A Retraction

There was a time when...

if you were listening and the wind was blowing the right way

...you could have heard me say, "'Fever' is my fave song and it's impossible for ~anyone~ to screw it up".

I would like to firmly, but very sadly, retract that statement.

Furthermore, I would like to make this retraction retroactive to Madonna's
version of this song.

Thank you.

If you don't stand for something, you'll eat anything....

I'm against fat marriage.

I think it's an abomination and a detriment to our society to allow these buttery little creampuffs to unite under God's pained eyes.

Think of the cost on taffeta! Let alone the injury caused should a piece of support underclothing burst.

As we're all aware, there has been much controversy over gay marriage recently. Consider this: it's all a very clever smoke screen thrown up by the obese community so that they can get married by the rolly polly thousands while we're all watching My Fabulous Gay Wedding. Why else would we care what a homosexual man wears on 'his day'? It needs to be stopped. Marriage is not a right, it's a privilege and the thought that overly portly lovebirds are falling over each other in a slow and sweaty race to get another slice of wedding cake just...well...it's just not right.

I mean...correct me if I'm wrong, but it's Adam and Eve, not Adam and Orca. If God had wanted fatties to pair off he wouldn't have covered their genitals with sagging bellies and flabby thighs. It's unnatural because, unlike homosexuality, you don't see ~that~ in the wild.

And, if they do manage to fit 'tab A into slot B' (somehow), the children! What about the children? Watching Mommy and Daddy's deep fried behaviour certainly will reflect in their own lifestyle choices. Some grow up thinking it's okay and acceptable and end up running (ha!) with the greasy torch of their parents within their moist grip. Or, studies have also shown, other grown children of flabby couples have regretted their sweet and sticky formative years (where, I've heard, some were unaware of some 'higher' concepts (ie. the sky) until they entered school...so long they were sheltered under a dimpled umbrella) and advise against it.

Besides...from what I've heard and seen, fat people don't even want to get married. Most find each other as unappealing as the rest of us do. Why should we redefine our definition of the word and holy sacrament of marriage (as a union between a man and a woman...but I'm not sure that includes such characters as jabba the hut and the michellen man) for a small minority of people who wouldn't want to 'get it on' with each other anyway? I mean, if you can't bear to watch someone dance, it's probably worse to watch them sweating and panting above, below, or behind you, your preference is none of my business.

It is an unhealthy lifestyle and therefore harmful that the wishes of the chubby are being thrust into our regular, god-fearing, easy-on-the-butter society. If we accept this then what's next? Monkeys running for office? Robots driving cars? What?

Live Nude Men

Last night I was trained in my second casting session to run a camera.

For my post on the first one see Girls Girls Girls that I wrote...I dunno...last week or somethin'.

Anyway...this one couldn't have been more different than a bunch of 3-5 year old little girls running around with their dresses up. It was a bunch of 21-55 year old men running around with their tops off. See? Complete opposite.

I can tell you the girls were way cuter.

Shirtless men of all shapes, sizes and ages were led into the casting room 3 at a time to audition for a pants commercial and were then instructed to dance to the musical stylings of Mr. Leo Sayer's You Make Me Feel Like Dancing with their hands in the air.

It was all about the belly.

And I was instructed to film them from the nipples downward.

The irony is that this has been #4 in my top ten list of sexual fantasies. It comes right after being bukkake'd by the linguistics department at MIT and a threesome with Charles and Camilla (but Diana's still alive in my fantasy).

It was quite funny to watch half naked men forced to akwardly dance in front of fully clothed men with two women on camera. It reminded me of another fantasy in which I'm in some sort of cross between a night club and a nazi camp.

In the end...I have no idea who they picked.

For the record

Micheal Jackson never molested me, either.

In fact, he never even invited me to Neverland.

WoW

Dear Sir,

As a level 30 Tauren curently residing in The Barrens, I was wondering how many experience points this would get me, considering this would ~have~ to be a 40 lvl quest at least.

Also, I would like to know if there is the chance for a reward of some sort of magic item?

Strength in honour,
Hoots

shoe

shoe
Originally uploaded by himbly.

I had a rock in my shoe all day yesterday.

I was too lazy to take it out, so I called it 'penance'.

I feel cleansed.

Wow! I'm great, I guess!

Your #1 Match: INFP

The Idealist You are creative with a great imagination, living in your own inner world. Open minded and accepting, you strive for harmony in your important relationships. It takes a long time for people to get to know you. You are hesitant to let people get close. But once you care for someone, you do everything you can to help them grow and develop. You would make an excellent writer, psychologist, or artist.

Your #2 Match: ISFP

The Artist You are a gifted artist or musician (though your talents may be dormant right now). You enjoy spending your free time in nature, and you are good with animals and children. Simply put, you enjoy bueaty in all its forms and live for the simple pleasures in life. Gentle, sensitive, and compassionate - you are good at recognizing people's unspoken needs. You would make a good veterinarian, pediatrician, or composer.

Your #3 Match: ENFP

The Inspirer You love being around people, and you are deeply committed to your friends. You are also unconventional, irreverant, and unimpressed by authority and rules. Incredibly perceptive, you can usually sense if someone has hidden motives. You use lots of colorful language and expressions. You're qutie the storyteller! You would make an excellent entrepreneur, politician, or journalist.

Your #4 Match: ESFP

The Performer You are a natural performer and happiest when you're entertaining others. A great friend, you are generous, fun-loving and optimistic. You love to laugh - and you like almost all people equally. You accept life as it is, and you do your best to make each day fantastic. You would make a good actor, designer, or counselor.

Your #5 Match: INFJ

The Protector You live your life with integrity, originality, vision, and creativity. Independent and stubborn, you rarely stray from your vision - no matter what it is. You are an excellent listener, with almost infinite patience. You have complex, deep feelings, and you take great care to express them. You would make a great photographer, alternative medicine guru, or teacher.

What's Your Personality Type?

...a few bad apples...

Wow!

What a huge apple!


It'll be our special secret.

Girls! Girls! Girls!

Last night I was at a casting session for 2-5 year old little girls.

(I was there to start training on how to run a camera for these things since it's my friends' business and they're run off their feet at the moment.)

I don't know if these auditions were for a movie or for TV but I do know one thing....piles of little girls dressed up and eager are really really funny.

I ~could~ tell you a ton of stories about what each little girl did that was cuter than the last...but everyone within a 10m radius of me has heard/is hearing/will hear those yesterday, today and probably tomorrow, so I won't do it here. However, I will tell you that if I have a little girl that is in a performance situation, I will put her in pants as it's much more difficult to pull those over your head when you're nervous. I will tell you that now instead of a puppy, I want a daughter...but I realize they're harder to chain up in the backyard. I also will tell you that little girls really enjoy saying 'shit' when their dad says they're allowed.

Can you imagine what my bf had to deal with when I got home?

But most of all, I just wanted to mention this:

The woman who was directing the casting session was quite brilliant at eliciting the response she wanted from each of the little girls. Not all of them did what she asked, but she achieved a much higher success rate than I would....so I call it 'brilliant'.

For instance, each little girl was asked to perform a song. If they seemed they would sing with a little bit of encouragement, the casting director would start singing (ABC, Itsy Bitsy Spider, or even songs she didn't know) wrong and the girls would not be able to help correcting her by singing the song in full. So it would go like this:

CD: "oh! Itsy Bitsy Spider is my favourite song! It goes like this:

Itsy Bitsy Elephant
Went down the wall
And it started to rain..."

kid: "nooooo! It's like this..."

And she would stand up and sing the song as well as she could...~with~ the actions.

Watching this, it finally hit me.

I've never grown past that stage of development.

Jesus, I've only ~just~ grown past the lifting my dress when I'm nervous phase!

benedictxiv.com

Yeah...

We all know, so I didn't bother saying anything about it.

But this is funny.

Lord of the Flies

The newest sensation from those who brought you Riverdance...

kidding


I just finished reading William Golding's excellent book Lord of the Flies...after months and months. It didn't take that long because it's at all a bad book...on the contrary, it's a great book. It took that long because I've developed into quite a lazy reader these days.

There were even times I was as gripped by it as I have been by WoW. Believe it.

At any rate...if you've read it, test your knowledge with this.

Maradiaga (Honduras) to win...

...Germany to place and Italy to show.

Looks like someone's beat me to it.

Anyone else got any bets? That's mine above.

I guess you could call me a misanthropope...

Lauren Bacall recently made a statement:

We live in an age of mediocrity. Stars today are not the same stature as Bogie (Humphrey Bogart), Jimmy Cagney, Spencer Tracy, Henry Fonda and Jimmy Stewart.

How true.

She, of course, was talking about entertainment. But the truth in that statement extends far beyond.

I'm sure she knows that.

Perhaps it's crass to bring this up before the poor old man is even carried to his final resting place, but *shrug*. More and more as famous and important people waltz off this mortal coil, the reaction has become less actual mourning as much as it has been made into a cultural event in which ~everyone~ wants to say they played a part. And, more and more as we move deeper and deeper into the age of communication and information, we are able to use television, radio and the internet to whip ourselves up into a froth of anticipation, sorrow, or commiseration faster than you can say, 'papal election'.

There are simply not as many real mourners out there as there is people making a show of mourning.

Currently, I am thanking whatever omnipresent being there is that allowed me the foresight to not have access to television for this event. It's all I can take seeing as much as I have. The media circus started days before he even died -my god- and reported to the world every cough and wheeze that escaped him. There's only so many candlelight vigils a person can watch before you either want to tear your hair out or book a ticket to Rome. And millions of people chose the latter simply because they were told others were doing it.

Now (what prompted my writing this) what I hear is rumblings he ought to be named Pope John Paul II 'The Great'. 'The Great'? The only 'great' thing he did was to survive the Vatican for 26 years...which ~was~ a feat considering his predecessor lasted only 33 days. Of course, it's not as insane as when Diana died and people were calling for her to be sainted in the Church of England, but it's still pretty insane.

(That's where my comparisons of the Pope and Diana will end since the Pope was an infinitely more important and influential person than a silly jet-setting princess.)

Anyway, John Paul II was not a 'great' pope.

As a man, he was unusually ambitious, academic, and committed. He would have to be, they don't pick you if you're not. The top banana of the Holy See is a position of unique power and authority. Mediocre men do not reach this position as they can as heads of other governments and royalty. But the title then affords you the ability to ~not~ grow, to not cater to the needs of your people, to meddle where you like and not not respond to situations to which you don't want to respond. Once you're there, you're there...

So, he was not a great pope, nor was he a great man. And I'm not saying that disrespectfully, there are very few real 'great' men and women. That's why they're great...because it's rare. He simply was not one of them. He did some good work, but not enough for me to fall to my knees clutching a rosary and trying to get through to Air Canada on my cell.

(He was also not a holy man. As an ex-Catholic, I cannot see one shred of connection between the Vatican and anything that is ~actually~ holy. But...that's me.)

'Great' as a title can only come to men and women who have gone above and beyond the call of duty. John Paul II did not. To 'splain:

One of the main jobs of the Pope is to promote the Catholic Church. A pope travels, meets people, performs mass all over the world in a grand scale attempt to keep Catholics catholic and make non-catholics catholic. The pomp and circumstance that surrounds the Catholic church and it's rituals is one of the world's oldest forms of propaganda and advertising. Check an art history text.

It is true that JPII was directly involved with the fall of communism in Europe. He worked up the people so that Lech Walesa could do his thing so that Mikhail Gorbachev could do ~his~ thing. It was important and changed the lives of millions upon millions. But, it wasn't altruistic. As pope it was his job to sniff out the opportunity to regain millions of Catholics lost to communism. He was the right nationality, in the right place at the right time. Good job, but it would have happened with or without him.

So, yeah...but no.

A truly great man and a truly great pope would reform the church. He would try to drag it closer to the 21st century and address the issues of today in a more rational manner. It's relatively important to us in North America and Europe, but we forget the grip the church has on third world and developing nations and how it's absolutely vital to the people of those cultures that it act with logic and caring. The pope was vocal in STILL condemning birth control and masturbation as mortal sins while these countries sink under the weight of the problems brought about by overpopulation and HIV.

And of course, a truly great pope would have tackled the issue of rampant pedophilia within it's clergy and tried to save thousands of children from it's own predators. Instead, he allowed these men to be nuzzled within the safety of the Vatican, moved from parish to parish with no regard for the children they were to meet next. As Christopher Hitchens referenced Maureen Dowd:

I should say now that I think she put it best of all. A church that has allowed no latitude in its teachings on masturbation, premarital sex, birth control, and divorce suddenly asks for understanding and "wiggle room" for the most revolting crime on the books.

But, in this age of communication at the speed of light, media as the center of everyone's attention, and news of events that can now reach almost anyone in the world, it is easy to forget all the important things a person ~hasn't~ done and lift up their achievements so that they seem to have reached such heights that the world almost deifies them. We seem so badly want ~something~ and we rush toward whatever we can to lose ourselves in it.

Whatever.

I, for one, am very curious as to who's up next. I'm thinking of putting bets on it. Anyone with me?

Awww...hell...

In the interest of making this blog more pleasing to my eye, I tried on some different templates.

And lost all my links...

So...does anyone remember what I had, even?

An Open Letter to the Young Women Of North America...

(Or how I learned to stop worrying and love Gloria Steinem)

Britney Spears lied to you. At least her handlers did.

I guarantee that, if you're the average North American 20-something, you don't have as much time in your day to spend on appearance as Britney does. Ergo, unless you've been genetically blessed to the point of being Naomi Campbell or her ilk, you don't have the body to pull off Britney's clothes. Besides, she's taped, pushed, pulled, and posed to look reasonable. You don't have a stylist following you...well...most of you don't, so stop it.

The truth is that those super low tight pants you're wearing...they push up your hip fat and make your butt look really tiny. So...what you've ended up with is a bottom half that looks like your top half is being poured through a funnel. Into big shoes.

Say that I am aging and jealous. Say that I'm jiggly in the buttock and thigh region. Say that I long for the days I could go out barely dressed and look reasonable. All those may be true. Whatever. They all pale next to the fact that I'm telling you the truth. You all look like freshly scrubbed whores.

Those outfits may get you laid at the bar. And if they do, good for you! You accomplished your goal and far be it from me to tell you what to wear when you're on the prowl with your heavily perfumed compadres. However, is it too much to ask that you don't serve my lunch with your gut hanging over your pants? Because, the amazing part is, you don't ~have~ a gut! By any woman's standards, you're usually a tiny little thing. It's the pants! There is magical pixie gut-dust in the fibers! Look in a damn mirror!

Which brings me to restaurants, since it was a girl like that who served me my food the other day.

I work downtown. The old, rich oil men in my city who like to look at women that have barely been weened from their mother's teat go to restaurants downtown. I know 1 + 1 makes 2 and I know that the board meeting to decide to hire pretty young girls dressed in clothes that don't really cover ~anything~ probably didn't go like this:

"We need more traffic. Research shows that oil men have lots of money. Now, if you look at this pie chart, research also shows that these oil men are centered around the downtown area, near our downtown location. If I may direct your attention to this diagram, the X-axis shows the age and wealth of the average oil man. The Y-axis shows the youth and hotness of women. You can see at this point here *smacking chart* that young hot women in very little clothes really interest old, balding men with lots of money. I mean, it skyrockets. What do you make of this? Jenkins?"

"I know, Sir! We need to hire young, pretty women who will wear slutty clothes to serve our rich oilmen customers."

"Dagnabbit, Jenkins, you're gonna go far in this company. Now go to the highschools and see if any of those pretty young things are looking to buy a car. And while you're out, pick up my drycleaning. And stay away from my daughter!"

When I was that age I worked at a coffee shop and we girls learned purdy quickly that the tighter our shirts were, the higher our tips would go. It would make the difference between leaving with $2.45 or leaving with $15 extra in our pockets. However, we ~did~ have to dress reasonably and not as if we were Las Vegas showgirls. And we weren't ~encouraged~ by our management. We weren't ~deterred~ either, and lets face it, even we knew why our bosses hired almost all young women but this wasn't a situation in which we were all dressed uniformly in a chain restaurant.

I could now launch into my rant about the backlash that has occured against feminism, but....well...hell, I'm gunna:

Over the past decade or so, I've noticed a serious reaction to feminism in North America in which, like a Phoenix from it's ashes, "The Lout" has risen to become profitable and sexy once again.

Women my age (early 30s) might recall the feminism of our mothers that wound itself into our every thought when we were coming of age in the late 80s/early 90s. But it was ~their~ generation's brand of feminism and when Camile Paglia came out kicking, screaming and foaming at the mouth we all rushed out to buy her book because it was what we needed. We felt we had been denied our sexuality and resented the 'earth mother' that morphed from the feminism we had known. Camile Paglia liked porn, she liked loud noises, she was unreasonable and we felt redeemed.

Not sure when the Riot Grrls came into the scene...but it was about this time. So, them too.

Anyway...so, we finally got to hold our heads high and march, arms linked and heeled high, out into the night to get drunk in our miniskirts, pick up (or be picked up by) whomever we wanted and call it 'reclaiming our control'...or whatever we said it was at the time. We refused to be 'victims' anymore...we were taking responsibility for our choices. We became aggressive, garish, loud, obnoxious, blatant...and other adjectives. We became lout-ish...but with eye makeup and a purpose.

I think men liked it...but mostly because we were being brash with our sexuality. When we used to yell at them, I think they liked it less.

What happened, though...the Spice Girls. They took it, put a bit more sugar in to counter the spice (no pun) and we had 'Girl Power (tm)' . *Whammy!* it was marketable. Girl Power (tm) is cutesy nauseating, but sorta useful, I guess. It's good that young girls and women wake up in the morning with the 'girl power' mantra floating in their heads. Whatever makes them feel powerful is a good thing. But...ugh.

On the other foot, though, the male backlash to all this feminist activity swirling around them was to take the sexuality but ditch the aggression. So, now the pinups they've always loved of Pam Anderson...they were nothing to be ashamed of. And strip clubs were something to be celebrated. Women get the message that no matter how much you work, how much you try to educate yourself , how much yoga you do or how much herbal tea you drink, a man with whom you are in love actually ~wants~ to be with his buddies being served cold beer by chicks with big tits and have nothing more to say than, 'Want more?', 'Bet your wife doesn't do this.' and 'Have you met my twin sister?'

Let me say here that I actually have no beef against strippers or anything. These women choose to do what they're doing and it's profitable...so whatever. My problem is that it went from 'just a thing' to a celebration of men's rights to be pigs...and pride in chauvinistic attitudes.

I used to believe it, too. The Lout's lie. That men had base instincts that had been denied them and now they can fulfill them to their hearts content. Men ~are~ visual creatures and ~do~ gawk a little more than women do, but I've come to understand that their lack of grace and manners are their ~own~ fault. Men don't ~have~ to be The Lout. Men don't ~have~ to watch strippers with their buddies and try to feel up the waitress because they have the choice to be decent and mature. And not all men choose that for their entertainment. Men don't ~have~ to go glassy-eyed and drooly and don't have to 'juggle women' (or pretend to) to feel masculine. Men can ~want~ to be with their imperfect girlfriend/wife and appreciate her thoughts and actions ~without~ stating loudly their right to go out with the boys, get drunk and dump water on some girl in a white t-shirt.

The Man Show, beer commercials, Spike television, Maxim...everywhere you look there's men reclaiming the reclamation women celebrated just years before. The difference is, we celebrated a furtherment in our emancipation. The Lout celebrates taking that back.

And ~that's~ why these restaurants gave themselves the green light to hire an almost exclusively young, hot, and female serving staff, clothed in garments that are irritatingly slutty, and encourage them to be cute and flirty with the customers. The Lout is a big spender and now he feels he's owed.

I went to one of these places with my mother for dinner recently and the waitress interrupted us, in her cute and flirty way, a few times during a very indepth mother/daughter conversation. My god! At least review your customer profile! Flirting with my mother isn't going to get you any more tips!

I'm not sure this is what the Suffragettes had in mind.

I love 'im.

Chomsky
Originally uploaded by himbly.

the play's the thing

pumphouse
Originally uploaded by himbly.

Last night I went to see my dear friends in their performance of a one act play as part of a 'one act play' festival at the Pumphouse Theatre. They chose the play No One Will Be Immune by David Mamet.

1- I was really impressed since the man who took the main role is a dear dear friend with very little acting experience compared to many other (non-doing-anything) actors in this city. I know next to nothing about theatre, but I do know this...g-damn that was hard stuff! He did a great job of it.

2- Turns out I love David Mamet. What a great piece and upon a little research, he's done a bunch of stuff I've enjoyed (Wag The Dog).

All in all a great evening. Nice work Scott and Erin!

...swooning...

Last night I renewed my vows to love Duran Duran for ever.

time travel

blotter
Originally uploaded by himbly.

Tonight I sat on my balcony (since I won't have a balcony soon) with my portable barbeque, a lighter, and two of my old journals.

However cleansed you felt having written a journal in your late teens/early twenties...let me tell you, you'll feel ~more~ cleansed the moment you rip out a page you just read and watch it smoulder on the ashes of it's fallen comrades.

Wow.

I read two journals from about 11 years ago. I probably spanned ages 21 and 22.

I'm happy to report I've learned a lot since then.

I am embarrassed to report that I was a complete nitwit...and probably still am in some arenas.

Know what else? I found half a tab of acid, wrapped in cigarette foil, stapled to one of the pages. A little journal detective work leads me to the conclusion that I ate the other half of that tab on Bermuda Shorts Day during my 3rd year of university.

I had no idea I had that. I don't think I've touched the stuff for at least a decade.

It went in the toilet.

Proverbs

I heard this somewhere a long time ago. I think it was Stephen Fry, but if it was, I have no idea if he was quoting someone else or if he made it up.

I love Stephen Fry.

Anyway...

"There are two types of people in this world. One who thinks there's two types of people in this world and the other that knows better."

I know it sounds trite, but I think it does us all well to remember that.