“How dare you put protective blanket on bed so I cannot shake my wet fur all over your pillows!”
CHRIS EVANS AND JENNY SLATE ARE DATING
THE GROWN-UP PUNKS PIECE IN THE GUARDIAN IS ABOUT LIFE AND AGING AND PASSION AND MEANING:
From 1977 to 1984, I was the lead vocalist for Crass. We toured the UK, playing gigs wherever and whenever we could. When Crass finished, I continued to perform and record with Conflict and later formed the bands Schwartzeneggar and Stratford Mercenaries.
In 2007, I moved to Norfolk with the intention of living quietly by the coast. I was going to sweep up leaves and all that sort of stuff – but it wasn’t to be. The year I moved, I got an offer to do two nights at Shepherd’s Bush Empire. With every gig I do, I like to donate to a cause. I knew the independent lifeboat service in Sea Palling is always desperate for funds, so I thought that was ideal: I could see where the money actually goes. They got about £1,000 and bought new life jackets that went on to save people’s lives.
The crew took me out on the boat, dressed me up in a drysuit, threw me overboard and picked me up, then asked, “So, what about joining?”
At first, I was very reluctant – I worried about the commitment and imagined that I would have to go on parade. The idea of some bloke looking me up and down and telling me off for not shaving properly went totally against my principles. But they were all scruffier than me. Now I’m a full-time member.
We’ll be talking to Moira Weigel next week about her new book Labor of Love: The Invention of Dating, and here is a great excerpt about how we started talking about our biological clocks and why:
The story of the biological clock is a story about science and sexism. It illustrates the ways that assumptions about gender can shape the priorities for scientific research, and scientific discoveries can be deployed to serve sexist ends. We are used to thinking about metaphors like “the biological clock” as if they were not metaphors at all, but simply neutral descriptions of facts about the human body. Yet, if we examine where the term came from, and how it came to be used, it becomes clear that the idea of the biological clock has as much to do with culture as with nature. And its cultural role was to counteract the effects of women’s liberation.
Sally Brampton has died, and it’s very very sad, and she wrote an excellent book (Shoot the Damn Dog) some years ago about the depression that ultimately took her life, and here is something she wrote about it, which I would skip reading if it’s not a good day for you to be reading about it:
Reading has always been my greatest joy and most constant pleasure. I have devoured books whole for as long as I can remember. I recall people having to shake me to get my attention when I was reading, remember my mother taking a book out of my hands and sending me out to play with the injunction to get some fresh air.
When I was severely depressed, I could not even get to the end of a simple sentence because I could not remember the beginning. Words, which I love, were no more than patterns on a page. Writing was nearly impossible. I tried to convince myself that I could still write, and set myself the task of keeping a journal of my days. Looking back, I see it is no more than fragments.
One of the fragments is this: It is a beautiful day. I stand on my balcony, high above a busy street, watching life pass me by. It is spring, a time of renewal, of new beginnings. I reach my hand out to the morning, try to imagine happiness, the simple pleasure of skin warmed by sunshine, the quiet joy of trees bursting into green leaf.
I feel nothing.
Our school of fish-humans is ready to learn, and the first rule of mermaiding is to smile. The second, like a mom yelling at her teenage daughter in church, is keeping one’s legs and knees glued together. The transition from human to mythical sea creature requires a deletion of joints; your body no longer creaks and bends, it moves like a worm, flicking from the chest to the torso to the hips in slow-motion.
We began the hour-long lesson by doing drills while holding onto the wall, trying to reprogram our brains to operate two legs as one. It takes a lot of core strength as well as some spine flexibility, like you’re trapped at an underwater disco doing an endless body roll. “Mermaiding is the best ab workout you’ve never heard about,” Mermaid Malibu tells us. “If your abs don’t hurt by tomorrow then I’ve done something wrong!”
oh gosh please listen to the good advice Ask a Manager is giving you:
I applied for the job of my dreams, no, the job of my life — the best job you can ever have in your wildest dreams! Long story short, I got rejected from the job. I was overly eager and contacted the lady who was the hiring manager. Anyway, I was looking at Craigslist and saw they have a few more openings. So I want to talk to the HR manger and address the situation and own up to my mistakes and make things better and right.
I need to do this for myself. I must just take charge and volunteer myself to do something uncomfortable and step outside my comfort zone. What do I do and say? As a side note, the HR manager told me I am no longer allowed to email the lady I was emailing, and if I do, they will take immediate action and may call the proper authorities.
I just do not know what to say. Is it best I just go in to his office and talk face to face or do I call or email if so what do I say and do?
Reaching the city will not be easy. It is in one of the most remote and inaccessible areas of Mexico and an archaeological mission would be costly.
“It’s always about money. Expedition costs are horribly expensive,” said Dr. Armand LaRocque, a specialist at the University of New Brunswick.
Scientists said they were astonished by the discovery and that it had been made by someone so young.
“What is fascinating about the project of William, is the depth of his research,” said Daniel de Lisle.
“Linking the position of stars and the location of a lost city and the use of satellite images on a tiny territory to identify the remains buried under dense vegetation, is quite exceptional.”
That cult piece Jezebel ran was B.A.N.A.N.A.S. and then some of the cultees showed up in the comments (this is a pretty low-grade cult as cults go so I am comfortable being a LITTLE jokey about it and also pushing traffic to a piece about how IT IS A CULT will dissuade people when they google this weirdo) and it was all amazing and this bit in the comments pretty much proved the piece for me:
AND I could write another book about how amazing Hot School is! International really does help us women not act out all crazy on men and focus on giving good experiences to men. Which gives us women an amazing experience in return. International taught me that men like to help women and how to receive the help instead of get all awkward and shut it down how I use to. And International taught me how to tell a man how much I appreciate the help he offers me. It’s amazing how much my experience has changed from learning how to do this. If you under-the-surface have a problem with men (which many women do) then it makes sense why you’d lash out and spew venom about Hot School, because these women are unwilling to think about what would make a guy feel really great, and just try it out, and have an experience of telling a guy how awesome he is when he helps them. It’s as simple of that but some women get so triggered by the idea of saying something like that to a man which is pretty intense. So they bash Hot School and try to blame Hot School or SSM for their horrible relationships. I am in the most incredible relationship ever and you should interview my fiance if you want to hear more of the truth of how amazing our relationship is. It feels like these sad, not-hot women are spiraling out in a bunch of crap and drama.
This is not how anything works:
Back when my husband and I were dating, I cheated on him (there were extenuating circumstances, but I still greatly regret it). We’ve now been married a number of years. I thought we had worked through things more or less, though I’ve never been certain he completely trusts me. Recently, he brought up the fact that he’d like to open our marriage. I’m clear I don’t want this—if nothing else, the toxic stew of jealousy and hurt around the cheating episode convinced me. When I said I wasn’t comfortable with an open relationship, he told me I was a hypocrite and have no legitimate objection because of the cheating episode. I feel rotten about the pain I caused my husband but don’t want to be bullied into polyamory or constantly punished for something that happened in the past. Is it time to walk away?
I am not a Parrothead but I love enthusiasm and stanning more than all things, so this lady is chill in my book.
re: AAM
WHY are you even asking if you should GO IN PERSON TO THIS PLACE
WHAT HAVE YOU DONE
I mentioned this late in yesterday’s LR, but I truly, legitimately think that letter came from an applicant who had us scared to death most of last month. When the corporate lawyer FINALLY sent him a cease-and-desist, he started calling her to explain that he wasn’t actually harrassing us. It was terrifying and ridiculous.
Is there anything more you can tell us about this without identifying yourself/company/candidate too much? Even if it’s not the LW it’ll give us some insight…
He was an older white guy (QUELLE SURPRISE), had a phone interview, didn’t meet the bar for skills, was sent the standard rejection email, and flipped out. Cursed out the hiring manager, wanted him fired, wanted the VP (my direct supervisor) to reinstate his application- or better yet, just hire him immediately. He called SO MANY TIMES. She had me sit in on her phone conversation with him and it was ridiculous, dude was nuts. He started calling corporate to demand they give him a job with us, and that’s when we were finally able to get the C&D done as well as blocking his phone and email.
Wow, OK, that is ‘overly eager’ for sure.
That is…wow.
If it isn’t the same guy, that’s even more disturbing. More than one person in the world who thinks this is great behavior if he can only get AAM to tell him how to do it right?
Honestly, my read of the letter was that it was a very young person who doesn’t have any idea of how to get a job, but if older men think this is okay … I actually wonder how he’s been able to support himself all this time?
ETA: now that I have read some of the comments below, I see that this is not so out of left field as I had imagined, but I also have a feeling that the advent of the Internet must have been like the dawning of a new sun for HR departments: “Wait, you mean we can make everyone apply through email/online and NEVER HAVE THEM SHOW UP AT THE OFFICE UNLESS WE ASK THEM TO? SIGN US UP!!!“
Yeah, that was my first reaction–someone young who has internalized too many movies/not-so-great YA books where you rudely interrupt people and give a dramatic speech about your passion or whatever and the boss says “You’ve got moxie, kid!” and hires you over the faithful, hard-working employee who probably is so boring she dresses appropriately and got actual training/qualifications.
(This is a trope I really, really have trouble getting past when it comes to a protagonist.)
I was going to say, “and let’s note that Moxie is not even made anymore” but discovered, to my astonishment, that it is:� �https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moxie There’s even Diet Moxie!
Ha, my husband loves Moxie! At least in Boston, most grocery stores carry it.
And here I am marooned in Moxie-less California. Sigh.
It legit smelled like this guy had absorbed all those lessons, and I started out feeling sad and sympathetic, but then he started calling any extension he could discover and LYING to try to get anyone who might get him closer to “the top”- and ALLLLL those inquiries lead back to LUCKY ME. Then when he finally spoke with my boss he just kept going ON about how the hiring manager for that position was an unprofessional moron and couldn’t see talent when it was in front of him, and it was TERRIBLE. Like watching a Ben Stiller movie, I wanted to kill myself in his behalf.
“As a side note.” Having been BANNED FROM THE PROPERTY is not in any way a side note.
“Long story short, I got rejected from the job . I was overly eager and contacted the lady who was the hiring manager.”
This is also a frustrating example of eliding. Some long stories NEED TO BE EVEN LONGER.
I have a feeling “contacted” means “showed up at her house.”
I misread that as “showered at her house” but then maybe I didn’t misread it at all?
That would be pretty creepy!
It reminds me a little bit of the job searching/networking advice I used to hear from older men who suggested we just go to a person’s office and hang out there all day, every day until they agreed to speak with us because that’s how they got their jobs. I assume they weren’t getting cease and desist letters but it sounds terrifying for the person they were trying to speak with.
Well it worked for Rory in the terrible latter years of Gilmore Girls!
Realtalk, that is 100% what Charles Guiteau did in the runup to assassinating President Garfield! Dude thought he had been promised/was due the ambassadorship to France and just hung out in various government offices until they foisted him off on other people.
Charles Guiteau is NOT A MODEL for proper job acquisition.
Charlie Guiteau!
Never said “never” or heard the word “no!”
The people at the Oneida free love commune called him Charles Getout. Dude could not find sex partners in a free love commune!
I had not heard of the Oneida Community before, so my first thought when I read your comment was “Oneida silverware is a free love commune?”
And then I figured, no, probably they’re just named after the same place.
And then I googled it and learned that actually, the silverware company is descended from the free love commune. Which is kind of awesome.
This is the greatest thing I’ve learned in a very long time <3
Yep! Their remaining legacy is, like, teapots and forks and not the practice of “mutual criticism” after dinner.
Followed by some hot, hot lovin’ to not-quite-completion.
Why are you surprised, they are both good at forking.
I’ll see myself out.
I am saving “couldn’t find a sex partner in a free love commune” for future insult use.
Sarah Vowell’s description of him there is pretty much always what leaps to my mind. I mean, Czolgoz and even John Wilkes Booth at least have some shred of dignity, but Guiteau is just. . .yeah.
ALSO TRUE OF MY DAD, ESPECIALLY WHEN HE’S TALKING TO WOMEN :////
(my mother and myself most of all, of course)
Not surprising, of course, that mental illness is something else he and Guiteau have in common. Oh, and they both terrorized their wives.
hahahaha A++ reference.
I normally HATE jokes where “lol, no one will have sex with you” is the punchline, but Sarah Vowell’s description of how obnoxious he had to be to get kicked out of the Oneida free-love compound is pretty wild.
My dad has definitely given that advice to me and my brother. No, Dad, sending Brother to the Gap EVERY DAY will not convince them to hire him. (Brother ignored the advice, and is fine).
My mom is convinced that the job listing I saw six months ago, just as the application period was closing, will still hire me as long as I just call them up and explain that I want a job. Every time we talk she asks if I ever called that place. Just call and explain to whoever answers the phone that you want a job! Who cares that they don’t have any openings posted and you’re looking for a very specialized position!
Oh, you WANT the job? We didn’t know!
Are… are we all siblings? Because my mom does exactly the same thing, no matter how many times I try to explain that the academic job market does not work that way, and just showing up somewhere and telling them I rock at teaching what I teach is not going to get me anywhere, nor is adjuncting somewhere (which is often a horror show in and of itself) generally a way to get yourself a permanent position.
My mom is like that for teaching. Like, I should just start knocking on doors of all the local colleges and tell them I’d be really good at teaching writing/pop culture/randomness.
THAT is my mama. Thirty years of housewifing, she landed a teachers aide position based on life experience- and KUDOS for that- but that thirty year interim SUCKED for me and my brother. We STILL, when in-between jobs, have to convince her that Walmart is NOT a given, or a good stopgap, and she still suspects that proving you Want It will help. Jeepers.
MY MOM DOES THIS TOO.
“just put yourself out there, show that you want it, it’ll impress them.”
i’m not Uma Thurman trying to learn from that old martial arts dude on top of the mountain in Kill Bill. i’m a chick with a bachelor’s degree, emailing another chick with a different bachelor’s degree.
Oh dear, that’s my dad, too. No, father, my stellar degree in a totally obscure und useless branch of literature will not automatically guarantee me a good job in publishing! Except if we’re talking about a time-travelling publisher who specializes in handwritten first editions of german Minnesinger.
It is bewildering to me how common it seems to be for folks from my parents generation to suggest people just continually contact/hang out at companies until they hire you. Did it ever actually work that way? Were labor shortages once so extreme that managers were like “shit, any warm body will do, someone go grab that kid who has been annoying us every day.”
**Asking as a Millennial who graduated during the Great Recession
Now that you mention it, it occurs to me that was a surprisingly common trope in old movies. Especially for secretaries or chorus girls. In the 1930s. How?!
But even for chorus girls, it was a matter of being right there when the lead broke her leg/Dick Powell showed up with a script at exactly the same moment Guy Kibbee walked in with a lonely checkbook/and you had to sleep with one or the other of them for it to work out, anyway.
In the days before email, voice mail, and mobile phones, when a lot more of your daily interactions had to be in-person, I can see how it could have been somewhat more acceptable to show up a couple of times in pursuit of a job. But even then there was probably a limit.
I’m at the front desk at my office and we had a super creepy guy come in out of the blue to try to talk to the hiring manager for an open sales position. To that point his entire interaction with the company had been to submit his resume and to get a confirmation email from the hiring manager, but to me he exaggerated the amount of communication they’d had. And when I said the hiring manager was on vacation that week, he left for 5 minutes and then came back asking if he could talk to the owner instead. I got him to leave and then he called us every day until the hiring manager finally sent him an email that he was no longer being considered. The entire thing was incredibly creepy and in no way welcome. If he hadn’t done that, his resume would have at least been reviewed and he might have gotten called for an interview, but based on his behavior it was a hard pass.
He seemed terribly socially inept and I suspect he either has huge boundary issues, OR that someone well-meaning idiot had given him the terrible “just show up and be persistent; people like gumption!” advice.
There’s also a cultural/work type thing there. When I was a receptionist for an agricultural machinery company we had a couple of young men walk in to ask if we had openings. The supervisors LOVED it. They were all from Europe which might have had something to do with it but I can’t be sure. But there would absolutely have been a limit to that. Walk-ins are one thing, loiterers are totally different.
This reminds me of the old Peter Cook sketch about how he became a coal miner (instead of a judge):
“I managed to get through the mining exams – they’re not very rigorous. They only ask you one question. They say, ‘Who are you?’ And I got 75 per cent on that.”
I have a feeling that they’re using the same test these days for Republican candidates …
This is pretty much how I got my job (as an adjunct professor). An adjunct had just quit at the very start of the semester, so they were desperate for someone to take over his classes. I heard about the job and called the hiring manager, and she said, “I have one question. Are you in Fairbanks?” I said no, but that I could get to Fairbanks. Apparently that was good enough, because a week later I was on a plane to Fairbanks and I’ve been here ever since.
I guess that’s like the academia equivalent of a 1930s Warner Bros. musical. “You’re going out an adjunct, but you’ve got to come back a star!!”
Yeah, I got this a lot too from my Evil Ex and his (wealthy, white, East Coast) family. Evil Ex’s mother thought it was genuinely good advice; Evil Ex himself used it to deliberately sabotage me getting a job during a period I was unemployed.
My mother (born at the start of the baby boom) has told me more than once that she doesn’t understand her children’s difficulty in finding work because “whenever I needed a job, I just went out and got it.” So yeah, it must really have been different back in the day.
They were crappy jobs. A way to pay the rent, not a way to further a career.
I really, really want to know what that person did to get to the point of “please stop emailing or we’ll call the cops” because you know there is something being left out here. There’s no way their response to 1-3 “hey have you considered me” type emails would be to call the cops.
EXACTLY
I really doubt OP is going to come back and update on this one, given the overwhelming NOOO coming from all sides, but I am BURNING TO KNOW THIS.
Conversely, if that was their response, maybe it really isn’t dude’s dream job.
True haha, though I doubt it. As someone who deals with pesky (and also sometimes nasty and mean) students via email every day, it would take a lot to get to the ‘cops’ point! Usually when they get extra bad, I just send them to my boss (and she may eventually escalate to the Provost, or the President).
I think we only once had to call the cops about someone.
That was the weirdest thing about our nutty applicant, he was so convinced that the job was the perfect fit for him, yet he was barely internet literate and had never done anything remotely close to the job before. He was SO SURE.
White. Dude.
Aw, man, his convo with my boss was BANANAS. He kept going back to,”I’M FIFTY-XXX YEARS OLD!” not realizing that a.) So is my lovely boss, and b.) His insistence that Age = Knowledge was Not Good given how much training he would need to do the job in question. And everybody acted like I was a hysterical wimmins for THREE WEEKS, while he just kept escalating, and I kept sitting in my open, 2-sided cube with my back to the GLASS front doors. I was so relieved when he started contacting corporate, it finally got treated as a problem, AND I was allowed to order a third wall for my cube + a desk flip so I can FINALLY see who’s rolling up on us.
What advice do they think they’re going to get? Yes, dude, just go to the office and explain yourself. That will go super well.
I agree that showing up in person would be a bad idea, and you’ve already been told you can’t call or email.
Probably the best thing to do at this point is send a good old-fashioned letter. It should probably include as much of the hiring manager’s schedule as you can figure out, just to show that you’ve got a strong interest in the company and top-notch research skills. And if you really want to dazzle them, using clipped-out letters from old magazines instead of expensive ink will show that you aren’t the kind of person to waste office supplies.
Finally, to avoid the risk of your letter being lost in a cluttered in-box, you should go ahead and tuck the letter underneath the hiring manager’s windshield wiper.
You can do it, unbalanced applicant! You are in no way confusing your comfort zone with your survival instincts!
A+ Advice right there.
(takes copious notes, nods)
This happened to me, except it was an author not a prospective employee.
Some guy sent me his novel after he crashed a writers’ conference. I sent the polite “no thank you” and he would send all these harassing looooooooonnnnnnnngggggggg rambling, insulting emails in the middle of the night, and then in the morning, he was write again as if the other email never happened. Some time went by and he submitted another novel about stalking and mass shootings, and I was like, “hemm…reporting this one.” Did a background check to reveal that he’s actually been imprisoned for stalking. So my security manager called to warn him that if he came to our building it would be tresspassing, and he sent this epic rant to a bunch of literary agents (those he submitted to) threatening to hurt whoever among us had called the cops. He tried to explain-away his stalking conviction as just something this rich girl’s father had wielded his money to get him arrested wrongfully (mind you, he’d made an ornament out her hair he had collected and sent it to her after she moved across the country). The best part was that as he’s threatening one agent and revealing himself as a stalker, he was insisting to the cc’d agents that he was actually a really great person to work with.
I’ve had to change all of my security settings online and really make an effort to protect my privacy. And I can seriously imagine the circumstances under which this person, for whom I am the PERFECT FIT DREAM AGENT would just want to submit one more novel to me again.
an ornament out of her hair.
O.o
this is horrifying.
This is an exceptional story, but every agent I know has a couple. Much more common is people shoving their manuscripts under bathroom stalls, speaking of inappropriate ways to get professional attention.
My inclination there would be to say, “Oh! More toilet paper! Thanks!”
Holy shit
>mind you, he’d made an ornament out her hair he had collected and sent it to her after she moved across the country
… what.
A good thing that he outed himself to all those other agents.
Re. the Guardian piece about aging punks: Jordan lives in my hometown and has helped to care for all of my cats and my mother did a public interview with her at an arts venue just last week! (#claimtofame).
<3
I loved that story! They all sound like they’ve had really interesting first and second acts.
“As a side note, the HR manager told me I am no longer allowed to email the lady I was emailing, and if I do, they will take immediate action and may call the proper authorities.”
THAT IS NOT A SIDE NOTE THAT IS WHAT YOU NEEDED TO OPEN WITH
CAN YOU IMAGINE WHAT THIS PERSON DOES WHEN THEY GET REJECTED FOR A DATE!? *shudders*
Oh–ohhhhhh.
HORROR.
Let me just start out saying that I am proudly from Cleveland and I recognize that I have strong Cavs feels …. so, Steph Curry – NO but Steph Curry’s daughter at a press conference – YAAASSSS.
I had to send my husband a message of excitement regarding that Jenny Slate/Chris Evans item. I am ENTRANCED by that pairing. ENTRANCED.
The news that they are dating has made my entire day brighter. I have never been happier while reading about a celebrity pairing on the Internet.
It’s ridiculous that I’m so excited for two strangers. She gets to touch those arms! He gets to listen to get adorable voice saying funny stuff! It’s one of those pairings that makes me like both people more, just like Adam Sandberg and Joanna Newsom.
I was hoping Chris Evans and Edith Zimmerman would get together :/
That dream will truly never die for me
Is it weird that this news makes me like him more? (Although…she just announced she was splitting up with her husband, and I am choosing to ignore possible implications, which after all are not my business; see also Keri Russell and Matthew Rhys).
I told my wife that i’m picturing Jean-Ralphio cautioning Evans by singing “My sister’s the woooorrst/Literallyyy the worst personnnnn”
I mean, I know Jenny Slate is not her Parks and Rec character, of course. I just love her on that show so much.
I really really really want a video of Chris Evans finding out that Jenny Slate is preggers and responding, “What have I done, like, to humanity?!”
Meanwhile, he’s standing in the rubble of an another city the Avengers have destroyed.
I can’t say someone is the worst without my husband asking me “what are they?” and then he expects me to put my hand next to my mouth and sing THE WOOOOOOOOOOOOOORST.
Which is why I married him (even though the show hadn’t been created at that time. I knew what I was doing.).
I am super sad that she and DFC broke up (I went to her comedy shows in Williamsburg, including the one where they debuted Marcel the Shell *hipster brag*) but I looooooooove that she and Chris Evans are dating. This is probably as close as we’re ever going to get to Chris Evans dating Edith.
I find myself inordinately concerned about custody arrangements for Marcel. I hadn’t realized how invested I was in the well-being of that fictional character.
It is INCREDIBLE. There is goodness in this world after all.
I am totally excited too, but did anyone else listen to the episode of Anna Faris’s podcast they were on very recently that had them gushing about how they were such awesome platonic friends? Because…I have some feelings about that now.
I agree, it IS the next best thing to Jenny Slate and Chris Evans both dating me.
I feel slightly bad for her ex husband.
I told my husband about it this morning but accidentally said that Chris Evans was dating Princess Superstar (I just finished reading about that crazypants cult in NYC that she’s in) and he was like “WHAT.” then I realized what I said and corrected myself, but the impact was gone.
This feels right to me.
I am super happy for them, and, I’m not gonna lie, kinda jealous.
Yes, and I can’t decide who I envy more, tbqh.
I am sad that she is getting divorced, though. I read some thing with her somewhere once in which she talked about how much she loved her husband and how lucky she was that he loved her back.
Divorce is sad, said the recently divorced person. 🙁
This made me chuckle and think of the hyphen toast dot net this morning.
http://www.thepoke.co.uk/2016/05/11/hackney-counc…
“When you put on a dog collar, people assume you’ve had no life before. But the passions that got me into punk are still there, and that’s what I bring into ministry now. It’s about a desire for meaning.”
Oh, dude, this gets me right in the heart. There are so many messages telling young people to BE AUTHENTIC NOW OR YOUR LIFE WILL NEVER HAVE ANY MEANING, so it is tremendously encouraging to read about these people with varied and meaningful and multi-faceted lives.
Nooo, Princess Superstar is involved in that cult?!
Who is Princess Superstar?
MAGIC: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mqNgAlMLjhk (probs NSFW)
That song was magic, though I’m terrified to play it in the house now that I have kids because it’s exactly the kind of beat/music my four year old loves.
CHRIS EVANS AND JENNY SLATE ARE DATING?!?!?!?!?!??!?!
I mean…. *ahem*. That’s cool or whatever.
I do not generally care about celebrity couples. I do not mean for that to sound elitist, simply that such activities are not among my interests.
BUT COULDN’T EVEN FINISH THE LINK ROUNDUP THIS IS GREAT AND ALSO WHAT AND ALSO yay
Don’t know if any other Toasties are into military history out there, but I found this fascinating – the Nevil Shute-like World War II engineering story of how magazine editors with washing-up bowls and gobstoppers invented the limpet mine. http://davetrott.co.uk/2016/05/suck-on-that/
This is so COOL oh my god, sometimes I forget why i’m an engineer and then stuff like this gets me so worked up and excited and I remember why. Oh my god!!
Yes this is SUPER cool and you should link to this sort of thing as much as possible. Also I love you for bringing Nevil Shute into it. I own about thirty Nevil Shute books and I am HERE for more Nevil Shute talk. Nevil Shute Nevil Shute that no longer looks like a name or anything else to me
YES! I was reading this thinking – when editors leave their desks and make real world stuff and call on the goodwill of people they’ve quietly helped or inspired over the years – this is exactly like Trustee from the Toolroom!
It also made me wonder what Nicole and Mallory could come up with … and then I wanted fanfic of it!
This sort of creativity was always my favorite part of Mythbusters, when they’d use random stuff in the workshop to make things. Much better than the shows where they’d blow things up.
Ooh, I know a book you might appreciate – Zodiac by Neal Stephenson (http://www.amazon.com/Zodiac-Neal-Stephenson/dp/0802143156). Protagonist is an eco-warrior, it’s a bit far-fetched perhaps but his explanation of the apparatus he devises out of everyday hardware store items to stop pollution flowing into Boston Harbour is thoroughly inspiring for anyone who likes pottering and tinkering.
Thanks! Just added it to my book list.
Today in (Feminist) History! [Archive]
(Today’s is such a bamf, ahhh.)
This day in 1771 saw the birth of Laskarina Bouboulina (look at this amazing painting of her!), a Greek naval commander and a heroine of the Greek War of Independence. Laskarina’s father was Stavriano Pinotsis, a captain from Hydra island, who was imprisoned by the Ottomans for participating in the failed Orlof Revolution. Laskarina was born in prison, during a visit her mother made to her father, who was sick at the time and died shortly after. Laskarina’s second husband was Dimitrios Bouboulis (whose name she took) was a wealthy captain and shipowner. When he was killed by pirates in a battle in 1811, the 40 year old Laskarina took over his trading business and his fortune; she built four new ships with her money, including a large warship named Agamemnon.
The Ottomans tried to confiscate her property in 1816 (because her second husband had fought on the side of the Russians in the Turko-Russian wars), however Laskarina sailed to Russia and sought their protection. She was sent to Crimea for safety, and reportedly was also granted safety by the mother of Mahmud II, the current Sultan of the Ottoman Empire. (Allegedly she convinced him to leave Laskarina alone, which is pretty fun to imagine.)
Supposedly (though there is no proof within the members lists) Laskarina joined the “Filiki Etaireia”, which was an underground organization (pretty much all-male) supporting revolution against Ottoman rule of Greece. She began collecting arms and ammunition (purchased at her own expense), organized armed troops, and provided ammunition and food for all her soldiers and sailors quartered in Spetses, where she lived and worked out of. On April 3, 1821 the people of Spetses revolted, joining ships from other Greek Islands, including those belonging to Laskarina, who took eight ships to Nafplion to begin a naval blockade. She later took part in the blockade and capture of Monemvasia and Pylos, and lost her son Yiannis Yiannouzas (from her first marriage) in a battle at Argos.
Laskarina saw the fall of Tripolis on September 11, 1821, and during the defeat of the Ottoman garrison that followed, she was responsible for saving many of the sultan’s female household. After this battle she met and became friends with Theodoros Kolokotronis, a Greek General, and was seen as an equal by all the other Generals when it came to strategy planning. Over the years that followed she was arrested for her connection to the civil war (and later freed), and was eventually killed in 1825 when she was shot in the midst of a family feud. During her life she spent nearly all her fortune for the war of independence, and after her death she was named an honorary Admiral of the Russian Navy– making her the only woman in world naval history to earn this title, until recently. There is a museum in her former second home dedicated to her, a statue of her in the harbor at Spetses, and streets all over Greece and Cyprus named in her honor.
GREEKS
MAH PEOPLE
LOOK AT THAT PICTURE
Proposed new series: ‘Women Pointing Majestically in Art History’
I have been to many of the places mentioned in the article! I’m only sorry I didn’t know about Laskarina when I was there.
This is fabulous. And all we ever hear in the UK about those wars was that bloody old Byron tagged along.
If someone told me “The Toast linked an al.com article,” I would be cringing with anxiety over what ridiculous shit someone in my state has said now that has gotten the attention of The Toast. This was….so much more fun than that!
I’m applying for jobs right now and it’s not going spectacularly well, but at least I haven’t HARASSED A HIRING MANAGER SO MUCH THAT THE COMPANY IS THREATENING LEGAL ACTION OH MY GOD.
I am also applying for jobs with not a lot of results. Just here to give you an internet hug. *hug*
Many hugs to you. Here’s hoping that things pick up.
I was on the other end of this–I was responsible for hiring for a position, and we had a volunteer who had started volunteering because they knew the position was going to be coming open soon. So we go through the process (over 300 applications for a part-time job, guys, it took major amounts of time to skim them all), and the volunteer gets an interview but does not ultimately get the job. And then they go completely batshit, start calling me every day demanding an explanation, start harassing my boss, SHOW UP AT MY HOUSE, etc. etc. I had to get a restraining order and the place where I worked banned the person. So no, AAM OP, do not show up in person, that is a very bad idea.
Fellow job-seeker reporting in with no results. I haven’t even gotten any interviews yet BUT I KNOW BETTER THAN TO HARASS HIRING MANAGERS WTF.
Group hug for all the fellow job hunters.
*hugs and interview-related good vibes*
My gentleman caller (who, bless his heart, has a lil’ bit of White Boy Entitlement when it comes to matters such as being contacted by potential employers) has been on my back to repeatedly call hiring managers who haven’t contacted me for interviews and just does not understand why that is a Most Terrible Idea. Maybe it’s an instinct among their kind. IDK.
I generally think real person shipping is weird and creepy but CHRIS EVANS AND JENNY SLATE ARE THE BEST CELEB COUPLE SINCE SETH COHEN AND BLAIR WALDORF!
Yeah, so I don’t know if this is crossing the line into creepy but… It’s so hard to not picture their relationship as a cross between the Jenny Slate/Jake Lacy characters’ romance in Obvious Child and the Edith Zimmerman profile piece… and and it’s such a lovely picture!
I somehow seem to be the only person who never heard about that piece by Edith and I just read it and I… what? I am so confused by it.
The Seth Cohen and Blair Waldorf pairing makes me SO HAPPY. First, because it is basically a plot from either television show they were on. And second, because they are both super chill and low-key about it.
Just remember that Plato wrote RPS of his friends/fellow philosophers while they were still alive (Symposium) that is still studied all these millennia later in academia.
And anytime you imagine yourself with another real person, that’s also a form of real person shipping. A generally accepted form of it, but it’s still real person shipping nonetheless.
Plato: the Tina Belcher of the B.C.s!
I don’t think fantasizing about Brad Pitt being your boyfriend is the same thing as real person shipping unless you reach the point of delusion where you think if only Brad met you, he’d immediately fall in love. I’m thinking of boundary-crossing stuff like those people who have blogs about how Benedict Cumberbatch has been ensnared by an evil money-grubbing fame-whore with a fake baby because his mom is racist and won’t let him date Lupita Nyong’o like he truly wants to (one of the more horrifying internet rabbit holes I’ve fallen into). Or lesser forms like people writing erotic slash about the members of One Direction fucking each other. (I have no problem with erotic slash by any means but I find it creepy when it’s about real people and not fictional characters)
Unfortunately it’s not real… lots of archaeologists have been weighing in and most agree the “city” is actually an abandoned field.
http://www.wired.com/2016/05/long-lost-mayan-city…
I have been really confused by the number of headlines which are all “Teenager discovers lost Mayan city!” and then have a throwaway paragraph at the end saying, “Actually, we only have satellite photos and we don’t know for sure what they’re of, but it might be a Mayan city, we suppose”.
Yep, I was about to say that. We get enough media misinterpretation already.
However, there is something cool and real that a kid did. Back in the 70’s-80’s a 15 year old boy was hanging out with his dad, who happened to be an archaeologist, who studied the Maya and wrote for National Geographic. He managed to put together the pieces that let us now read Maya script. Because he was bored, and it was there. THAT is pretty awesome, and real. The kid is David Stuart, and the book about it is called “Breaking the Maya Code”.
Ah, yep, there it is. It’s still cool that a student got to develop and test a hypothesis, but I was really wondering.
nooo, I am so disappoint 🙁 I really wanted this to be real
That’s too bad; I’m a sucker for “young scientist makes an awesome discovery” stuff. There were some kids who found a mastodon skeleton near Memphis (it’s now on exhibit at the Pink Palace Museum).
I won’t believe it’s not there until Sarah Parcak holds an official press conference.
My BS alarm was going off through that whole Telegraph article, honestly. Building cities in the middle of a rugged jungle because you want them to align with constellations defined by a culture that lived over 3,000 miles away seems like the least likely thing ever. I mean, the Maya weren’t always big on practicality to be sure, but that is some Ancient Aliens-tier impracticality.
LeVarrrrrrr yesssss.
I actually squealed when I saw that and now my colleagues think I am even weirder than they already did.
Do you think this is his way of subtly proposing to Yo-Yo Ma yes/yes?
Im hoping it’s his way of subtly proposing to The Toast..
“The best of Jesus, Buddha and George Carlin all rolled into one”
Tell us more about how cool you are, douchebag who charges women money to insult them in front of a group and CHANGED HIS NAME TO “INTERNATIONAL”
To be fair, “Immortan” was already taken. (Joking aside, this guy sounds terrible)
Finally put my finger on what that excerpt reminded me of. He’s like a PUA Garth Marenghi.
Ha! The language in the promo materials felt Trumpesque to me (unimaginable levels of success!!) but this is more accurate
“Oh yeah, and he went to Harvard.”
I love how that’s at the end. Just in case you weren’t convinced to follow a jesus-buddha-carlin voltron, maybe learning he’s a Harvard grad is what it takes to push potential recruits over the line
I came here to say this exact thing. Oh, he went to Harvard? Well, I’m sold.
Pitbull calls himself Mr. Worldwide, so I guess he probably thought he could rock it.
What, not Charles Bukowski also? Seems like an oversight!
I think unironically using “Like a ninja,” as part of your self-promotion is also def red flag asshole territory.
The best of Jesus? I mean, if this dude can turn water into wine, I’m sold.
I’m going to need him to break open the gates of Hell, free all the souls trapped in it, then rise again from the dead before ascending to Heaven in a wave of glory, though. I mean, if we’re going for “best of.”
I despise being in water (I don’t even like showers) but I would 100% enroll in Mermaid School. YES PLEASE.
Do you crochet? Because you don’t need to be wet to be a mermaid.
I don’t crochet BUT I do have pics and info of that in a post for an upcoming Mermaids collection on my Tumblr! =D I love those. So gorgeous!
I haven’t swum seriously since middle school but my heart still begs for me to go to Mermaid School, which is for mermaids.
Even though the book drove me crazy, the mere mention of mermaid school makes me think of “Fates and Furies,” so congratulations, Lauren Groff, you’re in my head, and best of luck to you, because it’s super weird in there.
Ugh. Same. As much as I hated that book by the end, some of the imagery has really stuck with me.
agreed!! 400 pages of purple prose gets to be too much purple prose, but damned if some lines don’t stay stuck in your brain.
ME TOO TO ALL OF THIS. Am still trying to process my feelings about that book, though I am eternally grateful that I read it without knowing its plot conceit beforehand.
I just read it last week. Loved it. I got very lost in it.
I’m interested why everyone else hated it?! Or struggled. I noticed on Goodreads there’s a real polarized reaction to it.
I wanted to love it, as Dysfunctional Marriage Books are my favorite type of books, but I was put off by how … impressed with its own cleverness it was? (I have a very low tolerance for books that endlessly strive to be Literature, which is fun because my literal job is reading/critiquing/teaching literature). But after a few chapters, I was like, ok, yes, I get it, it’s very clever that you’re charting the passage of time in new and interesting ways. Mmhmm, yup, through parties! And plays! And reviews! Got it. See also: reeeeal purple prose, which I normally am super on board with.
I didn’t hate it, though. There were moments I really loved. I suppose I was just deflated & unenthused by the “This is the Best Book of 2015” of it all.
It’s interesting to me that you say that. I really liked Arcadia and I like the kind of…dreamy quality that her writing has. I feel like the narrator is asleep and dreaming in poems in her books, and I find it sort of cozy and fun. Arcadia really reminded me of station eleven in that way- especially since there was some overlap in subject matter, or maybe of certain Margaret Atwood writing…where I feel like her main characters are sort of distant. There’s a creepy, slack quality to it, like a crazy witch from the future who is maybe underground is the narrator…oh hey that’s from the play…and I just realized that I ate it up completely. I do recall that there was a moment where she used some word and I was like…eh, really, ok, that’s silly.
And the time jumps are also similar to her previous novel, if more framed by the years and so on, so that worked for me. The weirdest thing I think was that I didn’t get until well into Mathilde’s story that her boss Ariel was a man, which really changed my understanding of how upset Lotto was, by being like, is he super homophobic…but his sister?
I think it’s interesting to hear how many people find it to have some level of linguistic intolerability…
I missed the hype , which maybe makes it feel different? I was like, oh hey I liked Arcadia, I’ll grab this. I know that disappointment that comes from overpraise- I HATED Sideways when it came out because I felt so tricked by the reviews which were so breathless, and I really felt like it was a decent movie in a year of shitty movies, not actually a timeless and great movie. Anyway, very interesting.
I haven’t read Arcadia! But comparing it to Station Eleven (which I really liked — and taught in the fall!) and Atwood (who is my ultimate favorite) makes me want to give it a go.
Oh Mathilde. I wanted to love her, and normally I would! I am all about unrepentant ladies. But “my beautiful thin wife has a tragic secret! and that secret is mostly how beautiful and thin she is and how difficult that is!!!” didn’t grab me. (I am being terribly uncharitable here, I know. I think I would’ve loved Mathilde if her story had come first? By the time I got to her part of the book, I was so over sunnydale that nothing would’ve pleased me.)
I blame the hype for like, 70% of my disdain, tbh.
Jimmy Buffet fans are called Parrotheads? You learn something new every day.
I love the idea of that lost Mayan city piece, because what kid hasn’t wanted to do that, and because Google Earth is just like the biggest treasure map ever, but I wish they’d gotten into the student’s methodology a little more, since saying cities “correlate” to constellations could mean…. anything or nothing. (I mean, I get that it’s just a newspaper brief, I am just curious.)
Yeah, when I first read about it yesterday, I was so frustrated at the lack of information. “What do you mean the cities match constellations? how the hell is that possible? what about the fact that the stars have moved in the last 600 years and maybe some aren’t around anymore? were the cities planned to match the relationships/ratios of star positions or were they placed to align with the stars at certain times of year?” were just some of the questions that the press release didn’t answer. I’m pretty grateful for seeing the Wired post saying “hold up, the Mayans were city-dense like modern New England for fucks sake, also the plot this kid supposedly found is within spitting distance of an already-in-progress city excavation”.
(edit: though I do think it’s really cool that this kid is showing how you can use Google Maps and other satellite imagery to narrow your search focus or help develop your hypothesis!)
Sad, not-hot lady. New tindr headline ahoy.
How much do you want to bet with that headline you’d get reverse neg messages?
“Girl, you are so NOT not-hot. What’s the matter with you? P.S. Sad chicks turn me on.”
I definitely do not think, as others may have in the past, that you resemble a parrot. Your complexion is more wallpaper paste than Froot Loops.
Yes, that’s precisely what we need: Telling men how awesome it is they’re helping us. Why didn’t we think of this?!
ETA: I’m now halfway through the article and I feel so sorry for these women, because I just know how easy it is to be sucked into this kind of thing when you’re insecure.
And lots and lots of crying, and anal sex, and 30-minute orgasms. Totally reasonable recipe for a healthy life.
Oh god. This comment has sufficiently warned me off reading this article for the time being, thank you for saving my blood pressure.
^This. Exactly.
I am morbidly fascinated by this cult, even though I never heard of it until this morning when I read the LR. I wonder whether there was ever a point in my life when I would have been vulnerable enough in the right ways for them to have preyed on me. I also wonder what a cult would have to offer me to get me to take that path of restricting contact with my loved ones and giving them increasing amounts of money.
Really random question for any UK based freelancers; whats the difference between a Schedule D contract and a PAYE contract? Google isn’t being much help, is there any gov websites that lay it out? as far as I can tell, one means you are self employed and do your own taxes and the other means you’re an employee and tax is deducted at source, is this right?
I ask because I got an invite for a job interview in video production, and they said that it would initially be a 3 month schedule D contract, instead of a probation period, and then changing to a PAYE contract (which I think means I’d become a permanent employee). This set up doesn’t worry me too much from the way I understand it (3 months on contract then permanent if it works out), but does it mean I’d have to do my own taxes for that 3 months? How the fuck does one do that? If its only for 3 months I don’t really want to spend ages incorporating myself or setting up loads of shit.
(A+ link roundup BTW. Currently hyper ventilating about the potential best couple ever. THINK OF THE BANTER.)
Not a freelancer, but PAYE is tax deducted at source by the employer, correct. Afaik you wouldn’t have to incorporate yourself, you’d just have to do a tax return.
Thanks! Ugh at the thought of doing a tax return, I’ll end up forgetting and getting arrested or something.
My husband is a video editor and sometimes does freelance (I assume that’d be schedule d, I’m American so…) and sometimes is on staff and gets paid via PAYE. If you’re not PAYE, I believe you’re considered self employed. You don’t have to incorporate, but you do have to do some paperwork with HMRC and report your earnings and do a tax return. If you’re on a visa with a financial requirement, be very careful about switching between self employment and PAYE, as you cannot combine them to meet the requirement unless the self employment income is ongoing.
Thanks! No visa requirements thankfully, the EU is a beautiful thing. I don’t know if I’ll even get the job, and if I do I might not take it (there’s a better, more definite, much more money, job simmering right now), but I’m just happy I got an interview! And I want to make sure I don’t sound like a complete idiot, so a minor grasp on industry standard arrangements is good!
Just as a side note, just because you’re PAYE doesn’t mean you’re permanent staff, just that you’re on payroll and your taxes are deducted automatically (I get paid via PAYE for temp work). Be sure to still clarify the terms of your employment after the 3-month contract.
Yeah I’ll be sure to clarify everything if it gets to that point (the job description said 3 month probation and then permanent, but I get the impression that they’re quite small so it might remain a contract job)
I’m not sure what schedule D means, but if you’re self-employed in the UK for that sort of job (where you aren’t planning on hiring people yourself and stuff), you can just register with HMRC as a Sole Trader instead of as a corporation. You’d still have to do a tax return, and you’d also be responsible for paying your own national insurance contributions.
I’m not sure what that would mean in terms of your employment rights – often employers insist on people who are essentially their employees being self-employed to get around having to give them sick pay/holiday pay/any guarantee of definite work hours, etc, and/or to avoid having to pay the government national insurance contributions.
Superstar Machine and Hot School sounds a little too much like a creepier, more misogynistic form of EST. Do you think Elizabeth Jennings would ever go to Hot School? No.
God god, I already spend so much time thinking about navigating around men’s stupid needs, I certainly don’t want to join a cult about it.
I have to say, this is really well said.
A cult based around dude’s egos is literally THE WORST sounding cult in the world. Of course, “navigating man feels” is the raison d’être for basically every cult ever, so. There’s that.
I realize that Elizabeth Jennings is, you know, a commie murderer, but my favorite thing about that character is her utter lack of interest in doing emotional labor for dudes.
It scares me a little how much I often see her as a role model
I mean:
(a) Really good at her job.
(b) Takes no guff.
(c) Makes high-waisted jeans look good.
(d) Incredible time management skills (balances being a super-spy, running a travel agency, benignly neglecting her children, and doing literally all of the cooking and cleaning in that household)
(e) Great hair.
Basically the only two places we differ are (a) I do not share her love of/passion for the Soviet Union and (b) I probably couldn’t kill a man (or old woman, or any person) in cold blood.
Other than that: role model.
Re: the Mexican archaeology story. It ISN’T quite real. Various updates containing opinions of anthropologists who specialize in Mayan archaeology:
http://www.wired.com/2016/05/long-lost-mayan-city…
http://gizmodo.com/teen-discovers-lost-maya-city-…
Yup (she says as a person who did her Master’s thesis on remote sensing of Maya sites in the Yucatan).
Do any of the articles say where in the Yucatan? (what state, even?)
There’s a mermaid school in my (hipster college) town that has classes both for adults and kids. AND I just found out that they do birthday parties. My birthday was a month and a half ago, do you think I can still have a party or should I wait for next year??
Have it as soon as possible. Tomorrow, if you can swing it. Definitely, yes. YES.
There is no wrong time for a mermaid party. Follow your heart!
If you go to mermaid school between now and your birthday, YOU CAN DO YOUR OWN BIRTHDAY PARTY!
On the upside, I now want “Under-the-surface has a problem with men” carved on my tombstone.
I started laughing at that point. Like, honey, I above-the-surface have a problem with men.
“under the surface” hahahahahaha we’re all too witches here for that nonsense.
Seems like a good place for this:
OT, but as tired as I am, I have some coach bragging to do.
Yesterday, we played a lacrosse game against another small team. Even so, one of our kids was dizzy, 2 were sick, and one got knocked down to the point where we stopped the game THREE times (the last time within a MINUTE of walking back on the field.). We accepted the offer of a sub from the other team (we’ve done this a few times before–it’s usually the schools that have been in our position before, and not the schools with 30+ kids, who help like that). Anyway, he scored for us. My team was ecstatic. We have never won a game and only scored two other times. They cheered him on rather than be jealous. Coach success number one, right?
THEN–we lost, 4-2. We had a brand-new goalie. He turned out to be great. Our other score? A ball that almost made it to the net, got caught in the melee, and eventually somebody managed to roll it in.
My kids decided since nobody could tell who finally did it, it was a TEAM goal. Coach pride #2. They didn’t fight over who got the credit.
Coach point of pride #3–they went home on the bus as psyched as anything that 1. that was the lowest score we’ve ever been beaten by (our next best game was 12-2). and 2. that we got 2 points!
This is a good bunch of kids.
Because this is long I’ll post the other thing in a separate post.
This seems as good a place as any to mention that in college I overlapped briefly with both Jenny Slate and Kate McKinnon (then Berthold). Talk about awesome college theater.
So here’s the part toasties should like:
Apparently our reputation is getting around. When I went to meet the other head coach before the game, he said, “I hear you have girls on your team”. I looked, counted, said, “Yep, three today. The one who plays goalie isn’t here”.
He said, “How are they?”
I said, “Oh, they’re small, but they aren’t afraid to go after the big guys if they have the ball” (this is middle school, some kids are 4’8″, some are 6 ft.)
He said, “No, I mean….should we treat them….special??”
I said, “No, they know what game they’re playing!” (full contact boy’s lacrosse with legal hits to the body with really big sticks and legal knocking-people-over).
And then our girls (even my 4’8″ daughter) won every face off because they know how to box a player out, regardless of size.
ETA: when I told the boys this on the bus on the way home, about 4 of them said, “What?! That’s so sexist!”
HOORAY!
“Treat them special” meaning…serve them tea? Fumble on purpose? Hit them with sticks? How about just play the game dude.
Treat them special clearly means if you knock them down you then have to bow and say “M’lady” before rejoining the other players.
A+
Sexism aside, I would totally watch that.
My friend whose daughter plays soccer and wanted to go out for football (btw, our girl goalie was on the football team, too), said, “Treat them special? Ok, you can buy them ice cream after they beat your @ss!”
My team was so happy yesterday. It’s the first game where we’ve kept the point difference low enough that they didn’t give us a running clock and pity faceoffs.
It’s kids like these that give me hope for our future.
I played boys’ lacrosse in HS; can verify this sort of conversation happened A Lot; still feel like a BAMF about it; CHEERS TO YOU
I’m not finished with the cult article, but I just read “reveal the Divine’s plan for their lives” as “reveal Divine’s plan for their lives” and I might be tempted to join a cult that can tell me what Divine would have planned for me…
Put on more eye makeup, to begin with.
I, too, would be tempted to join a cult in order to find out what Divine had in store for me.
My teaching mentor modeled herself on Ursula from The Little Mermaid; Ursula was in part modeled on Divine; by the TransDivinitive Property, I am following a Divine plan.
Everyone IMMEDIATELY listen to Chris Evans and Jenny Slate on Anna Faris is Unqualified
Part 1
Part 2
I am so pumped that he’s going to get so real and supportive of all body hair choices (ETA: it’s pretty early in part 1, I was side-eyeing my headphones).
I chose poorly and am listening to this at work. And now my lip is sore from biting in my laughs.
They were freaking adorable on this, but all the “yay platonic friendships!” seems uh, a bit much now that the cat’s out of the bag?
The more I learn about DJ Khaled the more I am fascinated by him. Now including the fact that he apparently loves gardening:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/15/magazine/dj-kha…
I just find him so genuinely delightful. (If he has done or said anything terrible please do not tell me right now, let me have this.)
I want someone to talk to about me the way that DJ Khaled talks about his favorite flower.
I am still working my way through the cult article, but thought you all might be as interested as I am in this tidbit: In time, Scherick would also create International Hot School, a weekly phone call where former members say he lectured women on how to tame their “inner crazy bitch,” as he put it, and create a “good experience” for their husbands and boyfriends. (Records show International Scherick, LLC, Scherick’s company, has applied for a trademark on the term “crazy bitch.”)
no words.
They keep filing extensions for proof of use…
I hope Buckcherry counter-sues them for the use of “crazy bitch” and then we can follow court proceedings involving those two shitshows and that phrase.
Trademarking “crazy bitch” just makes me think of
I have not tried Crazy Ex-Girlfriend but The-Toast is causing some serious consideration in that direction. (That is the origin here, right?)
Another vote for DO IT DO IT DO IT
– SMH at that would-be guru from the Jezebel article: “Like a ninja, he cuts through destructive unconscious sabotaging patterns with skill and precision never witnessed before on this planet.” And the thing about anal sex is beyond skeevy.
– The Guardian seems to have gone out of its way to find former punk musicians and models who have found middle-class professions. I mean, yesterday was Sid Vicious’ birthday (mine too, by coincidence), and obviously things didn’t turn out too well for him. Jordan’s hair is still on point, though.
They’ll have put out a call on Twitter and their website asking for former punks to tell them about their current lives, so no surprises it skews middle-class, Guardian reader types. I’d say it’s the opposite of going out of their way: they’ve not tried hard at all.
BLERGH, sorry, that quote triggered my Trump-induced vomiting.
Not exactly a punk per se, but Gary Valentine of Blondie has written a number of really good books on various aspects of 19th/early 20th century mysticism/paranormal types (Madam Blavatsky, Gurdjieff, the Golden Dawn, etc) under his real name of Gary Lachman.
Thanks and noted, because I’m a bit interested in some of that scene. That’s on the order of Brian May from Queen being a published astrophysicist
I think he generally hits a really sweet spot between the totally true believers and the die-hard skeptics on this stuff. And they’re well researched and referenced.
Thanks for the link re: biological clocks. I just read the article and don’t have much coherent to say (yet) but will likely be mulling over the ideas in it all day. This is something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately, as more of my friends are getting married, having babies, wanting babies etc.
Same! It’s so good, I’m going to need a reread though. There’s a lot there.
Fucking Richard Cohen.
It was very interesting and the thesis is apt but on the other hand I’m like “fuuuuuck I’m trying to figure out how to have kids as the main breadwinner and now I’m supposed to also organize my sisters I have a lot to do you know” which I guess is the point.
Speaking of AAM, can we talk about the poor woman whose boss is barging in ON HER CHEMOTHERAPY?! http://www.askamanager.org/2016/05/my-manager-sho…
SET! HIM! ON! FIRE!
The look on my face while reading AAM yesterday was way too much “shock and horror” for my liking. WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE?!
That receptionist would probably be me, and the whole thing is just 🙁 🙁 🙁
THIS GUY. What an epic shit heel who obviously has some serious boundary issues going on. (What work question is so important that you need to interrupt a medical procedure and lie in order to do so? NONE.)
Yeah, that’s beyond the pale. My former boss from hell got called on the carpet for calling up employees on weekends, and a couple of them even quit at the same time–that is in fact why I’m working here, and it’s loads better since she left.
The Sally Brampton article is really quite something. Thank you for sharing it.
Yes, it really resonated with me even though my depression is much less severe. The experience of not being able to accomplish things because my mind goes blank every few minutes, for one. I can finish sentences, but not pages. Also sometimes not being able to experience the emotional impact of physical sensations in the way I know I used to. I’m so sorry to hear she’s died.
Her book is really – I mean its awful – but good. Totally raw and a pretty good primer for the different ways that depression can manifest, as well as the battle to get the right meds and right therapist. And pretty clear that there is no hierarchy as the impact is so personal to each individual.
Obviously not recommended unless one is feeling stoic. I saw the articles appear on the Guardian and was loath to click through as I feared the worst.
I hope that you have the support that you need.
That Superstar Machine article was pretty RED FLAG enough and then it got to the Finger-Pointing, Fear of Shame part, and then it is completely, totally cult-like. That’s Jonestown church level of cult action right there.
I was reading it like “how is this not Scientology for the East Coast Yoga Scene?”
I thought that was SoulCycle?
ahh that was my thought too!
There are few things in life I am less interested in than “focus[ing] on giving a good experience to a man.”
A+ life approach you have there.
YEP, the whole concept is totally revolting to me. I’m glad to know Cosmo has been doing A+ journalism lately, but their covers used to inspire such rage for that reason alone, with all the “ten sex secrets that will blow every guy’s mind!” headlines. WHAT ABOUT SEX SECRETS THAT WILL BLOW YOUR READER’S MIND, COSMO, THIS ISN’T THE 1950S
Right? I have to avert my eyes still from Cosmo covers for this reason… so much focus on making some dude happy/sexually fulfilled, so little acknowledgement that the girl/woman reader can have this experience herself and maybe should be focused on that too…
And dudes never get the opposite message.
Yes, although this seems like a good time to mention that, as a teenager, I was babysitting for a couple who had the lastest Men’s Health on their coffee table. The cover advertised an article of ways to blow a woman’s mind with just your hands!
I learned some great new masturbation techniques that day. I probably also made 30 bucks, which makes it an A+ weekend in the small town of my childhood.
That’s good!
Amen to that.
“She remembers him telling her that she needed to “soften like a prune in water,” to go out of her way to compliment the men in her life and the many things they did for her.”
SOFTEN LIKE A PRUNE IN WATER
!!!!!!! Brb, going to laugh until I die.
Ban men from metaphors!
I know, right? Everyone knows you soak prunes in brandy for far bretons, duhhhhh. Ban men (especially from the kitchen)!
So like, swell up and become waterlogged?
If that’s what men like, who are we to argue?
*eats all the salty things*
(opens up “What Men Like” notebook, adds “lower extremity edema”)
You would think that a metaphor that conjures up images of something soggy and flaccid would be anathema to male satisfaction. And yet.
He’s probably tried stuffing his carrot in some poor unsuspecting soggy prunes over the years, eh?
I will never see carrot and prune juice the same way again.
(If you haven’t read through, the guy actually tells women that they should stick carrots up their butts.)
What!? Well damn, now I HAVE to read the article.
Become the diarrhea you want to see in the world!
BRB, embroidering a throw pillow…
Or a hurl pillow
::high five::
OK but which one of the Hey Ladies do we think would get sucked into a low-key cult, and start signing her emails with quotes from her guru?
The one who’s really bad with money–I think Nicole?
I need this in my life immediately.
Nicole.
Definitely Nicole.
Ali Winklevoss, all the way.
Ali would probably START a cult.
I don’t know, I’m going for Morgan on this one. Pulling for the underdog. I saw the group live at Housing Works when they did their reading a year or two ago, and Morgan had this perfectly nonchalant Valley Girl affectation that I could see working really well in this “entertainment and yoga/wellness” crowd.
and I agree with everyone above me – I need this installment of Hey Ladies like I need air.
Seconding my DIRE NEED for this article to happen!
I am here to obsess over wet, scragglemaster Sansa with her grumpy ears and her bed-clutchy cornering. I LOVE THIS PUP.
PROTECT RILEY CURRY 2016.
I saw some tweet yesterday where some human was like “Am I the only one who hates Riley Curry?” and someone else responded, “You hate a 3 year old? Yeah, that’s weird as shit.”
PEOPLE. good lord.
Although yay that someone responded to point out that OP was a dickhead? I can think of lots of places where statements like that get made and no one says anything.
OH MY GOSH new fave celeb couple I hope they stay together forever and have one million babies and let me be their best friend.
Lucas Lee & Niece Denise are going out?!!! I am into it.
“It’s beesed off our neeeeemes!”
Even if it wasn’t a cult I would have principled objections to giving money to something called “Hot School.” Seriously, everything in that article sounds like it was dreamt up by mean 13-year-olds.
I think the founder guy pretty much sees all women as mean 13-year-olds.
The founder is probably also a mean 13-year-old, in terms of emotional development.
Okay, true story time.
When I was in college (2004) there was this theater that I really wanted to intern at, and my advisor told me that the best way to secure an internship was to call and write letters to this theater DAILY. So one letter would be about my qualifications, another letter would compliment something about a recent production, and so on—and while I was doing this I was supposed to keep calling the front desk and trying to get by the receptionist so I could talk to someone in person and prove how awesome I was.
(I felt TERRIBLE about this, by the way. I was not excited about this plan, I felt this stab of shame every time I called or sent a letter.)
I was also encouraged to jump the hierarchy and write the artistic director, and here is the most unbelievable but true part: since my advisor knew someone who knew Stephen Sondheim, she told me to call that person and ask for Sondheim’s personal address (WHICH I DID) and then send Sondheim a letter asking to put in a good word for me.
(I received a lovely typed letter of bland and noncommittal encouragement in response. The stories about Sondheim answering all his fan mail personally might be true.)
All of this ended immediately the day I received a letter from the artistic director, with a single scraggly piece of notebook paper inside. Handwritten on the paper: “Dear Nicole, we have received your numerous calls and letters, including the one you wrote Mr. Sondheim. Do not contact us again.”
That is one of the most embarrassing things I’ve ever done in my life.
WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOUR ADVISOR?!
She was an older person, so I’m hoping it was the “this used to work 30 years ago” thing. But did that really work 30 years ago? Did it EVER work?
I just sank beneath my desk in horror.
Wait, so Sondheim didn’t just write something vague and throw your letter away, he actually did contact the theater company???? It sounds like less to put in a good word and more to… put in a not good word, but that’s still kind of incredible.
Sounds like he simply forwarded it to them.
That was always my guess. But who knows?
Oh noooooooooo 🙁
It is such an outrage that your advisor had any job with that title. But I know there are countless others still offering that deeply, deeply horrible advice. “Just be persistent!”
Just don’t let your skepticism of science get carried away to the point where you aren’t vaccinating your kids, though!
That Parrothead mum! When I was 18 my dad and I (and my fake ID) roadtripped to a Jimmy Buffet concert and it was magical.
According to that Biological clock article. When I say things like “I waisted X years in my 20s pining over Jerky McJerkface” what people hear is not “I should have enjoyed being young and unencumbered and reveled in the fact that I was unattached with a minimal committment job, and could pull off hot pants” but rather “NEED BABY NOW. UTERUS SHRIVELING AS WE SPEAK”
Whoops.
Yeah, just because I don’t want kids doesn’t mean I never have regrets. It’s just that instead of my baby clock ticking, it’s my life clock.
The real biological clock. It tolls for us all.
Ask not for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for your perky body parts…
I can’t believe you even let Sansa on the bed after a bath. No furniture for my pup until he’s at least reasonably dry! (Not that he doesn’t try.)
I’m so down for a chat about biological clocks and “he wasted my time” and all of that noise. In particular the idea that men into marriage are scarce and women abundant even though studies show that married men and single women are the most content. I think it’s amaaaazing that the thinkpieces and articles and pop psychology of it all can make it so that straight women are trying desperately to get into the institution of marriage and men are trying to escape it like it’s some terrible trap and meanwhile it’s all a trick! The trappers are the trapped when they get it! etc. And what would happen if women were like, no thank you I want none of your old sperm, I will hook up with this young man and use his fancy fresh stuff for my kids?!
I would read (or write if I had my old brain back) light genre fiction about some female version of the Drones Club, where women support each other’s spinsterhood and hilarity ensues.
Also, the idea of finding some nice, energetic young man with fresh, zesty sperm,* who could chase the kids and fix up the house and hand me a cold one when I came home from the library, has its appeal. Who cares if he’s only interested in me for my Social Security benefits and the distinguished worry lines all over my face?
*I am so sorry for that mental image but it made me laugh on a day I am feeling blue so I put it in in case it made someone else laugh as well.
Ooooo, I like the idea of a female Drones Club!
Will there be throwing of rolls? I do love a good food fight.
I would read (or write if I had my old brain back) light genre fiction about some female version of the Drones Club, where women support each other’s spinsterhood and hilarity ensues.
I kinda took Cranford like that, actually!
Yes, but I hope we’d have a lower body count than Cranford! (So many people die off in Cranford- especially in the TV adaptation- that they may as well have called it “Game of Crones”!)
Avonlea would work too, with the older generation. More sewing, less stealing of policemen’s helmets.
“Game of Crones” just made my entire life. I literally laughed out loud (and my coworker gave me a weird look. Worth it.)
Also relevant: Single motherhood has grown so common in America that demographers now believe half of all children will live with a single mom at some point before the age of 18.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/…
*mutters “childcare, childcare, childcare, childcare, childcare, pay gaps. pay gaps, pay gaps, pay gaps, pay gaps”*
http://qz.com/679138/sheryl-sandberg-now-understa…
Can we still throw bread rolls, tho
And have darts tournaments.
John Wyndham’s ‘The Trouble With Lichen’ maybe?
“Also, the idea of finding some nice, energetic young man with fresh, zesty sperm,* who could chase the kids and fix up the house and hand me a cold one when I came home from the library, has its appeal. Who cares if he’s only interested in me for my Social Security benefits and the distinguished worry lines all over my face? ”
Heterosexuality is not for me but I LOVE and SUPPORT this as the new ideal for our society.
Also, it makes more logical/biological sense in terms of life spans. Men very frequently die younger than women, which makes it really weird that our culture tends toward women dating older men and not the other way around.
Mommunes and Channing Tatums for everybody!
Anyone else wonder what would have happened if Ellen in “Slings and Arrows” had settled down with Sloane? She needs a lot of care and attention and he is good at caring and paying attention.
Just the idea of all the hip 40-50 year old men being like, “oh we’re ready for babies now!” and their age cohort turning to them, looking them up and down and going…nahhhh, can’t risk it, and forming mom communes. It reminds me a lot of what happens with elephants where they kick the adolescent males out.
I mean, I like monogamy, I like men, I am monogamous to a man, but I just also really like the idea of women being like, no thanks, this is a much worse deal for us than it is for you, so talk ME into why it’s worth committing to you?
Toasts! A mashed-down smallbear knocked out power to almost 39,000 people last night in Seattle, including self. Coincidence, or has the revolution begun???!??
Maybe it’s the same wobble-squampler who told Mallory to go to hell in yesterday’s deleted comment?
I certainly hope so – otherwise, we’ll have to face the possibility that they’re working together…
“A KOMO news crew at the scene reported that the raccoon survived the incident. It was captured and appeared to be doing well.”
That is how you get increasingly high stakes sequels to your horror movie! Do you really think you can keep that villain contained?
I hear they’re sending it off to Arkham Animal Sanctuary, but everyone knows how lax their security is!
I, for one, welcome our new bandit-faced overlords.
Reading the Superstar Machine article yesterday was…surreal. I recently listened the twelve-part Charles Manson series on You Must Remember This, and all I could think when reading that Superstar Machine article was, “Holy fucking shit, these are the same tactics Manson used when running the family.” Well, I mean, plus a lot of acid. BUT STILL.
ALSO, can we talk about the fact that one of the previous names for this cult was “Starmaker Machine.” I kept wondering if they’d changed it because somebody connected it to Joni Mitchell’s “Free Man in Paris” line –“running the starmaker machinery behind the popular songs.”
I mean, that’s where he got it from, right? I’m not completely off-base here?
I’m so glad Lin-Manuel has started calling out on Twitter (in addition to notifying the stage manager between his scenes) the assholes with their phones out (photographing, filming, checking ESPN scores) during Hamilton.
ME TOO! It pisses me off enough that anyone would be so disrespectful of not just the actors or their fellow audience members, but also the whole production (someone worked hard on that light design and you’re fucking it up!) This is true at every theater thing, from Broadway to your local HS’s shitty production of Grease.
And then, to add insult to injury, you’re doing it at a production which will most likely be filmed for a PBS production or something? STOP. Immerse yourself in and enjoy the experience. Then take 14,000 selfies and Vines and snapchats before the show, at intermission, at the stagedoor, in front of the marquee, etc. etc. etc.
Just this past weekend I was at a small ballet company’s performance in Eugene, and this group of a dozen people, including some small kids, came in late. Shortly after they took their seats a little below us, A CAMERA FLASH WENT OFF, right from the middle of them.
And then in Act 2 (after a “please, no flash photography” message after intermission, which they normally don’t have to do), the small girls got of their seats to twirl and play on the aisle stairs. And the adults with them didn’t stop them, besides a few half-hearted efforts to reach out to them. An usher had to finally go over and escort them back to their seats.
I totally missed an entire scene because I was too preoccupied glaring at them and wondering when someone would do something about. I wish I didn’t care so much, because I would’ve been able to enjoy the show more, but I’ve always been incensed by people a) not following the rules and b) disrespecting those performing. Do you even have an inkling how hard ballerinas train? DO YOU KNOW WHAT THEIR FEET LOOK LIKE?
I used up all the milk. How can I make this better and right? As a side note, my hair is on fire.
“When boarding my train yesterday, I accidentally hit an old lady’s arm with my umbrella. Should I apologize the next time I see her or buy her a kitten? As a side note, I also pushed her in front of the moving train.”
so like, what, exactly, is the connection between engaging in specific sex acts with a monogamous male partner and finding job openings in your creative field…. ??
god saw me givin a real good bj so she sent me a check in the mail for $500!
i did my partner’s laundry and the universe was so thankful that it cured my depression
my student loans just literally disappeared once i stopped trying to live my life and let a man decide everything for me
if you read that comment you now owe me $200 for my intergalactic therapy session. $400 if you cried. YOU’RE WELCOME.
TBH I’m kind of tempted in by that last one…
what you need to do, lil’ lady, is Please A Man so that he will take care of you financially, thereby allowing you to persue your creative dreams without concerns over generating income.
buttsex + BJs = creative freedom
That biological clock article – dude, are we still living in Tudor England where if a woman can’t get pregnant it’s all her fault?!?!?
Also, I was greatly amused by the line “Often “old sperm” simply flail and perish around an egg they are trying to fertilise.” Flailing old sperm, amirite?
OT, but: I’m having a bad time at my job. It’s not what I was led to believe at the interview stage in hours at all. Every week has at least one 12+ hour day, my schedule is all over the place, and I only sometimes get 2 days off together. How do you find the energy to get out of a bad job when you’re exhausted? I can’t afford to quit outright (I pay the household bills).
If you find out, please let me know. My job is a lot more steady, but I still only have the energy to do one thing at a time, and right now that one thing is either working or looking for a job but not both.
That’s the thing, isn’t it? I haven’t had time for friends in months. I’m tired and lonely, which makes it all worse!
is it time to be a slightly less polite yeti and get the other people who are part of your work process to organize better?
And, is there a respite coming?
Otherwise, I have nothing but hugs and virtual sympathy.
Unfortunately, I don’t think either will work. I’m in blood banking and the schedule for the region is controlled by people way above me. Some variability around start times is expected and normal, but this is the worst run system I’ve ever seen. Add in bad/lazy coworkers and I spend the first five minutes I’m awake every day wishing I had a reason to call in sick. 🙁 I’m hoping my partner lands something soon so I can quit, even without anything lined up.
I have no advice, but I’m sending you toasthugs and hope that you find a way out soon. <3
Break down the job hunt into 10-minute segments. Spend 10 minutes every day working toward getting away from your current hell and finding an employer who will respect you.
And your 10-minute habit will go a long way to making you feel a little better in your current hell.
It is soooo hard. I’ve been there. Soooo many times. Wishing you rejuvenating rest, abundant serenity, and smooth paths.
This is very helpful (I’m unsurprised) and something I can probably do. Thank you!
Toast people, may I rant completely off-topic? I will briefly anyway.
We were informed by not our landlady but by her son-in-law that “someone would be over to do some work outside.” They are currently tearing the roof off and Adam & I just witnessed the delivery of new roofing material. They did wait until 8am to begin, but I’m still freaked about the lack of complete information here. In a raised house such as this one, even Keith the perfectly good neighbor in the house next door, running a generator after a hurricane caused the entire structure to shake. On top of the roof without warning. Adam & Brent thought I was throwing furniture around and also wondered how and why a 5’3″ tall retired woman would do that. I wondered if these folks hadn’t hit the wrong address.
Another day, another experience. It’s the part where we were unprepared that rankles.
Uuuuuuugh, that’s the worst! Sometimes I worry that I over-communicate and it comes off annoying or micro-managey, but I’d rather be annoying than not tell someone I’m going to be ripping their roof off.
You cannot over communicate. People need to know.
I know we talk a lot about the ridiculousness of female-oriented marketing, but my male roommate is currently using a bright orange body wash called snake peel and I can’t even.
I… may have used Axe snake peel… /hides
How was it? I know intellectually that it’s probably just normal body wash, but it sounds off putting as hell (to me).
I think it smelled strongly citrusy and had microbeads in it?
I used to use a lot of Axe products because I liked the smells. I still think they smell good but am skeezed out by the marketing. I also used to think purchasing Axe products as a woman was somehow sticking it to the man… I’ve had all kinds of anxieties about this and have determined that from now on I will buy the personal products that work for me and smell good, regardless of marketing.
That sounds like a good policy! I don’t like most artificial smells, so almost all my shower stuff ended up being ungendered. As a result, super gendered marketing (on either side) seems really weird whenever I run into it.
It’s for exfoliating, but they say “snake peel” to make it sound more manly. Never mind that the proper word for “snake peel” is, I believe, “molting.”
All I can think of now is the infamous “skin shower” scene in the X-Files episode Deadalive.
Feel vaguely queasy.
Need a little extra room for your body inside your skin? Use Snake Peel! After several days of use your eyes will become cloudy, a few days later you can shimmy out of your old skin, leaving it largely intact for pulling hilarious pranks on your loved ones!
I’ll buy twelve!!
(PS- NAME SYNERGY)
Is it gendered, or specied? Are we sure this was for humans and not like… really ripped chihuahuas to use when they need to feel like a big dog?
No, no, they find something smelly to roll in, as Sansa has demonstrated.
The ‘Ask a Manager’ question is gold.
Very sad about Sally Brampton. I look forward to reading more about her life and work.
I feel pretty much the same as she did.
I terrorize myself over lack of ‘success’ and it’s scary to think that isn’t the answer to everything.
“Shoot the Damn Dog” is one of the best books I’ve ever read about depression, and I am so sorry to hear about her suicide.
My husband was discussing The Winter Soldier with his students and said that a defining characteristic of Captain America is that he’s always right. One of them shouted, “Like your wife!” to which he agreed, naturally. Thus:
Captain America is always right. I am always right. Therefore, I am Captain America.
Right? Right.
I’d argue with your logic, but you’re always right.
This checks out.
This is way late but I am disproportionately annoyed at a Man on the Internet so I’ve come to where people will understand.
A scientist friend of mine (a man, but not the one I’m annoyed at) posted this piece on FB about sexism in science:
http://www.sciencemag.org/careers/2016/05/we-need…
And literally the first comment, from another dude (who I don’t know) was: “A good chunk of the basis of sexism is having a lack of respect for other people. I surprised that this author thinks it’s OK to stumble into a talk 10 minutes late and disrupt the talk for everyone who had the courtesy to show up on time b/c of her lack of time management skills. How tremendously rude.”
AAAAAHHHHH YOU ARE A FUCKING DOUCHE WHO IS DEEPLY INVESTED IN MISSING THE GODDAMN POINT. SO MUCH RAGE.
shouting along with you in righteous rage!
I was in 7-Eleven getting coffee this morning, and the radio had a dude talking to a caller (caller was woman, dude worked for the radio station) about why celebrating mother’s day with a pregnant woman shouldn’t count.
DUDE WHY DO YOU EVEN CARE AND I BECAME ANNOYED AT A MAN ON THE RADIO.
So I’m feeling you on this.
#banmen
UGH. But also EEE my friend wrote that article! And had to use a pseudonym because of dudes like the above.
OT but last night I went out to dinner with Lying Dude and gave him three chances where I made it obvious that I believed he was 34 to see if he would correct me. (One of them, amazingly, involved the zodiac, where the difference between seven and seventeen years is quite a lot!) Let it be known that I was a Good Sport, who gave him a Fighting Chance.
And then when the beignets came I said very brightly and cheerily, “So! Let’s talk about the part where you’re ten years older than you led me to believe.”
Reader, I will cherish the look on his face until my dying day.
And then he tried to make a case that he never set out to deceive me, he hates Facebook and doesn’t have a real one and that one’s just a burner because air bnb makes you link them (um, no?), and like, age isn’t a thing to him, he doesn’t see why it matters, he moved back up here from LA and everyone lies about their age in LA!
I am, incidentally, from LA, but I was perfectly honest about MY age.
So I cheerfully eviscerated him (including the best line I have ever delivered: “I am an academic. If there is one thing I can do right, it’s research!”) though how much I was laughing at him may have softened my “seriously, don’t be a skeeve and stop trying to fuck with people who are smarter than you” message.
And then I clapped him on the shoulder and said, “Thanks for dinner, enjoy your midlife crisis. It’s been real, buddy!” and strolled out of the restaurant. It could only have been better if I knew how to whistle.
I feel very good about my life and my choices today.
I just caught up on this saga via your IntenseDebate profile. GO YOU. That jerk deserved every bit of that.
I keep thinking about this loser. How long did he think he could keep up the lie? It honestly tells you a lot about his expectations and goals for the relationship. Clearly he was just looking to get laid in the short-term, he did not want a serious long-term thing that would involve a confession of this really basic personal detail he lied about.
It was weird though because he had previously introduced me to a friend of his we ran into while at a bar and invited me to some other things where his friends/coworkers would be present, so I really wonder if maybe he just thought I was dumb? Because dude, all it would take is one person making a cradle-robbing joke for the whole thing to come out as a much uglier surprise!
enjoy your midlife crisis
You are fantastic.
I aspire to your level of awesomeness. Beautifully done!
I almost broke out clapping and cheering at my desk reading that. Well done you!
BEAUTIFUL.
“Buddy.”
I am positively giddy with your badassery.
Okay, but have you considered that you under-the-surface have problems with men? Hot School might be the one institution your academic self really needs.
(In all serious, WAY TO GO!)
Clearly I was insufficiently invested in giving him a good experience!
YES. YOU SHOULD FEEL AWESOME.
Hello I love you you are the best
Let’s be real, laughing at him will be a more effective deterrent from this behavior than any stern admonition could be.
I hope it was this walk you walked when you left:
because you are a queen.
You are my hero, and I aspire to reach this level of badassery.
As I was reading this I kept thinking “SICK BURN” and then I’d get to the next paragraph and think “SICKER BURN.” And then I got to the end and died. Dead.
FLAWLESS VICTORY
Seriously, this is some Veronica Mars shit.
You are my hero.
This is the most perfect fae ending.
you are an honest to god HERO
Will you marry me
You are my new hero. This was a wonderful story and thank you for telling it.
AMAZE, I, like so many others, aspire to this level of awesome. Well played. ♥
AMAZING.
>”I am an academic. If there is one thing I can do right, it’s research!”
The whole thing gave me so much joy to read, but especially this part. No one likes being lied to, but as a (once and possible future) journalist, I find it personally and professionally insulting.
I love you and you are my hero.
You are brilliant. You are the hero we need and deserve.
I feel good about you!
International really does […] focus on giving good experiences to men.
Because we definitely needed another organisation that does that.
(Disclaimer: I am not opposed to the idea of men having good experiences! I just think they’re pretty well catered for already in that respect.)
Man, that AAM.
“Ma’am, don’t email again.”
“Ok.”
“I’m serious. We’ll pursue legal recourse.”
“O-*kay*!”
“And don’t call again either.”
“Fine. I get it. I’m not *stupid*.”
“We’re clear then? No more emails? No more phone calls?”
“Yes. Geez.”
“Good. I’m glad we’ve cleared this up.”
“If I were to stop in, what floor are you on?”
“Goddammit.”
Sooooo Captain America is dating Mona Lisa from Parks and Rec
I think my brain just exploded.
Yes, pre-WWII, and maybe later, day labourers would wait out the front of docks, building sites, etc, and a foreman would walk outside and pick and choose who to hire for the day.
I live in a small city, and I still rarely see "work available, apply within signs" on small businesses. Rarely. I've certainly never been hired as a walk-in, in my 30-year plus working life.
Oh. Oops. 😬
[See above re pop culture, even in Oz, where I currently live. Eep. At least I know Rusty is a kiwi, but you guys can have him.]