accidental feminist

what not to watch April 25, 2008

Evanston Athletic Club has, like any respectable athletic club, televisions mounted to the front of their cardio machines. Although their lack of a DVR that would allow me to watch my choice of programming is a serious design flaw, they do have cable, and I can usually find something to watch for 45 minutes. In fact, I’ve developed a playlist of sorts of “work out” shows, i.e. shows that I would never choose to waste my time watching at home, but that somehow become incredibly appealing once I’m stuck on an ellipital machine. Ooh. Ooh. Is this the season where Chandler and Monica are married? Hmmm…they really do look “Ten Years Younger”! Oh, Chris Matthews, you’re so happy with yourself!

I have learned, however, that there are certain things you cannot watch while working out:
1. “The Godfather”- depressing tragic hero + bloody ass kicking + increased heart rate + vague smell of someone else’s sweat = nausea.

2. Anything on “E!”*- schadenfreude + public embarassment when the person next to you sees that you’re watching it + the strong stench of the guy next to you ripping a big one = nausea

*Note: You may be able to get away with watching “The Soup” because “Hey, I’m mocking this vapid, celebrity-worshipping culture! Really!”

3. HGTV - Actually, there’s never really a reason to watch HGTV. “Whoa! That guy built his house in the shape of a Smurf mushroom cottage! That’s weird…I’m bored…”

enchanted= maybe i don’t hate everything April 22, 2008

I have to admit it, despite my gag-reflex at the thought of Disney trying to be meta, some of this movie actually worked. Here’s a breakdown:

Worked-
* Amy Adams got that Disney princess movement and voice down “freaky-good”, y’all.
* “Working Song” and “How Does She Know That You Love Her” work way better in the actual movie than on stage at the Oscars. Oh, I get it! Because New York is streotypically dirty and the people are stereotypically misanthropic, so it’s ironic! Sure, sure.
* Susan Sarandon- Bassie says she has a beautiful voice, and wants to see other Susan Sarandon films now. Hmmm…shall it be “Rocky Horror” or “Dead Man Walking”?

Didn’t Work-
* Most of the plot
* Most of the dialogue
* That stupid chipmunk

All in all worth the expense, considering Dina got it as a gift. (At least it’s not this)

call me a neoluddite, but… April 16, 2008

Um, no.

a second in what appears to be a series of suburban mother rants April 15, 2008

Um, okay. How do I explain this? When you make my latte without foam, and I get up the nerve to point this out to you, which is very out of character for me and I hate doing, but which my friend who works at Starbucks has encouraged me to to in order to provide proper feedback to baristas regarding their milk foaming abilities, and you fix the problem by taking that very same non-foamed latte and scooping some foam onto it from some unrelated metal “milk foaming” pitcher you are not fixing the problem. (If, however, you are placing foam from the very pitcher in which you foamed my milk in the first place, I may be more lenient; but I’m not happy).

My Starbucks employee friend can back me on this: hot, unfoamed milk and hot, foamed milk taste different.

Now, you’ll have to excuse me. I’m late to my daughter’s soccer practice and I still have to pick up the Capri Sun for the team snack. Good thing I have this mini-van to fit them all!

certain notes on the use of reusable shopping bags April 14, 2008

First of all, let it be known that I am not an active environmentalist. I don’t compost; I don’t go out of my way to recycle the glass that my landlord refuses to put in our regular recycling; I don’t take fast showers. But I am an environmental pragmatist. If aiding the environment is made into an economically beneficial option (and here I use “economically in a broad sense of exchange, and not just monetarily), then I will do it. It’s why I sent the cover of my recent Newsweek, filled with Target bags, to Tercycle. And it seems I am not alone, since it is clear that the reusable shopping bag has recently reached a tipping point. And I am on the bandwagon.

(Sit tight; that was just the prologue…)

So I go shopping at the big mega-Jewel on Howard tonight, since I have to fill several prescriptions there. I usually shop at the much smaller but well-stocked Dominick’s on Green Bay, but, things as they are…

So I get to the check out and proudly lay my reusable shopping bags on the conveyor belt. Things seem to be going fine, although the bagger is skimping on the bag-filling a bit. I reach over to help her load some light cereal boxes on top of the meat. Now, I’m feeling a little micro-managey at this point, so I back off. What happens next I would not believe but that I witnessed it myself. After half filling two of my three enormous bags, she leaves the third next to her and begins double plastic bagging the rest of the items. She used an entire bag for one matza box. Another for a package of chicken. And the kicker, she bags my freaking 12 roll toilet paper package. That thing barely even fits in a bag.

At this point, dear reader, I assume you are asking: Why would this dumb-shit bagger (and I’m not saying all of them are) use even more plastic bags than is normal for a person who has brought her own reusable bags? Alas, I cannot answer this question; but I can finish my epic tale…

Now I notice the unused bag, and remark as such to my foolish bagger. She smiles a sheepish grin, opens the bag, and proceeds to place the already half-filled plastic bags into my bag. I am dumbstuck, nay, awestruck, at her complete obliviousness. Rather than trying to stop her, I wait patiently until she is done, then move myself and my cart to the side, dump all of the contents of the plastic bags into my bag, and shove all of the plastic bags into the bagging station of the register next to mine. “Take your god damn bags!” I cry in my head. Then I turn and smile at the bagger, thank her, and head out into the cool night air.

“isn’t that something that old people get?” April 11, 2008

A thirty year old woman should not approach a colonoscopy like one approaches a yearly teeth cleaning. Next thing you know, It’ll be all “Doesn’t everyone have an enlarged prostate?” and “Time for my monthly blood letting…”

“laura linney is a revelation” April 7, 2008

I put that in quotes because I’m just assuming that more than one critic has used it to describe her current stint as Abigail Adams in the HBO mini-series named for the aforementioned’s husband. She makes the tiniest facial tick explode with emotion on my crystal clear Panasonic HDTV (although I don’t think I have quite the level of readership that would allow me to actually make money from Panasonic with that plug…).

It’s inspiring to see two equally strong people in such a seemingly mutually supportive relationship. Obviously they had their issues, too, but that makes it all the more touching to watch them work through such difficulties and remain together (and by “such difficulties” I mean primarily “A recently widowed and totally hot Thomas Jefferson hanging around their home in Paris and obviously having a little thing for Abby”).

I can’t wait to watch last night’s episode later this week. I’m really hoping that my big Founding Father crush, Alexander Hamilton, makes an appearance. Yum!

happy birthday, dina. April 6, 2008

My good friend recently wrote a very insightful post about bratz, and, shocked as I am to be disagreeing with her, I’m going to have to go out on a limb on this one and say that…

those things are f-ing vile! Are they 21 year old hookers? 8 year old nymphets? 90 year old plastic surgery addicts? They are awful! Awful! Awful!

So when Dina got this for her birthday today, I was beside myself.

“But I looooove it Mommy!”

Yes, and it’s Mommy’s job, just sometimes, to save you from yourself.

I’m all for positive body image. I’m all for being open with children about sexuality. And yet, and yet…I envision the next line of bratz dolls: Polly Porn Star! Comes with wax strips and asshole bleaching kit.

Was that shocking to some of you? Now you know how I feel…

a cautionary tale… April 1, 2008

…to those women who have cultivated the habit of taking food or drink from their husband’s plate/glass without asking first:

It started as a normal interaction. I had put my antibiotic in my mouth, and didn’t want to walk to the kitchen to get a drink of water to swig it down with. Yosef had in his glass what seemed to be that watery ice/soda mixture that occurs when you’re done drinking and you leave it to melt. Naturally, I grabbed it and poured it toward my lips.

But before it even got there, I noticed something; a sweet yet pungent smell. Only upon actually collecting some of the liquid in my mouth did I place the scent: it was twelve year old Scotch.

Yosefblog, realizing what had just happened, could only laugh at my folly. And I certainly learned my lesson: don’t drink that mixture of melted ice and soda at the bottom of the glass, because it just might be alcohol.