Parks & Rec: 2-1 Pawnee Zoo

Plot: Leslie accidentally marries two male penguins. Mark hits on Ann. Andy is living in the pit and stalking Ann. 

Deep Thoughts: I love how dated this episode feels. It’s only from 2009, but I think it would play differently today, when gay marriage is legal and apparently “established legislation.” I mean, I’m sure some family values group would totally get worked up about a city employee performing a gay penguin marriage ceremony, but it would have a lot less weight now, and that’s delightful.

Your Related Link For The Day: Meet Zoo Atlanta’s Gay Flamingos and Their Chick.  You’re welcome.

Ann is Mean: Given how much I love this show, it’s amazing how I feel about Ann. In that I don’t like her. I range between disliking her Continue reading

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I know it completely won’t matter but

A letter to CVS Caremark*, on the occasion of my prescription’s increasing 1009% in one month, because I had exhausted my “one trial month” and now need to switch to either mail order or a CVS store: Continue reading

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Hillary’s child sex ring and other YOU ARE A MORON

pizzaToward the end of the campaign I saw a couple of my Trump-enabled acquaintances refer to Hillary as a pedophile. I didn’t even ask, because by that point their rants were so nonsensical as to not be worth my time. So I didn’t even know this was a thing.

Now I would like to say: JESUS CHRIST. Really? Really? A child sex ring? REALLY? Continue reading

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What do we actually DO now?

vuurwerk_in_new_yorkWell, 2016 was fun, right? And we’ve all been wallowing in the not-fun for a couple of weeks now at the very least. I personally am tired of the wallowing. I’ve decided to put some of my money where my mouth is and commit to regular donations to a bunch of charities. I have come to understand that there is real non-monetary value in committed, regular donations, rather than my usual random one-off impulses. So I decided to pick some and actually do it.

There are a lot of great charities, and I was a little overwhelmed, so I made a small list of issues that are important to me, and then Continue reading

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Ghostbusters: Not All Women

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One thing we all need to know about Ghostbusters is that my husband enjoyed it unequivocally. And that’s great news, because he is Prime Target Audience.

My husband is by no stretch of the imagination one of the charming male-persons who has been so determined to ruin the box office prospects of this movie. (He wouldn’t be my husband if he were!) And he will even go Continue reading

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The Judge Who Didn’t

“Good morning!” the judge says, too cheerfully. Nobody replies.

“I’ll try that again… Good morning!”

Under the bailiff’s glare, the motley crew on the uncomfortable benches manages to mutter out a response. Nobody else looks nearly as excited to be there. In court, you’re either afraid of what’s coming, or you’re angry about what happened, but nobody’s there for a good time. Not even the guy wearing happily colored flannel pants covered in marijuana leaves.

“Well, I am having a good morning,” the judge says. “I had a good breakfast, I’ve got some coffee right here, and I’m going to get good work done today. And you’re all going to help me. The first thing Continue reading

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Sometimes the cheese works

The Close-of-Service “Letter to Yourself”
(Cross-posted at my other blog, Diary of the Desert.)

Tuesday, September 18, 2001.

It’s your (my) last day in Bayt Yafa. Surprisingly typical: I had breakfast upstairs. We watched the new miniseries, but it isn’t as good as the old one with Abu Sfooh. I came downstairs to clean and the girls came with me to help and wouldn’t be deterred. Lunch was Continue reading

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The River & The Mayor

This is a story about the time I ended up in a cabinet meeting with the Mayor of Wuhan. But before it gets there, I have to talk about diarrhea and vomit.

Diarrhea is a natural thing we don’t talk about much. Or when we do, we use euphemisms. Which is funny, really, because if there’s one thing we have in common with literally every other human being on the planet, it’s Continue reading

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Just Kidding

Turns out Alfred’s peeps did reply. Bless their hearts.

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I mean, even with a misspelling or two, that’s a nice note to a kid. Perhaps we will meet again, AHMM.

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Death Blobs of the Past

When this self-employment thing isn’t going so well, I will be able to tell myself I’ve been getting rejections for a very long time. Or passive non-response rejections, anyway. [ETA: they did reply, and kindly, even if it was indeed a rejection. See next post.]

The below is a 1986 letter from my esteemed father to Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine (which still exists, who knew?). Continue reading

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