gone like a cool breeze; if he’s lying about that, to make it more of a surprise when he comes back, there would be a lot of blowback not only from the press but from fans.)
3. Not at all, although if Jon comes back… nah. She’d better have a ring of invisibility or some such thing cued up.
4. Yes. Although, given how much of a mess the place is right now, and what Tyrion has gone through (and done himself), it would be a little chilling if he ended up being just as ruthless as his old man. And the cat’s in the cradle and the silver spoon / Little boy blue and the man on the moon…
OH. I just revisited some of the pre-released chapters of the next book, and Theon jumping from Winterfell with Ramsay’s wife (Sansa in the show, Jeyne Poole in the books) is legit.
Ok in case this is where everyone congregates I have two small book reader things (forgive me!)
1. Before I realized it was Selyse, I let out a gasp and said “holy shit Lady Stoneheart is back!!!!!!!!!!!! Thats waht you get for killing your kid!” But then it was… not
2. I refuse to believe Jon is dead. I don’t care if all the books get written and he never comes back, I won’t believe it. Why build up this mythology around his origins and throw it all away.
I am 99% percent sure Mel brings Jon back. His backstory, the Night’s Watch vows, it all fits together too neatly. If GRRM makes a fool out of me I’m going to be super pissed.
But WHY are Kit Harrington and the show runners doubling down on the fact that Kit is off the show?
Part of me hopes that by aligning this finale exactly where the books left off, it means there is some sliver of hope that the next book is forthcoming?
WELL I can see the showrunners doubling down because if the viewership basically takes it for granted that he’s not actually going to die and they agree “oh yeah he’ll be back it’s fine,” it could take the “oomph” out of his resurrection.
HOWEVER, I’d much rather they handle it like the Buffy showrunners did and just campaign on it. JON SNOW LIVES.
The Kit Harrington hair watch begins now!
He’s apparently cut it. Third to last question.
I just saw an interview where he said he might keep it, because it’s easier to have it already grown out if he gets a role that calls for it. http://www.vulture.com/2015/06/kit-harington-coul…
JON SNOW LIVES!
It must be so weird to have millions of people scrutinizing the exact length of your hair as some kind of Statement. I googled “kit harrington haircut” and the news stories alone are astonishing and hilarious.
I’ve already told my husband that if Melisandre doesn’t resurrect Jon Snow a la Thoros and Beric Dondarrion I will eat bananas (my least favorite foodstuff in the entire world) for a solid week.
And you know, if Jon Snow rises as a white walker and joins the Night’s King in wiping out all of humanity in this universe, I’ll eat those bananas happily, because at this point fuck everyone in Westeros anyway.
I’m still cranky about the events of last week but if this week was really Stannis losing the rest of what he cared about and fulfilling a death wish then FINE. FINE. *insert Tyra “I was rooting for you” gifset here*
I had a momentary LADY STONEHEART!!! feeling as well. Also, I got so freaking excited when Benjen was in the previouslies because I thought, “Oh man! Do we finally get to find out what happened to him?” But no. NO. I should have known better.
I actually definitely thought to myself, “Man, those Night’s Watch guys are going to be really sorry when Jon Snow leads an army of the dead after them.”
I know you hate the wildlings, but you need some perspective here, guys. ARMY OF THE DEAD.
I still get so frustrated thinking about his failure to articulate and persuade his fellow Brothers about the Walkers. All he needs to say is, “They are a bunch of ice zombies who can raise the dead. They are going to kill everyone in their path. It makes sense to minimize the number of people in their path as much as possible because otherwise those people are going to become UNSTOPPABLE ICE ZOMBIES.”
Maybe the tl;dr version is “you guys might hate wildlings, but you’ll hate them more if they are UNSTOPPABLE ICE ZOMBIFIED WILDLINGS, no?”
Every time there is an argument, I don’t understand why Jon Snow doesn’t just say, “UNSTOPPBLE ARMY OF ZOMBIES UNSTOPPABLE ARMY OF ZOMBIES UNSTOPPABLE ARMY OF ZOMBIES.”
ONE TIME he says, “We didn’t build a thousand foot wall of ice to keep out people,” which I thnk is a good point but he has NOT been on message about that fact.
Jon Snow didn’t need a Maester, he needed a PR firm. o_O
yeah, i think the series is too invested in Jon Snow to kill him off so suddenly. As I learned from reading recaps elsewhere, Lady Melisandre has the kiss that can restore life by her magic and she just returned to the Wall and might be looking for a new person with royal blood to serve.
I don’t even know how I feel about Jon Snow! I mean, yeah, there’s a lot of back story there, and he was kind of set up to be, like, the answer to many Westerosi problems, but there’s also a part of me that is like, Melisandre hasn’t resurrected anyone (and doesn’t she seem like the type to screw it up, given how things shook out with Stannis?), and warging into Ghost seems like a massive, “Whoa, I can fly!?” twist that feels sort of…cheap?
But also: he’s Jon Snow, Big Deal. So who the f knows?
Yeah, in the books I’d be more confident re the Melisandre/warging comeback trick but they haven’t really demonstrated either too well in the show. Yes, there’s Thoros/Dondarrion but..
D&D totally trolled book readers re. Benjen, and while I’m kind of meh about this finale I was really amused by how hard they trolled us.
On that note, count me in on Jon Snow coming back, EW’s interview with Kit Harrington be damned.
ETA: DAMNIT GHOST, WHERE WERE YOU? I knew this was happening because of the books but: most fickle direwolf ever.
Also: was anyone else as taken aback by the face removal moment that Arya had? “who is this person? Jaqen? Maester from Winterfell? Oldass Lady? ME?!?” WTF WAS THAT. Also, how was she blinded if they never even put the poison in her mouth? The ways of the Faceless (Wo)Men(?!?) are truly mysterious.
I’m also was hoping that this finale would make the Sansa storyline at least bearable or more sensical, but as a person on reddit said (heh), it’s pretty sad when the most “badass” thing that Sansa does/says at this point is “I’d rather die than [be tortured/assaulted into oblivion].” Also, I was hoping she would backhand Myranda or at least grab the arrow and point it away from her, but no. Theon had to do it. o_O
Where’s Ghost?
Off dragging Melisandre over to resurrect Jon, is my bet.
Oh Ghost, coming in 10 minutes too late.
The Benjen thing was so so good. I was so excited and then when Ollie mentions him I was silently saying “NOOOOOOOOOOO” the entire time.
Right?!? I was like “oh no, it’s a trap!”
I guess the storyline rundown (in comparison to the books) is as follows:
Stannis: we’re past the books, he is no longer the Mannis (he never really was for me)
Davos: ??? we’ve been off the books for awhile
Melisandre: same as the books
Jon: same as the books
Greyjoys: who?
Dorne: off the books and it’s terrible
Arya: we’re actually behind the books? maybe?
Bran/Rickon: still a tree (always a tree?)/who?
On the plus side, they are casting a piratey character for next season, which is probably Euron, which means the Greyjoys aren’t gone forever!
I’ve been kind of meh about the Greyjoys in general (aside from Asha/Yara) so I’m not terrible excited about Euron. I am curious about how they’re going to fit him in at this point though!
ETA: Kings Landing – we’re a little behind the books event-wise but I think we’re still there w/r/t to Cersei’s motivation to burn everything down. I was more okay with the Walk of Shame in the books but given the way the TV show is going it’s hard for me to not see Cersei’s Walk of Shame as part of a larger portrayal of extreme sexual violence/humiliation of women in Planetos all the time, forever. (see also: Meryn Trant is not only a pedophile but gets off on beating little girls?) I think she’s a horrible person too but I now want her to burn everything down as well.
Kevan hasn’t met his fate yet, and *that* has to happen before Kings Landing storylines are caught up to ADWD. I’m guessing that’s a season 6 event, possibly midseason. Not sure how unless Varys borrows Baelish’s transporter.
Yeah, I was very confused by Varys being in Mereen, which a seemingly permanent position? I guess this is mostly because Young Griff is not in the show, but something’s got to happen to Kevan.
Right! Littlefinger is around and he stands to gain from some Lannister-destabilization as well, so I wonder if he might be the one to (indirectly) off Kevan.
why was Dorne? Just a weirdly bad subplot for so much of the season. I don’t think Sansa was handled well, but at least I could see what they were going for. Dorne just seemed so unnecessary. Bronn and the Sand Snake? What?
Everything about Dorne felt like a waste. Alexander Siddig? I was hoping they brought him in so they could do some variation of the Fire and Blood speech, but nooooo. Instead his scheme is to send his only son to Kings Landing? That’s not exactly failproof.
Was the whole point of Dorne just so Jaime could work out his feelings re. Cersei and having kids only to have one of them die on him? Ohh, women in refrigerators all over GoT..
It’s also part of Cersei’s storyline, presumably. Doesn’t change the fact that it was shot to move Jaime along. Also, is that another case like with Shireen where a book thing is spoiled by the show? Isn’t she alive (though scarred) in Dorne in the books?
Myrcella is alive & scarred in the books, but I don’t know if this necessarily spoils the books with regards to Myrcella’s death. I always took it for granted that all of the Lannister^2 kids will die anyway because of Maggy the Frog’s prophecy, but I have to admit I didn’t think it would be because of this. The Dorne plotline is just so weird and different in the show now..
Holy crap, they wasted Siddig so much. He would have slayed a good angry speech. AND INDIRA VARMA. I know you’re in mourning, but wow, you had your wings clipped back so hard. The sultry violence of Dorne was completely wasted — it was all about Jaime and Bronn and not about the Sand Snakes or the Martells at all. So basically, a couple of white dudes again instead of interesting, complex POC and women.
RIGHT
I think that it’s setting up something for S6. Cersei is almost guaranteed not to go to trial, especially with Ser
Frankenstein’s MonsterRobert Strong on defense, but she and the crown in general are in a very weak position right now versus the High Sparrow and his dead-eyed minions. Hey, let’s go to war with Dorne! They killed my baby girl! Try to deny me that, you sack-wearing motherfucker. (It also lets us see more of Siddig & Co., which as a diehard DS9 fan pleases me greatly.)Stannis: actually dead or did Brienne not go through with it? This show makes me question everyone is dead until I see their bodies burned… And where does this leave Davos? I could see him joining the Night’s Watch. I could also see him advising Jon if Jon comes back to life but if Jon is reanimated I don’t know that he can shake Mel and I hope Davos wouldn’t want to hang around her anymore.
I think actually dead, though his offscreen death was in the spirit of the Hound. If, for some reason, Brienne didn’t get him (and I really think she did), then that femoral artery wound probably dispatched him.
I’m not convinced the Hound is dead either! Although I do think Stannis is probably dead I wouldn’t bet on it.
I really want the Hound to be alive and for CleganeBowl to actually be a thing, but how could he have actually survived in the apparently isolated hills of the Vale? It didn’t seem like there was anyone around for miles.
I forgot about Brienne and the gravedigger. Wonder if the show can work that in somehow. I mean, a monk coming across the Hound is plausible given how Brienne randomly runs into Sansa.
That is a very good point. I was also thinking that this is a show that has dragons, so theoretically the Hound could have been picked up by anyone and healed.
Okay, I’ve read a couple of recaps that have said that Arya going blind was fate, or something to be expected, because she shouldn’t have killed that pedophile guy. I don’t understand this and I haven’t read the books … can someone explain Arya’s blindness?
You basically explained it. Her being blind is punishment for her failing to become no one. In the book its also a part of her training. In the show, it mirrors how she killed Meryn Trant. She has to live by the strictures of the many faced god, and killing Trant wasn’t one of them.
In the books, she comes back to the House of Black and White after killing a man that only Arya specifically wanted to kill. The Faceless Man says, “I see Arya Stark has returned to us,” and gives her a cup of warm milk. Arya is weirded out that they don’t throw her out or do anything to punish her for breaking the rules. But then in the morning, she’s blind. The book ends without making it clear if the blindness is punishment for not losing her identity, or if it’s all part of her training as an assassin.
This all makes much less sense when she’s not drinking something given to her by a poisons expert who has just recognized she hasn’t been following instructions.
XKCD’s Landing comic about Philae has been updated as well! https://xkcd.com/1446/
XKCD’s space comics make me cry happy tears, except when they make me bawl wretchedly at my desk.
The one about Spirit trying hard to come how is *devastating* 🙁
That one in particular, holy shit.
Oh man, I get all teary when I think of that one. 🙁
Nicole, thank you for posting the Maclean’s piece. I mean, sure, I’m sitting at my desk trying to choke back tears, but this is really important and I’m glad to be reading it.
The combo of the Maclean’s piece and the Cindy Gladau piece is devestating.
I thought I was familiar with the Cindy Gladau case but had no idea that she was dissected and used AS EVIDENCE for the defence…maybe I blocked that out. I absolutely agree with you, totally devastating combo pieces.
Toasts, I had a very itchy weekend. I decided to go to the walk-in clinic on Saturday. The doctor gave me vague advice about using unscented soaps and lotions, and a prescription for an antihistamine that Wiki somewhat worryingly says is “used primarily for the symptomatic relief of anxiety and tension associated with psychoneurosis.” :/ I’m not neurotic, I just have an inexplicable body-wide itch. (She also gave me a referral for a dermatologist, but I have to wait for the dermatologist’s office to call me and set up the appointment and who even knows how long that will take.)
I’ve gotten to the point where it feels like I will never not be itchy again, and I feel so foolish for having taken for granted all those days where I didn’t itch. I just want this to go awaaaay.
Sorry friend. I’m glad you’re going to see a skin specialist! Bodies are weird and will sometimes dream up sensitivities to things that don’t make sense. For example, I had a red, raw, itchy rash on my face for something like a year and a half. I finally went to a dermatologist, who told me to stop using mint toothpaste and gave me a cream that cleared up my face in two weeks.
May you have a speedy return to soothed skin!
Oh, friend, do I know your pain. Is it possible that you have dermatographic urticaria? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dermatographic_urti…
My allergist finally diagnosed this and it made so much sense for what was going on with me. Mine is typically managed with a daily dose of an antihistamine like Zyrtec. Benadryl will do the trick but it also makes me loopy AF. I feel your pain (itch) so strongly – good luck and try a cold shower for temporary, if unsatisfying, relief.
itching is so legitimately awful and doubly frustrating when it feels like doctors dismiss it as “in your head.” Which I guess is triply frustrating because sometimes that’s exactly what it is http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2008/06/30/the-…
Thanks for reminding me of the article. Now I am going to sit at my desk and scratch my skin off.
what I meant to say is I hope you feel better sooooon
Have you tried taking a regular antihistamine? If it’s an allergy-related itch, something like Benadryl would probably have a good chance of helping.
Yep, I’ve worked my way through most of a bottle of store-brand diphenhydramine and it hasn’t had any noticeable effects.
well, that’s all my ideas. unless you just stopped taking an SSRI or something, I know I had all-body itching when I was in withdrawal from my antidepressants
UNSOLICITED ADVICE WARNING!
Have you tried calamine lotion? Or acupuncture? I went through a phase of getting what my acupuncturist would call a ‘Wind Rash’, something to do with your Qi being out of balance or some shite. Anyway, massive blotchy rash would appear suddenly, hands would swell up and itch like CRAZY for 10mins or an hour sometimes. Then boom. Gone. Calamine helped in the moment, acupuncture helped in the long run.
Couldn’t go to the doctor with it because the symptoms would disappear so quickly, I was also having other physical problems, and all the doctors could tell me was ‘Oh its stress, stop being so stressed’ thanks doc, I’ll give that a go, in the mean time I have a thesis to write and bills to pay with no income.
I’ve tried calamine lotion, and Gold Bond, and hydrocortisone, and an “extra-strength” variety of Lanacane with benzocaine and resorcinol. They help a little bit, but they don’t address whatever the root cause of the Dread Itch is.
Well I have no help to offer than. Sorry!
My only other solution would be get naked and don’t touch or eat anything for 24 hours, probably wouldn’t help, but it would be an interesting way to spend a day (I would have been a brilliant doctor :D)
Also check your washing detergent? I had an awful case of phantom itch as a kid, turns out it was too much washing power in my clothes.
Also also, this just reminded me that when I had said phantom itch, I was put in a bath with a handful of oatmeal tied up in a muslin cloth, it seemed to help sooth the itches!
Seconding the oatmeal bath! It’s very soothing.
I have sensitive skin, but didn’t always. I had to switch to unscented laundry products and sulfate free cleansers a couple of years ago. I generally moisturize with coconut oil (refined or at least strained of coconut bits) because my skin gets so itchy if it’s at all dry and I have to read labels for anything that touches my skin.
My sister developed an allergy to her roommates hair dye that caused major itching until they figured out what it was and she moved out.
Itching is horrible, I’m sorry. I went through a phase a few years ago where I came out all over in hives (apparently as a stress reaction), and it was nightmarish. Give me straight-up pain any day of the week over that kind of itching. Good luck getting it treated effectively.
Do you have any areas that are obviously more itchy/rashy? I was feeling itchy all over, despite only having a few small rashy areas on my thigh, and my dermatologist said something like–the itchy rash had made my hypersensitive, so that I felt itchy all over. She gave me some steroid cream to clear up the rash, and also recommended I start using vanicream, because it’s free of all the stuff (that dermatologists know of) that can cause skin irritation. And the itching cleared up (hallelujah)
tl;dr: full-body itching is the worst and I hope you’re able to resolve it
I guess my arms? That’s where it started. I assumed it was a heat rash from working out, but it’s been almost 2 weeks and it hasn’t gone away. I’m not allergic to anything as far as I know and I haven’t started using any new soaps or lotions or anything.
I had something very similar one summer 5 years ago, but I don’t recall it lasting this long and it eventually went away by itself.
I am not allergic to anything, but sometimes I get a runaway hive situation. I’ll have an itch, and then I’ll scratch it, and then a new spot starts up etc. Taking a Claritin usually calms the situation down. Weirdly, it usually happens to me 2-3 weeks after I finish a course of antibiotics.
Oh god, itching is the worst thing in the world. I’m so sorry this is happening to you. I really really hope the dermatologist can help — a friend of mine had a situation a couple years back where her entire family had a terrible itchy skin issue, which eventually turned out to be some sort of microscopic mites? Or something? Anyway once they figured out what was causing it, they were able to fix it, which is what I hope happens for you!
that’s horrible I’m so sorry. Last time I had that it was an allergic reaction to an antibiotic, but it started 2 weeks after I started the drug. I assume a doc would have caught something like that for you.
It doesn’t have to mean anything! Antihistamines are prescribed BOTH for itch AND for anxiety 🙂
The difference is (according to the pharmacology teacher who held a brief intro class for us) that some of the weaker allergy/itch meds won’t cross the blood-brain barrier, they work on antihistamines in the skin I believe. If they do cross the barrier into the brain, you might become drowsy – and that’s what’s used for anxiety relief. So, some antihistamines are used both for their itch-relief ability and for their calming ability, so your meds might be completely legit anti-itching pills.
If I can speculate a little, I’m also wondering if maybe your doctor thinks that your itch resides in the central nervous system, and not in the outer parts. Like, maybe the problem isn’t that your skin is producing histamine all over your body, maybe the problem is that there’s too much histamine activity in your brain or that your brain isn’t suppressing unnecessary histamine signals efficiently enough. In that case it wouldn’t be too crazy with an itch-reliever that can creep through the barrier and stop the histamine freakout? I’m not a doctor, just a brain student, and I’m not sure how the histamine system works, but I think this is basically plausible.
So, it’s not necessarily that your doctor thinks that you’re just believe you’re itchy because you’re anxious. I mean, even if she did think that anxiety played a role (it plays a role in all brain-regulated systems, because anxiety’s job is literally to change the way the brain acts, for example by prioritising signals that say that there’s a problem somewhere), she didn’t give you Valium, she chose an antihistamine. I hope it will do whatever the doctor thought it would do so that your itch goes away (that sounds terrible!), and I wish that doctors started explaining these things to people. I actually ran into this from the other side, when I needed anxiety relief and got an antihistamine that seemed to be for carsickness and itch with drowsiness as a side effect – nobody explained to me that this wasn’t just a weird and dismissive way to avoid giving me real meds, I had to Google it for myself to find out that it was legitimate.
I am so very sorry you’re itching, and I hope it goes away soon. Don’t worry that the doctor thinks your itching is somehow not “real,” or that she wasn’t taking you seriously. She was probably thinking allergic reactions are one of the reasons people itch, and if benadryl didn’t help then maybe a stronger antihistamine would do it.
I always hate it when doctors roll their eyes and don’t take me seriously, or tell me nothing’s wrong and I should stop worrying when obviously something IS wrong. But I hate it in a completely different way when they take my concerns very seriously and do their very sincere best to fix it…and it doesn’t help. So I hope the dermatologist has a quick and easy fix for you that works perfectly. If the dermatologist’s office doesn’t call you to set up the appointment after a day or so, you can call and ask them.
Oh winterbymorning, I am so sorry you are suffering. Itching is devilish torture.
A product does not have to be new to cause a reaction. While waiting for that dermatologist visit, don’t neglect to try eliminating familiar soaps/lotions/detergents. My sensitive skin can be happy for years and years with a given product, then suddenly react badly to it. When I’m trying to track down why my weird skin is suddenly unhappy, I wash with pure glycerine or with Dr Bronner’s baby version, including my laundry. My laundry routine includes white vinegar in the rinse cycle, to remove more of the detergent. I quarantine all my usual products, even though they’ve been good for me for so long.
Sometimes it’s the product formulation that has changed. My Beloved Biochemist says the product ingredients may not have changed and therefore the label does not change, but the *way* the product is made can be changed, which changes the resulting chemistry significantly. Most of the time it’s that my skin has built up a sensitivity to an unchanged product.
Best wishes for quick relief and lasting serenity.
As I got older, the allergies that used to make my face explode with snot transformed into allergies that make me want to scratch my head clean off. I never knew how much I would long to be snotty! Now I take a generic Zyrtec every night before bed and my skin stays itch-free.
I have been making my way through the TRC report. I recommend reading it, especially for Americans who are lacking the context on residential schools in Canada. If you are pressed for time, prioritize the chapter beginning on page 41, “The History.”
A couple of years ago, I had the opportunity to view some videotaped testimony and speak with the judge who oversaw the whole TRC. I don’t say this lightly: it was a life-changing experience.
Wholeheartedly agreeing with chickpeas.
And I would add this about the life-changing nature of engaging with the work of the TRC – It has transformed not only my engagement with the legacy of the residential school system and my awareness/mode of engagement with aboriginal peoples; but has transformed my lens on so much: education systems, child welfare, adoption, culture, work….
hehe egg-splaining
You guys, I finally saw Mad Max Fury Road this weekend and it was everything I hoped for and more. Now all I want to do is read smart people analyze it except it’s surprisingly hard to wade through all the whiny men who are mad at the feminazis for stealing their movie. I know it’s gotten discussed on here almost daily since it came out but I would welcome any/all links to stuff I should read.
You’re in luck- there’s a new post about Fury Road and portrayals of sexual violence over at Smart Bitches, Trashy Books. Contains spoilers for Outlander and Game of Thrones as well.
Would you like to read the thing I wrote about it on my blog? *shameless self-promotion*
Just read your post and HELL YES to everything you wrote.
There is a tumblr I’ve been following that has reblogged/written a ton of great analysis posts: bonehandledknife.tumblr.com
So I have been steadily reading through all of that tumblr’s mad max posts, and then I got to this: http://seekingskywhales.tumblr.com/post/121534927…
I thought I should share.
Yesssss join us! I spent all weekend on tumblr, endlessly reblogging bonehandledknife’s stuff. She has some great meta, including worldbuilding and film criticism.
Responding to myself to add that if there’s anything you want to talk about here, post away because I could babble forever about how much I love this movie and the characters and the way it’s shot and the story arc and the worldbuilding and essentially everything there is about it.
ME TOO. Everything.
OK LET’S GO. The scene in the quagmire when Bullet Tooth Tony is shooting at them and there’s a great classical piece in the background playing that I *think* is Dies Irae, and if it is it has the best opening ever: “The day of wrath, that day / Will dissolve the world in ashes” and yesss the music nerd in me gets so pumped.
Also the fact that at the very end – It’s the Milk Mothers who turn on the water, which means that they’ve staged their own rebellion by unhooking themselves from the milking machines and taking control of the water pumps.
Also also I’m sorta falling in love with the War Boys? I think its fascinating how the movie explores the exploitation of our pack mentality, and I can’t help but pity them and their ignorance to their actual place in the society. And the worldbuilding fan in me wants a peer-reviewed paper on the combination idolization of cars and Viking beliefs.
re: Milk Mothers: I feel like there must have been some time elapsing between the war pups letting the women up, and the water coming on. But even with that, everyone’s allegiance shifted SO FAST. The little pups only took like ten seconds to decide to take the lever and let the platform down to Furiosa. Why did it happen so fast? Was everyone already prepared for revolution, somehow? The Wretched certainly knew Joe was an oppressor, but why did the pups know? What relationship did they have with Furiosa?
War boys break my heart.
Are the Bullet Farmer and the People Eater also Joe’s sons?
Or does he just make everyone call him “dad” or similar as part of his overall hierarchical regime?
Re: the Bullet Farmer and People Eater – At first I thought they might be brothers, but it’s probably more likely that they’re just fellow war lords.
Re: the Pups – Oh man, I love them. There’s a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment in the beginning when the War Boys are running to get their steering wheels: a War Pup raises his arms so a Boy can pick him up and ughh it’s so cute. I figure that the Pups are loyal to the Boys and the Imperators more than to Joe – who probably has no interest in them until they graduate into his war parties – and when Furiosa returns, they’re not so much as overthrowing their own social order as much as they’re publicly acknowledging what they’ve felt all along.
But yeah, that ending does wrap up everything pretty quickly.
But the Bullet Farmer calls Rictus “brother” and Joe “daddy” before he takes off in the track vehicle.
I caught that war pup lift on the 3rd or 4th time through. Adorable.
I admit I don’t remember the Bullet Farmer and Rictus scene (oh no I guess I’ll need to see it again, dang), but the part when the BF calls Joe “daddy” struck me as simply being sass. If Joe was a general/military dude pre-Citadel, maybe the BF and People Eater were also soldiers? Since they seem to be within the same age group, it seems unlikely to me that they’re his sons.
Oh, of course you’re right — it’s right after they find out Angharad’s baby was “perfect in every way” — the Bullet Farmer says “stay here with your grief, daddy” or something like that, and you’re totally right, he’s just sassing. He’s already fed up with the whole thing anyway (“all this for a family squabble” much earlier in the movie).
However, re: Joe and “daddy”: http://farmerlauren.tumblr.com/post/121647342121/…
Oh my god this is so perfect. Everything about the movie and the cast is so, so spot on and it makes me ridiculously happy that everyone were so involved/invested. Have you seen this clip making the rounds on tumblr of Keays-Byrne in full costume and a group of War Boys? http://soysaucebase.tumblr.com/post/121145763277/…
YES I love it. Are you on tumblr? Come be my tumblr friend.
I would very much like to have a group of half naked dudes worshiping me from atop their truck-tank. Please and thank you.
I am indeed on tumblr! I use it primarily to reblog fanart, though – Very little original content. But it’d be great to get some more Mad Max fans on my dashboard! I’m http://jaesauce.tumblr.com over there.
Yeah, just go to Tumblr for your meta needs. Very few whiny men last long on Tumblr. At least not in my corner of it. I put up a Fury Road collection a couple weeks ago, if you want to look through some of those posts for discussion, etc. I’m putting together a collection of just MMFR meta but it won’t be ready for a month or so.
I follow you on Tumblr and can I just say it is a relief to know you compile your collections over time? You’re always like HERE IS A SET OF THE BITCHIN-EST PHOTOS ON A THEME” and I keep thinking your Google skills on any given morning must just be so much better than your average mortal’s.
Ha! Yeah, those collections take some time to compile. I have twenty to fifty collections going at any one time, and I just like things that fit as I see them on my dash. Every few months, I’ll go through my Likes folder and tally them up to see which ones need to get posted soon. The one with the most items gets queued up for posting on Tuesday morning (because Tuesday 10am EST is the default and I’m too lazy to change it every time), unless I have a collection that is particularly timely.
For some reason, the showing I was at paired it with the trailer for the latest Woody Allen emission, and boy, if I hadn’t already been in the mood for burning down the kyriarchy…
Thank you for “kyriarchy”. You just expanded my education. No snark. I mean this sincerely.
All of the above, and also I enjoyed this Btch Flicks piece and this one from Buzzfeed.
I started watching the old Mad Max films to complement my obsession with Fury Road, so now I really want to read people’s analyses on the change in society from Mad Max to Fury Road.
I will take any and all suggestions for reading material!
Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome was based partly on the Russell Hoban book Riddley Walker, so you might be interested in reading that. It’s (I think) a brilliant book that does some very interesting things with language.
Oh my god, you guys, I haven’t gotten any work done all day…
Thank you very much for the Judy Garland article. It’s been too long since seeing that version of “The Man That Got Away”. May have to rewatch the film as soon as exams are done…
My favourite Garland-related story is to do with “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas”. It brings me to tears almost every time anyway, but apparently the lyrics were initially even more morose. They went:
“Have yourself a merry little Christmas,
It may be your last…”
They were changed to the current ones when Garland complained that a character who sang such awful things to her distressed younger sister would never be sympathetic to an audience.
That reminds me of a recent card that my office passed around for a coworker’s belated birthday. When it was my turn to sign it, I saw that another coworker had written “Your birthday is gone but you are still here” – I thought it was vaguely ominous and threatening (like there’s an unspoken “but not for much longer!” there).
I am not able to listen to her version of “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas” (regardless of location or season) without crying. I am honestly tearing up as I write this just thinking about the line, “Through the years we all will be together / If the Fates allow”.
I saw Jurassic World this weekend! Did anyone else? I have a lot of thoughts, mostly about footwear. Spoiler party in the thread?
SO. BRYCE DALLAS HOWARD DID THIS ENTIRE DAMN MOVIE IN A PAIR OF STILETTOS. I have so many questions.
1) How did the shoes not break?
2) How did the shoes not come off?
3) How did her ankles not break?
4) How did she sprint in those damn things?
5) How about when she was in the explicitly-pointed-out muddy terrain with Owen? How did she not get stuck in the mud?
6) Seriously a state-of-the-art money making behemoth of a park doesn’t sell souvenir Nikes? You can’t show her finding better shoes?
…otherwise I mostly enjoyed the thing. It wasn’t as good as JP1, but it was better than 2 and 3, and thoroughly enjoyable in its ridiculousness.
I actually kind of liked the bit about the shoes? Because Owen points out that she won’t be able to do anything in those shoes. It’s A Thing That Is Commented Upon. And then not only does she do everything he does while wearing them, but she outruns a T-Rex in them. I kind of loved that. It was like “Fuck you Imma wear whatever footwear I choose and kick ass while doing so.”
Haha true, I’m honestly mostly marveling at how the shoes *survived* what she was doing in them.
Also my sister tells me they actually gave Bryce Dallas Howard platformier heels for the muddy terrain and she had a hard time with them so she put the original shoes back on and did it without a problem, so. Bryce Dallas Howard is a superhero.
I hated the shoes thing. I read it as, well, people are going to point it out if we show her wearing sexy heels the whole time, but instead of having her wear practical shoes, we’ll just point it out! That makes it ok! Who doesn’t take off their heels to run from a T-rex?
I thought the movie would have been much better if all the genders had been switched. I want an icy male scientist and a roguish female raptor trainer.
…oh my god give me the icy male scientist and roguish female raptor trainer. Give it to me NOW.
Not to mention, who wears stilettos in the first place when their job apparently regularly involves doing field visits to unpaved pen areas and driving Jeeps? If she’s anything like any of the other women I know who like wearing heels and work jobs that occasionally involve field visits, she’d have a pair of flat boots under her desk or in her Jeep to throw on when she had to go out.
I HAD THESE QUESTIONS AS WELL! I like CleverManka’s way of responding to the Shoe Debacle, but it just didn’t read that way to me. The whole time I was like “take your goddamn heels off woman!”
CHRIS PRATT’S BODY HOLY CHRIST.
I might have made a Tumblr post and tweeted about it.
PUTTING ASS BACK IN JURASSIC.
I saw it last night and my primary comment was “WHERE ARE ALL THE WOMEN?” (Mr. blazes helpfully and ironically pointed out that the dinos were all girls.)
The shoe sitch also made me crazy, as did the babysitter/assistant being so helpless.
Overall, I think the original JP 20 years ago did women better in a lot of ways.
Oh finally a movie about brothers learning to respect and get along with each other. Never seen that before.
At least they were true to the original?
I spent the whole movie wishing they had gone with 2 sisters instead. Both old-school computer hackers.
They could have been girls and they could have been something other than white. You could still tell the exact same story. NO HARM DONE.
The original JP was 1000 times better; by 90s Hollywood standards it’s downright feminist. Grant cares for the children while Ellie runs around like an action hero in appropriate footwear.
Jurassic World gave us an uptight, impractical fool whose failed maternal instincts had to be highlighted every 15 minutes and who constantly needed lecturing from Indiana Raptor Whisperer.
Ugh, I had forgotten about the part where Bryce says “If I ever have kids” and Judy Greer is like “WHEN you have kids” and “you won’t understand until you do” and “they’re worth it” AARRRRGGGGHHH
You brought it all back. This movie is a slap in the face after the excellence of MMFR.
I have so many thoughts!
1) I agree with you wholeheartedly re: shoes, although it is impressive. I also saw San Andreas recently and there is a similar shoe issue so I was particularly sensitive to the footwear.
2) Why on earth was that sea monster so close to the park patrons?! We’re supposed to believe that the 6 foot fence normally kept it from just jumping up and eating guests? But somehow it can jump up and eat dinosaurs once the fence is broken?
3) Jake Johnson is a treasure.
4) Needs more female scientists and computer hackers.
5) How is Chris Pratt’s motorcycle dealing with the jungle floor? That’s why ATVs exist.
5) I still have no clue how the genetic monster’s eyesight works? Like she’s a t-rex so they all hold really still all the time? And that works? But then she’s also a raptor, so shouldn’t that holding still thing be bollocks?
6) I don’t think that’s how science works?
7) Why is the owner of the park surprised that Bryce Dallas Howard already knows Chris Pratt? Like she runs the entire park, of course she’s familiar with the guide who is there TRAINING THE RAPTORS. Like dang, I should hope so.
8) Why did they have an aviary full of carnivorous birds?
9) It’s been 20 years, why do they still insist on making the dinos look like reptiles?! Like isn’t the whole thing in jurassic park that they’re more like birds?
10) Chris Pratt is really attractive.
Whenever I started to get sad about the REALLY REALLY POORLY WRITTEN LADY CHARACTERS (no really, Blunderboyfriend leaned over to me at exactly the moment I was wondering if The Toast had ruined my ability to enjoy pop culture forever and said, “This is, like, Seventies Sexist, right?”), I amused myself by wondering if Jake Johnson is Oscar Isaac is David Krumholtz.
My thoughts:
1) I had fun finding all the product placement. Particularly enjoyed the Jimmy Buffet’s Margaritaville restaurant and the intra-corporate synergy of Jimmy Fallon’s cameo.
2) Appreciated Chris Pratt’s body.
3) Didn’t appreciate the Bryce Dallas Howard Is Redeemed By Her Maternal Instincts When She Just Lets Herself Feeeel and Also Takes Off a Lot of Her Clothes motif.
3a) Why did Chris Pratt stay dressed throughout the whole movie
4) Why couldn’t the nerdy younger sibling have been a girl. Or both of the siblings, really.
5) A nontrivial number of POC as extras/in minor roles, which only made me wonder why they didn’t have POC in any of the bigger roles (although I looooved Irrfan Khan piloting the helicopter)
6) T-REX vs. GMO MONSTER DINOSAUR. (Although it was more like GMO T-Rex vs. Even More GMO Dino. Still, it was awesome.)
7) The dialogue was bad. Way bad. So bad. I liked the whole thing so much better when nobody was speaking.
8) Judy Greer! I love Judy Greer.
I am biased because I am a biologist, but I think part of what made Jurassic Park 1 great was that the dinosaurs behaved like animals, not monsters. They hunted, but were not killing machines. You saw all of then show curiosity, caution, rudimentary problem-solving. The raptors in JP1 were smart in that they tested the fences and tried to figure out doors. The Frankendino in JW hatches weird elaborate escape schemes and I couldn’t have engineered with any certainty (how did it know that they’d open the large door to let the workers out if it prevented them from reaching the small door? how it know that it needed to hide from the thermal cameras and then pull out its tracking beacon?) when it had apparently never interacted with a human in its life? What is the bullshit about it “finding its part in the food chain”? Like, its plan was to kill everything until something killed it and then go “well, I guess that answers my question”? Why the hell would the raptors abandon their current pack structure because some freakish hybrid with some small amount of raptor DNA chirps at them?
Honestly, though? I loved it because I watch monster movie B movies all the damn time and this was Megashark vs Giant Octopus with a huge budget and better acting.
I *LOVED* it, because I loved the first one, and I had a grand old time watching dinos smash stuff and also the 3D was fantastic.
I kinda thought they handled the shoe thing in a funny way, like they knew it was dumb and that’s why they kept doing so many shoe glamor shots. To me it felt tongue-in-cheek in a good way throughout, kinda like how 30 Rock used to nod to its product placements. Like how Verizon Wireless was their new sponsor but nobody’s phones ever worked. And I sort of liked that she was in the MOST ridiculous outfit imaginable for the environment, but did the whole movie in it anyway. Like “okay, you want us to have a sexy lady in heels? Sure, let’s laugh about it a little.”
Also, this is the shallowest question imaginable, but I want to know what brand of shoes those are because they’re obviously more comfortable than any I’ve ever owned.
WHO was trying to be all “Judy Garland doesn’t matter”? WHO WAS IT, and how dare they??? Show me where they live!!!
“Not unsolicited advice, just some instructions about how to do something that you didn’t ask for.”
Nicole, thank you so much for the Hair reference to Philae – that song is on my daily roster of morning songs I sing to my baby, and now I can imagine I am also singing it to lonely Philae out there in space….
OMGOSH a classmate from my conservative Christian college posted that picture of that hymn on his Facebook wall! It sparked a serious theological discussion in the comments about worship, and if sarcasm has a place in church songs, and it was beautiful.
Nicole, I do hope you will post here and/or livetweet about watching the miniseries incarnation of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, starring the corners of Alec Guiness’s mouth, because it is one of my favorite things that anyone has ever filmed.
See, I usually think of that as starring a silent but awesome Patrick Stewart…
It is a beautiful miniseries! So good and bleak.
Can a Music Toast please explain why some of the notes in the misandrist hell anthem are round, while some are triangular, and at least one is a rectangle?
It’s shape note!!
I’m the wrong person to ask for any more than that, I just know it’s a thing. Maybe some other Musical Toast can give you something more concise.
Yep – it’s shape-note. Think back to the Sound of Music (do re mi fa so la ti do) — this is that, but with a shape assigned to each note of the scale in addition to a syllable. It helps folks learn to sight-sing more easily because over time you develop a mental association between the shapes, the syllables, and the musical intervals. And you don’t need to fuss about key signatures, because no matter what key you’re in, the tonic is always Do (or La, in minor), and the interval between Do and Mi, or Do and Fa, etc. is always the same.
This piece uses a 7-shape system (http://www.paperlesshymnal.com/shapnote/doremi.gif) but there’s also a 4-shape system that’s quite popular (http://www.cs.uky.edu/~raphael/shapes.png).
bc shape notes are a really annoying thing some Protestant hymn books do in a misguided attempt to make music easier to read. I think it just makes the score more cluttered and difficult to read.
If you’re practiced at shape note singing specifically it can help a lot, but that takes some practice of its own.
A lot of work today, so this is all you get:
Now New Zealand is a place that’s far away from anywhere
Well known for all its mountains, elves, and sheep
And now the word is out that selling sex is OK there
although transportation costs are rather steep
So finally in the highlands, the sheep can now relax
and goats and other ruminants rejoice
for now the sexual workers are a source of sales tax
and not a copper’s arrestee of choice.
So bang away New Zealand, O pioneer of screwing!
If you’ve got the cash there’s no impediment
and no one can arrest you for the crime of only doing
what you need to do to pay your monthly rent.
THIS GUY:
http://thebillfold.com/2015/06/how-not-to-do-couc…
“My home is where I am,” he said. “And it doesn’t matter if it is a friend’s place or a couch or the middle of the jungle or a hotel room on the Lower East Side. But I realize that most of humanity, especially women, don’t see it that way.”
holy fuck *eye twitching*
“expects the women of the house to do his laundry” –> not smart.
She also made his bed 😐
what he calls ‘couch surfing’ used to be called Free-loading, or perhaps ‘sponging’.
If a couchsurfer “expected” me to do his laundry, I would donate anything appropriate to Goodwill and then burn the rest. No hesitation.
Or I might be tempted to do his laundry, but with a twist. As each item comes out of the dryer, find the most strategic location and rip (or scissor) a large hole there. Then return the neatly folded stack to him. With a smile.
Wash each load with red socks or new dark-rinse jeans for extra color!
“My home is where the women who give me food and do my laundry are,” he said. “And it doesn’t matter if it is a friend’s place or a couch or the middle of the jungle or a hotel room on the Lower East Side. But I realize that most of humanity, especially the women who do my laundry, don’t see it that way. For some reason. Probably biological.”
The sheer entitlement of this guy! I cannot comprehend how you would behave like that.
I’m a loud talker, and I can be a bit inappropriate, but the amazing lack of consideration for other people! I love that in his head he’s doing this great generous thing for his friends and family, but its all about him and how much money he can spend
“…expects the women of the house to do his laundry…
oh my goooooooooood *smash*
*sings the Misandrist Hymn at the top of her lungs*
And he has alienated friends by “eating entire bowls of lemons”? I think this guy is just trying to blend in as a human as he prepares for the coming alien invasion. “How does one wash these garments? I will let the female show me. But first, I need to replenish my ectoplasm with more lemons.”
Urgh, yes, that guy. Strangely, people didn’t want him to stay at their houses, mooch their clothes, and ask them to do his laundry for him. FUNNY HOW THAT HAPPENS.
Hey couchsurfer dude, I already hated you when you were called Jack Kerouac. Do go away for real, this time.
I think even *Kerouac* hated himself for doing this, this guy hasn’t even gotten that far.
very excited for you to watch Tinker, Tailor. The George Smiley books are amazing!
AND – The UN is down for decriminalizing sex work. The UN. I’m very happy about this.
Ironic, since the UN security forces have shown a tendency to enjoy highly questionable sex practices in the poor countries they ‘secure’.
One of the most disturbing parts of the de Kock article is that one his former underlings, Leon Flores, not only doesn’t regret what he did but is working private ‘security’ in Iraq. Military Industrial complex, for the lose.
There are only a handful of things as good or better than Alec Guiness and _Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy_. I should break my copy out and have at it.
my dearest Toasties. i know this isn’t Open Thread but i need to throw this into the void…
what does one commitmentphobe do when they start to have an overwhelming desire to make a Grand Romantic Gesture to the commitmentphobe they’ve been dating for almost 5 years?
we’ve always been very clear that we do not want to live together and that we don’t want to get married. we are, however, in a kinky relationship and i have been collared for some years. i can’t think of a way to be MORE committed within the agreed boundaries of our relationship. but, you guys, i’m having visions of , like, giving him a ring. i can’t think of any other way to scream “I LOVE YOU MORE THAN ANYONE EVER AND I WOULD VERY MUCH LIKE TO STAY WITH YOU AS LONG AS HUMANLY POSSIBLE!”.
ugh. it’s completely insane. WTF do i do??? halp!
Hmmm, maybe figure out what’s different about this ring vision of commitment than the collar commitment you’ve already made? It could be a passing experience with traditional social escalation of relationships, or you’re feeling that the agreed boundaries no longer agree with you quite so well anymore. That’s okay! People, feelings, and relationships can and do evolve.
Also, consider that you can NOT live together and NOT get married, but still declare love (more than for anyone else ever!) and a desire to stay with them (as long as humanly possible!). This doesn’t have to include a ring either, but it can!
And this is *definitely*your own personal call, very much so, but maybe consider the label of “commitmentphobe.” Maybe it’s been helping you in terms of feeling at peace with not wanting to live with or marry this person (and other people), but if you feel like you express commitment in other ways, it might be holding you back.
I recently read an essay that spun off on Dan Savage’s law of happiness — not quite in those terms, but the gist of it — in that we’re happiest when these things align: what we want, what we actually do in terms of getting what we want, and what we tell other people we want.
“marriagephobe” would perhaps be a better term. we are both in agreement that we are, each individually, uninterested and ill-suited for traditional marriage. (not the least of which is that i’m divorced and i can’t imagine saying, “you’re The One. i love you forever and ever ’til death do us part. unlike the last time i got married. this is different. you can trust me!”. )
It could be a passing experience with traditional social escalation of relationships
i think you’re onto something with this. a couple we know recently got married and all i could think was, “how dare they?!?!?! they don’t deserve this! they’re worse at relationships than me and THEY get to live happily ever after?!?! *rage*”.
i am a giant selfish child : i don’t want it but that doesn’t mean i want them to have it *pout*
“i can’t imagine saying, ‘you’re The One. i love you forever and ever ’til death do us part. unlike the last time i got married. this is different. you can trust me!'”
Well, marriage doesn’t *have* to be about The One either, or forever, or death. I think a lot of people do take it this way — they have this feeling about a person, they want to keep that feeling going on, and hope it does. I hope nobody goes into a marriage telling each other, “I promise to love you but even if I don’t, I’ll keep pretending until you or I die.” Yet we know love can go away. It’s just … hope.
All relationships, including ones that exclude marriage, ask for trust; it makes us feel safe and lets us be/have fun. You’re already trusting each other in many ways! This is presumption, but it sounds like you’ve talked about what you want before, talked about boundaries, and have enjoyed each other’s company, and in ways that require at least physical trust if not emotional.
And just shortly: To me, divorce isn’t a track record. It just means a relationship stopped working (I don’t want to say “didn’t work out”, because it probably worked until it didn’t) and, the end. No different from any other relationship, but just more paperwork. What’s really different from one person ending a marriage and, say, me ending an eight-year co-habitating relationship?
Maybe ask yourself … what is it that a married couple has that you don’t think you have? You sound like you’ve been in a happy relationship with communication and mutual satisfaction. What’s “happily after ever”? Their marriage probably started way before they got married, and it will be in progress a long while yet.
“how dare they?!?!?! they don’t deserve this! they’re worse at relationships than me and THEY get to live happily ever after?!?!
That’s a lot to unpack, I don’t blame you for feeling confused! I think it’s worth examining why you think getting married means some type of “happily ever after” that is different from people who don’t choose to get married.
I’ll tell you something though. I’ve been with my spouse for almost 20 years now, married for the past 3 years. Nothing, not one thing, in our relationship changed or felt different after the wedding. It was a great party, lots of fun, and nice to celebrate with friends and family, but our relationship felt and feels the exact same way as it did the days, weeks, months, and years before. Also, we have been non-monogamous for about five years now (off and on, you know how it is), so what may look like a traditional marriage on the outside isn’t at all.
i don’t think it’s really even about marriage or a wedding. i just have this itch to make it very obvious and clear to him how much i like him and want to be with him. i have used my words but they fail to convey the magnitude of my feeling, dammit. “wedding” and “marriage” are the next ritual step that our culture subscribes to for telling your partner you’re Serious. blarg.
i was toying with the idea of proposing to be collared 24/7 (a cuff, actually, but something permanent). we are D/s 24/7 but i only wear a physical collar when we’re together, though i have necklaces i wear every day. part of me fears devaluing those previous symbols of ownership by getting a “better” one. but… people get a wedding band to go with their engagement ring, right?
so maybe an eternity bracelet. then he’ll know that i’m for realsies really REALS when i say “I LOVE YOU MORE THAN ANYONE EVER AND I WOULD VERY MUCH LIKE TO STAY WITH YOU AS LONG AS HUMANLY POSSIBLE!”. not that i don’t think he knows that but… Grand Romantic Gesture, yo.
You might want to check out Polysingleish. The author has a GREAT article on “elevator relationships” … the way society pegs escalation of a relationship according to specific milestones, but how we can decouple those things and find the same kind of intimacy and commitment expressed in other ways. I found it very helpful for me to deal with having an intimate relationship that will not lead to marriage.
THAT’S WHAT i WAS GOING TO SAY. 🙂 🙂 🙂
Link~~~~> here.
So, she’s calling it an “escalator” relationship, but whatevs.
pretty_monster– sounds like both you and your partner have decided you’re both off the escalator, but you’re maybe not exactly on the same page about how to express your feelings of wanting to do this thing indefinitely without taking an escalator step.
So, I mean, my first handful of questions would be about whether you’ve changed your mind on any portion of it. Like, maybe you don’t want to get married, but maybe you do want to move in together. Or, not move in together, but, maybe, like, apartments next door to each other. Or, not that, but maybe spending more time together. Maybe you don’t want to get *married*, but you do want to make a commitment to each other that you’re agreeing to do this more permanently. Maybe you want to do that in front of your community, maybe you don’t. And, you get to pick and choose. Saying you’re going to have a non-escalator relationship doesn’t mean it’s all or nothing. Some people get married but don’t live together for most of the year.
So, yeah, I’d suggest thinking long and hard about what exactly it is that you are looking to avoid (ie, legal marriage), and what it is that you’re looking to get that you don’t have (ie, a serious promise about the future made tangible in jewelry). And then, once you’ve had a chance to sort out some of that, talk to your partner about it.
thank you both so much <3 this is exactly what i needed.
And, while we don’t want to see a ring on our fingers as a symbol of contractual obligation, we do value assurances. We value knowing the landscape, and knowing that the relationships we share can still have direction, intention, and milestone moments, like any other relationship.
*goes back to reading*
Hi pretty_monster! Glad you are enjoying my article 🙂
Big romantic gestures *definitely* still exist off the escalator. I think of the reasons i’m polyamorous is because I’m such a die-hard romantic I want to be in love with ALL THE PEOPLE!
Maybe look at what he, as an individual, might read as being meaningful. For many people the gesture of an engagement ring or moving in represents a huge fulfillment of a desire- so what is there, either in your shared relationship, or in his life, that he is desiring that you might be able to procure or provide or approach in manifesting in some creative fashion?
YES thank you, it’s an escalator. I always confuse the two. (But obviously, “escalating” … “escalator.”)
(thank you all for the replies and my apologies for the FEELINGSDUMP.)
(i replied to something gloriana232 said upthread, commenting here to make sure you see it too)
I know I’m a couple days late here, but maybe you guys can help. Where do I find other people who see things this way IRL? I’m also in the not-interested-in-traditional-signifiers-of-“serious” camp and just hit up against some complicated shit with the guy I’m seeing and am feeling all confused and sad and want to talk to people that aren’t in happy, typical on-the-path-to-marriage relationships about it. I’m realizing you guys are vocalizing some stuff here that I only just realized in the last couple of days apply to how I feel/see things in my relationship (that it’s serious in its way without being on this progressive path to the big symbolic things) but I didn’t even know to think that way until it was challenged because the traditional language of relationships doesn’t match my feelings,
Anyway, could use some like minds to hash out some of this stuff with. Suggestions?
Seattle toasts — happy hour meetup, tonight, Belltown! 5:30pm until whenever, at Kushibar on 2nd between Bell and Battery! I’m told there is outdoor seating, so I think we should try for that. I may be the first one there. I have a glasses, a pink sweater, and a black dress, and will be reading a book if there alone. There will be MEN joining us, so do not be confused by their presence.
Edit: I will keep an eye on this thread and also on email. You can reach me at lauren at my username dot com
Ahhh the creepy eye contact tracking dude from AAM is haunting meeeeee
Seriously. Way to make it weird, dude.
LRB’s TOC has presented a problematic gender balance for a long long time, so much so that it’s well-discussed and no need to rehash here! I have long felt that the editor’s support of excellent, insightful Jenny Diski is supposed to make up for the very small number of women who get to publish there. Terry Castle I have no time for, but Diski gives real insight.
I am deeply angry at the universe for what it is doing to Jenny Diski now.
I just feel obliged to come back and point out that this is a thing that now exists https://soundcloud.com/bequilles/if-men-go-to-hel…
You are enchanting. Thanks for posting this. Well done, all!