Nobody Talks About My Tina That Way

I’m sure by now that almost everyone in the world has seen the Sarah Palin/Hillary Clinton open from Saturday Night Live with Tina Fey as Palin and Amy Poehler as Clinton. Like me you probably thought that the sketch was hilarious and that Fey was pretty dead-on as Palin. Seriously no one else should even attempt a Sarah Palin impersonation after Saturday night because you’ll just be the Sammy Hagar to Fey’s David Lee Roth.

Unfortunately someone had to be the spoil sport and Carly Fiorina is her name. Fiorina is the former CEO of Hewlett-Packard and current John McCain advisor. On MSNBC Monday morning she said, “The portrait was very dismissive of the substance of Sarah Palin, and so in that sense, they were defining Hillary Clinton as very substantive, and Sarah Palin as totally superficial. I think that continues the line of argument that is disrespectful in the extreme, and yes I would say sexist.”

Ugh. Seriously? I know Saturday Night Live has only been on the air for 33 years, but someone needs to let Fiorina know that the show is known for its comedy. They were joking. It was supposed to make you laugh. Governor Palin even thought the sketch was funny, and apparently dressed as Tina Fey for Halloween one year. I don’t know how you do that, but one year I was a bum and all I did was wear dirty clothes.

Anyway, Carly you need to let this sexist thing go. You obviously missed the whole point of the sketch. Oh wait, I forgot the new rule of the Republicans since August 29th: “If anyone says anything bad about Sarah Palin it is sexist.” You must have forgotten about the past year when Republicans pretty much said a sexist thing about Hillary Clinton on a daily basis. If you need a reminder click on this link: The Daily Show

So in conclusion Tina Fey was not sexist. She was fucking hilarious. Sorry you didn’t get the joke.

Here another video Carly probably won’t find funny:

Eugene Mirman you are funny!

Hypocrisy on A Pig

Yesterday Senator Barack Obama said this in Lebanon, VA:

Of course the McCain campaign latched onto this statement with the same fervor that they have to any comment that may be remotely related to Governor Sarah Palin. But in two minutes of searching on YouTube I found these two videos:

Vice President Dick Cheney campaigning in Hawaii during the 2004 election. His remark was made about John Kerry. Which makes his comment very strange. Is Kerry a cross dresser? Oh wait. I get it now. It’s just a statement about policy – not gender. Thank you, Dick Cheney, for clearing that up.

Senator John McCain talking about Senator Hillary Clinton’s health care plan last year.

I guess we should be attacking Obama for not being all that original. Get some new writers Barack, or you’ll be in danger of being the Carlos Mencia of politics. So back off, Republicans, it’s a phrase meaning “Don’t dress up lies and bullcrap and say they’re not lies and bullcrap.” In this case it meant “John McCain says he’s for change and that is lies and bullcrap.” Get mad at him for using your own phrase to call you out, don’t shove Sarah Palin in there to try and make her a victim. If she’s half as strong and ruthless as she claims to be, she would not appreciate being put in that role unnecessarily.

I spotted Lucy, framed and hanging on the walls, in the bowels of the American Museum of Natural History.

Birth: The Surprising History of How We Are Born By Tina Cassidy
Released: September 2006

AWESSSSSSSSSSOME! I put off reading this book for a long time because I thought it was more mechanics, nature, etc. OMG it’s not. Well, the first chapter is mechanics and how we differ from other animals but the rest is how human birth has been handled and mishandled across time and cultures by human peoples. There’s a whole chapter on tools and fads! TOOLS!!! With pictures! This is not the kind of book that favors any particular way of going about it, like books that favor midwives over obstetricians, etc. This one merely lays down, der, the history of childbirth management, although she does of course mention what worked and what didn’t.

Also it’s funny and has pictures throughout, which is pretty much the best way to organize a history book ever, if you can afford it. Everybody read it!

My dear Catherine, I am dying.

The Autobiography of Henry VIII: With Notes by His Fool, Will Somers by Margaret George
Released: 1986

It certainly is a whale of a book! Well, this guy had a big life. I loved this book. It starts out with Will Somers writing to Catherine Knollys about her real father, Henry VIII. And she’s like “AW HELL NAW THAT GUY SUCKED BALLS.” And will is all “IS THAT SO, MADAM.” So he’s like here, read his journals. And he’s made notes. So while Henry is going on and on about this and that, we get Will’s more objective input once in awhile, and he fills in the blanks when Henry is too proud or depressed to write about certain things.

I read this in the hopes of getting some tidbits of non-fiction to take with me when I finally sit down and read Six Wives by David Starkey, which is the same length and subject matter but, you know, real. Also I tend to like historical fiction from the point of view of the person I’m most interested in, not the chamber maid who is sometimes in the right place at the right time to overhear something and has her own story going on. Blech.

Margaret George fans don’t much care for this one because apparently her Cleopatra book was fantastic. Well, I don’t care much for Cleopatra.

Old Fernley the postman was out and about early, making deliveries in his small red van.

I have been slacking on book reviews. There’ll be three today…

The Valley of Secrets by Charmian Hussey
Released: January 2005

Mystery, adventure, science fiction, history, travel! This book has it all and more! It’s the story of an orphan, Stephen Lansbury, who finds out he’s been left his previously unknown late great uncle’s estate in Cornwall, UK. So, he goes there! But strange things are afoot, like a phantom gardener, swinging green eyes, South American foliage and something that goes WOOMP WOOMP WOOMP. The mystery slowly unravels, thanks to his great uncle’s journals, and I found it to be an original, fun and interesting story.

HOWEVER.

This is an independent reader but I know that as an 8-12 year old I would not have been able to get through this book. It’s 370 pages and very, very heavy on descriptions. The author literally spends TWO WHOLE PAGES describing a bathroom. A BATHROOM. Since the estate is quite large, we spend most of the book (MOST OF THE BOOK) following Stephen around as he explores EVERY INCH of the property, and our ah-ha moments don’t come until he settles down for the day to read the journals. Also, Stephen is quite preachy about saving the rainforests. He’s a little treehugger-in-training and loves to jam it down our throats. I realize that this book is intended for kids, though, so maybe I should leave him alone.

Last complaint: Stephen can only do things happily. Even when he’s just had the bejesus scared out of him by one of the many strange things that happen to him before he figures the whole thing out. Like, he realizes someone has just been in the house when he was away. He thinks “That’s weird” and then does something happily. NO. I am sending the author a dictionary and a thesaurus. Maybe she intended to paint Stephen as optimistic and unflappable, but he just comes off as dense.

I’m interested to see what else the author comes up with, though, because I think she’s a great story thinker upper.

Princesses were raised to be devout, obedient, (sic) and faithful.

(I am slacking off. I finished this book almost a week ago.)

Sex with the Queen: Nine Hundred Years of Vile Kings, Virile Lovers, (sic) and Passionate Politics by Eleanor Herman
Release date: April, 2005

The follow-up to Sex with Kings, everybody’s favorite history book of royal mistresses. Here she examines the situations of the queens and princesses who took lovers. And you know, I can’t recommend these books enough. Learning is even more fun when it’s titillating. Inevitably, the fact that this book was about female adulterers instead of male meant a lot of the stories ended tragically.

I think Eleanor Herman took the advice of the LibraryThing.com reviewers when she organized this book chronologically instead of by theme. This meant I didn’t confuse people as much, but it also read like a handful of short biographies. And I don’t know if you guys know this, but I hate biographies AND short stories. So while I was able to keep everyone straight, I didn’t much care for the organization. You know, if I wasn’t enjoying one of the subjects (say, the Catherine the Great one because I’ve read a biography on her and didn’t want to read another one, albeit much shorter), I would just have to keep plugging along, instead of being comforted by the fact that in a few paragraphs Herman would jump to someone else. I will reiterate what I said in my review of Sex with Kings on LibraryThing.com: I think it’s better organized by theme, but would have liked to have a cast of “characters” and timeline in the book.

Also, she CLEARLY does not care for Princess Diana, and it was really interesting to read an opinion about her that I’ve never heard before.

Recommended to everyone who likes history and sex. Read both books. They are just good fun.

Once on a dark winter’s day, when the yellow fog hung so thick and heavy in the streets of London that the lamps were lighted and the shop windows blazed with gas as they do at night, an odd-looking little girl sat in a cab with her father and was driven rather slowly through the big thoroughfares.

A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett
Released: 1905

You guys should totally check out this book. It’s way new.

Naw, I’m kidding. It’s like three thousand years old. This is the kind of story I could see reading to my kids, half a chapter each bedtime. I cannot see myself ever having wanted to read this before now, even though it’s intended for people much younger than I. After all, I started it in April and just finished it the other day. I found the middle of it to be dreadfully uneventful. But I am not seriously writing a review for This Book. I just wanted you guys to know that I finally read it and it was pretty cute.

Emilia awoke alone.

The Seamstress by Frances de Pontes Peebles
Release date: August 5, 2008

Another one of those stories taking place where I have very little knowledge – Brazil, 1920′s and 30′s. The story of two sisters raised in the interior of the country by their aunt, a skilled seamstress who passes on her knowledge. Emilia dreams of being a fancy lady, and Luzia really doesn’t know what, considering an accident as a child left her with a permanently bent arm. Then a famous group of cangaceiros (whom I like to refer to as scrub pirates) come to town…

This is one of those back and forth stories where you spend a couple months with one sister and then with the other, overlapping slightly or, at times, not at all. It was different from stories with the same format in that each still knew what the other was doing even though they weren’t in contact. Not because of ghouls or so, but because of the newspaper. It kind of turns into a way to communicate. You’ll see.

From a critic’s standpoint I’d have to agree with the review I read that said the author could have left out a few passages, but from the standpoint of someone who was really enjoying a good story, I wouldn’t have minded had she included more seemingly unnecessary passages, as the longer the book is, the more I get to hang out with Emilia and Luzia. Also, I’d like to give credit to the author for her skillz in describing. I said I had very little previous knowledge of Brazil in the 20′s and 30′s for the picturing of it, but Frances de Pontes Peebles painted quite a picture regardless. I could see this book as a movie but I hope it doesn’t come to that.

I think Elaina would enjoy this one.

I Do NOT Need a Bag

My wife and I are huge Target fans. So big that we registered for our wedding there, and make an almost weekly trip to the nearest store. A good chunk of our clothing is from Target, and I’ve even started buying CDs there. We love Target. We love it except for one thing. They always try and give us a bag.

About a year ago my wife and I made a decided effort to rid our apartment of plastic bags. We knew we would end up with a stray bag here or there, but we were going to really try. We bought tote bags, and if we could carry the item we didn’t even ask for one. Our closet and Al Gore are very happy with us. Except maybe not so much with Target.

We noticed that every time we went into Target that the cashier would scan the item and then place it directly into a bag. With the exception of drinks which never get placed into a bag anywhere, but that is a different issue. No matter how big or small the item needed a bag. We didn’t really have a problem telling the cashier we didn’t need a bag, but we thought it was kind of odd that it automatically went into a bag.

The last straw came with the new Coldplay CD. It was the only item we bought that night at Target. A rarity for us. The cashier scanned the disc and placed it into a huge Target bag, and we both said we didn’t need one. She kinda looked for a second and then dug the disc out of the bag. While walking to the car we both wondered why she felt the need to place a CD into a bag?

I’ve worked in retail for almost eight years now, and every time someone buys a single CD or DVD or book I ask if they need a bag. Depending on the weather probably 70% of the customers say they don’t need one. It’s small, pretty light and maybe I have a CD player in my car. It makes sense. Also with all the “green” talk and a poor economy I feel that saving a bag helps the environment and my company. So why doesn’t Target see it this way?

The only explanation that I could think of was that the cashiers were told by management to place items into bags. I understand why you would do that maybe five years ago, but times have changed a bit. Global warming and a recession have made a lot of companies re-think the way they do things. Saving bags at each store could save a company millions of dollars. Target alone has 1,500 stores! It’s a really simple thing to do that Target seems unwilling to do, and I know this because of an e-mail I sent.

Every now and again I need to let someone know how I feel. So I decided to write Target customer care and let them know that I didn’t agree with this practice. It was very Grandpa Simpson of me. I figured that I would receive a reply about it being a store to store decision, or if they wanted to be truthful telling me it was an effort to get the Target name out there for the public to see. Instead I received a condescending reply about how Target bags are recyclable and if I needed to know how to recycle them it says so on the bag. Thank you for not answering my question.

I replied to that e-mail, but have yet to receive a response. I’m sure the answer won’t be to my liking. Does it mean my wife and I will begin a Target boycott? No. I don’t know if she could do that. Truthfully I probably couldn’t do that. Target is our favorite store, and to leave it over plastic bags seems ludicrous. We’ll just have to be on our toes, and make sure to let the cashier know that a bag will not be needed.

If Lia Lee had been born in the highlands of northwest Laos, where her parents and twelve of her brothers and sisters were born, her mother would have squatted on the floor of the house that her father had built from ax-hewn planks thatched with bamboo and grass.

The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures by Anne Fadiman
Release date: September 1997

Mine is a first edition without its dustjacket. This is sad for me.

This book is many things. First, it is the story of a family of Hmong refugees living in Merced, California, and what happens when it is discovered their baby daughter Lia has epilepsy. Oh, the trials and tribulations that can pop up when the family doesn’t speak English and the hospital hasn’t any Hmong interpreters. And even if they did, how would they explain a neurological disorder to the family, who knows the sickness is caused by an evil dab who has stolen Lia’s soul? This part of the book is so sad. Lia’s doctors totally fail the family because they’re unwilling to work with their beliefs.

Second, this book also includes a brief history of the Hmong people, how they fought for the CIA in the Secret War in Laos and when their side lost, came over to the US in great numbers to avoid being exterminated by the Pathet Lao, and then what their lives have been like here. You know, what it’s like to go from farming in the mountains, to living in a refugee camp, to owning a refrigerator. Also it tries to give an accurate description of Hmong culture in general, but it’s a pretty short book and there’s a lot of other stuff going on so.

This is one of those stories you wish a lot of dumb Americans would read before they go around telling foreign-born citizens to learn to speak English. It very much made a case for cultural sensitivity, not just because it’s politically correct, but because not being aware of and respecting other cultures KILLS!!!

PS I found this on a website maintained by an American named Jeff Lindsay. It’s all about the struggles the Hmong face here, and here is an email he got:

“Hasn’t America been invaded enough for you nutjobs! They bring their culture, NOT AMERICAN, with them.
YOU need to go live among them. . . .

You liberals are either insane, stupid or truly evil.

Again, you need to go live with your own people. Them. “

Oh good lord!!! No seriously, that woman is probably Christian, right? Jesus needs to come down here and bitch slap her.

Anyway. Excellent read, but really, really sad. Oh! And at the end there’s a short chapter on Hmong orthography, pronunciation and quotations! Sweet!