Thrift Store Male Objectification!

Another one that's a little too saucy for Hello Giggles, but Bad Cholla sent me a picture of this epic poster for sale in a local thrift store: 

 Although...really...a woman's touch? Won't any touch at all do, really?

The Secret Miracle: Don't Be A Douche

Okay, so as I mentioned, the $100 that I finally earned from folks clicking on the ads on this blog was used for a writing project--a deposit for a residency at the Prairie Center for the Arts where I'll be for a month-ish this summer (it's a key deposit--I'll get it back if I don't trash the place). So: your support here on my blog = time writing this summer. And once/if I get the $100 back, I'll totally take suggestions as what I should do with it (Bedazzling? Fine liquor? Objets d'art?).

In honor of writing, I thought I'd share that I'm currently rolling around in awesome books. I just finished Colm Toíbín's The Master, which was bliss, and I'm still reading his short story collection The Empty Family.

And for all those authors out there looking self-promote, this is why I started reading him: my friend S. lent-then-gave me the book The Secret Miracle: The Novelist's Handbook, edited by Daniel Alarcón. It's interviews with authors--divvied up by theme--about various aspects of the writing process (well, specifically the novel-writing process). 

Anyway, S. and I both agreed that some authors came off wonderfully--as in, "How insightful/charmingly self-deprecating! I'd bet we'd be total BFFs and could go down to the pub and have a pint and talk about George Elliot/insert author of your choice! And even if we cannot or should not ever develop a personal relationship, some of these writing insights are both reassuring and useful!" --while some came off a utter douches.  

Misha Collins is Awesome, and I am Surprisingly Emotional About It

So, you know how the Fug Girls are recapping Ringer? (I find this interaction particularly awesome/sweet, I have to say). And I was like, "Oh cute! Cause I am trying to totally not failing at recapping Supernatural! CW cheese 4evah!"

Well, then there's this news: Misha Collins is going to guest-star on Ringer.

Halloween Shenanigans: Strange Clouds

So I actually put in some effort into Halloween this year -- me and Bad Cholla spent an afternoon at Savers creating Nancy Kerrigan and Tonya Harding costumes. 

For those wondering if the costumes were a little outdated (Jason: "Timely. What you going to be next year? Judge Ito?"), they were originally conceived of for a roller skating party. But then--ironically--the Tonya Harding to my Nancy Kerrigan suffered an injury, and we didn't go roller skating. While we eventually wore the costumes on Actual Halloween and I think they were successful, when I told people, "Originally, they were gonna be worn roller skating," the person always went from "polite about costumes" to "Oh! That WOULD HAVE been really clever!" So the true epic awesomeness potential was never fully unlocked, but I think we still did good. See?

That's so...Theatrical

Got various news in theater end of things. I'm very lucky to have become one of the theater reviewers for the Tucson Weekly. 

And...this weekend The Gonzo Group Theater is doing a reading of my play, "The Most Incredible Thing" about fairy tale writer Hans Christian Andersen.

There's a reading Saturday, October 15th at 7:30 pm at the Baroque Room in lowertown St. Paul. And a reading Sunday, October 16th at 11:00 am at Golden's Deli (also in lowertown St. Paul). 

For your entertainment, here's Danny Kaye as Hans Christian Andersen: 

Supernatural 7.01 The pre-recap RECAP. (Recap implies spoilers, obvs)

Okay, so let's be honest. There were three things any good Supernatural fan was looking for in the Season Seven premiere:

Favorite Things!

Every time I saw the title to this blog entry, I'd get this song stuck in my head:



Yeah, that's Jane Horrocks! From Ab Fab! On this classic British television programme, she plays my Soul Twin, Bubble:




Here's a picture of me dressed up as Bubble for an Ab Fab themed party in college:

We Have A Winner!

Okay, so "The Time that the Apple Company Accused Me of Peeing on My Computer" won decisively, which was to be expected--I mean, the title is just so weird.

I think the only reason I was hesitant to post that story was because I'd told that story in person so many times. If you were a friend of mine who lived in Minneapolis around 2007-2008, you not only had to live through stages of the story with me, but you got to hear the story, like, more times than you probably wanted to. But but but! There are others out there who haven't heard it! AND SO I WILL TELL AGAIN AND HOPEFULLY TELL WELL.

But I want to put a decent amount of energy into the post (yes, the story involves urine--well, no, actually, the story involves no urine that I knew about, ONLY THE ACCUSATION OF URINE) but to give you the full context would probably take awhile, although the punchline is sort of spoiled in the title.

And right now I am sick. "I'll baby-sit your sick child!" I said. "I never get sick!" I said. "Okay, I'm sick, I can still do stuff!" I said. "I'll just take some cold medicine!" I said. "I can still drink!" I said.

This cold or whatever it is--it's the Terminator of colds. It's the Terminator paparazzi robots in Britney Spear's "I Wanna Go" video:

Really Real Inspector Hound

Wot I Wrote about Wot I Didn't Write: Minneapolis Star-Tribune book review of the The Free World by David Bezmozgis.

I also fulfilled a long-held dream last night and finally saw Tom Stoppard's The Real Inspector Hound. I'd read the play before and even suggested it to my college's summer stock company, UNCO (which I think, sadly, doesn't exist anymore. Am I wrong about this? I hope so) -- as  a friend of mine was going to be directing and was looking for suggestions. And they actually did a production of it! Which I did not get to see, as I never got to be around for/participate in UNCO, as I always had a summer conflict. (This has always made me sad).

So, despite my fannishness of the play, and the fact that I was extremely indirectly and casually responsible for a production of it coming into being, I'd never seen it performed.

And it was well worth the wait! As funny as the play is to read, it's much, much funnier performed (obviously); anything confusing about the script makes perfect (albeit, absurdist, dream-like) sense in production; AND it was done very well by The Rogue Theater company, who have a great track record and put up this extremely cool-looking sign on the Historic Y building:

If you're in the Tucson area, see this immediately! The also open with another (very short) Stoppard play called New-Found-Land.

Rage Distorts Creative Title Abilities: The Eurovision Song Contest Entry

Some time ago -- actually, (gulp!) this was nearly a year ago -- my parents were both highly amused over a New Yorker article on the Eurovision song contest and kept pressing me to read it.

I think my parents simply enjoyed the article as they had not thought about the Eurovision song contest in a long time, and it made them nostalgic about living in Europe/being European. Which is fine. But I simply couldn't stand this particular article, though I didn't take the time to deeply analyze why.

For your reference, most famous product of said contest:

When my parents asked what I found so objectionable about the article, all I could articulate was that I found it too condescending. It's all very well to write about something you affectionately find tacky or awful, but there's a fine line being light-heartedly snarky and simply being a patronizing ass.

Recently, a few things have brought the Eurovision song contest to my attention again, and I decided to write a blog about these new perspectives. But in order to do so, I had to go back and read the article online (bless you for your amazing online archives, New Yorker).

Reading the article again, I got so angry that a) my jaw actually popped, due to my unconscious clenching of it; b) at one point, I grabbed two chunks of my hair and pulled, causing myself physical pain. This article actually made me try to pull my hair out.

Anyway, here it is. It was so anger-making that it derailed my entire post, which was simply going to be a few links to different perspectives on the Eurovision contest. Instead, the other articles and links and perspective will be incorporated within this rant. You've been warned: it's a rant. I'm about to get all polemical up in here.

Signs of Life, Part II

It's funny to be up in Canada, the place the blog was born. This post is also sort of a sequel to this.

Sometimes it's hard to find things:

Here is an odd case of emphasis:


I would understand if it read:

Don't invite BEARS to the cottage.

Or: DON'T INVITE Bears to the cottage.

But why: Don't invite bears to THE COTTAGE?

It makes it sound as if THE COTTAGE is the ominous part of the sentence, when, really, isn't it BEARS or DON'T INVITE?

THE COTTAGE isn't, in and of itself, particularly scary. I mean, you wouldn't say, Hope you have a nice time without bears at THE COTTAGE! Or, Be safe from bears while you're up at THE COTTAGE! I hope your time at THE COTTAGE is very relaxing with no bears.

Accidentally Racist Cupcake Arrangement?

The disadvantage to boasting about your fabu skillz/love for baking things is that sometimes you can get asked to bake things. Cupcakes were requested of me, meaning that there was a push-pull between narcissism and laziness:

Narcissism: I love praise and attention! It feels like love!

Laziness: But I'm so laaaaaazzzzzzy.

But desire to please won out, so I made cupcakes! And put them on my awesome stand. I realized afterwards that the way I had arranged them was inadvertently a little racist:

Why are the minority white cupcakes at the TOP of the stand, towering over the majority chocolate cupcakes? Am I trying to visually illustrate apartheid through baked goods?

In truth, I just had some leftover vanilla frosting to use up and made a new batch of chocolate.

Because I'm determined to become a complete cliche/caricature of myself, I made the cupcakes while listening to Lady Gaga. After complete indifference/annoyance when it came to "Born This Way" and general irritation at the Catholic guilt/spirituality/whatever-whatever she is going through right now, I am completely in love with "Judas." I'm gonna have to buy the album when it comes out, aren't I? Damnit, Gaga, I cannot afford this! I caved and bought Britney's Femme Fatale (which is awesome) but her dead eyes and catatonic dancing make me feel weird about it! I don't want another pop diva album that I have ambivalent feelings about right now, please.

Excuse me while I go listen to "Judas" one more time.

Disappointing Gay Best Friend

Sometimes, when I have intense, internal debates with myself about Britney (is she an unhappy robot or a triumphant revolutionary comeback queen and what the hell is up with her extensions and the mystery of the disappearing dancing awesomeness? Please come back, dancing!) or Lady Gaga (activist and/or corporate pawn and/or is it okay to just be getting bored with her?)--when I listen to my favorite band, snuggle with my favorite TV show, or read my favorite book--I wonder why God didn't just finish the job properly and make me a gay man. If I were to be born a man, my mother was seriously considering naming me Percy, and no power on earth will ever convince me that slim, bookish, effete Percy Derwyn Wepre Owen would not have been the gayest gay man that ever gayed a gay.

If I ever work up the courage or figure out how to work a scanner, I'll scan in my eighth grade school picture: I was rocking a very short haircut at the time, and it gives you a pretty good sense of what ol' Percy "Easy O" would have been like. Because I have a long neck and big eyes, my friends referred to this picture as "the newt picture," because they are sweethearts. I sort of looked like this, only unattractive rather than attractive (reason #4 million for my affection for Jensen Ackles: similar hair and sartorial errors in the nineties. Of course, as I stated, Jensen Ackles is hot like burning, and I am more along the lines of You Would Look Pretty If You Smiled More! But still!)

But then, when I start thinking things like the above paragraphs (OMG I SHOULD BE A GAY MAN TEE HEE) I get really annoyed with myself. Because I sort of hate how women act about gay men sometimes: that gay men are around for our amusement, or should automatically be our "gay husbands," or that all gay men are feminized and/or like stereotypically "gay" things. Gay men aren't our cute little poodle pets to put in our purses, people. That shit bugs me.

So I was delighted to find this the other day: Disappointing Gay Best Friend. Both actors just nail it; it's amazing.

More Deep Thoughts About Important Things

Yes, I teach impressionable young-ish minds, and theoretically write books and other literary-type things, but there's something important you should know about me, and that is that I'm completely obsessed with the legendary Ms. Britney Spears.

I've been "outing" myself more and more recently, so this won't be news to most of you...I have long, complicated thoughts and theories about why I love Ms. Britney so much, and that's matter for another day. It has a lot to do, as most pop culture obsessions do, with growing up in the particular cultural moment that I have, and the fact that Britney, as a celebrity, has come to mean and stand for lots of things, both to the culture and to me personally. To explain my complicated feelings -- which in the past, have consisted of envy, disgust, admiration, morbid fascination, schandenfreude, pity, admiration, frustration, and now mostly consist of "You go, girl!" -- would take a long time and involve sharing lots of complicated stuff about myself.

So for now, I'll just explain what I love about the following clip from a Britney concert.

1) The fact that, a few days ago, feeling grumpy and stressed, I decided that the ONLY thing that would make me feel better would be to watch Britney dance to "Toxic."

2) The fact that, at first, seeing the midriff baring and tight bright pants, I was like, "Oh an old Britney clip" only to realize that in fact this is from her concert like LAST WEEK. This is CURRENT Britney, people. AMAZING! She's looks great!

3) The fact that she STILL wears freaking midriff tops CONSTANTLY despite the fact that the fad has long past and that, although she's got a nice tummy these days, it's not the scary-buff abs of yore. It's like she's stuck a little in 1999, which is both sweet and sad.

4) But, snideness aside, her abs and body do look great. She jumps all around and there's NO BOUNCING of her tummy. It's all muscle. I shudder to think what would happen if I jumped around in a midriff-baring shirt, under bright lights, no less. Lord.

5) OH MY GOD SHE'S WEARING GLASSES! Girl is dancing in glasses! And has to adjust them during the routine. It might be the cutest thing ever.

6) Her TERRIBLE hair. This makes me feel so bad for Britney. Girl has no hair! She's dyed it so much and had so many extensions that she has very little real hair left. And despite being a millionaire many times over, her weaves almost always look ratty. But I kind of love that. Do you know how long it takes to sit in a stupid chair and get all those extensions put in? I might be like, "Fuck it, I'm putting in a sloppy bun," too. And I absolutely would have shaved my head, too. Am I the only one to whom that particular piece of Britney-madness made complete sense? YEARS of painful dye and extensions and wigs that have WRECKED your hair and EVERYONE makes fun of you about it. I'd buzz it off during a divorce, too. For realz.

7) Her dancing! Maybe not up to prime-of-Britney, but energetic and she looks like she's having fun.

8) The fact that Britney inspires me to dance and to have to fun with it. Yes, that's super-cheesy, I know. But true. And I'm not alone. There's a documentary called "How Britney Spears Saved My Life." Seriously. I wouldn't go that far, but I think it's sweet. Even the filmmaker was a convert.

Do your thing, Britney:



And, if you feel like, Get Naked: