My friend Carrie’s puppy Carmella met a pug.
When you love those breezy summer dresses but are like “where does my big beige bra with wide straps fit into this look?” (my boobs are smaller post-kids, which has increased my options, but I definitely dress-shop based on Bra Accommodation first and Cuteness second):
I like to think I’m realistic about my body shape. Yet every summer it’s the same: an acute case of Booby Dysmorphia, accompanied by an unfounded conviction that I too can rock a spaghetti strap. I can’t rock a spaghetti strap. Not unless I wear a T-shirt underneath, thus disguising all the scaffolding.
No, do not do this, why would you not just have returned the laptop at the time:
I voluntarily left my employer after one year’s leave of absence, I gave a two-week notice and asked the HR person if I needed to speak with anyone specific. She told me she would handle my separation. I never heard a word from them so I shredded the company credit card and kept the laptop in a closet. Two months later, I get a letter telling me I need to drop the laptop off. I told them I would mail it but they would need to compensate me for my time, $100 as I no longer work for them. Is this a reasonable request regarding payment to return what they should have collected two months ago when I was prepared to do so during my two-week notice?
I am sure this is a delicious cake but I just read the recipe and now I have to go lie down and eat a handful of M&Ms.
The best part of this (this is my local zoo, btw) is the fact that escaped animals are “Code Houdini”:
Visitor Coleen Jennings said she was approaching the leopard area when the woman approached her and said: “I think I just saw an animal out of its cage. Is there a zookeeper around here?”
Jennings waited while the woman found a zoo worker. The three women, children in tow, rounded the corner and saw the 60-pound cat lying on a rafter in the shade structure.
“She didn’t say what kind of animal,” Jennings said. “If she had said it was a leopard, I wouldn’t have kept walking.”
This is a sweet tribute to Amadeus (the play) and to the late Peter Shaffer, who wrote it:
It is in its bombastic, tortured approach to the question of talent that Amadeusachieves the stature of masterpiece. What Amadeus knows is that the most vital part of art, and of art’s creation, is ineffable, and terrifyingly uncontrollable, and in many ways indescribable. This is the frightening part of making—or writing criticism about, or teaching—art. If we can’t control it, how can we be certain we can keep it? If we can’t describe it, how do we know what is good? In Amadeus, Salieri experiences this firsthand when he sees Mozart’s sheet music for the first time and says, “On the page, it looked [like] nothing.” But when he hears it: “This was a music I’d never heard… it seemed to me I was hearing the voice of God.” You needn’t be religious to understand what Salieri means here. Talent, or inspiration, or genius, appears to flow from outside of us, and cannot be explained. It has, at its best, the force of the divine, terrifying and thrilling at once.
I love a certain female fiction writer
N.K. Jemisin’s The Inheritance Trilogy is the best book I’ve ever read. It is just great Sci-Fi/fantasy writing. With really wonderful characters and some of the best storytelling I’ve ever come across. Her writing just keeps pulling you deeper into the lives of the people/gods she has created. The rules of the world are very clearly drawn, but they don’t feel constricting at all. Even the strangest things in the books are fully realized and seem familiar.I’m pondering what to do with my Grammy Award
Although, I haven’t had it sent to me yet. I keep sleeping on that, but it’s coming. I’ll probably do something real eccentric with it, like put flowers in it, or use it as a doorstop. I just feel like, it’s a very rare thing to accident yourself into a Grammy, so I gotta do something.
OH BOY (there is also an update):
Hi, legaladvice. I can’t believe I’m in this situation.
I was recently promoted to Store Manager of a grocery store after the original manager quit (I was assisstant manager before for about 6 months).
We hired a woman, let’s call her Sally, a couple of weeks ago. She’s not terrible at her job (just basic cashier stuff) but she refuses to process payments that equal $6.66. I know, it sounds crazy.
Our store prices everything ending in 28 cents as a ploy (kinda like Brandsmart). So anything priced at $6.28 will ring up to $6.66 after tax, and it happens quite often that people will buy just that one item (which I’ve learned after Sally started working here).
Every time this happens, one of the managers or supervisors has to take over because she refuses and sometimes it throws a spanner in the works. I brought it up with HR and they said I can’t do anything about it because it’s her religious freedom (since 666 is the number of the beast in Christianity).
The thing is, we have the same religion; we even go to the same church! But I don’t think she should be able to use that excuse to not ring those transactions. I’ve offered to move her to another part of the store but she doesn’t want to stock or do anything else.
The situation for Muslim refugees during Ramadan:
Swaid, who lives in a shelter north of the German capital, spends most of the 120 euros ($136) he gets a month on food. He and other asylum seekers chip in for flatbread, rice and vegetables, which they cook using a kettle.
“I miss my wife, but during Ramadan I will miss my mother’s food more,” joked Swaid a few days before Ramadan, eating pieces of flatbread stuffed with chicken shawarma and garlic paste.
Many shelters in Berlin are hosting Ramadan for the first time and some are trying to ensure a pleasant dining experience.
At Tempelhof, a former airport built by Hitler to showcase Nazi power and now home to some 5,000 migrants, a spokeswoman for a company running the shelter said guests would be offered dates and water after fasting, in line with Muslim tradition.
you have to click bc of how cool and weird these hands are:
Thousands of years ago, some Greeks and Romans walked around carrying disembodied, twisted, corpse-like hands. Sometimes they propped them onto wooden poles and paraded them in processions. Adorned with snakes and sporting a secret compartment in the wrist hidden behind a hinged door, they were the sign of a religious cult that worshipped the mysterious Sabazius.
Each ornate bronze and copper motif, called the Hand of Sabazius, was a sacred symbol of the god Sabazius, a deity of fertility and vegetation who was worshipped alongside other gods—particularly Zeus and Dionysus, the god of wine. Scholars are still digging for clues on the exact significance of the hand, but regardless of its particular meaning, it shows that Romans were influenced by outside religions and formed their own cults.
Jonah and Splett, forever in my heart:
One of the other things that has been so funny has been the pairing of Jonah and Sam Richardson’s Richard Splett, which is great because the power dynamic between them keeps shifting. What was it like to work with Sam even more this season?
We started getting paired up in the second or third episode of last year, and it’s just amazing. Number one, Sam is unbelievably talented, incredibly funny, and just fun to hang out with on set. There’s something about Richard’s buoyant positivity that always plays well compared to Jonah’s weird negativity and aggression and defensiveness. No matter what, if he just keeps being sunny and I keep being doom and gloom, it always works.
But one of the things I liked about the power shift at the beginning of the season was how quickly Richard just takes that mantle. The man has two Ph.D.’s in veterinary sciences and recount strategies in the West, and he is okay just getting people coffee. But when he got that power, he so easily took it on. But he’s so passive sometimes, he won’t ever hold on to it, which is terrible, because he is the one that should be in power. He is the one who should be running for Congress and for office. He is smart and he works well with people, and he’s kind. But he doesn’t seem to have that dogged determination.
hey, pissy catladies, go to Worcester before Sept. 4th:
“I’m a dog person,” a visitor told Adam Rozan, as he stood amid 230 artworks showing cats at the Worcester Art Museum. Big cats. Tiny kittens. A cat wearing Andy Warhol glasses printed against a background of Campbell’s Soup cans. A cat-shaped tea cozy and a cat-printed quilt. A collage of cats in hats. A Magic Marker stick-figure cat.
“Isn’t that interesting, dividing ourselves into dog people and cat people?” Rozan asked. “We don’t do that with types of cars, or even other animals. No one says, ‘I’m a bear person.’ I think that comes from a place of loving our own animals so deeply. This exhibit is really about that love.”
Rozan is director of audience engagement at the museum, where “Meow: A Cat-Inspired Exhibition” runs through Sept. 4. This was in the “Community Cats” segment of the exhibition, which features work submitted by local artists (including one attributed to a 5-year-old). The exhibit, both Rozan and museum director Matthias Waschek said, is part of a push to reengage the community with the museum.
Richard Splett is the most pure, wonderful character. I love him so much.
“Richard T. Splett–I don’t know why I said T, my middle name is John…”
omg richard splett and jared dunn – OTP
Oh my god, this is the crossover we need.
YES oh my god, I just start smiling every time he’s onscreen. That jovial dorkwad savant is always the butt of the joke and yet is probably the only character with any dignity.
I have made the Arnold Palmer cake, and it was one of the more delicious things I have constructed (there is no other word for a Milk Bar cake) in my life. However, tea jelly: I cried, I cursed, I made it three times, and I will never make this cake again. Unless Nicole specifically asks me to.
ARE YOU SERIOUS YOU REALLY DID THIS? Mate, I salute you.
I did! I thought I was ready because I’ve made a few other of her cakes and did just fine. Ordering the wrong pectin for the jelly was my fatal error and I had to do an unseemly amount of research to make the chemistry work at last… and just in time…
Moral: Don’t promise a complicated cake for a wedding if you’ve never made it before. (Duh…)
I have made things like homemade pastry (for gaming group) and a rainbow cake with pink frosting (at the special request of my niece, for her sixth birthday), but I look at the sheer length of that Arnold Palmer recipe and my eyes just go blank.
Maybe if someone I really loved asked me. Maybe.
it does look wonderful, though.
Some of the most disappointing cakes I’ve ever eaten have come from Milk Bar.
DAVEED AND I HAVE THE SAME FAVORITE BOOK TRILOGY SO OBVIOUSLY OUR BOND IS STRONG AND REAL.
It’s just so good, though. A+ choice, all of us.
okay but real talk: a tv show based on the trilogy, with Daveed playing Nahodath. y/y?
omg Daveed as Nahodath would be…. whew.
I just gasped out loud at how much I love this idea. I mean, he’s not exactly how I imagine Nahodath, but he’d be so good.
I see why she called him “Manly.”
Literally came down here to post that exact same thing.
He is so gorgeous I forgive him for dating a 15 year old when he was 25.
I can’t figure out which link this is referring to?
It’s the Almanzo Wilder pic.
Ah, thank you; I do not know enough about Ms. Wilder to know how she referred to her husband. Now I do!
I missed the UnReal talk the other day, I only watched it last night (I really wanted to avoid it an binge later in the summer, but I was weak). And as an aspiring producer every fiber in my being desperately wants to be them both. I know that’s not the point of the show, but god dammit I wanna be running the fucking show. Money, Dick, Power, hell yes.
NK JEMISIN IS THE BEST and her cousin is W. Kamau Bell and seeing them talk on Twitter blew my mind and everyone should read the Inheritance Trilogy and YAY
I didn’t know that, but that is an awesome fact to learn 😀
Ditto
I AM A HUGE JEMISIN FAN I own all her books and support her on Patreon and I am so very sad that I am going to miss her talk in my city this summer b/c I will be traveling. I just think her ideas and worldbuilding are so evocative and wonderful.
Ooh amazing link roundup.
I used to be so taken by Christina Tosi, because she’s adorable, but dang her recipes. Anything that requires being assembled in acetate is probably going to look better than it tastes, in my humble opinion.
I’m dying at the $6.66 question, but can’t go on reddit at work, so I’m hoping y’all do the highlights in the comments here.
Love the bronze hands! Even though I am reasonably afraid of scuba diving, I’ve been having a lot of worktime daydreams about treasure diving, and you know I would be psyched to dig up a creepy anatomical votive. Also, I never realized the benedicto Latina extended beyond Christianity in the west– wasn’t there some theory floated somewhere that it became popular after some pope with nerve damage?
Gonna respectfully disagree with you on the cake. I wouldn’t make the Arnold Palmer cake again (see above), but every time I make the birthday cake and present it to people, it’s utterly destroyed in minutes. The acetate is actually central to deliciousness–it allows you to layer in soaks and frostings and then set the whole shebang in the freezer, where it takes on a texture that makes the cake even better than the sum of its many parts.
Can you like…. Translate the birthday cake recipe? I think I get it. Like, I understand what everything IS, but… is a cake ring just a springform? Can you use a springform? Do you need two?? Do you start inside one and then make a pseduo ring above it with the acetate, hoping and praying that it holds as you shove the top layers in? How many hours does this whole procedure take? Is it really worth it? Is it just all frosting-forward??
I’ve been to a milk bar once in my life and it was heavenly — so much that I’ve considered paying to have stuff shipped to me at 10x the cost — but making these recipes just makes me want to take a nap…
A cake ring is a wide-width hoop of metal, which unlike a springform pan has no bottom ledge, completely smooth sides, and no latches. If you order through Amazon, they are cheap and very much worth it. Don’t bother with physical stores (unless you know a bakers’ supply that lets non-commercial people in), because they probably won’t have them.
You just need one ring for the whole deal. The acetate is there to extend the sides of your ring so your second tier doesn’t slop over, as well as to help you pop the frozen cake out more easily. Definitely pseudo ring. Definitely just trust the process. When you get to popping the cake out of the ring, trust that its frozen and sturdy at that point. Be brave and firm.
Acetate is useful, but I took a pile of obsolete, unprinted overhead transparencies from my former English department and that worked fine. Either way, it will hold. No prayers required.
The assembly of the cake in the rings takes me about a half hour or a little less, now that I have practice especially. Just breath, don’t panic, read the instructions, take one step (cake, soak, frosting, crumbly bits, cake, soak, frosting, crumbly bits) at a time.
No part of the process takes an excessive amount of time, but there are a lot of components. It’s hard for me to estimate how long it takes because I usually make the cake and crumble ahead of time. I did make two cakes in one day, from zero cake up to putting whole cakes in the freezer, but it took all fucking day and I cried some. 0 stars, would not recommend. Plan ahead.
The reason I make these cakes is I hate it when cakes are all sugary, flavorless frosting and no cake substance. The cake part is delightful, as well the icing. Plus the soak adds extra flavor and moisture/texture, and the crumble adds texture contrast and salt (the secret soul of Milk Bar). I love to bake these cakes, and I love to eat them even more, but these are definitely special occasion only. Weddings, birthdays of very best friends, etc.
The comments aren’t that entertaining, but my favourite thread started with someone suggesting a 1 cent discount code so that she could ring up transactions for $6.65, and then someone else pointed out that everyone who got that once would want it at every store from every cashier, so…
The resolution is pretty great, though; manager got the data that proved that this behaviour was harming the bottom line, and HR went from “not touching religious freedoms!” to “Wait, what, no, this is not ok”, talked to a lawyer about it (who told them that this was not a religious freedom issue), and told the employee that she could either ring up the transactions or get a new job.
A couple hours after the meeting I saw her ring up a $6.66 sale begrudgingly. Funnily enough, she did the sign of the cross right afterwards and does it after every such transaction now. Whatever gets you through the day, lady.
Of course, HR acted on this behavior only when the manager figured out it was costing them money. :/ The world we live in, I guess.
Aaaaaaah, the comments on the Update are where the gold is! https://np.reddit.com/r/bestoflegaladvice/comment…
I rang an order up to $6.66 at Chickfila of all places. The young girl behind the counter said that usually customers buy something else to change the total. I stood my ground and accepted the fact that my chicken minis made me one with Satan.
666 might not even be the number of the beast. A Bible fragment found in 2005 shows it could very well be 616. Try that argument and see what happens! *snort*
How dare you, the rhubarb shortcake she made for Momofuku Ssam may be the most delicious dessert I’ve ever had.
Yay WAM! It really is a great little art museum (and they have a Magritte!). Nicole left out the most important detail of the exhibit though, which is that starting on July 13th there are going to be live cats from WARL hanging out too!
Speaking of zoos my friend in New Zealand is a kiwi-hatcher and she’s getting ready to release her last baby into the wild, there are all these photos on fb now of her toting this plump little kiwi around as it gets weighed and tagged and I know I just got my MLIS but maybe there’s a zoo out there that needs a dedicated kiwi toter? I am highly qualified.
Smithsonian just had 2 baby kiwis hatch, you should ask! And then invite me to help.
I read that whole thing as “my friend in NZ has lots of babies and she is almost due to give birth again and ” then it got kinda inscrutable after that.
ahaha I should have put “baby” in quotes (she refers to all of them as her babies which I guess is fair because she does stand over the incubators and go “peep peep peep” to encourage them to hatch!)
That is adorable
A+ job.
I wouldn’t be all that great at kiwi-toting but I am TOP NOTCH at going “peep peep” at things encouragingly.
KIWI TOTER? Take me with you!
Kiwi birds are the cutest! When I went to NZ everyone thought it was strange that I found them cute but they’re so fluffy!
They look like pants. Adorable, whiskery, sentient pants.
They’re adorable! I was a kiwi person long before I was a cat person.
I love WAM – it’s the perfect size for an afternoon wander! With just enough interesting exhibits! Especially since they added the Higgins Armory collection. You can see all the things and not leave feeling like you missed out OR exhausted yourself trying not to miss out.
I’m so excited for the rescue kitty portion of the event. I hope it’s super successful for WARL and the museum. It’s just a charming idea!
Sweet Christ, don’t google “kiwi hatcher” at work. I don’t know why I got the results I did, don’t want to know. “Kiwi hatching” is fine though. And very cute!
If I search “kiwi hatcher” without quotes on bing I just get pictures of kiwi birds. If I google “kiwi hatcher” with quotes I get pictures of Zachary Quinto, but not very many.
Oh god, it must be based on something Google knows about me. *casts self into void*
Okay- so given the number of different image searches I have done for exciting skin conditions I should have the weirdest responses ever. I don’t think it’s you.
My kitty is from WARL, that made me very excited, like they put my own personal cat in the museum.
(We spray a little aerosol fat on the pan before lining it, so the cake releases more easily.)
You mean you used cooking spray. That is what you mean.
MAKE THE BITTER TEA SOAK AND JELLY
1 Bring the water to a boil in a small saucepan. Remove it from the heat and add the tea bags. Let the bags steep for 5 minutes, or until the tea is very bitter. Discard the tea bags and store the bitter tea soak in an airtight container.
You mean you made strong-ish but not actually all that strong cheap tea.
Right? Five minutes is like how long I normally steep my tea.
I dream of adulthood, when I believe I will finally learn to steep my tea for a set amount of time, instead of for the vague number of hours to remember that, oh, god, wasn’t I making tea at one point this morning.
I have a specific setting on the timer of my sports wristwatch for tea (most of the teas I make regularly steep for the same amount of time). I make tea immediately after my morning run, so I’m wearing said watch, and start the timer immediately after pouring the boiling water over the tea leaves. This is now so routine that I do it without thinking about it.
Feuilletine is made of little pieces of crispy broken crêpe or cookie.
then say that
It tastes better in french. Natch.
PAM, just say pam.
No, use functional terms which are internationally understandable, not only-in-north-america brand names! Please!
Yes, of course. I meant to snark at the kind of cook/baker looks down on brands and products that are mostly associated with home cooks when they’re actually really useful.
You mean you used cooking spray. That is what you mean.
Yessss A+ gif application
Ok, I’m going off on a tangent, but on All My Children Erica Kane’s Trumpish husband gave her a limousine in “the palest of persimmons”. That description’s been bothering me for 30 years. Even in the 80s that was a really stupid dream car.
That’s it, calling cooking spray “aerosol fat” from now on.
I couldn’t find the words “cooking spray” in my brain the other day and I called it “spray fat,” which I just liked so much more. Aerosol fat is even better!
During my teens, strapless dresses were the big summer dress trend. My cup size is 34A. It didn’t go well.
hello yes are you me
Every comment on every article about boobs ever:
‘Are you sure you’re wearing the right size?’
Hey, and do you know what, if I follow those articles about fitting your bra properly then I should be wearing a 32A, but I tried that and my bra hurt and left red marks on my skin so they can all fuck off.
THANK YOU! I tried it, too, and it says I should be wearing a 32 band, but when I do, it hurts. When I wear a 34, it doesn’t. So they can all fuck off, indeed.
There’s something amiss with their definition of fitting properly, then, because clothes should not hurt!
It just really depends on the bra and how much support you need.
I’m a 30E/F in MOST bras, but my boobs are pretty high up despite their size, so I can often get away with a 32DDD without any problems. If I wear a 34DD though, THEN I’m having issues–having the bra slip up when I reach over my head, etc.
The other thing to keep in mind is that elastic has a breaking-in period. My fave bra of all time was pretty uncomfy the first couple weeks, but then proved to be my Old Reliable for years.
It sounds like bra advice should be subcategorized more! Like maybe advice for A-C cup, for D-H cups, for J-sorry we don’t make bras your size.
My bras are currently 36K (UK) (I probably wear a 36M I can’t find big enough cups) and if the bra doesn’t hurt me terribly the first two weeks I wear it it will be too loose in short order and my back will start to hurt again constantly. But if your boobs don’t give you constant backache without the correct bra, then I would totally go with bras that are comfy.
I am 1000% a bear person and I don’t keep that quiet. If I could tend and love a grizzly as a companion animal without fundamentally violating its bear nature, I would absolutely do so.
Have you read Bear?
Bear is my favorite dirtbag book recommendation.
(It is a great book! Even/despite the … ya know … bear sex. But it is so fun to have other people read it without telling them about it)
I like to recommend it to ppl with “it’s about a librarian type that ends up in Northern Ontario and while there has intimate relations with a bear. And in telling you that I have spoiled LITERALLY NOTHING about that book”.
I loaned it to my work BFF, and i still have the sticky note that she put on the cover. It simply (and elegantly) reads WTF? And last summer, found a first ed of the book in the Little Free Library across the street from my house. I almost fainted.
No! But I’m going on leave from work for a bit in a month and it’s now on the tip-top of my list. What I *have* done is convince my partner to honeymoon in Alaska so I could see bears IRL and obsessively watch and rewatch every grizzly-based documentary I can get my hands on (including “Growing Up Grizzly” and “Growing Up Grizzly 2” on VHS).
!!!! Have you also seen the Herzog doc Grizzlyman?
I really should not be adding to your love of bears, especially grizzlies, they are dangerous and the worst. I have a pic of one just SCREAMING at the helicopter that was being used to chase it away. Grizzlies: not your – nor anyone else’s – friend.
I was literally about to say this, I am definitely a bear person (as long as I never actually like, encounter one in the wild).
This is me, except substitute polar bear.
Have you seen the best bear-like dog?
https://images.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=http%3A%2F%2F…
omg how did this dog even happen this is amazing
I may have a couple of them. LittleGirlDog is the cuddliest. There are few better sensations than a small bear-dog resting the side of her muzzle against your face as she relaxes in your arms. Only in air-conditioning, of course. When I’m sweaty I refuse cuddle requests and make her accept arms-length petting. So. Much. Fur.
Yeah, that’s a winter dog right there.
Ahhhhhh Schipperkes are mad cute and definitely in my list of Top 5 Dogs.
I like black bears and I cannot lie, those fuzzybutts I can’t deny, when a bear walks in a Lake Tahoe den with frosting on his face I want hugs!
(I’ve run out of my parody writing ability but you get the idea.)
HOW LONG before a Toastie has a cat named Sabazius? Maybe it will even be me.
That interview must be old, because Daveed and the rest of the Hamilton cast have been doing shots out of the Grammy.
I so feel for the people doing Ramadan right now. Luckily the weather’s a little cooler now, but the sun went up this morning at 5:20 and won’t set until 21:58. That’s a long-ass time not to eat anything, and even longer not to drink anything. And then you have the racists getting pissy that some supermarkets sell Ramadan-type food at a discount…
Should specify that this is in the Netherlands, but there are quite a few Muslims here
oh, me too. I kept thinking it could not be a worse time of year to fast (in the Northern Hemisphere anyway – not sure how it is elsewhere). OOF.
Yeah, there have been news stories here in the UK about how it’s the longest Ramadan (in terms of fasting hours) in 33 years. It does not sound like fun; I hope the weather doesn’t get too hot so it’s a bit easier. (As Ramadan is quite early this year, there was also a thing about making sure the dates of GCSEs – public exams for English and Welsh 16 year-olds – didn’t clash with it, because doing important exams while not being able to eat or drink all day would not be great.)
Yeah, I saw Ramadan pop up on my calendar, and was like “Aw, that’s gotta suck this year.”
Fun fact you actually can only eat between sunset to dawn not sunset to sunrise. Fasting times in Dublin today are you break the fast at 9:52pm and your last meal must be finished by 2:53 am. After the first day it’s much easier Ramadan this far north definitely is challenging.
Wow that makes it even worse
Yep, the window for eating is small. I don’t know how people manage to have a decent sleep schedule. (I remember last year I kept being woken up at about 3am by my upstairs neighbours’ door slamming as their guests left.)
As I understand it, Scandinavian Muslims follow the sunset/sunrise times of Mecca. Otherwise they would pretty much never get to eat (especially if it’s first light of dawn that counts instead of sunrise! There is no actual night this time of year, just a dusk that almost seamlessly flows into dawn).
[never considered this…that would otherwise be the worst]
Al Jazeera did a interesting article about that a few years ago that showed people used a mix of rules. http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2014/07…
In Mary Roach’s book about space travel she talks at one point about the guidelines for Muslim astronauts – how do you pray five times a day (including washing), facing Mecca when you do so, when you’re orbiting the Earth several times in a 24-hour cycle and in zero-gravity? It is cool that people have come up with how to handle these things.
Ah! Mary Roach, answering our unasked questions and offering up endlessly fascinating anecdotes.
Or the astronaut can assume he or she is “travelling”, and just delay fasting until they are back on earth again. But, yeah, they did put out a handbook on that 🙂
Google “Ramadan pole paradox for more”
Everyone come to the Southern hemisphere! So many reasons. Unless you like an ozone layer. Then you have a problem.
I want to bring back those bronze hands, who is with me?
1000% here for anything to do with weird cool hand things
With you. It’s almost like having a Hand of Glory.
I’m in, just for the secret wrist compartments.
When I was young, I assumed Almanzo was Hispanic. After all, a guy at school was Alonzo, and that’s not far off, and Alonzo’s definitely Hispanic, so why shouldn’t Almanzo be? I definitely enjoyed the books more when I imagined that Almanzo and Laura’s relationship looked like my parents’. They handwave his odd name in Farmer Boy, don’t they, but I ignored it.
I remember being horrified when I stumbled across that photo on the wikipedia page.
There’s an Alonzo in LM Montgomery though (one of Philippa’s rejected suitors in Anne of of the Island) so almost certainly there are Caucasian Alonzos.
ALEC AND ALONZO
Phil is the best.
TEAM PHIL. As a kid, I briefly wondered if Alonzo could be Latin American, but then decided that in 1890s Nova Scotia it was…unlikely.
The point is not whether white Alonzos exist but more are there any Hispanic characters for young me to see herself in and the answer was no.
Probably didn’t help that all my books came from my mother and my unpronounceably Spanish last name came from my father…
This is very literally the first time I’ve considered the fact that he wasn’t Hispanic. Funny how stuff like that sticks in your head…
Me too–so confused how it was never mentioned or anything.
Am I the only person that does not care and wears strap dresses with my bra straps showing? (38D). Like, I have boobs. I can either wear this bra or not, and you do not get to have an opinion, people that are not me. (as a side note – did pashminas go out of style and I did not notice? When did this happen?)
That said, I would think about maim tiny adorable creatures for that green dress at the bottom of the article. Soooooooo preeeeeeeetttttttyyyyyy.
I will show my bra straps no problem, but all the backless/side cut out dresses can fuck right off. I am so very tired of seeing a cute dress on a hanger only to pick it up and discover its backless.
Seriously, do clothes designers not understand that bra’s are a thing? or are they just so blinkered by mainstream body norms that they don’t realise that the majority of women need a bra and don’t just wear them for funsies.
Same! I’ve seen people wearing bralettes under them but I don’t want to have to go buy another thing just so I can wear dresses. I don’t necessarily mind free-boobing it but it’s annoying trying not to bend over or run anywhere. Great for sitting and eating, not great for much else.
My ginormous knockers just lol at “bralettes.”
I’ve literally just bought a little black crop top with spaghetti straps so that I can wear it over my bra and wear the backless/sideless things in my closet (Why did I buy them? I don’t know.), at least then my 36G/F’s can feel like their part of the bralett under backless things trend. Can’t do shit about my back fat though, just gotta stand really straight at all times.
All my hate to whoever decided that things should have a cutouts in the back/flank right below the bra line. You know, exactly where a bra squishes your under-shoulder/back skin into rolls unless you are very skinny.
I was going to ask why they would design a thing to show off an area that most people wouldn’t want to show off, but then I remembered that they do not design these things for most people.
Those stupid fauxwrap tops. I get that it’s great they don’t slide or gap but they’re still showing waaaaay too much cleavage for an awful lot of women to be comfortable with at church or the office or even just running around.
I’ve found this to be an excellent use for camibras. You don’t get layers and layers of clothing trapping heat over your ribs, but you still get the effect of a lacy camisole under your shirt.
Very true! I just feel like I shouldn’t have to.
This is a fair point. I just like how nicely the wrap shirts outline my boobs.
And they always come in such nice colors and prints!
It’s so hard to find tops that give good bosom shaping. There was that whole era of empire waists and between my long torso and big bust the waist used to cross right at my nipple line. I wore them anyway, but it wasn’t a good look.
The only way to get most of those to look good on me is to wear them lower than I’m comfortable with, otherwise the band does sit right at the nipple line.
So annoying, but I understand that not all things can be designed with my shape in mind. For every* one of us complaining about lack of accommodation there’s some poor woman feeling like all the tops she looks at are floppy at the front.
*autocorrect changed this to ev’ry. I changed it back but I had to mention it.
I do actually have one top that’s floppy at the front. It looks amazing on me for a total of three days before my period, and that’s it. It’s not even one that looks good with a camisole underneath, so I just have to stand up very straight during that 3-day window when my boobs are big enough.
I don’t care if people see my bra, but in situations where I want to look “put together,” I don’t like having the strap adjustment buckles or the tags and clasps that most bras put in the back on show, since they’re so functional looking, rather than a seamless part of the look. For those cases, I have a couple pretty cloth bras from UO that have cross-back straps instead of adjustment buckles and no clasp at all, they’re just a band of fabric. And they’re lacy, so it looks intentional if they’re on display in a backless or strappy or otherwise tricky cut of dress.
Nooooo it is your entire generation of whippersnappers with your bra straps out there loud and proud. That explosive sound you hear is me tutting at you. (There are many of you.)
I am an Old and can’t handle it and get all laughably prunefaced. Big generational marker, the exposed bra strap. (I am not seriously blaming you for this, I just can’t help being old.)
Nope, totally fair, my maman makes the same faces at me, and i always reply with “but mumsy, this is why i buy pretty bras!”
I love that, at 36, I am being called a whippersnapper, ty ♥
It really is, I have a couple of cute boho tank tops with sort of a collar neckline that leaves bra straps exposed (no way can I go without) and it’s all I can do to wear them out in public. Total cognitive dissonance because I consider the look adorable on other people, just not on me, An Old.
I find that wearing bras with bright colors (cobalt! cherry! orange!) or else black bras with narrows straps helps, because then it feels like the bra strap is part of the outfit. If you’re feeling on the fence — go big!
Hahaha oh, were you a teacher at my middle school? Spaghetti strap tank tops were very in at the time, and subsequently our school had a ‘no bra straps showing’ policy. Because no one likes showing off their bra more than preteens who hardly need a bra, but apparently pre-teen boys shouldn’t be reminded that girls wear bras.
I did not need a bra at the time. I was free to wear all the spaghetti strap tank tops I wanted, but I sorely wished I needed a bra because that was part of the look.
Yeah, when I was in middle school you specifically shifted your bra straps around so that they peeked out from under as many different kinds of tank tops as you could. Especially racerbacks.
I’m 36. I used to have a bra with a lovely lacy edge, and in one of my fave tops, it would ever-so-delicately peek out of the plunge neckline.
While out at a pub, a woman younger than me pulled me aside to whisper, “Your bra is showing,” and when I said, “Oh, yeah, I know,” she looked genuinely confused.
Nope. It’s not like it’s a big secret that I’m wearing a bra. Cute dresses > worrying about people’s opinions.
‘I can see your bra’
‘Good, I spent a lot of money on it.’
Overheard by a friend recently:
Woman 1: I can see your nipples in that top
Woman 2: Oh, fuck off.
Bless.
Right?
I enjoy and can get away with not wearing a bra with most of my summer dresses…yes, sometimes you can see the outline of my nipples…nope, I’m not sure I really care.
I mean for god sakes, I can wear a thick sweater and a tank top in winter and you can STILL see my damn nipples so I kind of just gave up. I’d like to not wear super thick bras all the time. I know that it’s somewhat unprofessional (although I have a casual office)…but I kind of don’t care.
‘I know, that’s why I wore the pretty red one today.’
I do the same thing! My bra straps are almost always on display anyways (thanks awkward necklines!) and I like to wear strappy dresses with low backs in the summer and everyone else can deal.
You are not the only one. Often my only other alternatives are: never wear a sundress or wear some heinous strapless bra that is so sweaty and restrictive it defeats the purpose of wearing a summer dress in the first place. See also: Spanx.
SPANX, you are both terrible and useful in equal measure.
I am crossing my fingers, because I found bras online that come in my size (I hope!!!) and in colors that are not beige and I am SO looking forward to rocking those straps.
Depends on the look. Denim cutoffs? Already dirtbagging so might as well show off my bra straps too, give me that muscle tank crop top. But if I’m wearing a pretty/fancy dress I prefer not to show them if I can help it.
YES to this and all the above.
I think I have a pretty average body type (ha, as if there was such a thing) with a 34C bra size and I still have yet to find a strapless bra that isn’t just a lie. They don’t look quite right. They don’t feel quite right. I can’t dance like a mad fool at weddings while wearing one. They are not for me.
34B and I agree, all strapless bras are lies
I am more comfortable braless than in a strapless bra
I am 34B and I actually like Gap’s strapless bra? It is no more/less comfortable for me than other bras, and it does what it’s told. I’m wearing it right now in fact.
Strapless bras should never have been a thing. They are the worst.
(Although I suppose there could be women who they work for since these things are so variable).
I own one strapless bra. It is the only strapless bra that has ever worked for me – indeed, it is one of three bras that has ever truly fit me. It was selected for me by a lady who bore a strong resemblance to Ms. Frizzle, in one of those specialty bra stores where they are actually good at fitting. I do not like to think about how much money I spent on the thing. I will wear it to shreds.
I am now trying to picture the perfect Ms. Frizzle ensemble for working in a bra store.
Probably a dress in this fabric: http://gravelandgold.com/collections/gravel-gold/….
I have one yellow dress with skinny straps that I will wear with a normal beige bra that’s very close to my skin tone, so it’s less in your face. I think as long as it’s either a flesh-tone bra or a bra that matches the color of the dress, it’s completely fine.
However, someone wearing a visible hot pink bra under a blue top or something drives me nuts. Then it seems like they want people to look at their bra. I’ve actually seen a lot of women on the subway wearing shirts with a giant cutout in the back with normal, completely visible (and by completely I mean you see 100% of the back of the bra) bras under them and it baffles me. You could have worn a shirt without a giant hole in the back, dude.
Hmm see this is interesting, because I personally HATE the look of beige bra straps showing, but am totally fine with pretty much any other colour of bra strap showing. Life is a rich tapestry!
I think beige straps are vastly preferable to the clear plastic ones, which can catch the light in really odd and blinding ways.
Fair point. I also don’t like those. I think my issue with both beige straps and the plastic ones are the same. You can still see the damn bra, trying to semi-camouflage the straps isn’t going to help, so you might as well pick a nice colour.
I am a huge fan of bra straps as fashion statement! Buying loud, colorful bras so that the fun straps show in a tank top is the best.
32C/D and I could not care less as long as I’m not at work. Even if I am at work sometimes I don’t care.
But I also do have some serious booby dysmorphia and sometimes I imagine I have the body of a ballerina when I am shopping, only to realize in the fitting room, “wait, I have this STUFF on my chest.”
booby dysmorphia LOL. I mean, at the term. Not at the thing itself. Dysmorphia is rough, I hope that it is not too hard on you ♥
I cannot take credit, it was in the original article, but IT ME.
Never mind dresses, so many of my shirts have necklines just wide enough that bra straps are constantly showing and, like, I don’t design the lady clothes, people. I wanna wear a shirt and I wanna wear a bra. And sometimes I am not gonna color coordinate the two and you’ll just have to live with it.
This is why I have a collection of tank tops in different basic colors to but on under my shirts for work. It’s not the bra straps showing that bothers me as much as showing the tops of the cups (if I want support and proper fit, they have to go up pretty high)
Back when I lived in the southwest I just wore sundresses every day and when I was at work I put on a shrug to cover my shoulders/make it “office appropriate.”
A large subsection of my stripey shirt collection is boatnecked stripey shirts. They are nearly my most favorite shirts but I CANNOT keep my bra straps from peeking out at the top all the damn day.
OMG, this is so late, but where on earth does one find a large subsection of stripey boatnecked shirts? These are my two favourite things for shirts to be!!!
Ha, me too, apparently! Mine are mostly from Loft (three-quarter sleeve) and Boden (long sleeve). Actually, the Loft shirts are Loft Outlet — I think some of their Outlet stuff is made specifically for the outlet, although I have seen some true Loft items there on occasion.
When and if I can find 32F bras where the straps look cute and work with the outfit, maybe. But my bras are mostly boring, and I feel self-conscious when I’m not put together.
I’ve become a fan of the fact that eShakti (along with all their other great qualities) puts bra strap keeper in most of their sleeveless dresses. I’ve also picked up a pair of silicone nipple covers, which are little pasties that stay in place w/o adhesive and make me look like a Barbie. This lets me where slightly structured strappy dresses without a bra and without nipple torture. (I cannot stand fabric rubbing against them when they aren’t contained if they get even a little bit pointy.)
brastop.com is your friend (34 GG here, hi)
High-five for another member of the Sensitive Nipple Crowd, seriously, that’s at least half the reason I ever wear a bra, even soft rayon shit eventually makes them sore.
I just wear them without a bra (32G). I have days where I feel like going braless is somehow inappropriate, but then get mad at myself cause there’s no fucking way a part of my body should ever offend someone else when properly covered. It’s not like I can detach them before I leave the house.
#bralessness4eva (except in professional contexts, usually)
I have a specific sundress I love because it’s the same color as the bra I always wear it with, and together they look super cute.
I don’t know if it will help the specific summer dress conundrum, but I’d really like to plug A Bra That Fits on Reddit for introducing me to a) bras that fit and b) bras that are actually cute and sexy above a D
I wish I wasn’t so horrified by Reddit (in terms of layout and usability) because it really seems like the place to be.
Yep, same.
I’m so glad we have a really good bra store in Portland.
Today in (Feminist) History! [Archive]
On this day in 1877 was the birth of Meta Vaux Warrick (Fuller), an African-American artist known for her art which explored Afrocentric themes and social commentary. A forerunner of the Harlem Renaissance, she has been described as “one of the most imaginative Black artists of her generation”. She was born in Philadelphia to a beautician and a barber, and named after one of her mother’s customers: Meta Vaux, the daughter of Senator Richard Vaux. In the intellectually active black community she grew up in, living in a family that encouraged education and enrichment, Meta Vaux was trained in horseback riding, dance, art, and music. She was also one of the few students from Philadelphia public schools selected to attend J. Liberty Tadd’s art school. It was her home life especially that encouraged her later art careers; she had a father interested in art and sculpture, a sister who liked to model clay, and a brother and grandfather with a love of horror stories, the combination of which influenced the woman who would one day be known as “the sculptor of horrors”.
Her art career was started after a high-school project of hers was selected for the 1893 World Columbian Exhibition, following which she received a scholarship to attend the Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Art. At the time, there was a certain feminine style expected of female artists, but Meta Vaux refused to fit that mold. She broke out of it in a rare act of independence (at that time) by dipping into the more horrific and gruesome ideas from the “fin de siecle Symbolist art and literature”. After graduating in 1899 she went to Paris, where she studied individually with Raphael Collin, as well as sculpture at the Academie Colarossi and drawing at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts. In Paris she faced discrimination and was refused housing, and eventually found lodging with the painter Henry Ossawa Tanner, who introduced her to his group of friends. In Paris she also became first influenced by, and then a protege of, Auguste Rodin, and her careful depictions of “the spirituality of human suffering” lead to the French press calling her “the delicate sculptor of horrors”.
Meta Vaux was seen as one of the first African-American female sculptors “of importance”. In Paris, she was influenced by W.E.B DuBois, who encouraged her to let the African and African-American themes flourish in her work. She was well-known in Paris, but when she returned to Philadelphia in 1903 she was shunned because of her race and the fact that she was what they called “domestic”. But Meta Vaux didn’t let that stop her. She was the first African-American woman to be commissioned by the U.S. Government; the exhibition involved a request to create several dioramas depicting African-American historical events. Shown at the Jamestown Tercentennial Exposition, and later at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, the display included scenes of slaves arriving in Virginia in 1617, and other depictions of the home lives of black people. It included fourteen dioramas and 130 plaster figures.
In 1907 she married Dr. Solomon Carter Fuller, born in Liberia, and one of the first black psychiatrists in the U.S. Eventually they moved to Framingham, Massachusetts, where they had three sons. Resented and pressured to leave by white neighbors who isolated them from social events, Meta Vaux eventually left the church she attended in the area. Despite this, she continued working on her sculptures, including making several with traditional religious scenes within the privacy of her home studio. One of Meta Vaux’s most famous sculptures was created in that time. Called Ethiopia, she sculpted it for for the America’s Making Exhibition in 1921, and it was meant to represent pride in African and black identity and heritage. It was featured in the exhibition’s “colored section”. However, despite the fact that she kept working during these years, Meta Vaux was never as appreciated in America as she was in Paris; in fact she was isolated, detached from her African-American contacts, and feeling depressed and desolate about her career. She continued to work, however, and did not died until 1968, at the age of 90.
Some of Meta Vaux’s sculptures: Ethiopia Awakening, Emancipation, and Self Portait.
I love, love, love how much I learn every day from these posts. Thank you so much!
I love her stuff! “Ethiopia Awakening” is a woman coming out of a mummy wrapping, with an Egyptian headdress, and with African features! I’ve never seen that in art before.
I wish she and her family had been surrounded by kindred spirits in Massachusetts instead of racist coldness. I hope she got lots of attention from people who appreciated her work.
Sitting around waiting to get my official job offer letter so I can give notice at Crappy Current Job is agonizing. My boss-to-be said she has all the paperwork ready and now it’s just up to their HR to finalize everything but this is the government, it could take ages. And it’s getting really hard to focus on/care about anything at work since I know I’ll be leaving soon and none of it will be my problem anymore.
Congratulations! That’s very exciting! However, waiting for that letter of offer is always excruciating and tedious within the government.
I feel you!
I’ve been waiting for 3 months for news, and have had a saga the last two days about it especially, and oh maaaan.
Anyway, joined hands in solidarity and everything and I really hope the letter has already reached you by the time you see my comment, and if not, that HR have found a time turner and it still reaches you by the time you see my comment!
Daveed + N.K.Jemisin. Yesssssss.
Also HOLY SHIT WHY IS THERE A LEGAL ADVICE REDDIT. My lawyer self has the vapors.
I am strooooongly tempted to send that to my bosses but their blood pressures are high enough already
Right? I’m boggled, and not in a good way.
There’s also a Best of r/legaladvice reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/bestoflegaladvice/
You’re welcome (and I hope you had nothing planned for the next few days).
My 21 year old Brother groomed a 14 year old he met a Summer Camp and asked for nudes. Could he get into trouble?
O_O
Strap in.
Hooooly crap that poster knows enough to use “groom” in that context and yet needs to ask the question SCREAMING
EXACTLY!
The titles in the Best Of sub are written by the user who submitted the thread (and deemed it lolworthy), not the OP.
That’s almost a relief.
[to self:] don’t click don’t click don’t click SHIT
Why is it bad to have a legal advice message board? Genuine question.
Generally speaking, an attorney giving anybody legal advice can constitute an attorney-client relationship (no matter how loosely or informally that happens). That entails all kinds of legal duties and responsibilities, and you can theoretically be sued for malpractice, disbarred, etc., etc., for failing to meet those.
So giving informal legal advice to strangers over the internet is something most reputable attorneys would VERY much want to avoid.
And TAKING legal advice is pretty risky too. You have no idea what the person who’s advising you knows, how ethical they are, etc. And law is generally very jurisdiction-specific, so advice from another state could well be totally inapplicable.
Oh, you know what lemme volunteer this: Worcester Area Toasties- Would folks be interested in doing a meet-up at WAM (when the real kitties are there also)? If there’s interest I’ll get an email list or something going and we can pick a weekend.
Yessity yes yes. Yes yes.
Toast, I’ve been having a terrible week, work-wise, which blends into my personal life. I have the usual headache, along with nausea, and I know it’s all psychosomatic, and I just want to not be an adult.
I’m sorry–big Toast hugs if you’re into hugs or a totally sympathetic Toast high five if you’re not.
Thank you! I like hugs very much, but I’ll take the high five as well, I need everything I can get 😉
Oh man, I am so sorry to hear that. 🙁
Does treating the headache and nausea with traditional means work, even though they’re psychosomatic?
Chin up, Toast friend. You got this. You will slog through, and you will make it, and things will get better.
Thank you. I usually take painkillers for the headache, but I’m going to physical therapy later, and I think it’s better if I am able to feel the potential pain so I can give feedback.
I’m home now, and it’s better already. Tomorrow will bring a decision, and then there’s the weekend. It will get better.
Why would you assume that we’re cat ladies? I mean, I have two cats and they’re my ENTIRE WORLD and I have oil paintings of them all around my tiny little house with 15 litter boxes and 22 carpeted towers, but still. The assumption.
I know, I have CATS LIFE tattooed across my knuckles and everyone just assumes…
Another museum targeting the catladies: Civil War Tails in Gettysburg, where wee clay cats play the role of soldiers in Civil War battle dioramas.
oh, I was just in Gettysburg for my cousin’s wedding but I didn’t know about this! I could’ve spent so much time here instead of driving around the actual battlefields! Now I have to go back.
Why didn’t this exist when I was at college there???
I skipped the “clay” and imagined kittens dressed in Civil War uniforms and you know what? That’s a great mental image.
As did I! I was picturing live cats and kittens in uniform reenacting battles and etc which is obviously bananas because cats are incorrigible dicks BUT STILL it was the best mental image I’ve had in a while.
Would 100% go see the clay cats too though.
So many clothes just do not seem to work with big breasts (particularly if you want your bra not to show. I (30H-ish) have resigned myself to never being able to wear anything strappy, strapless or backless, but even sleeveless stuff is a problem – if I can find something that fits over my chest (unlikely), the armholes are always so big that they show off half of my bra. I don’t know how other people do it; I just wear things with sleeves all the time and so have constant sweat stains under my arms.
Not to mention–no button-downs and it’s impossible to find a swimsuit.
The wonderful Bravissimo in the UK sells swimming costumes in different cup sizes, with underwires, so i am okay there, but their clothing range is sadly limited.
I <3 bravissimo.
I like Athleta swimsuits–you can buy the parts separately, and their bra-inside tops really have a real bra in them that isn’t obvious and really works. They come in long, too. They are the reason that for the first time in my life at 42 I got a swimsuit that didn’t try to fold me in half.
For swimming, I wear a rash guard over a proper bra, a bra purchased at a specialty bra store with professional fitter who made sure I have a foundation garment that is just right for me.
So much effort just to have clothing that fits. Why is it so hard to be a woman?
I have a Panache bikini that I quite like. They come in cup / band sizes. It was super expensive (like, maybe $150 for both pieces), but it fits! (I would rather be the person buying leftover clearance swimsuits at old navy for $1.99, but whatevs.)
ASOS sells bikinis and swimsuits up to 30I online in the US – not the greatest quality but then you can get a set for under $50.
Finding swimsuits is rough 🙁 I find myself just not wanting to go swimming, even though I quite like it once I can get my breasts out of my head.
Sometimes big armholes can be remedied by taking the shoulders up an inch or so, because manufacturers assume that once you hit a certain size, you’re like 5’10. Or maybe a fuck you I’m adorable LOOK AT ME bra for those summer days where you need some air circulation.
I wear a 30DD, which is not that big at all, but tends to be included in “extended sizes” around here, so I have my fair share of thick straps and aggressively full coverage in my underwear drawer and the associated wardrobe issues. My kingdom for a balconette that is ACTUALLY A BALCONETTE, and not a full-coverage bra with a really fat gore!
Yes, as a person who is only 5’0″, the assumption that I am large in all directions is a pain. So many tops and dresses have straps that are too long and necklines that are too low, resulting in half of my bra being on show. (Gap also exhibits the converse of this: it is assumed that anyone short is also slim, so their petite trousers only go up to a size 12 or 14. RAGE.)
Not to mention shoulders that are at least 3″ too wide.
I remember once sitting in a restaurant booth looking at the back of another woman who was wearing a spaghetti strap top that had adjustable straps, and she had the straps all the way as long as they would go, and it fit her perfectly. And I marveled, thinking, “In the extremely unlikely event that I were wearing that top, I would have the straps cinched up as short as absolutely possible, and they would probably still be sliding off my shoulders. Life is a rich pageant.”
Also fun: when a brand offers the exact same garment in straight and petite sizes, but then it turns out that 10P is actually like, three sizes smaller than 10. (Looking at you, asos.)
I tried on a cute sleeves top with foxes on it at New York & Co yesterday. I have no need of such things, but I almost bought it just because the armholes were of an appropriate size.
YES. 30F here and I swear, I’ve been having this problem since I was far smaller. What’s with this! Even the dresses the author links to in the summer-dress piece would probably show a bunch of bra in the pit. And not cute pit-bra, but like, industrial-mesh-for-side-support-stained-with-deodorant pit-bra.
I wear a lot of cardigans.
I am so glad it’s not just me; I was starting to feel like I was abnormal. I think part of it is to do with the whole thing about not being able to have clothing (unless it’s stretchy) fitted too tightly under the arms/breasts, or the wearer cannot move their arms properly. With sleeves, you can make this area quite loose and allow for freedom of movement; without sleeves, you either get arm-restriction or gaping armholes.
I also think…the only reason clothes fit me in the chest is because they’re cut to be roomy, but then my breasts take up all the slack in the fabric and pull the arm holes forward to expose maximum pit-bra. UGhhhhh
We share a bra size! Fistbump!
I also have a dress (from Title Nine Sports!!) where the shoulders actually cover the bra straps quite well, but then the arm hole is so wide that the side strap shows. What?
I have seen a Look that is “wide-strapped bra made apparently out of lace” under a spaghetti strap dress, and it’s kind of a neat look? Like if there is any sort of mystery as to whether it is actually a bra and or part of the dress, I could probably get behind it, although normally as a 34DD I just don’t even look at spaghetti strap dresses. I’ll go braless under a halter top dress, though.
I am a dog-person AND a cat-person, but slightly more a dog-person, so here’s this lovely video of a kid sneaking snuggles with his neighbor’s dog.
TOO MUCH ADORABLE!!!!!!!
Awww thank you for sharing, this is hilarious and adorable. He *really* scrambles to get out of there!!
Ahhh, thanks for that link. That is adorable.
This may actually be me in small-boy form.
Crying.
When I was young (6-7?), a neighbor got a puppy and left her tied up in his front yard on a semi-regular basis. My friends and I had NO SHAME camping out in his front yard to play with the puppy. Clearly the puppy was there to delight local children. The neighbor was completely bemused to find a gaggle of children surrounding his new dog.
Toasters, I’m a bear person.
Also: other fun news today for link rounding up:
1000 sheep run amok: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/w…
Pennsylvanians in serious political poll say the Philly Phanatic > Trump: http://www.phillymag.com/news/2016/06/08/phillie-…
Well, would Trump be anywhere near as adorable driving an ATV? No, he would not.
In the Hand of Sabazius article why do they describe it as a cult instead of a religion? Serious question. Was there evidence of cult-ness that was omitted, or is there a definition of cult I’m not aware of? or is it Christian supremacy where ancient religions are called cults because they clearly weren’t as good or important as our modern religions? (Am I projecting too much?)
I have a vague idea that a cult in this sense is a group that focuses on a particular patron within a larger religious framework shared with other groups – a particular god in a pantheon, for example, or a particular saint in Catholicism.
Ahhh, so like religious orders? Like the Order of St John or what ever. I suppose that does make sense, thanks!
Medievalist here, and I would pretty much agree with this. I think we’re talking about a more neutral sense of the word “cult,” basically indicating devotion directed to a particular individual. Like, in my scholarship I often say things like “the cult of St. So and so” to talk about the way a saint is worshipped in a particular context. Or I might refer to the “cult of Christianity” when talking about the religious practices of early Christians. So I guess there’s a sense that it refers to slightly less official, or codified behavior than “religion,” but the term definitely encompasses Christianity and I think doesn’t have the negative valence of the way we typically use it.
what others have said, plus cults you usually had to be initiated into! the religious practices, beliefs and rituals of a specific cult were a secret, you didn’t know anything about what happened there until you went through initiation. Kind of like the Masons- they existed under the framework of the main religion, but represented an extra secret special sauce and extra WEIRD version of it.
that’s what I think of as the difference- anyone could go to the temple of Apollo and sacrifice a goat for good blessings. But if you wanted to worship Mithras, you had to actually want to join his cult and they had to agree to it and then you’d be taken into the cave and shown the mysteries and welcomed into the cult and allowed to worship with them. Even then there were levels, like the priests would know EVERYTHING but the novices would only know the very beginnings. & the mysteries weren’t just physical practices but a deep knowledge of the god in question, they were supposed to be spiritually transforming and ecstatic and esoteric, etc..
so we know that the cult of Sabazius existed, we know that they carried around those hands, but we probably won’t ever know what the actual rites of worship involved or what the mysteries were, because those were the secret and there’s no physical remnants of them.
“The cult of _____ ” is a history of religion term. It doesn’t mean it’s weird or cult-like in the modern sense. It just means a group of people religiously devoted to ______. E.g. the term “the cult of the Virgin” just means religious devotion to the Virgin Mary as a component of larger Christian practice, in a way that was very mainstream in the middle ages, and still is in present day Catholicism.
Agreed. So while “mystery cults” is definitely a term that Romanists use, “cult” is not exclusive even to the mystery religions. For example, if talking about the site of Abydos, Egypt, it might be referred to as the cult center of Osiris.
Today’s Guardian long read was interesting – it’s about a scheme to reduce gun violence in Richmond, California by offering financial incentives to those most likely to commit crimes if they exhibit good behaviour. But it’s also quite depressing in that such a scheme needs to exist (there were 47 murders in 2007, for instance). In conjunction with reading news stories in the same issue about Chinese human rights lawyers being imprisioned and women in Pakistan being burned to death by their families I am just feeling a bit hopeless about the world at the moment.
This American Life did an episode on the Richmond program, it was interesting- http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/ep…
I love Peter Shaffer and Amadeus (though Equus is my favorite), but I really have to wrinkle my nose at it and at Isaac Butler for signing off on the “genius is a product of selfishness” idea. Some geniuses have been selfish, and selfish misbehavior gets some people attention which spreads to their art, but the two aren’t necessarily correlated, and the idea that they are seems to inspire legions of Those Guys in Your MFA to be their very worst selves in the mistaken belief that it’s a signifier of their greatness.
Yeah, I got excited to read that piece and then didn’t really agree with what it was saying.
I have an MFA and we used to laugh about the lore of famous selfish monster writers in school, but a lot of people I know from it — especially those who have gotten book deals — have proven to be pretty selfish and insecure in our post grad school years. 🙁
Well, the worst geniuses-are-assholes-and-look-I’m-an-asshole-draw-the-obvious-conclusion guy in my class sent a series of drunkenly abusive emails to our more successful classmate, and consequently is more or less blackballed by every institution that might have given him a hand up, so I find that cheering.
On the other hand, I know a writer who behaved like a monumentally terrible person while dating my oldest friend, and frequently pops up in the NYT, the New Yorker, etc.; I don’t actually think she’s talented, but she does seem pretty successful. So being a self-centered asshole may correlate with success. But I don’t believe it correlates with talent.
And the difference in tolerance of selfishness between men and women is huuuuuuge.
What I love about the picture of Carmella and the pug is from that photo, they could be in the middle of a nasty disagreement. Or they could be playing like the best of friends. Of course, with dogs, one can turn into the other fairly quickly.
Carmella looks like she’s awaiting the response from the pug to a really bad pun and the pug appears to be still processing. 100% adorable any way you read it.
Relaxed ears, relaxed tongue, relaxed hindquarters. They’re friends.
they’re both having the perfect reaction to meeting one another…
pug: HOLY SHIT A FAMOUS TOAST PUP
carmella: ZOMG A PUUUUUG
I would charge the fuck out of that company if they wanted their laptop back.
“One hundred dollars.”
“Well…”
“YOU TOOK TOO LONG TO DECIDE NOW IT’S A THOUSAND DOLLARS.”
I have a seasonal job, and my managers occasionally try to get me to do work while I am off and I sometimes will do it to maintain cordial relations but often i say nope – you’re not currently paying me, therefore you don’t get my time. I actually laughed at my manager when she said “you’re still my employee so you have to expect to put in some time while you’re off”. Uh, no? You don’t own me, baby.
And send them gouged-out keys every day.
Photos of the computer suspended over a full bathtub.
“TIME’S RUNNING OUT SUCKERS”
Laptop on a pile of kindling with a bottle of lighter fluid beside it
“Send me the $$ or lappy gets it”
I think that cake would taste just as good if you made the components, put them together in a cereal bowl, and sat down with it in front of Bob’s Burgers.
I’ve just finished season 1 of Great British Bake-Off and fully expect that cake to be a technical challenge in a future episode. (To be completed in 2 hours, of course.)
Hey y’all! I am reposting this since I posted it late in the game on yesterday’s Link Roundup, and I think it’s important and EVERYONE should see it!
POSSIBLE FREE MONEY ALERT [srlsy and actually tho]
Hey, do y’all know about unclaimed property?
Unclaimed property (sometimes referred to as abandoned) refers to accounts in financial institutions and companies that have had no activity generated or contact with the owner for one year or a longer period. Common forms of unclaimed property include savings or checking accounts, stocks, uncashed dividends or payroll checks, refunds, traveler’s checks, trust distributions, unredeemed money orders or gift certificates (in some states), insurance payments or refunds and life insurance policies, annuities, certificates of deposit, customer overpayments, utility security deposits, mineral royalty payments, and contents of safe deposit boxes.
What this means in laywoman’s terms is that you just might have some unclaimed money sitting in an account somewhere. Every state has an unclaimed property department (take a look at this website to find yours) that you can search to see if you have unclaimed property in that state. You can also go to <a href=”http://www.MissingMoney.com” target=”_blank”>www.MissingMoney.com and search your name, which will pull up accounts in multiple states.
I am not guaranteeing that everyone will have unclaimed property, but a fair number of people do! I found over $300 in unclaimed property for my boss two days ago, ~ $250 for a co-worker, $107 for another co-worker’s boyfriend, and $50ish for my sister. Plus, searching is addictive as heck, so even if there isn’t something for you, you can search ALL OF YOUR FRIENDS AND FAMILY and possibly find money for them, which will make them love you even more than they already do.
Try iiiiiiiiiiiiiit! And if you want, please tell me how much you found for yourself or another person. I LIVE for this kind of stuff!
(Sorry couldn’t help myself.)
lol, that’s awesome. This GIF is going into my arsenal.
Holy shit, I found a dividends check from Disney from when I was a baby! They did not say how much it was, but yay!
YESSSSSSSSSSSS! MY HELPFUL POST ABOUT WHAT IS ESSENTIALLY GOOD BOOKKEEPING HAS BROUGHT JOY TO YOUR DAY, AND THAT IS ALL THAT I ASK! #virgo
Yes, but you need to show proof that you lived at such-and-such address twenty-six years ago when you were a toddler! I wasn’t signing any leases back then, yo.
WALLSY! ^_^ <3 <3 <3
Ugh, that is really annoying!
Also tho…how did your name end up on something signed 26 years ago when you were a toddler? Are you part of an international drug-smuggling/clandestine-real-estate-buying ring? o_O
I left that all behind me, okay? Okay?! I can dress myself and say the word “yellow” now. Don’t bring up painful memories.
(I think my mother put my name on her savings account so that I’d have access to it for… reasons? In case something happened to her, or to build credit, or something. But the end result is that the state needs documentation from both of us. Though let’s be real, I can’t find any three-year-old bills to get my $20 from AT&T either.)
They have it in care of my mother and I imagine they will send me a letter asking for proof. Which I can provide because I have 2,000 medical documents with my address on them…
Looks like the state of Iowa owes my mom $25. Why, I’m not sure.
Dammit, Iowa!
Super off-topic and I hope not too creepy, but are you the same bird internet that plays Guess My Word? And have I asked you this already and forgotten? I saw a bird internet on the top of joon’s leaderboard today and said Hey wait a minute, isn’t that a Toastie? I think I may have asked you this already and forgotten… 🙁 But with the Toast going away I didn’t want to lose my chance to ask you [again]
I am not!
Haha who knew there was more than one bird_internet? Well, you probably already knew… and now I do, too! Go figure. (Thanks for letting me know!)
I can’t stop searching people I know. I have found nothing, but I still keep looking…
YOU WILL FIND SOMETHING, FELLOW OBSESSED SEARCHER! You just have to throw shame to the wind and be willing to ask mere acquaintances if they happened to live at such-and-such an address back in 2008.
Don’t worry. The obsession drives away the awkwardness in the moment. It’s only later that night that you’ll wonder to yourself “Hmmm, was it entirely appropriate to ask my boss that question?”.
Comment back here when you inevitably find money for someone! I will share in your joy!
Well, shit man.
I have one. It’s less than $100, and I’m fairly sure, if memory serves and it’s the refund check I think it is, it’s actually something like $7, so I’m sitting here debating whether it’s even worth the effort, but the likely reason it was never claimed before is because they misspelled my first name, but it’s obviously me at the only other address I’ve had in the last 20 years.
Huh. Go figure.
Yeah, that’s the only part of the process that is kind of a let-down.
You’re like “I HAVE MONIES 😀 😀 😀 😀 :D!!!!!!!!!!!” and then you look at the total and it’s like, $2.85 and to get it you have to do paperwork, and then you’re all ” >_< :((((((((((“.
That’s why I searched everyone I know, because the totals that I found for other people were pretty significant, so I got to live through their joy.
I have looked this up before but the amount of effort required to get my 50 dollar utility deposit back from 10 years ago did not add up.
This exists in Canada as well! http://www.bankofcanada.ca/unclaimed-balances/
I found my FIL. But they have the street address from his current location, but the city and state are where he grew up. I’m betting it has something to do with his parent’s estate from many years ago, but I imagine it will be hard to proved you lived at an address that doesn’t exist.
Whattttt, I found $200some credit on an ancient credit card (I think? Gotta be like 15 years old)
THAT IS AWESOME!!!
I found money belonging to my grandfather who died and now I am having FEELINGS. But I want his money anyway. Is that possible?
I am pretty sure that money is definitely claimable by heirs. I have no idea what would go into that process though.
Aaaah turns out my great-grandfather on the other side of the family (who has been dead since 1994) is also owed money from his electrical company! Apparently my blase attitude toward following up with my utility companies is inherited!
Absolutely the money can be claimed by heirs. I definitely got a check from John Chiang (previous CA State Controller) when I was executor for an elderly relative, BUT I would swear that the items they currently list are the ones I collected about ten years ago! When you posted this link, I thought I should check to see if any additional money had showed up in the last ten years. Instead, it looks like they never processed that these items had been cleared out? So weird.
Last known address: NOT DISCLOSED
Reported by: NOT DISCLOSED
Amount: UNKNOWN
Seems legit.
“Seems legit.” LOL
Did you find that on the MissingMoney.com site? If so, you may be owed that money in a state that is a little more rigorous in its concealment procedures than others. Virginia, for example, makes you create an account to search their actual database, so any unclaimed property in Virginia will show up without any information next to your name on the MissingMoney site.
Try going to your state’s actual unclaimed property page and see if you can find out any more info. (I mean, or don’t, I can’t tell you what to do. :P)
Yeah, I’ll probably actually try that on VA’s unclaimed property site when I get home. But I am at work, and am pretending to limit my non-work emails while I’m in the office.
I hope your total is a chunky little chunk of money! Like, $50 or up….
Good luck, Toast friend!
I just can’t get over the concern that “look at this site to find all the free money you own” site, that won’t actually tell me anything except AMOUNT UNDISCLOSED, report by UNDISCLOSED,” is a scam. I’m sure it isn’t, but this is still my fear.
I feel ya, mang, it totally feels like a scam.
I felt like that until I realized that some states (like DC, for example) actually use the MissingMoney.com site as their database. Like, if you go to the DC Unclaimed Property search page, they tell you to go look on MissingMoney.com. So I figure it’s legit if states/districts are using it in place of maintaining their own databases.
Ah, VA says it doesn’t have anything for me! Le sigh.
Awwwww maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan. I’m sorry it didn’t work out. 🙁
Nothing for me, but 2 other people with my name (or one who moved cross country), and under $100 for my cousin!
YESSSS! You are about to become SOMEONE’s faaaaavorite cousin!
I like to think that I’m *already* his favorite cousin, but this certainly can’t hurt.
OMG. Typed in my super uncommon last name and found something for my mom! Looks like an unclaimed check for over 100 dollars from her old job at the PX… passed the info onward. Love it!
That’s awesome! I am so excited about how happy she will be! ^_^
My son found this during his copious Reddit time the other day and started texting people like crazy. He found $70 for his BFF’s dad, and something like $150 for my grandfather (which we knew about – the amount of paperwork to claim it 46 years after he died is Not Worth It) and also for my brother, who is delighted, and under $100 for my dad’s cousin.
Yessssssssss. Your son and I are cut from the same cloth. I had SUCH an awesome time searching almost literally everyone in my Gmail contacts, and I am sad now because I don’t know more people. 🙁
HOLY CRACKERS I HAS MONIES!!!!! Thank you, wee_ramekin! It’s a little light in a very very dark day. I will donate it to a Hispanic LGBT charity when it arrives. <3
I am glad you has monies! And even gladder that you will be donating it to a Hispanic LGBT charity, as I’m still raging/crying about Orlando. 🙁
I know this a week later, but you said you wanted to hear results. I told my college roommate I found her husband’s name. They looked into it and apparently found they had over $300! And she was having a really bad day prior to this, so yay!
That is awesome! I am so happy for them, and by extension, you: The Bringer of Their Joy!
I got $157!
YESSSSSSSSSSSSSS! That is amazing!
I believe I recall from Hairpin days that you are also a Virgo(?). Did your your Helping & Organizational Virgo Genes go into hyperwarp and cause you to search every human you have ever known?
I feel like the whole concept of an Unclaimed Property Department must have been conceived of by a Virgo. Shoot, if I worked there, I would be the best employee they ever had. I would offer to track people down on foot in order to give them their hard-earned dollars. I would scour every corner of this great nation to make sure people got what was theirs. I WOULD BRING JOY TO COUNTLESS HARD-WORKING CITIZENS BECAUSE OF METICULOUS BOOKKEEPING AND EARNEST HELPFUL URGES!!!1!!!1!
I would sleep so, so well at night.
I am indeed a Virgo, and I definitely looked up my husband’s info.
There was a scene deleted from Pulp Fiction in which Mia Wallace asks Vincent Vega three questions before they go out for dinner. One of the questions, which she skips because the answer is obvious with Vincent, is “Are you a Beatles man or an Elvis man? You can like both but nobody likes them equally.”
This is how I think of the question of whether somebody is a cat person or a dog person. You can like both, but you have to have a preference and I think there’s an assumption that which one you are says a lot about you.
I’d also have to take issue with her claim that we don’t divide people up by their cars. I know tons of people who refer to themselves as a “pickup guy/dude/man” or “pickup girl/chick/woman” (their words, not mine). I think there are similar assumptions made if somebody makes a point to mention they drive a minivan or a sports guy.
Really though, I use “I drive a Corolla” as a way to explain myself and people seem to know what it means.
You let them get all settled into their assumption and then you show them the Corolla’s scooped hood, flames paint job and custom wheels.
I had a Corolla in high school and I was That Girl who put neon piping on the undercarriage.
Yep. My sister asked me if I wanted a spare ‘vote blue’ bumper sticker she had for my car. I said that I don’t feel the need to put political stickers on my car. She asked why not and I said “I drive a Prius”.
She was like, ohhhhhh, yeah.
There were a number of reasons I got rid of my GTI, but one of them was I realized from the dudes who approached me about the car at the gas station – always at the gas station – that it had a “type”. It made me feel a little silly.
I once saw a Prius with a bunch of GOP stickers and this must be why. (I guess it was a super-cheap old dude who doesn’t want to share.)
I like to specify “I drive a Prius station wagon” even if the term station wagon is out of style (I think even the C is considered a hatchback?) That way you know exactly who I am, and that I would be down for camping or bringing your dog somewhere at a moment’s notice.
I know someone who drives an SUV and gets really upset if someone calls it a “car.” Can you imagine being so insecure about your self-image that you can’t bear to hear someone use casual, non-specific language to describe one of your possessions?
This makes me want to go all Cathy and just “ACKKK!!!” it up.
I don’t troll often, but I doubt I could resist the urge to never call this person’s vehicle anything BUT a car after hearing this complaint.
Or, get increasingly long winded and needlessly descriptive each time.
automobile
motor vehicle
primary form of transportation
internal combustion engine propelled closed cabin multi-passenger carrier
Horseless carriage
Miniature truck
Glorified station wagon/minivan
“Sportt utility car”
It’s not even just being a pickup person, there’s a whole brand loyalty thing around Ford/Chevy/Dodge. (Non-American pick-ups are studiously ignored.)
Ignored except for the stickers of Calvin peeing on them.
No one drives a minivan by choice. It’s a temporary solution to carting around growing children plus their friends and sports equipment.
I know a couple where one spouse thanks the other for making the sacrifice of driving the minivan. They can’t wait to get back to their sport sedan.
My brother only has two kids and he was very excited about selling his two seat commercial van and getting a mini-van. He now has a maroon Renault and loves it dearly. He is only 33.
My dad does. He’s an empty nester who could probably transport his bike on the back of any vehicle provided he had a bike rack, but he loves his Honda Odyssey so so much.
Me too! My nearing-retirement dad has a minivan by choice because it’s tricked out with all of his camping equipment and he can sleep in it if it gets too cold on the mountain. I also think it’s his way of flipping the bird to American Man Culture that requires him to have an SUV.
Dividing by the cars they drive: You drive a stick shift? Wow! (Said to me so many times.)
“Some hands also had a small hinged door on the wrist that locked away a lost object, such as a mother and child. ”
Um, what? How big were these votive hands? Is “mother and child” a euphemism for something religious and/or filthy? How can the object be lost if it is locked in your bronze cult hand? Is it lost because you stole it? DID YOU STEAL SOMEONE’S MOM FOR THE GLORY OF SABAZIUS?
IDK about classical times but the medieval church was also pretty into religious objects shaped like hands, and in that case it usually contained the arm- or finger-bone of a saint https://www.google.com/search?q=reliquary+hands&a…
Ah, okay. So. Being Roman times, people tended to cremate their dead. So presumably, the local Sabaziusists broke into the local cemetery, stole the ashes of a mother and child, probably knocked over a couple tombstones and drew Sabaziusist imagery on a mausoleum, then returned to the shrine in their parents’ basement and distributed the stolen remains to put into their little secret compartments, death juxtaposed with life and fertility, very power, much symbol. So the mother and child constitute a lost object, because they were stolen. It all makes sense now! No doubt the cultists spent the rest of the evening performing rituals from the Sabaziusist Bible, playing D&D and listening to Black Sabbath.
Somebody totally needs to use “DID YOU STEAL SOMEONE’S MOM FOR THE GLORY OF SABAZIUS?” as the first question in speed dating; if this somebody is you, please go out and do that forthwith.
Somebody needs to ask Donald Trump.
SO, once upon a time, my friends and I went to the STL zoo (which is an awesome zoo!) and were having a pleasant time. It drizzled off and on, and in later afternoon, a zoo employee approached and asked us to please go indoors to the Monkey House or Reptile House until further notice. We assumed, at first, due to the weather, that maybe there was a tornado warning or something…
NOPE! Escaped animal!!! Everyone had to be quarantined indoors while they chased this animal around the zoo and got it back into its area. Turned out to be an antelope, so not as dangerous as a leopard, but it still required us to be trapped in the Monkey House for about two hours, growing more and more stir-crazy with only animal crackers (how apropos) as snacks.
One time I was at our zoo and a zookeeper on her break was standing next to me watching the great apes. I turned to her and said, “Is he supposed to be back there?”. She ran away and somebody came to get us all out of the building. Turns out one of the new apes had escaped somehow and was running around loose in the back, eating all the plants and visiting all the animals still in cages.
In 2011, an asp got out of its glass cage at the Bronx Zoo, and the zoo was put on lockdown till it was found (several days later, sleeping under the pipes in the Reptile House). While it was missing, someone created a Twitter account for it–@BronxZoosCobra–and one of its tweets was “Donald Trump is thinking about running for president?! Don’t worry, I’ll handle this.”
I still follow that twitter! Good times.
Did anybody think to check the area for small bespectacled boys with mysterious scars?
“We don’t do that with types of cars”
Haha ahhhh yes definitely people do. Also, people will categorize themselves vociferously about pretty much anything, and argue about it online. Guitars, cars, bicycles, workouts, you name it.
I forget the name of the game show–I’m pretty sure it was on MTV back in the eighties or nineties–but they’d have teams split up according to these arbitrary classifications; they once had teams split by “Thinks that Sulu was a helmsman” vs. “Thinks that Sulu was a navigator.”
Yep! If you’re an Aussie, there was a long period of history where you were either a Ford person or a Holden person.
As a cyclist, I will admit I judge other cyclists based on their bicycle. I try to keep things value-neutral and sometimes fail. And I’m snobby about dumb shit, considering that my bicycles are a mid-90’s long distance bicycle that’s covered in stickers, a really common city bike, and an old beat-up British 3-speed. But I see someone on a carbon racing bike trying to pass me in the bike lane and I make some negative and likely untrue assumptions.
Oh–I didn’t hear that Peter Shaffer had died. Seeing Amadeus on stage is one of the greatest theatrical experiences I’ve had. The movie is good but the play is such a goddamn great piece of writing, in a way that the costumes and scenery and bombast of the film tend to obscure. Salieri is so eloquent–so many wonderful speeches to the audience about music and God and his own time:
You, when you come, will be told that we musicians of the eighteenth century were no better than servants: the willing slaves of the well-to-do. This is quite true. It is also quite false. Yes, we were servants. But we were learned servants! And we used our learning to celebrate men’s average lives. … We took unremarkable men – usual bankers, run-of-the-mill officials, ordinary soldiers and statesmen and wives – and sacramentalized their mediocrity. We smoothed their noons with strings divisi! We pierced their nights with chitarrini! We gave them processions for the strutting, serenades for their rutting, high horns for their hunting and drums for their wars! Trumpets sounded when they entered the world, and trombones groaned when they left it! The savor of their days remain behind because of us, our music still remembered while their politics are long forgotten….Tell me, before you call us servants, who served whom? And who, I wonder, in your generations, will immortalize you?
And the ENDING of the stage version is not only different from the film, it’s different depending on when your script was published; Shaffer revised the play’s conclusion at least twice. In the version I saw in 2001, Salieri doesn’t try to steal the Requiem like in the film. He reads it and suddenly sees it as a requiem for himself as he was, for the young boy in the Italian hills singing little songs to his God, and my friends, I hope I never forget that moment.
I saw an EXTREMELY BRILLIANT punk/avant-garde Amadeus production that remains the greatest and most creative thing I have ever seen on a stage.
That sounds amazing! One of the things I love about the play is how it just straight-up uses history for what Shaffer wants to do, and doesn’t pretend to be anything like an accurate story of Salieri’s and Mozart’s lives, so it would be really cool to see it taken one step further in a production like that.
Off topic but, how to I unfollow on IntenseDebate? I don’t intend to follow anyone, but apparently I am now?
Click through to the profile; the unfollow link is at the top left, near the RSS feed icon
Thanks!
So that cake recipe sent me on a binge of reading the lucky peach, and I got down to the duck broth recipe and now I’m confused. Has anyone made this? Is it literally just the condensed steam and rendered juices of the pre-roasted ducks under cellophane, produced by indirect heat, or am I missing something?
I read it the same: sweat from duck carcasses. This can only make about three tablespoons, right?
Several friends on Facebook linked to this longreads piece about an actor/director who terrorized members of his company for years, and it’s enraging: http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/profiles-the…
Ugh, I left acting precisely *because* of the unbalanced, abusive dynamic between directors and actors, and this is just the most extreme example I’ve encountered. (Of course, then I went into politics, and was recently told that “oh yeah, all campaign managers fuck the volunteers; everyone knows that” so I think I’m at a point where I just want to fire all men into the sun and then go live on a desert island.)
That article is horrifying and yet, not in the least bit surprising. As an actor, it is beyond the pale how normalized it is in theater/film for directors to psychologically (and sometimes physically) abuse the actors and crew. It’s insulting, degrading, illegal, and completely unnecessary.
A director who has to manipulate their actors to get the performance they want is an ineffective and terrible director. Full stop.
The theater/film world has always attracted narcissistic/abusive assholes from time immemorial precisely because of the permissive attitude of “anything goes for art.” It amazes me how shocked people are when they find out that their favorite director or big-name actor is a terrible person behind-the-scenes. Most of them are. The few that are not, are usually those that fly under the radar and genuinely do what they do for the love of it, and not the fame and glory.
Actual high priest of Sabazius:
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I just really want to say thank you for these refugee links. It’s a crisis *of and in people’s lives,* it’s this surreal englobing thing for people, and it has so many sides to it (like the realities of eating and fasting and living under a roof, or like how you have to build and narrate a story that will make sense to the authorities according to criteria you can’t possibly know) and they are getting totally obscured by the way it’s been politicized.
This link roundup speaks to me!
So I have to share about Saints Adrian and Natalia of Nicodemia who might be a fantastic patron saint joke, I can’t tell. Anyway- he was martyred, she carried his hand around after, and now they’re the patron saints of arms dealers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adrian_and_Natalia_…
And yesterday I watched a thing on youtube about the making of Amadeus the movie because it’s a fascinating film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWeqBI-Xsj4
I wear a 32g bra, and I used to look longingly at summer dresses, until I discovered the Freya longline strapless bra. It not only legitimately supports my boobs, it’s also pretty comfy.
They’re pricey, but not any more than my normal bras. They also regularly show up at my local nordstrom rack for around $40.
http://www.amazon.com/Freya-Womens-Underwire-Cont…
Yessssssssss. Your son and I are cut from the same cloth. I had SUCH an awesome time searching almost literally everyone in my Gmail contacts, and I am sad now because I don't know more people. 🙁
That is awesome! I am so happy for them, and by extension, you: The Bringer of Their Joy!
I am glad you has monies! And even gladder that you will be donating it to a Hispanic LGBT charity, as I'm still raging/crying about Orlando. 🙁
YESSSSSSSSSSSSSS! That is amazing!
I believe I recall from Hairpin days that you are also a Virgo(?). Did your your Helping & Organizational Virgo Genes go into hyperwarp and cause you to search every human you have ever known?
I feel like the whole concept of an Unclaimed Property Department must have been conceived of by a Virgo. Shoot, if I worked there, I would be the best employee they ever had. I would offer to track people down on foot in order to give them their hard-earned dollars. I would scour every corner of this great nation to make sure people got what was theirs. I WOULD BRING JOY TO COUNTLESS HARD-WORKING CITIZENS BECAUSE OF METICULOUS BOOKKEEPING AND EARNEST HELPFUL URGES!!!1!!!1!
I would sleep so, so well at night.