Month: June 2014

News & Politics

Stay Assy, Ted!

Shelly

If we stay on this insane course to self-destruction (fundamental transformation), America will indeed go the way of soulless collectivism, and the American Dream will become the American nightmare.
From Right Wing Watch (I refuse to link to Wingnut Daily)

It’s easy to talk about the evils of collectivism when you are obscenely rich. It’s also easy to wax rhapsodic about your right to live the American Dream when you’re part of the 1% who is able to dream. The wealthy have stacked the deck so that we cannot, and never will be able to, claw our way out of the mess THEY have landed us in, and all the while they are ridiculing us for our lack of bootstraps.

Fuck you, Ted Nugent, and the horse you rode in on.

News & Politics

This Happened

Shelly

Judge Young wrote, “In time, Americans will look at the marriage of couples such as Plaintiffs, and refer to it simply as a marriage – not a same-sex marriage. These couples, when gender and sexual orientation are taken away, are in all respects like the family down the street. The Constitution demands that we treat them as such.”
From HRC

Judge Young did not issue a stay, so marriages commenced immediately.

Of course, some counties are insisting on being giant shitheads and are refusing to issue marriage licenses. Monroe County, I am happy to report, is not one of those. Our county clerks office was immediately open for business and has already performed four marriages. (I for real started tearing up typing that.)

Also of course, Indiana Attorney General Greg Zoeller says he is asking for an immediate stay of the decision. He’s a special kind of asshole that way.

Crankypantsing

Instant Review: Yoplait Greek 100

Shelly

I eat a lot of yogurt and prefer Greek because it’s thicker and you get more protein for your calorie bucks. I’ve been eating Dannon Light and Fit, despite the fact that it has artificial sweeteners in it, because I like the texture and it’s only 80 calories per serving. I can add Fiber One to it and get a decent amount of protein plus stay full, for just under 150 calories.

My grocery store didn’t have Dannon Light and Fit on sale (or, rather, not the flavors I like), so I tried Yoplait Greek 100. What. Fresh. Hell. Is. This? Y’all, it is awful. Way too sweet, and somehow it’s runny. How do you make Greek yogurt and have it still be runny? The stuff is supposed to be strained multiple times to remove excess moisture. That’s why it’s so high in protein relative to regular yogurt.

I double and triple checked the nutrient label. It allegedly has 12 grams of protein, which puts it in line with other Greek yogurts, but I don’t understand how it could possibly have that much protein given that it’s runny. Something seems fishy to me.

Also, when I added my Fiber One to it (if you’ve never had it, it looks like little twigs, and the taste and texture is what you’d expect from little twigs), the cereal got soggy before I could eat it. That never happens with Greek yogurt. It’s thick enough that it doesn’t saturate the cereal before I can finish it.

Do not like. DO NOT WANT. But I have 9 more containers of it, so I’ll be eating it for the next two weeks. O gross.

Found Poems, Poetry

A house with human hands built

Shelly

A house with human hands built

A house
with human hands built
lay now underwater
salt and weeds, all
eternally hidden
Glass Sun invisible.
It had been there for a long time
Centuries
the dwelling place
of wisdom and sacrifice
blossomed into thorn.

So. I was trolling around in my Amazon recommendations, like ya’ do, and up popped Marion Zimmer Bradley’s “Mists of Avalon.” I read the book when I was a kid, on the glowing recommendation of a neighbor who was getting her masters in English Lit. It passed for “pretty good” at the time. She was no Mary Stewart (a comparison that folks on Facebook are quick to point out and which I agree with). Then I reread the book, a few years back. To be charitable, it did not hold up well. It is every damn thing I loathe about feminist earth goddess worship woo. Every. Damn. Thing. And it was crap, and not very well written crap, either. Cringe-inducing, ham-fisted crap that takes itself way too seriously.

I wondered, looking at the book on Amazon, how it got so damn many five-star reviews. Are the reviewers all 12 year olds? If so, I think their bad taste can be excused. I doubt it, though. I posted about my befuddlement on Facebook, and a friend directed me to this page.

I was gobsmacked. I had no idea Marion Zimmer Bradley was a child molester. I think I may have read about her ex-husband being involved in NAMBLA and being convicted of child molesting, but I didn’t know MZB was involved or to what extent. I’m gobsmacked. But also, thinking back on some of the passages in Mists of Avalon (I’ve not read any of her other books), with this knowledge, they take on a new and horrifying aspect.

The bottom line is that this is not a book I want in my house. I also don’t want to pass it on to a thrift store. What to do? I guess I’ll tear out pages and make poems with them. That’s the best way I know to exorcise contemptible ghosts.