Didi needs a forever home!...

I hope our American readers are having a great long weekend, if you are so lucky. I want to take the opportunity to do some advertising for my current foster dog, Didi. As you may recall, Miss Miley was quickly adopted a couple months ago! Didi has been with me since Friday afternoon and she’s...

Friday Fun Thread: You’re so Vain...

A little bit of 19th century misogyny for ya. Thanks, Charles Allen Gilbert! Last week, we discussed the things that we would spend our last dimes on, and although there was a bit of thread drift simply toward things y’all wouldn’t give up, there were a couple of mentions of personal grooming...

In Which I Think Aloud About Sarah Palin...

s.e. smith at This Ain’t Livin’ has an interesting post up about the latest spate of Palin-related mania in progressive circles, this time over her adoption of the word “feminist”: Liberal feminists are asking why Sarah Palin, a conservative feminist, should be allowed to call...

I Already Have Nipples, Thanks...

This look can be yours for £9.95. Or for free. As y’all know, there’s no shortage of stupid-ass shit useless products marketed to women by telling us our perfectly normal bodies are somehow lacking. Today, I give you: Body Perks Nipple Enhancers, available from British department store Selfridges....

Good News from Elsewhere on the Globe...

Time forbids me from rattling on today, but there are two stories that you should know about, if you don’t already. First up is from Trinidad and Tobago:  on Monday, national elections there resulted in a new prime minister for the Caribbean island nation.  A lady prime minister:  Former Attorney...

Calling All Gardeners...

Via computix @ Flickr.Reader Tall-in-Heels tipped me off to a great way to share your backyard bounty. AmpleHarvest.org is an online resource with the mission to diminish hunger in America by helping gardeners donate their excess produce to local food pantries. The founder, Gary Oppenheimer, donated...

London Calling...

So I’ll be in the UK next month, vacationing and enjoying the benefits of the weak pound. (Don’t judge! When the dollar was weak, I put a lot of Brit friends up on my sofa so they could enjoy New York on the cheap.)  If any of you gentle readers want to meet me for a pint somewhere in Londontown...

Perfectionism, Feminism, and The Man...

Newt (not the Nefarious one) wants you to fail, too. Over the weekend, I got together with a colleague to drink nuclear-strength coffee and grouse about our writing-intensive summer plans:  deadlines, uncertainty, anxiety.  He mentioned the chapter “Shitty First Drafts” from Anne Lamott’s...

In Praise of Stieg Larsson’s Mille...

The US edition of the first book of the Millenium Trilogy. I have been meaning to write this post for a long time now, but held off until The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest*, the final installment of Steig Larsson’s Millenium Trilogy was finally published in the US. Starting with The Girl...

Friday Fun Thread: Outta My Cold Dead H...

I feel like Natalie Dee reads my mind. Yesterday I saw a story at U.S. News & World Report entitled “10 Things We Can’t Live Without.” After a little story about the riches-to-rags-to-maybe-some-riches story of a young woman, it lists those titular ten things. Portable Computers High-speed...

Violence is sometimes the answer...

I’m over non-violence, as a political philosophy. Advocating non-violent resistance to injustice is either a luxury or something that’s undertaken by those who have superhuman tolerance for violent oppression. It is a crime in Saudi Arabia for unmarried men and women to mix. A Saudi religious...

WTF Are These?...

I can’t post a pic here because of copyright issues, but go check these out, then come back. Giant, neutered-and-therefore-male, cyclopes  (yes, that’s the plural)? A bottle opener and a parking meter? Metallic squid? Kang and Kodos? Please, Londoners, Britons, UK residents:  help me understand.