Catholics, rest of the world to Pope: "Shut the fuck up!"

Oh this just warms my heart. A tip of the hat to this entry on Pam's Houseblend.

In light of Papa Benedicto XVI's embarrassing, dangerous, and inane comments on condoms, and everything ELSE HE'S DONE since his...uh...ascension? it seems all sorts of folks are just crawling out the woodwork all angry-like.

First, France & Germany told the Elder Thing to STFU, now it seems the Shepard's own flock are about to join together in a rousing rendition of "Bring 'Em Out". Okay, maybe not, but that'd be hilarious.

Vatican Insiders declare Pope a "disaster"

The Holy See is struggling to contain international anger over the Pope's claim on his first official visit to Africa that Aids "cannot be overcome through the distribution of condoms, which even aggravates the problems".

The Pope's remarks about condoms, and a recent furore over his lifting of the 20-year excommunication of a British bishop who has questioned the Holocaust, has left him looking isolated and out of touch, prompting calls for a radical shake-up of the way the Holy See delivers its message.

The Pope is isolated and fails to adequately consult his advisers, said a Vatican source with 20 years' knowledge of the Holy See.

Another Vatican insider described Pope Benedict's four-year-old papacy as "a disaster", recalling the pontiff's previous inflammatory remarks on Islam and homosexuality.

"He's out of touch with the real world," the Italian insider said. "On the condom issue, for example, there are priests and bishops in Africa who accept that condoms are a key part of the fight against Aids, and yet the pope adheres to this very conservative line that they encourage promiscuity. The Vatican is far removed from the reality on the ground."

I think I can safely sum that up to "DO NOT WANT". I think this is my favorite piece from the whole thing (the link is mine for the good Papa):

The Holy See claimed that the Pope had no idea that British bishop Richard Williamson had denied the extent of the Holocaust, but critics have pointed out that a simple Google search would have uncovered the maverick's anti-Semitic views.

Yeeep. But don't worry, the Papa's foot soldiers aren't taking this unfair criticism from sensible Catholics lying down, oh no:

We learned this morning that "Vatican insiders" consider Benedict XVI "a disaster". It's true. They do think that. He's a disaster for them, and their determination to turn the Catholic Church into a touchy-feely forum in which uncomfortable teachings and traditions are "modernised" to impress non-Catholics. Until the Williamson affair, the media weren't sufficiently interested in attacking Benedict XVI to be useful. But now, after that own goal... YES!!!

Take the furore over condoms. I don't think the Pope should have strayed into the topic of condoms and Aids, but what he said didn't represent a hardening of the Church's line on this subject. Post-Williamson, however, the liberal media have slipped back into anti-papal default mode, which suits certain "Catholics" just fine.

I just love how it's always the Libruls fault in ANYTHING when shit goes down. And you thought it stopped at politics. Nope! Puppies get run over? Libruls. Your foot falls off? Libruls. Millions dying over seas? Libruls. Can't find the cool side of your pillow? Libruls. LIBRULS!!!111!!AUUGH!

*tissue* Okay. Okay. I'm done now. I think I might just start calling Papa the Rubberband Man, he's always in trouble man.

Spurious Hair Purchase: Black Earth Products

Part of my semi-transition to natural hair, which, if you remember from waaay back in August (I do not), pretty much involved me just cutting off my damaged hair and carrying on--

Part of that was, I said to myself, "Self", I says, "we're not going to use all those stupid 'black hair care' products Target tries to pan off to us for 20 dollars. No more olive oil organic no lye super blow out kits!"

And so far I've been pretty good about using less stupid stuff and keeping it real simple. I haven't really switched over to totally organic & natural products, but I've kept me afro up pretty well. And as a reward (kinda) it's grown thicker and longer wilder *swish swish* I also desperately need a haircut like WHOA.

So...basically because I don't trust many people to know what the fuck to do with my fro, it's imperative I figure out how to take care of it, and I think I'm going to slowly make the change more drastically (yes that's what I said) over to natural products that will make it less Brillo Pad-tastic.

I started using Talia Waajid's healing hair oil because my scalp had been itchier than usual and me thinks I'd bout scratched it up something fierce, so that's been helping. Only, I think it's actually more useful as a hot oil treatment and since I do not/can not heat dry my hair it's not AS effective as it could be, except in not making my scalp so damn irate.

So, since I'm still pretty happy with the product, me thinks I'm going to go for the rest of the shampoo & conditioner line. It looks pretty nice. I'm not totally feeling the herbal cleanser since I don't like putting in that much damn effort, but I think I'll come out better buying the whole set then just getting the shampoo & conditioner separately.

I've also decided that since my hair is so porous, I need to stop dying it with semi/demi permanent dye. It's still freaking PURPLE on the top. I want a new color already! In the meantime I'm trying to convince my buddy to dye hers blue.

Visas, ready!

Tutoring woes

I start back tutoring next week and I'm not sure how I feel about that. I don't know if I'm really ready to get back to it or not. I'm beginning to wonder if maybe I could request a new school.

I don't want to leave the one I'm at but honestly I don't feel like I've been doing much good there. I don't feel like I can. My site liaison's getting on my last nerve by treating me like I can't handle the student I'm working with, who does really good when she's with me until the teacher decides to come over and basically meddle. Seriously, fuck off, I've had it going since last semester and here she come *sigh* if I can't work something out, I don't know...I don't want my kid to suffer because of some external "technical" difficulties.

I guess the good thing is, that's really the only part of the job that's annoying the hell out of me, the bad part being that it's a fairly sizable part. Sigh. Next week I'm going to try extra hard to work things out...I haven't actually spoken to her about her supposed "meddling" because I'm not sure how. I mean, am I really doing badly? If so she needs to just come out and tell me. I don't think I'm doing that badly, my kid's been making great progress while I've been there, I can tell. I'm not totally serious but I don't crack around the whole time either. It's so damn frustrating, bleh!

This, folks, is why I could never teach. Sigh. I'm annoyed.

Vintage Rush

I had a bunch to talk about, but I ceased feeling like it about 5 minutes ago. I hate school.

Instead, here's Geddy Lee shutting DOWN your ear drums with "Anthem", live in 76. He does not sing that shit in concert ANY.MORE.



Dig Alex's hair. That is one fly biatch. He looks like he just escaped a Spinal Tap reunion.

Auuugh the haute coutre outfits are killing what's left of my soul. I love some 70s Rush.

I see you don't quite get shit: Anthropology Edition

You know what, I'm bout to pop people in the face.

If you're unfortunate enough to follow my Twittering Train you may have heard that yesterday I'd gotten zero hours of sleep and proceeded to class hopped up on sugar and caffeine. Needless to say that day ended in a 10 hour marathon nap.

I tell you that to explain that I've officially been up 13 hours today about about 3 o'clock because thanks to that long kiss goodnight, I've been up since 2 this morning. Hopped up on even MORE sugar¹, AND it's sunny outside. So I'm rather hyper today :D I'm typing this blog post from upside a wall.

AHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

So proceed to my cultural anthropology class were we're a-talking about gender. I usually love my anthro class since we're such a talkative bunch and today was no different. For extra fun, our regular prof had hear graduate assistant, a sociologist, teaching instead! YEYUH!

Now...uh...here's where the title of my post comes in. I sometimes feel--while I don't like to toot my superior intelligence²--that self-identifying or belonging to not one but a few minority groups (black. female. unstraight. *shatner*) sometimes it feels like I just get shit more. I read a lot. I blog. I'm in Bloggity Blogland where I learn. And let's just say that when I hear women make way less than men for doing the same job, I don't question the validity of that shit, I can tell you it's true and I can tell you a few other things that are true.

Being "outside the box" as in neither white nor male nor straight, it seems that I can grasp the conflicty things that perhaps gender, being a social construct, isn't static. It's dynamic, it changes from culture to culture. If you tell me that some Native American tribes believed there were 3 or even 4 genders I'm past the stage where I'll boggle at you like "NUH UH THAT CAN'T BE POSSIBLE COZ THERE'S ONLY MALE AND FEMALE", I will say, "Oh really? Do tell." I think they call that open minded.

Now, that doesn't make you dumb for not understanding that gender all over the world isn't what you think it is. That doesn't mean you aren't open minded either. In all reality it probably just means you didn't know that little fact, and that's fine. I just found it hilarious watching a handful of people struggle (I guess they were struggling) with the concepts of gender vs sex and how you really have to SEPARATE THE TWO.

BUT

I'm an antagonistic bastard so I passed around some sarcastic hand claps whenever I felt someone had either grasped a concept or failed to utterly. It didn't matter to me! I had lots of fun.

The best one was, while talking about the two spirits concept, which is something I'm admittedly not that familiar with, we talked about what WE, as, uh, Americans, would call "homosexual" marriage. The thing about the two spirits concept is that, there were in some tribes males born with female characteristics, and females born with male characteristics. I mentioned in class that this might tie in to what we would call intersex but I don't know if I explained myself adequately. What happened was, though, a few folks seemed to have trouble with grasping the fact that the two spirit males & females could get married to OTHER males and females respectively and it wasn't considered homosexual because the two spirit people displayed the opposite characteristics.

Got it? Good. Because that had shit to do with anything, it wasn't a "straight" marriage or a "gay" marriage, it was a socially accepted union, or a MARRIAGE. One guy seemed to have the most problems with accepting that there was something outside the heteronomitive and our regular teacher told him that he was equating sex with gender even though we had established that you need to separate the two. He eventually seemed to get it. I clapped.

What got my blood boiling towards the end of class--and I discussed this with another girl later because it was really funny--was the GA talking about possible solutions to the fact that women DO make less money than men for doing the same work even with the same education or better, for various reasons (and I will just sum it up with my favorite buzzword PATRIARCHYYYY). What can we do about the gender discrepancies in our country? Is this a problem?

One guy in the class answered with basically (I'm paraphrasing but you can trust me here): it's not really a problem, it's been this way for years and it's going to be hard to break old attitudes.

Class: *chirp*

I clapped. And lol'd. And BANK'd my first amendment rights to call someone's opinion foolish, but I didn't actually voice this with words because GA answered too fast.

Regular teacher gave a much better and not stupid answer, and thus class ended not too long afterwards. We're going to be on this subject for a few more weeks. Goodness I cannot wait until Thursday.



_{Note¹: Sugar doesn't actually make you hyper. Fun fact!
Note²: Momma says I'm smart. Cite!}

Music = intelligence? You don't say

I've heard about this "study" before but I've only seen the actual data once or twice...the only reason I'm taking time out of my napping schedule to do this and blast DMX is because the Telegraph is reporting on it?

Talkin bout some dumb shit, ain't that some shit.

You may have heard of Music That Makes You Dumb. Like...a couple of years ago. It turns out the Telegraph just asked somebody (I consistently & constantly advocate asking your friends about what's up) and the results are in: listening to rap, rock & pop signal a dumb person where as listening to classical music and old standards and high end indie & rock signal a smart person. Like I.

Now, if you're like me you'll look at this chart upside down one time, think about it for five minutes, conclude that's bullshit and be on your way. This article makes me irate for a few reasons, some of those being:

-musical genres that overlap
-the genres themselves
-use of goddamn SAT scores
-what about those of us that can stand more than certain genres?

I'm not really going to go out of my way to disprove this little chart. All this list really proves, to me, is that some folks that happen to listen to certain music may be deemed dumb or unable to do well on the SAT. You may listen to Lil Wayne and fail the math portion but I guarantee you Lil Wayne could run you circles on standardized testing. That makes...little sense? Also I guess it's good for people to sit and feel smug that they listen to high end, "intelligent" bands therefore that makes them smart folks. Ehhh.

But I have always wondered, not in terms of smart vs not smart, how much of what we listen to has to do with us. We listen to certain music because we like it and more often than not because it means something to us. It moves us in a way, but does it really signify how intelligent we are or how we live? I listen to Bob Dylan, DMX, and Bach--what does that say about me other than my tastes are pretty diverse and eclectic?

Also, I hate the SAT & ACT. Hate. Absolutely. I killed the ACT mind you, I still hated it about as much as I hate letter grading systems.

And now you can go back to whatever it was you were doing.

Dear Depression

I'm afraid this isn't working.

I know, the last time we got back together I vowed it would be forever. Teenage promises rarely extend into adulthood, childhood relationships held on by such slender threads.

I can't be with you anymore.

You're a bleak cloud over my life...which...uh I guess is the point. For years you've dominated first my nights, then my weekends, then my weeks, until you consumed entire months of my life. And while you brought out the creative side in me you rather suppressed the other aspects of me, like...everything else. Then you just swallowed up the creative side as well so that's moot.

Well, after our little bout last night, no more. I'm asking you to leave politely.

Also, I want my music collection back ASAP. I forget when we swapped but I want all my LPs back and they better not be damaged or so help me. Frankly when you're not around I don't even enjoy your music that much. I'm not even sure what YOU see in it. I don't want to know. Just give me my records.

Sincerely,

xands.

PS: I actually really want your Bauhaus CDs. I'll trade you vintage Madonna?

Watching Sita Sings the Blues, take 1

You may have heard of this going around el blogosphere, a short animated movie called Sita Sings the Blues. This is the movie here and the page about the movie here.

So I know ABOUT it and I have a general idea of what it's about, and I'll tell you. It is the story of Nina Paley, who, using the story of the Ramayana and jazz singer Anne Hanshaw, relates the story of her divorce.

Now, I started writing this post a while ago because I wanted to give the movie a fair shake. It's not even that long, bout an hour and thirty. I took off my special Gender & Race goggles and watched it like any ol' thing. I should have put them on.

But in a week I have not been able to get past 30 minutes into this movie. Uh when I do I'll let you know, but first let me explain why:

Animation

This has been irritating me to death. The posters I saw showed a pretty cute, simplistic, geometric style & it was colorful, I thought, "Mkay I can work with that". But it's not like that throughout the movie...and I'd be okay with that if it weren't for the fact that while we're looking at Nina's real life it's this weird sketchy style that reminds me of a child's drawings. Fine. Then it switches up again with the shadow puppets and their narration to a sort of cut out style. THEN the cutsey geo look. I was fine with this for most of my time watching but due to the structure the animation changed up so much that I just found myself getting irate.

But that wasn't as bothersome as the

Structure

Okay so I said I only watched 30 minutes of it so I can't say too much other than...damn this irritated me. It didn't flow. After about 10 minutes I ceased completely to feel the shadow puppet Greek Chorus. The way they explained the Ramayana--already in a dumbed down form anyway--just didn't work with what was happening. Holding up the story every now and then to have amusing banter and commentary quickly became unnecessary. And switching back and forth between the Ramayana story and Nina's story...I just thought it could have gone better. At some points if it weren't for the music I'd have been lost on what Nina was trying to get across exactly and I don't think that would have happened if the stories had just been able to intertwine without the excessive use of our little shadowy greek chorus.

Then there's the

Story

Ehh. Again I didn't watch the whole film so I can't go all up into this, but I felt a little weird seeing the Ramayana being related to this divorce. That's on a really basic level and I see where she's going with this, and I think it's a pretty interesting idea, it's just the execution that's making me want to cut someone's face up. With a razor.

So in all...I want to try to get through the rest of this over the weekend and hopefully my feelings will change, because I WANT to like it. Plus, apparently I'm grounded now so I'll need something to do *blink*

Yes, you heard me. Grounded. GROUNDED.

Random musings on women's studies

You know what, in retrospect, my Intro to Women's Studies pissed me right off.

Backtrack. You see, I was aiming to minor in women's studies (now I'm an undecided/film studies minor). I do still want to take further courses if I'm able, though. This is also the first year, I believe, that a women's studies major has been offered.

The teachers participating in the course are basically doing it because they wanna. They already come from other departments like English and Sociology and are just teaching the course because, damnit, they wanted to. And that's great.

Going a little forward, Chally from Zero At The Bone tweeted a quizlet over Twitter and I took it, and turns out I'm Judith Butler. I was ecstatic, then paused, and an ellipsis appeared over my head.

So naturally I typed in Judith Butler in my handy dandy address bar and a Wiki article appeared. And I went through it and said, "Oh, I know her". What I meant was, I knew her theories, but not specifically her by name. Eh, that happens a lot. I have an unfortunate domino memory though and thought back to some musings I had over Christmas break about me first semester.



Now, I loved my Women's Studies course. It was great. It was one day a week for 2 hours in the evening so that meant I didn't eat dinner Mondays but it was still great. We had a great teacher and the class discussions were usually pretty good. I enjoyed taking it. So I guess "pissed" is a strong word, more like "miffed a lot". That's a phrase.

BUT

Miffed a lot it is. I was miffed. For one thing, yeah we had discussions but it never felt like we talked about anything...specific. Our book was full of influential articles and we read just about all of them, and we talked about plenty of intangible theory *sigh* but rarely ever the women themselves. It was kind of weird, now that I think about it (or thought about it a few months ago). Also, besides the odd Audre Lorde piece and mentioning bell hooks & Gloria Anzaldua literally at the very end of the class race was conspicuously absent. Uh, I was the second black student in the class and I think in total there were about 5 people of color (we had a small class note) so I never figured out if I was the only one that noticed that.

Back to talking about specific women, our final exam was to do--we chose a woman to write a short report on and presented it to the class. I did Simone Beauvoir and Gloria Anzaldua. That was as specific as we got even though, as I said, we talked about plenty of articles and women's issues and that was fine.

So I guess "miffed a lot" doesn't work either, maybe "unsatisfied" is best. It was an intro class so it's unfair for me to expect to be given a full blown course on err'thang but it just feels like even in our short amount of time we could have gone so much more in depth, not just...theory. Oh well, I guess that's what more specific courses are for.

How do you watch a movie?

See, I was trying to figure out what the hell I wanted to say about the Manchurian Candidate, since I'm dying to talk about it but there's soooo...much going on with it. Then this came up. And I GUESS it was important enough to warrant its own post. Did I mention this was going to be a long ass week?

I'm dead serious too. How do you watch a movie? Do you even think about it?

Movies are my hobby, well, at least a specific KIND. Midnight movies, trashy flicks, cult films, obscure movies, old classics. Horror, drama, a little comedy, foreign language. Art house shows. Like subjecting myself to television, it's just what I do. It's my THING.

I treat movies like reading most of the time. I can't help it, I have to analyze. I don't care if it's some dreck (and I use that affectionately) from Something Weird, I'll find something to nitpick about it whether I'm planning on writing up a blog post on it or not. I could probably be talking to Mrs Jones down the street and bring up filming techniques and artful use of grainy footage or sepia tones. Again, it's just my thing. I do it. I don't know why I do it. Watching movies & talking about them here or elsewhere is just for fun, usually. I do take it seriously though--probably entirely too seriously. This is why no one watches movies with me anymore I think *sad face*

Anyway, I guess just about all of us are on the DVD trip now, or at least using Betamax (stupid VHS). Or at least torrenting--I won't tell. Usually, if it's a good DVD it'll come with some sort of special features. You'll watch them if they're good, like interviews or old trailers or deleted scenes. If they're bootlegged--as in poor quality as in low grade as in "this sucks!"--you'll probably pass right over it. I make it a point to watch special features if there's something going on. It's like research. Researching movies is also part of my thing, considering some of the movies I tend to force myself through. If I hadn't done some sort of research on Suspiria or Satyricon I'd have been so lost.

I analyze. I pick out filming techniques or art techniques if I can remember any. I analyze the themes, messages in context if I can. I do it all mentally, btw, which probably accounts for why I'm so scatterbrained *side eye*

It's a funny thing to do but I think, other than watching some, uh, truly memorable films, this helps movies stick in my brain more. I can recall some truly random shit I've ended up watching, I guess because of that whole little thought process.

Yup, me going up and beyond the call of duty. While you sit there and flick popcorn in your mouth without sharing, I'm looking at medium shots and close ups *sigh* life is hard.

400 posts, 400 posts!

You're looking at my 400th official post. Yep, this is it. Plain ain't it?

It's rather hot and humid outside, as I realized when I found myself making the longest trek ever to RiteAid, only to be sidetracked by Bojangle's. I don't even like chicken, I just wanted some damn tea.

...I wound up eating chicken because I was hungry like a mofo. Seriously, 20 minutes! I walked for 20 minutes in 70 degree heat. I'd forgotten what 70 degrees (Fahrenheit :D) felt like. How did we go from the lower double digits to this shit?! AUUUGH! The worst thing was ALL I WANTED WAS MILK *frowny face* this is sooo hard.

I figured out how I'm going to get paid for the next three weeks, finally. I'm going to get paid by attending educational events on campus and writing, hold on, reaction papers! Wow, I haven't had to do that...ever. Unless it's here, you know I'm perfectly fine doing that. I will give them a reaction alright. Damn, I wish I'd made it out to that Int'l Women's Day seminar Thursday *sigh*

Speaking of which, Sunday is officially International Women's Day two-thousand-nine and, awfully conveniently, it'll be raining that day *another sigh* so I'll get something together maybe...

Uh, I've been watching the Manchurian Candidate--the '62 version not that...04 version which...is about the same as margarine is related to an elephant--and we simply must do a reviewlette. I'm only 4 decades late, fuck em!

The Day I Was Unable to Do Oral

Or, There Goes My Last Chance at Straightness, Again.

Warning: TMI Alert & Rambling Awareness set for RED. Take the women, hide the children, run in circles, scream if you must.

So, I only bother putting that half-hearted "disclaimer" up just because this might get graphic. Shit, I've talked at length about sex, masturbation, made bestiality jokes about rabbits and cold twitchy noses (yeah try to sleep with that imagery). This might also being extremely hilarious and/or discomforting (read: awkwaaaaard) to folks that know me in real life so I'm giving you a fair chance.



Okay? Everyone gone? Alright let's talk dir-tay.

I do recall talking a bit about my first REAL relationship with a boy. I'm so not looking for those entries because that's not a particularly painful point at my life but I really do have to wonder just what I was doing. He was the first guy to show interest in me that I've ever shown a remote interest back. It's teenage dating y'all. How serious was I? You'll see in a minute.

I knew OF this guy as he'd gone to my middle school and he knew of me. It was the first day of a new school year and for some reason I talked to him in the stairwell. He was funny and found me funny (everyone does). That particular year was grievously stupid for me in terms of school years so it was nice to have someone who made me laugh, to ease the tension of dealing with punk ass teachers, whack ass principles, and jivin' motherfuckin' guidance counselors (who neither guided nor counseled).

So long story short, after a few initial mis-starts we started "dating". I put that in quotes because at a certain stage we were still just hanging out, more or less, now with the added benefit of making out and groping. Until he learned that I actually just lived down the street from him. Ohhh deeeear~

Understand that no matter how comfortable I am right now, I'm probably going to be figuring out where I lie on the sexual identity plane all my life. I can't. I've settled into being bisexual because it at least allows me to admit I like teh wimmens while the general assumption is that I like guys as well. And that's fine with me even if it's not particularly true. I just don't feel like I'm sexually attracted to guys. When I mentioned the fact that I had caught me a mans, my brother remarked that at least it wasn't a girl (and fuck him by the way). I felt, for a rushed few months, that this was a great chance for me to prove to my family that indeed I was not a freak of nature and perfectly capable of being "normal". Which, as it turned out, is WROOOONG.

This particular guy was a great ego boost since he made me feel wanted even if I felt dubious about his intentions the whole time, and turns out I was right anyway--that's actually a story for another day, and you will laugh hard at it. But the fact is, sure he just wanted to zoom zoom in the whatever--sex. It was a little unnerving but I have to admit I was kind of okay with it. Until I was expected to...

PERFORM.

It came up that maybe we should do this sex thing. No real pressure, I knew how to resist him and put him the fuck out of my house if need be. I'd like to consider myself well informed enough with sex, and at least he had the decency to have a condom on hand. And sure I was curious. But not on the first date homeboy.

So the first date went by and he had to evacuate my premises before I laid hurting on his ass. Second one too. About our 2.5 date (yes it was a half) the issue came up again and I near successfully pulled off a hand job. I felt great. I'd gotten a guy hard and almost made him orgasm! And penes (yeah I know the plural for penis, I'm a geek) feel funny! I say near successful because, no joke, my arm was hurting too much to fully bring him off. I still felt great though staring at his near-orgasm face. I rocked for about 5 minutes.

Later on in the course of our semi-date, I finally decided that maybe I wasn't quite ready for vaginal penetration. He was disappointed sure but naturally there are other ways to get off--like a boob job. Sadly, I have itty B-cups and I'm short so that didn't work out so well. Finally oral came up.

Now...get this. I can receive oral all day long and had nooo problem with that and I don't think I ever will. But me being expected to PERFORM made me realize that in order to make this equal--and I'm all for equality--I'd have to put a penis in my mouth.

Needless to say I was a bit...daunted. Uh, he was pretty large (thus my hand hurting). But after some debate I thought I'd give it the college try anyway and put my lips on it and...

...promptly gagged. What the fuck was that horrible salty taste?! AUUUGH!

I looked and realized my tongue had landed right on the so-called pre-cum aka Cowper's fluid aka God's Way of Telling Me To Repent. I wasn't expecting it to taste like 3 years of salt off someone's brow though. Ugh ugh ugh! I thought if I held my breath for a moment it'd take away the taste but auuuugh it didn't work. I didn't mind the taste of flesh so much as I did THAT. Auuugh! How do other girls (you know, THOSE girls I guess) and gay guys do it, I wondered in awe!

Apparently I did semi-good and much like the hand job couldn't quite bring him off (did I mention my mouth hurt?). He didn't much seem to mind providing oral for me though so it was all good. At least I tried!

It wasn't just the horrible "pearly fluids" that I hated though. It was...everything. The weight, the texture...the feeling of it sliding in and out and feeling like, of all things, a failure despite his insistence that I wasn't. We tried it a bunch of different ways--lying down, standing up, in the shower (hoping the water would take away that aauuuugh taste) and nothing seemed to work. It felt like my Baptist training was coming back and I was having a biblical freak out, even though I didn't mind his penis everywhere ELSE on me that much. I probably wouldn't have even minded it directly in my eye compared to sucking on it.

I was still disturbed, a little. A lot of times if I can envision myself doing something, I can do it fine--this works a lot with drawing and essay writing especially, but, a penis is neither a micron pen nor a pencil so no matter how much I saw myself enjoying giving him a blow job, in reality I just could not. I felt guilty! He could pleasure me just fine but I couldn't seem to return it and that was selfish of me wasn't it? What on earth was wrong with me?

So as it turns out, of course I'm not the only woman with this issue or even the only person. Some of us just can't tongue-lash our lovers like that. It might have even just been that particular penis, but in the end it came about that I just don't like to give oral. That relationship disintegrated anyway so maybe it's for the best that I couldn't so readily hand myself over to him completely. Perhaps one day I'll find that super special penis or even that awesome fountain of youth vagina, but for now it just makes a funny story.

Johnnie Walker: Keep Walking

I remember when I first saw this Johnnie Walker making the rounds about...last year. Late last year. I showed it to my mom and we were both like "Hubuuuh?"

The background music is badass but for one, I hate liquor and two, I didn't know how much I appreciated the "change can happen!" message through out the commercial being tied with...liquor.

But...I did find it strangely empowering. I'm just waiting for my weekly punishment of Sober House, don't mind me.

The Great Masturbate Debate Continues

Say it in your Obama-voice. Say it! Omgomg.

So I told you about me & mom's little masturbation incident. Yeah it went over very well right? Riiight.

So I held off a couple of days calling her, mostly because I just couldn't get around to it, but also because I was going to let her stew in her own conservative guilt thoughts. I stewed in my own which mostly consisted of napping.

I finally called her because I got lonely & bored at meal time, and we ended up briefly talking the incident over. I finally explained to her that I was fucking kidding for frick's sake (I didn't say fucking) but also made it clear that what I do with my body AND MY MONEY is my business. Thus even in the event that I actually wanted to pay $60 dollars for a sex toy, I just hope--REQUIRE that she respects my decision. I mean, dad almost after 10 years got over it, why won't she?!

She agreed, begrudgingly, and normally that'd be the end of it--but, again, I can't let shit go. She said something that has bothered the hell out of me since Monday abouts. Apparently she told the incident to her co-workers--who I guess she likes this week, for now--and one of them remarked to her something along the lines that she raised me a lady and I wouldn't do anything like that to her.

Now...that's about half true. Yes mom did more or less raise me a lady, even though I thwarted her every attempt. And yes, I wouldn't ask my mother to buy me a sex toy (I did offer to buy her one though, but I'm rich). In fact, if you look at it like that it's completely true.

BUT

I get the feeling the gentleman was trying to imply that I wouldn't masturbate because I'm a lady. And even if that's not what he meant, let's not kid ourselves and say some people don't hold that outdated thinking. I'm pretty sure mama holds that sort of thinking true which I think is silly. It's all goddamned silly and that thinking sort of went out completely about 40, 50 years ago. Damnit why are we still so backwards. Ladies don't touch themselves and get to know their bodies, we just lay on the bed and hope the man trips so our purity can't be taken for another day or so. I just don't get it.

Also, that statement is true but it's not a...linear thing. It doesn't connect. Yes I guess I am a lady and no I wouldn't ask mommy to buy me a rabbit, but neither one is BECAUSE of the other. I wouldn't ask mommy to buy me a sex toy because frankly it'd be rather odd, she can't afford it and I can (barely), and it'd just be embarrassing to both of us in the end. As much as I want to have this conversation with her, I'm really not about to send her to the Hustler store to find me a purple bullet to match my tichel *blink*

Furthermore, also lady or not, fuck that, masturbation is good. For men & women. Stop being silly with your outdated thinking. Yes my vision is bad but I'm still blaming the television and genes (both my parents wear glasses & me and dad have the same prescription, somehow). Maybe my palms are a little itchy sometimes. But that doesn't mean touching your naughty bits is a bad thing, it's actually rather good for you.

And with that I think we've finally reached the bottom of this issue. And the moral of this story is, I like blasting family business in public a lot.

Stealth Mode, go go go!

Dive!

I think I should mention that if you go to the bottom of my page, again--that is, if you've never made it to the bottom of my blog before--you'll see that I have a Feedjit map! Like the Feedjit live feed thing that shows you when people come on to or leave your blog, except a map. It's on all the awesome blogs now but no one has the map. I'm different!

There's a few reasons I have the map instead of the live feed thing, the foremost being that it totally clashed with my layout in terms of size. The regular feed just looked all awkward and shit. The map's smaller and does more of the same except I can't see search terms if you're popping in from google or something, and I can't see you come on/leave like the real time feed. Also, I tend to hit my own blog a lot which would have shown up on the real feed. Not on the map, just "Johnson City TN". No mention of how obsessively I comb over for broken links and what not, or doing posts even though I use ScribeFire. Fwah :D

Whew. Look at that map too. We've got quite the diverse array of stumblers from all over! I noticed a couple of folks seem to be trickling in from some of my older, less Fuck The World-centric posts *nuzzles a cuttlefish* which makes me wonder what exactly they're googling, but oh well. Whatever draws em in I guess. *face gets sucked off by aforementioned cuttlefish* !!!!!

The no search terms thing is one downside of the map, but also it's kinda creepy...it's the Google map so if I zoom in enough I can more or less see where you live. Don't worry though, believe me when I say I barely have the means to get myself off campus, let alone worry about where someone half across the country lives. You're not getting any freaky letters in the mail, either, again stamps cost money and I have none to spare. If I did I'd be eating right now. Hmm, but on the other hand this means other people can also see--not that they'll be getting your house address though.

So yeah that's what's fun today. I'm kinda playing around with it seeing if I even want to keep it there or not, which is why it's at the bottom of the page and not the Illustrious Sidebar. I care not so much about the stats, really, but more about the promotion it gives.

His world is under anaestethic, subdivided and synthetic

Pssh, so I'm not quite done being angry at the universe and its utter failings just yet, so I did that thing where I spend up my paycheck.

Well, not spend up. I just bought the latest live Rush DVD set from the Snakes & Arrows tour, released late last year. I got it for $21 :D I'M THRIFTY. See, mama?! *no she doesn't read me blog, and thank the Invisible Pink Unicorn*

Okay, so perhaps I did buy it in a random bout of depression. And I'm about to flex my nerdskill/Rush mastery. But while being pissed I suppose I had a craving for their music and treated myself to a bunch of live songs. And...dear lord, they played Digital Man. I think I wept a little at the 2008 footage. It's not really one of my favorite songs even though it sounds incredibly awesome in studio and even better live. And after playing a bunch of 2008 live songs I finally bought into the mania and now my life is complete, for now.

Forgive me for my musical ramblings, I can't seem to quite focus enough for a *serious face* post. Or even to be joking. The real question, as usual, would be to why post at all and the answer is quite literally *shrug* Oh well, we'll all deal with it eventually I suppose. And if you can't...let me know.

CVS says no condoms for you

While I was trying to un-depress myself I came across this article on the Curvature blog.

CVS Limits Condom Access for Some

Another CVS practice that disproportionally affects communities of color is the chain’s lockup of condoms. Condoms are one of the best defenses against unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases such as HIV/AIDS, but CVS makes it difficult for people of color to obtain them. At hundreds of stores across the country in areas where people of color predominate, CVS displays condoms in locked cabinets that require customers to summon CVS staff to unlock them and then monitors customers while making their selections. CVS is less likely to lock up condoms in areas with fewer residents of color, and the chain’s two main competitors do not lock up condoms.

Now, a little background for me, you guys know I come from Nashville. Nashville on a whole, I think, doesn't really have that many CVS stores. We have Walgreen's stores galore though. For the longest time I had no idea what the hell a CVS was until we passed one in a, let's say more upper-middle class area when I was little, and to this day I've only been in a CVS a handful of times. Walgreen's is my shit by the way.

So not particularly caring about CVS, in my time around the blogosphere I've been learning that, apparently, CVS has a problem with us colored folk, or at the least poor communities. I grew up in a poor, working class community, or better yet "The Hood", so apparently this explains why I'd never seen a CVS store until I was like...damn near 15. That and the Walgreen's stores kind of make it obsolete.

Again I say, not giving a fuck bout some CVS, I had no idea it was like that. But while reading Cara's analysis on this policy of locking up condoms, it got me thinking--it set off a couple of memories of home, and y'all know I'm suddenly homesick, so bear with me, I will have a point.

Like I said, we have a Walgreen's mafia. The closest Walgreen's to my house locked up their condoms--but they also locked up cough syrup & cold medicine and allergy medicine due to the meth epidemic. I remember once commenting to my mom about how shameful it was that we had to lock up condoms because someone would steal them. This particular Walgreen's literally got robbed every weekend so it was a surprise that they just didn't lock everything in the joint behind glass. But what was also odd was--or at least now after I read this information--was that this was a black community, but it was a fairly middle class area. The gas station never got robbed and I thought that was weird, but that's actually neither here nor there.

So, that Walgreen's locked up condoms & birth control. I said I could understand the cold medicine shit, sad as it was, but the condoms? Again though, keep in mind that Walgreen's got robbed an awful lot (it still does, poor guys).

A few of the Walgreen's in our area locked up condoms & birth control for what I always assumed to be security purposes, even in the more ritzy areas. The areas you would expect the Walgreen's employees to rob, not the other way around. I found it really sad that we had to lock up the Trojans from what we assumed to be randy teens that were too embarrassed/cheap/young to buy some damn Durex.

But the CVS. The nearest CVS to us was in a very upscale neighborhood, and while they did lock up the allergy medicine, the cold medicine and, hold on, condoms were on full view for folks to buy. I remember this because I was mostly bemused and sick. And now that I'm in college, you go in the convenience store in the Culp and the condoms are next to the fucking cough drops. It is university and at least they're promoting safe sex which is great. But as I've bemoaned constantly, I'm also in the whitest of the whitey white areas of the state, good ol' Appalachia.

So what am I getting at with this series of loosely connected stories? I already said I hadn't been in many CVS stores, so I can't comment on their policies really. Is there really some vast conspiracy against poor and/or black communities having to do with condoms? I think it's kind of interesting, and on that Curvature post in the comments there was a semi-discussion on whether this was classist or racist, with the consensus seeming to be that it's both. I agree with this even with my limited experience and I think it's a really interesting topic to go into.

Personally, my feelings on this supposed epidemic of condom theft is, at least in my neighborhood it isn't working. We still had really young girls getting pregnant and catching STDs at a scary rate. I say young folks because for some reason condom thefts are usually blamed on the young, probably with good reason. There seemed to be an awful lot of "condom breakage" too, suggesting to me that if indeed kids are out robbing stores of condoms, they still don't know how to use them (or didn't bother to use them, which ever). It all just goes back to crappy abstinence only sex-ed, really. Make your own damn problems, look at the consequences. Again I say, people wonder why shit happens.

What's so wrong with forgiveness?

The other side of the coin...or perhaps a different section of the same side...yeah I don't have a song for this post. I looked for about 15 minutes. I have no forgiveness songs...if I pull any random song lyrics it's from "Laid So Low" by Tears for Fears.

It's actually kind of telling that I looked for a song to fit with this post on "forgiveness" and didn't find one. For one thing my music collection is mostly rage/angsty rock and...some more.

The other thing is, well, I talk about anger and awful lot. I talk about anger, cynicism, being a skeptic, and just generally hating everything and everyone. And to be fair I'm a vindictive bastard. I like baiting folks into saying shit to me just so I can cuss them out sometimes. Yes, anger is good, but you know what's also nice? Forgiving.

Chewed the bone down too low...got fed on tea & sympathy

With all my rage you may guess that I'm not a very forgiving person. Not at ALL. I seem damn near incapable of the act. I can only be less mad at someone than I was before, but my policy has been, all my life, fuck up once and we're done. I can tell you people I've been pissed at since elementary school. I can not forgive & forget. I can do NEITHER.

I have a very hard time with this. As I say, I'm honestly pretty calm & chill. I consider myself pretty compassionate if a little aloof sometimes. I can't deny that I'm a bit of a fucked up individual, not to be all kewl and trendy but it's just the truth. Some shit happened in my life and it's clearly affected the person I am today. I'm rather assuming this is why I have a hard time with that whole "forgiveness" thing, even though I wish I didn't because it can take a toll on you, holding all these grievances in your heart like a stuffed piggy bank.

I don't think the world hates me. The world doesn't care, it's rather non-sentient. But thanks to my funny childhood and just the general nature of people as I've come to understand it, I simply can't seem to forgive ANYTHING. No matter how many times you say you're sorry or how much either of us have moved on. I get pissed then I can't get unpissed.

I was humble for you...what a fool I've been to have laid so low, for so long, so long

Again about my forgiveness. I have more of an issue with my inability to forgive minor acts & myself for things, but that's more of a psychological thing, I think, for a different post. Now, big things I don't really care if I forgive you or not. Like my favorite issues of racism & sexism and all that, offend me on those and you can expect to be on my shitlist for...ever. I don't care how many times you apologize and for what. Know why? I don't believe you. For me, forgiveness is a lot like "sorry"--if you were sorry you wouldn't have done it. I got tricked a lot when I was kid where people would tell me they were sorry for pulling my hair or tripping me in the hallway or calling me fat, as they laughed behind their hands. I came not to believe them, because if they were "sorry", why do it?

For me forgiveness works the same way. If you want someone to forgive you, you should have thought about that act before you did it. Now you want to be forgiven, assuaged of any wrong doing. It doesn't work that way for me, I dunno about you. Like I said, I'm a rather vindictive biotch and my worldview is a bit skewed.

Made a mess I guess I...should have known, that life was lust & liberty

So. That's all just me by the way, I'm not trying to get into anyone else's head. I have a hard time with my own. I have trust issues and I simply don't believe people when they want to apologize, sincere as they want to be. Perhaps I've taken my mother's lessons too much to heart, or perhaps I'm so damn tired of being a doormat I literally just hate everyone. Or perhaps it's a lot of things. Who knows, I do not.

Why did I bother with a post on how insanely well I hold grudges? It just dawned on me last night how I talk so much about rage and spite but never about the flipside of being nice and compassionate. I put myself off as a nice if loopy individual but never show it. Now you know why. Also, I totally lied, I'm not nice at all, as Danz. Whom I don't hate by the way.

What's so wrong with anger?

Y'all know I have a BA in Dylanology, but before that I had my Master's in Rush. The song I'm pulling lyrics from for this post is called "Stick it Out" from their '93 album Counterparts. As I go along you'll see why I used this particularly "angry" song over the countless millions of 'em.

So let's talk about anger. Or rather, I want someone to tell me when "anger" became a bad thing for MINORITIES.

Trust to your instincts
If it's safely restrained
Lightning reactions
Must be carefully trained

I don't get it. When I say "minority" for the purposes of this post we're talking men and women of color for right now. If that term bothers you any I apologize.

I've never understood why minorities of any sort can't be angry though. We're labeled with "angry black" or "that damn angry woman" or "angry asians". It's supposed to silence us, somehow, but the irony is that the silencing makes us even angrier. This isn't exactly new ground but it still kills me when I see in internet debates or real life conversation, it's usually some white person pulling back from a minority like "Oh my gosh why are you so angry?"

I've always thought it's pretty obvious to anyone who's not fucking clueless. I mean, you've been in history class and learned about what us silly minorities have suffered under the hands of Them In Power, right? So we're not supposed to be mad. We're supposed to suck it up and be polite, respectable negroes, asians, women, whoever. This is how people listen to us to totally disregard us later. If we politely write letters with our dainty white gloves on. Riiight.

Stick it out
Don't swallow the poison
Spit it out
Don't swallow your pride
Stick it out
Don't swallow your anger
Spit it out
Don't swallow the lies

So again I ask you, what's wrong with anger? We have every right to be angry but there will be folks that will tell you to calm down or watch your tone, like that matters when you're confronting patriarchy, discrimination, prejudice, what have you. Don't cuss, don't shout, it frightens us!

Honestly, if I'm not shouting, how do I get heard above the dull murmur of the masses? That's the part I don't get. We're supposed to be quiet and hide in the background, politely raise our hands like "excuse me? Can we have some equality?" Yeah, this gets nothing done.

I'll tell you about my anger. I consider myself pretty chill. On the other hand, I'm afraid I'm not very tolerant and blatant idiocy makes me kind of upset. I don't like to waste energy, so if I'm yelling at you about shit I probably have a good damn reason. You disregarding my argument because you did something to piss me off is really more telling of you that it is of me.

I have been called angry and pissed by white men many times. People that know I'm usually a calm individual (if a little bouncy) but the minute I call them on injustice and stop being their little dancing monkey suddenly I'm angry. I've been told to calm down. And sure, every so often I'll get so pissed I make insane typos because my hands are trembling. It's true, yes, I do get mad. And I don't really care. Why shouldn't I get mad? Why shouldn't I declare my anger? Hell, I don't even particularly care if you listen to me or not, the thing is, you've made this black chick pissed and she's telling you about it. If that makes you uncomfortable, deal with it. Think about what you said prior to me screaming at you to eat a bowl of dicks and don't do that again. Consider it a learning experience, fucker.

You might be too dizzy...to do the right thing

Anger is good. I'm telling you, anger is good. Sure, sometimes it causes us to make rash decisions like slash boyfriend's tires or set girlfriend's cat on fire. But I honestly believe that anger is good. It's healthy. If you never get angry at something you might be Richard Cory. It's fine for other folks to get mad, but minorities? No, we're either just whining or we need to get ourselves together. We can't be mad about injustice or anything, and for god's sake stop yelling, I can actually hear you!

You get so used to surrender

Man I get tired of people's bullshit. I tell you guys everyday (or everyday you read my blog, I'm more than likely pissed at something). I'm sure you do too. I am tired of being told I should just lie down and take what's coming to me and smile politely at it, or better yet, that I need to just pull myself up by my bootstraps and get over it. No one cares but me.

Who the fuck are you to tell me that, I want to know.

I care and me caring is all I care about. So I'm mad, you know what you should do? Listen to my grievances regardless. It's not that people don't whine, but this automatic dismissing of minority anger so you can plug your ears and go "Nananana, lalala!" has really got to stop. It's all sorts of immature and disrespectful, and yet it still goes on with the completely oblivious--and they wonder why shit happens. Well that's why shit happens. You don't listen to us, we make you listen. That, again I say, is how feelings get hurt and people get cussed out.

I'm angry by the way. Oh noes!

AmLit is keeping it real...real American

I'm about to set upon you all a great revelation!

I think I may hate my American Literature II class.

No...hate isn't the right word. I dread going to it. I get majorly bored sitting in the class listening to my teacher drone on (then the brief moments of silence when he asks a question and no one feels like answering).

Also, the reading? Extra, extra dry.

What's irritating me most though, is an extreme lack of diversity in the writing.

I was looking through my Norton anthology and in the beginning there's a lot of Native American works. Towards the end there's a lot too. I look at my syllabus and wonder why we're not covering these hymns, chants, and stories, as well as authors like Ambrose Bierce (whose Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge trumps Huck Finn so hard I can't stand it). I look at the syllabus and for the first time, a little numbly, I note the authors.

Mark Twain. Henry Adams. Henry James. Kate Chopin. Jack London. William Faulkner. John Steinbeck.

What did you notice about all those.

...

Yeah? Yeah. They're all white. I threw in Kate Chopin to fuck with you. Make no mistake that we do cover some black authors suck as Booker T Washington & Richard Wright and Ralph Ellison.

But actually, you know what, add those names to the list and take out Chopin's. NOW what do you see? That's right, all male. Seriously, the whole syllabus looks like that, and in reality we're not even covering that much literature. I know, it's the second part of the course, but please tell me there's a THIRD.

Now for the beginning of the anthologies there's actually a pretty good reason for that make up, being that for a long time most writers in America were wealthy white males. Then they were wealthy white females. Then they were just white folks. Then blacks, and all those other wonderful minorities. We know this, and I can understand that pretty well. Except this class goes from Civil War to past the 60s, so I'm a bit perplexed as to why there isn't an increasing diversity of writers in our set out little time line.

Like, really confused, because this anthology and my Heath anthology contain a great diversity of writers for us to pick and choose from. Hell-o, professor, 'sup? Is there something you want to...tell the class?

I actually don't think my class cares. Goodness knows I barely do, and if I were another plain-jane complacent person with more time on my hands, I don't think I would. I'm keeping these books, it's just one class, I'll read what the fuck I want as long as I get them grades.

STILL

It rather bothers the hell out of me that this class seems to be content just to study a really superficial, I think, sampling of American authors. This is kind of ironic because I originally wanted to take Euro Lit, which would have probably been mucho màs blanco. But since I'm here I might as well improve my condition I guess.

So why? The simple answer is that we only have four months in a MWF class to cover the span of American Literature, so *shrug* I suppose. Pick out all the important ones, which makes sense. Too bad we don't like simple answers though, right?

I'd also like to mention that this list, strictly in academic terms, is boring as hell. It may have to due with aforementioned lack of diversity, but seriously. WE CAN DO BETTER THAN THIS. I aim to ask the teacher about it one of these days, I just wish I'd realized this sooner.

And I suppose my laundry's done. You know how it goes, it all comes out in the wash.