Trans/plant/portation

When I was a child, I had a wonderful book called The Nonsense Book by Edward Lear, of riddles and jump rope rhymes, knock knock jokes, and logic puzzles. There were great illustrations here and there, but by far, the riddles section was my favorite. No contest. I learned every version of “What’s white and black and red all over,” and I could fire them off like any of the Catholic prayers drilled into me by the nuns of my primary school. Except the riddles were met with groans, and as far as I know, God didn’t groan at me, even when I was going through a whole rosary as penance for telling Danny McGuinness he had a fat head. Read More…

In 1636, a ship of intrepid English women and men arrived to the new colony in America and the first thought that coursed through their brains was wow, it smells a lot better out here. Those were some of my ancestors, and thinking about it now, I can see why my lot are stubborn and make foolish decisions. At least from that side of the family.

Two years after setting foot on a new continent, as autumn sounded its last gasps and the days shortened to a quick, the moon went away. Who knows how this was explained among them? Gallileo sat back in Europe, under arrest. Yes, that Gallileo. A modern millennium eventually rolled around, and the eclipse/solstice collision was reenacted for another generation, one raised on fearmongering in the news and among their political appointees. Read More…

I yanked out my ball of clairvoyance +2 last January, and crafted a snarky list of things I thought would occur by year’s end. With the birth of the New Year just around the corner, I suppose it’s time to take another shot at what’s in store for us over the next calendar year. Because politics, television, writing, and cooking are my interests on this blog, I’ll stick to those as topics. So here goes. Read More…

This week, Susanne and I are dog sitting. Somehow this entails dogs. And poop, and a lot of it. Actually, now that I think of it, much of these “sitting” endeavors involve poop, pooping, or conversations regarding same. It’s not so much sitting as poop management. Maybe we should have a public conversation about updating the use of “sitting” as a term because for me at least, reclining on one’s derriere to relax doesn’t happen often in these arrangements. Unless, I suppose, a toilet is involved.

Long time readers of this blog will recall my experience with a baby’s explosive offering. Nothing of the sort has transpired with these dogs, one of whom is an anxious herder, and one a saved puppy from a farm in Yakima whose entire body shakes when he wags his tail, which is constantly. Read More…

For the past couple of months I’ve been wondering just how to communicate about the Liar House to the next people who move in here, without alerting the maintenance staff. Sitting atop the downstairs medicine cabinet? Might not ever be found, period. Inside the chimney flue? Would just go up in flames, or fall out if (and this is a big IF) the college attempts to clean the chimney before the next occupants are here. Kitchen drawers will of course be opened, leaving it in the freezer might result in it being unreadable or overly brittle with frost, and of course pinning it to a wall somewhere does not count as subtle. So for the purposes of telling the universe what anyone needs to know should they attempt to occupy these premises for any significant amount of time, I’ll just lay it out here in the nicest way I can imagine.

Welcome, Tenants!

If you are reading this, you have been granted a visiting or tenure-track professorship at the college. Tenure-track professors, congratulations! Enjoy the next six years toward tenure as you acclimate to campus and try to find a modicum of time to work on your research, because remember the school has an open-door policy and our students are very involved! Visiting professors, know that the administration appreciates your hard work and they expect you to be dedicated for the one or two years they’re willing to employ you. Enjoy your time here!

Now then, about this house. This lovely Cape Cod structure was originally built on 2×3 hardwood, and isn’t it great that they’ve kept it intact for the most part? Don’t worry about that bulging wall on the stairwell to the second floor—if you don’t bother it, we’re sure it won’t bother you! On your first walkthrough of the property, be sure to check out the small hand print in concrete next to the garage; little Helen is now 82 years old and still likes to stop by from time to time, so don’t be surprised if you receive a visit from her! But Helen doesn’t have the only lasting touch around the house. Up in the back bedroom you’ll notice the ceiling plaster is well, plastered with doodles from another young girl named Paula! Paula clearly had an affection for California, and the Olympics! Paula also left several lovely games of Tic Tac Toe on the ceiling for visitors to ponder. That Paula!

Yes, this house has a lot of history. You can see some of it in the upstairs hallway where not one, not two, not three, but four layers of wallpaper are revealed in the corner, under the peeling oil paint! Washingtonians sure do like to gaze upon their ancestry since Lewis & Clark passed through a little more than 100 years ago. One hundred years! That’s almost mind-boggling!

There are a few things you should know about residing in this house, because homes with this much character have a few special needs. Anything worth doing in life requires effort, right? Right!

1. The refrigerator emits a thin stream of water down the back, behind the shelves, which slowly pools under the crisper drawers. The college maintenance staff assure all tenants that this is the intended design of the appliance; that’s why it comes with its own flat Gladware container. Be sure to dump out the water on a regular basis, unless you want the refrigerator to self-clean the two feet of floor in front of it. It will do this by overflowing the bottom of the unit and spilling out through the seal of the door. Also note that as the rear of the unit is much colder than the front, your Gladware Capture SystemTM may freeze over. Simply bang the Gladware Capture SystemTM against the sink and release the ice, then return it to its place against the refrigerator wall.
2. When bathing, be sure to keep the water level lower than the overflow hole near the drain, as there may or may not be a seal to keep the water inside the plumbing system. Water that bypasses a seal will fall directly onto the subfloor, and from there, into your kitchen, anywhere from the electric stove top clear over to the refrigerator and kitchen entrance. Baths with up to 8 inches of water are safe to enjoy. So enjoy your own personal hygiene!
3. Your unit comes equipped with a fully functioning fireplace and chimney. Do note that during the time you want to relax with a fire, you should shut the heating ducts on either side of the fireplace. Otherwise these ducts will disturb the air flow near the fireplace and you may be subject to clouds of smoke and ash. We have not asked college maintenance about this but we are sure they would respond that this is an intended design feature of the fireplace unit and not anything requiring their attention. They would however prefer you observe a four-foot distance from the fireplace at all times, including placing your furniture outside this boundary, as well as your toddlers and pets. Better safe than burned!
4. Speaking of the heating ducts, do note that you should only have a maximum of three open at any time in order to heat small spaces optimally. Should your feet get cold, know that you may stand next to the vent in the kitchen, as this is a mere three feet from the top of the boiler in the basement below and always emits pleasant heat.
5. The garage in your backyard comes equipped with a locking door and garage door that you should feel free to open and close manually. It also has a cat door so that any random rodent can make its home in or near your garage when the summer heat kicks in or when it is very cold in winter. You may also notice several hornet’s nests in the garage eaves; these are normal, but the college will supply you with hornet spray if you request it.
6. Remember that today’s appliances use more power than in years past, so operating too many items at once, like the microwave and the toaster, may cause a circuit breaker to switch off. This may become quite inconvenient, as there is no apparent circuit box anywhere on the property, and trust us, we have looked high and low for it. Fortunately the house does seem to reset blown fuses automatically. Like about the bubbly wall, we don’t ask too many questions, and you shouldn’t, either!
7. Conveniently located right outside your kitchen window is the college recycling center. A project of several seniors who graduated many years ago now, it was originally intended to serve the entire Walla Walla community, but they may have bitten off a little too much to chew! Such idealists, those seniors! Now the college aims to serve just the local college community, which it has communicated to the greater city population by writing an announcement on the college email list and via a small sign on the front of the building that when open, no one can see. Do take the time to get to know your local recyclers, who will stop by all day and night with their clattering bottles and plastic. It’s a great way to meet people! Also, when they leave the Union-Bulletin in stacks to blow all over your lawn, know that this is an intended design feature of the college recycling center. We all fare better when we read and support our local newspapers!

Have a great year!

In 2003, I volunteered at DC’s gay film festival, which meant working with some very nice people and a few overly controlling people, but I was willing to take the long view and deal with challenging personalities in order to get passes to other movies for free. One of the films I went to see was Drag Nuns in Tinseltown (rereleased in 2006 as The LA Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence), a documentary about the antics and charity work of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. Some of the Sisters attended the screening, laughing along with us and hosting a Q&A afterward.

Unlike other drag performers I’d seen before, the Sisters don’t eschew things like facial hair (a Ru Paul no-no) or insist on lip synching to women-sung songs, but instead will occasionally take on tenor or other “male range” compositions, singing in their own voices.

They also have a tendency to rework lyrics to songs we’d otherwise be able to belt out with them, in order to make a point. I’d forgotten that little bit of Sis-trivia until last night.

Susanne and I trekked to the Tri-Cities yesterday with a few colleagues from the college to see the Seattle chapter of the Sisters host a fundraiser for Walla Walla’s Blue Mountain Heart to Heart organization, a non-profit direct service charity for people with HIV, AIDS, and Hepatitis C. Heart to Heart is, in fact, the only direct service charity of its kind in southeast Washington state, and Franklin County, which it also serves, has the highest HIV infection rate outside of Seattle, so their work is rather desperately needed here. I would have gone to see the Sisters in any case, but knowing it was a fundraiser for Heart to Heart only solidified my commitment to making the 60-mile trip.

We found our way to the only gay bar in these parts which, on the inside, was a series of differently shaped rooms and a hell of a lot of seating: booths, high tables and stools, plain diner tables that looked like they’d been purchased from a going out of business sale from the empinada counter around the corner. A room in the front boasted a stage and short catwalk where the Sisters and local performers belted out everything from Xanadu’s I’m Alive (unfortunately not performed on 70s-style roller skates) to Bjork to School House Rock, Electrify, and some strange German song about genitalia that left me covering my face because I was there with a student from the college. Talk about awkward! Thank goodness there’s no sexual harassment policy at Susanne’s school. (Ironic, I’m being ironic.)

As the performances rolled on, audience members left their seats to slip money into the contribution basket at the end of the catwalk. Here’s where I was reminded of the unofficial rules about gay bars:

1. No matter how gay the bar is, there will always be a creepy straight guy trying to strut his stuff or hook up with some random lesbian. Persistence of said creepy guy is in an inverse proportion to his level of attractiveness. And creepy guys tend toward creepy props/dress, like a pipe or opened up dress shirt.
2. As soon as a couple first hooks up, they must stand in a corner or against a wall, making out. It helps if they’re anywhere near a heavily trafficked area, so that more people will notice their coupled upness.
3. Older couples should feel free to bicker in the bar or stand apart from each other, at turns looking cold or hurt.
4. There will be an overworked, overtired lesbian bussing tables and shooting daggers out of her eyes at the careless customers who spill their drinks for her to clean up.
5. Even if the gay bar is occupied by 95 percent gay men and < 5 percent lesbians (the other 1 percent straight allies, transgender people, and lost people who haven’t realized they’re not in a straight bar yet), there will still be a long line for the women’s rest room.
6. A small group of depressed looking older men will be quietly sitting around a video monitor of gay porn.
7. A few young or questioning people will be in the bar on any given weekend night, looking astonished at the naughty humor and antics of the other people there.

All of these I saw with my own eyes last night, and nearly 20 years after walking into my first gay bar, I smiled a little to myself, because no matter what else changes, these dynamics are the same. Not that I don’t want all of those to stay the same, certainly not. But it’s kind of like I haven’t aged.

Who’s up for Gay Bar Time Machine? Or the Curious Case of Benjamin Buttman? We can make it happen, people. Actually, maybe I should do an Internet search and see if they’ve been filmed already.

Back in DC, the local NBC affiliate’s weatherman would take bets as to the first snowfall of the year; whoever came closest without going over (thank you, Price Is Right, for that little construct) would get a visit from the local celeb, who would shovel their walkway with a special golden shovel. To call it absurd would be a bit of an understatement.

Out here in Walla Walla, the betting is on when we’ll get our first 90-degree day. I don’t really see this as comparable to snow in DC, because 90 + days are a plenty in the um, desert, but snow days, last year’s winter notwithstanding, are actually fairly uncommon in DC. Looking for the 100 + point seems like the closer approximation to me. But fine, the Union-Bulletin is looking for 90-degrees as its benchmark. I’m not sure what the award is—maybe a free 10-minute lawn watering? A golden chalice with some ice cubes and lemonade? We don’t have a local television station, so there’s really no weather-forecasting person to bring anything to the winner. Like other things in WW, the glory is in just being right. That way there’s no real expenditure associated with the contest.

The heat and cold have been struggling over the last couple of weeks, and we even had a thunderstorm here a couple of nights ago, during the college’s “Naked Beer Mile” event. I don’t suppose it stopped anyone from trotting around the quad naked, but certainly, I was not going to head over there to witness their fortitude-slash-stupidity. We learned last year to keep our shades drawn that evening.

The tradition is this: the cross-country team, obviously a group of exhibitionists and nudists, sponsors a run around the quad on campus at midnight on the day after classes end in the spring. We hadn’t been forewarned about this last year until a few hours beforehand, and as we live on the edge of campus, heard shouts of “naked” from some students who, through the loudness and slurredness of their communication, seemed fairly intoxicated. Ah, college. I had friends who pushed a refrigerator out of a second story window, so I suppose this is par for the course, and less environmentally troublesome.

What is particularly amusing, once one gets past the communal birthday-suits-are-the-most-aerodynamic thing, is the email that went out in advance of the Mile this year, with some advice for participants:

In preparation for the big event, we would just like to take a second to play the grandma role and remind you of a few ground rules. First, if you are traveling from off campus, you should be wearing clothes when you arrive and when you leave. Your neighbors and especially the authorities do not appreciate public nudity. Second, do not enter any academic buildings, residence halls, or the library, no matter how tempted you are to do so. Finally, please do not set off any fireworks. Seriously. This quickly catches the attention of the police, and it’s in everyone’s best interest to keep their presence to a minimum.

This email amuses me to no end, because:

1. I can’t see any grandma offering any of this advice to young adults who were preparing to run around in their skivvies.
2. I can’t believe people need to be reminded to wear clothing in public.
3. I might have reversed the sentiment of the phrase “your neighbors and especially the authorities.” In our house, it’s “the authorities and especially your neighbors” who don’t appreciate your naked bodies skirting across the lawn on the way to campus.
4. (Really 3a) I can’t believe the email author had to give a reason why public nakedness is wrong.
5. Students really are tempted to go to the library au naturelle? Seriously? Mightn’t you be seeing these librarians again? You want them to be able to recall that image of you as they’re checking out your books or arguing over fines you owe? Seriously?
6. I just can’t imagine that fireworks and alcohol are a good combination, especially when there’s not even the barrier of cotton shorts or t-shirts, much less serving as an SOS flare for your activity.

Yes, I was once in college. And I poured orange paint on Penn State’s Nittany Lions as a prank. But darn it, I did it with my clothes on.

One beer consumed with dinner still causes a hangover the next morning. Apparently I now need to drink twice as much water for whatever alcohol I’ve consumed which 1.) really doesn’t feel good to do at the time, sloshly stomach factor-wise, and 2.) makes one look like an old fart when he’s trying to be sociable. But okay, message from brain received. And I’m living in wine country why again?

The same set of stairs one has used for the past 19 months start to cause joints to sing a song, a little longer every time they are traversed. Once upon a time my right knee (the non-operated-on one) would click a couple of times while climbing the stairs in our house. Now it sings like Pavarotti. This is why I’m happy to announce that my right knee has a new recording contract from CBS Records.

You jump up and down with glee when getting carded for the beer mentioned in the first paragraph. And then you realize that jumping up and down doesn’t work so well anymore, so you just smile a lot, now looking like some creepy, semi-crazy dude. And the picture on your ID is horrible to boot, so you’d rather not show it to anyone. That gets the smile to go away pretty quickly.

Whatever skill you’ve gained from experience starts to become eroded by a lack of memory in how to repeat it. Sure, I’ve made the Joy of Cooking’s pancake recipe hundreds of times, but I still can’t recall the ingredient list, the page it’s on, or which measuring cup makes the best pancake pouring device. People are kind enough to eat them anyway. But I know they’re humoring me.

Those two gray hairs you’ve been avoiding suddenly decide to throw a gray hair party, and you realize you’re growing a clump that makes you look like Jay Leno. And that guy is such an ass clown nobody wants to look like him. A sudden red beard would be so much better, but there’s not a drop of Irish in you.

You see punk teenagers chasing ducks around for fun, and you yell at them to stop. Oh my, ain’t that just the mood killer? You realize you are That Guy. Long live the high school class of 1988.

Crazy right-wingers have to ask themselves: bang the birther drum or change rules to let guvenator run for prez. decisions, decisions.

Clearly, Arizona and Virginia are in a thumb-wrestling match for Biggest Assclown State.

Sometimes I just have to throw up my hands and ask why. Today’s pats of butter: http://wp.me/pQHmS-DE

@gwenners but he was an episcopalian minister! they’re out of their gourd to call him evil.

Sherman Alexie makes a joke about pooping his pants and everyone laughs. I make a joke and get called Mr. TMI. Damn you, Sherman Alexie!

cheesy grits, wilted spinach with garlic, and pan-seared pork chops; I’d say we’re over the stomach flu around here.

@snarkysmachine that’s why I own a Cup-a-cake. www.cupacake.com/

@snarkysmachine mmm, cupcakes.

damn, if Sandra Bullock can hide a black baby adoption for 4 months, maybe they need her in Wash, DC, to tell them how to kill leaks.

This is cross-posted over at I Fry Mine in Butter.

Once upon a time, I balked at the prices of toiletries marketed to women. Just the sticker shock from the tampons alone! What the hell? Little cardboard or plastic tubes of fabric cost how much? I did a quick calculation: a woman in the US with an average number of total monthly cycles could expect to shell out something around $40,000 to $50,000 in her lifetime for these damn things, and that’s not adjusted for inflation. It’s not as bad as the cost of a carton of cigarettes, so good thing I wasn’t shoving those into my own private Idaho. But where was my tax write off? If this shit happened to men, they’d have a tax shelter for it, I figured.

Everything else related to my personal hygiene was overpriced, too. This would have been somewhat more tolerable if the products themselves had decent quality. Not even great quality, just decent, as in don’t take a half-inch strip of my skin as a token of my esteem when I’m just trying to shave my legs. I let the stubble get longer and longer between shaves because I just wanted to avoid the pain of my shaving gel mixing with my fresh-oozing bloodstream. Ankles, it would seem, are not designed for flat, sharp pieces of metal to be dragged directly over them.

Nair was even worse. I might as well have poured gasoline on my legs and lit them on fire—the torured sinuses would have been the same, at least.

Why was I doing this? It didn’t make any sense. Except I saw how other girls in school were ridiculed for not being as feminine as possible, and I bought all the messages that were sent my way: to be beautiful, one must be hairless, wear makeup, be submissive, pretend to be dumber than the men one encounters. I wanted to be liked, and so I sold my soul to the culture for the price of my allowance.

Finally, 15 years and one sex change later I have no more relationship with women-marketed products. Bam, just like that. Okay, not really. And it’s not really full circle, but I’ve come around enough that I need to deal with shaving again, this time on my face. Men aren’t expected to rid themselves of hair anywhere else, right? Right?

Something shifted in that decade and a half. Gillette, Philips Norelco, and friends decided to go after the male consumer. But to do this they had to motivate men into buying increasingly expensive products where before a $2 can of Barbasol and a straight razor—totally reusable—would do the trick. They couldn’t have men thinking these new products would adversely impact their machismo, of course, because 1.) they really like traditional masculinity just as it is, and 2.) gay men are like beach front condos, they sell themselves. Or rather, gay men will buy all kinds of cosmetic products because they already have a solid interest in grooming, it’s like, totally part of the stereotype, all right? Geez!

So what was poor, lonely Philips Norelco going to do to shift the frame enough that men would show up at their product party? They’re going to come up with the Bodygroom. Sounds like a helpful friend, right? Or a protector! Hey, men can be groomed too, and still be manly masculine men. It’s brilliant. In fact, if we posit them as better than the men we used to say were perfectly fine being unkempt sweat hogs, it’ll be even more brilliant. It’s not that it’s manly enough to shave off or shave down your man hair, it’s that it’s super manly! Go you, super man!

All you need is the Bodygroom. “With a hair-free back, well groomed shoulders, and an extra optical inch on my *bleep*, well, let’s just say life has gotten pretty darn cozy.” Or so says the actor in a white robe similar to the one my mother stole in 1998 from The Four Seasons in New York.

So shaving makes one’s junk look bigger? That’s the selling point. I recognize that the messaging is slightly tongue in cheek [sic], but it seems perfectly fine playing to mainstream masculinity even as it opens up a little more room in the concept, just so it can sell more products.

I’m not just harping on Philips Norelco—there is now a whole slew of products out there for men’s grooming since the Bodygroom came on the market a few years ago. And they all sell the idea that men will be more sexually appealing and don’t have to lose an inch [sic again] of their egos in the process or take on the metrosexual label. Dove, Aveda, Nivea, and other companies that have traditionally marketed to women now have products, all clearly and loudly labeled for men. And there are a whole host of products made for men that don’t use a brand name ever associated with women, that sound just like a guy’s best friend, like Jack Black, Molton Brown, and John Allen. The Molton Brown face scrub (yes, facial scrub) sells for $30.

Razors keep adding blades in some bizarro world’s version of the grooming arms race. I remain content with my junior varsity three-bladed razor, and it still costs me $25 for a box of four razors. If I were to add up all of the prices I would have to procure just to shave my face with these high-end things, it looks like this:

Gillette Quattro razor: $30

True Gentleman pre-shave oil: $18

Jack Black shaving cream: $20

Nivea for Men after-shave lotion: $15

Total: $83

Of course Barbasol and disposable razors are still available, and you could get them both for about $10. But they’re not in this marketing push. If I want “the best shave,” “the closest shave,” and more importantly, the chicks (even though I’m married I’m supposed to want chicks, right?), I need to pay to play. And God forbid I grow shoulder hair because I’ll need to plunk down $70 for the Bodygroom. Friendship does not come cheap.

When I was hoping hegemonic masculinity would change, it wasn’t like this. And it sure wasn’t for shaving. I suppose I could go all Mountain Man and grow a beard.

And women will still have to pay way more for feminine hygiene products. Nothing like a captive audience.