Showing posts with label randomness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label randomness. Show all posts
Sunday, June 5, 2011
Apocalist
Because my brain is currently overworked due to the coming dissertation defense (Friday!), I have been less...writey. Do you see what happened there? I invented a word. It's a word that doesn't need to exist, but my vocabulary is leaving me, so instead of whatever the word or words are that would convey being "writey" I just used "writey."
Aaaanywayz...I made this list in my head and thought it was enough for a post. It's influenced by my recent read of the Hunger Games trilogy, as well as screenings of COINTELPRO and Weather Underground documentaries. Oh, and then I watched Man vs. Food.
Things I need to get done before the apocalypse:
1. Lasik, so I'm not sightless once my glasses break.
2. Learn how to box, fight, defend myself.
3. Learn survival skills. Like how to shave your legs using implements found in nature.
4. Learn how to pick locks.
5. Stockpile water purification tablets.
6. Also stockpile duct tape.
7. I should probably get a second battery for my laptop.
8. Relearn how to shoot a gun (I think I left that hobby behind at around 11)
9. Come up with a really cool apocalypse nickname. Something sweet, but could also be ferocious.
10. View some Youtube videos about how to start a fire, hide food from bears, and what to use as toilet paper.
11. Stockpile tampons and pads. And toilet paper.
12. Get some books on telling the difference between poisonous food and not poisonous food.
13. Learn gardening.
14. Learn how to make vodka from potatoes.
15. Work on my horrible aim.
16. Buy a megaphone. People with megaphones are totally the key people in a group. Megaphone=power.
17. Figure out what part of the country would be the least desperate and cutthroat in the event of an apocalypse.
18. Start acquiring apocalypse-friendly wardrobe items. This includes cargo pants that don't make me look fat, and hats that don't squeeze my ears or itch my forehead.
19. Learn morse code.
20. Stop saying "sorry" so much.
Anything I should add?
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Friday/Sunday Finds - The Devil
Deviled Egg Cozy $12 at Garnered Crafts on Etsy
Cuddly Devil? Handknit hat for $39 - another Etsy find
Satan Lightbox from Morbid Decor, $23.99:
Devil Horns stamp! $7.63 at Skull and Crossbuns
Little Devil Oven Mitt. They have a Dracula one too...I giggled with glee when I saw it! This one is only $19.50
Faust & Mephisto shadow puppets - so beautiful! $19
$34 Deviled Egg Pedestal Tray - I may be buying this, so maybe it's gone by the time you click!
Who Put the Devil in Deviled Eggs? A Food Lover's Guide to America's Favorite Dishes by Ann Treistman
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Party Dress
Aw, yeah, I'm back to my old bloggy self (hopefully). First day of training in the new department and I've got happy hearts in my eyes. Not only is the work more up my alley, but it's a quiet area, a slower-paced environment, and the guy training me had a phone that was incredibly dusty for lack of use. I was so giddy that when I got home I did work on my dissertation, hemmed a dark purple corduroy skirt I bought (extra long, so I could make it an appropriate a-line length), and started a recommendation letter for a friend. I even posted pics on Flickr and now I'm blogging. Total win.
My mom, out of the blue, decided that she wanted to get me a dress from my Amazon wish list that I labeled "the prettiest dress." Amazon lets you list things from any other site online using their "add to wish list" button, so I used it to add a dress from ModCloth. Check it out, this is coming my way soon:
The Admission Party Dress is $165 and though you can't really tell, is navy blue with metallic dots.
Check out the close up:
Ooooh...ahh, right? Am I right? Here's a pic of someone in it:
Yes, it's a decent length for my old lady gams and everything. I'm not so into wearing cutesy spectator pumps with it, but I am at a loss as to what would work best with it. It's too cold to wear it now, but in a few weeks I'm thinking it would pair well with a little sweater and some silver flats. What do you think? Advice is much appreciated. If I were to do something other than navy or silver for accessories, what would you recommend? I could never buy something like this for myself with my salary, especially a party dress, something I wouldn't wear too often. My mom rules. I can't wait to get it!
My mom, out of the blue, decided that she wanted to get me a dress from my Amazon wish list that I labeled "the prettiest dress." Amazon lets you list things from any other site online using their "add to wish list" button, so I used it to add a dress from ModCloth. Check it out, this is coming my way soon:
The Admission Party Dress is $165 and though you can't really tell, is navy blue with metallic dots.
Check out the close up:
Ooooh...ahh, right? Am I right? Here's a pic of someone in it:
Yes, it's a decent length for my old lady gams and everything. I'm not so into wearing cutesy spectator pumps with it, but I am at a loss as to what would work best with it. It's too cold to wear it now, but in a few weeks I'm thinking it would pair well with a little sweater and some silver flats. What do you think? Advice is much appreciated. If I were to do something other than navy or silver for accessories, what would you recommend? I could never buy something like this for myself with my salary, especially a party dress, something I wouldn't wear too often. My mom rules. I can't wait to get it!
Monday, October 18, 2010
The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane
I love reading anything about the Salem witch trials. While at Barnes & Noble, I came across a book on the discount fiction table and was instantly in love. If you liked The Historian and read paranormal fiction, this would be a great little novel to read.
It's about Connie Goodwin, a graduate student who just passed her doctoral exams in the history department at Harvard. She has a summer before embarking on her dissertation, and rather than doing research like she planned, she ends up having to take charge of repairing and selling her grandmother's long abandoned house near Salem.
She happens upon a key in an old 17th century family bible in one of the rooms that has a small slip of paper in the hollow that reads: Deliverance Dane. Connie sets out to find out who or what this paper means and in the process learns about her family's connection to the Salem witch trials. What follows is part intellectual quest, part family history, part magical experience.
It was nice to read a stand-alone book. It was nice to read a historical novel by someone well versed in the history. Kathleen Howe is herself a descendant of two of the Salem witches and holds a doctorate in American and New England studies.
And wonder of wonders, not one vampire in the whole novel.
In other news, today was my first day at work. Not much happened, I'm exhausted, but employed, so yay! I don't have new employee orientation until tomorrow, but I'm pretty sure it's exactly like working in every other office in America. And maybe Canada.
In the words of some of my new coworkers, see youse tomorrah!
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
Library Letdown
Things are looking up. For one thing, I have a job interview. Not a teaching gig, but it's a job! I'm very excited. I'll tell you all about it after the interview. I am trying not to jinx it too much. But that one phone call propelled me into motion today, making me do like 15 tasks on my to-do list. I even sorted through all of the bills and old mail.
Anyway, on to Library Letdown:
I went to the Free Library of Philadelphia, center city branch, on Monday. It's a gorgeous building:
It is a grand place, built in 1927. Some pics of the interior:
I walked up the grand staircase in the lobby and was in awe:
Maybe because it was a rainy day, or maybe because it's been treated poorly due to budget cuts, but I found the whole building to be pretty depressing. Don't get me wrong, there are tons of books, and it's huge, but once you get into the separate departments, you find that though the architecture is beautiful, it isn't being used to its fullest potential.
Drab green-grey walls and metal bookcases mixed in with older wood bookcases. The saddest part was the art section, which was large but there was no actual art on the walls. In fact, there were no pieces hanging in any of the rooms I went into, even though it was clear there were at one time paintings on the wall. The hooks and nails were all still there. I thought, Ok, it's lost some of its luster, but maybe the collection makes up for it. It's a big collection, don't get me wrong, but it's hard to find any book in the convoluted system they use.
When you get there, the terminals all direct you to the same web search you can do from home, but you quickly find that when you do a search, you aren't in the library where your book happens to be!
This is the search page for the "classic" search method, which usually yields the basic information you need:
There were two copies held by the Central Library, and neither were available. I get that, it's a popular book, but I found that it can take up to 6 weeks to get it from another library! You can just drive there and pick it up in less time. No information about interlibrary loan was available, and it was hard to find a call number that corresponded to the Library.
Even worse, I walked down to the lobby and saw no signage for a checkout desk. Usually, in any library you walk into, whether they be academic or small public libraries, the circulation desk is clearly indicated. Not so here, I had to go to the "Popular Library" section, where they keep the most popular titles, DVDs, and test reference books. It seemed like a silly, redundant section and was really small. There I found some self-checkout machines and two actual library workers, both dressed in grubby t-shirts and jeans. They looked like they were dressed for moving day and I thought maybe I was in the wrong place. Damn. I could not have gotten away with looking schlubby at the library I worked at. And who would want to!? It may be a low paying city job, but damn if you've given up on looking decent on your way out to work, you should really take inventory. The librarians in the other departments seemed more professional, but why was circulation so laid back?
Two, count 'em, two library weirdos talked to me. I'm a freak-magnet, and libraries are also freak-magnets, so I figured it was par for the course, but these two dudes were heavily strange. One walked by and whispered "looking very cute todayyyyy" so creepily that I thought he must have been singing along to a song, but no, he was looking at me.
Later another one came by as I was doing a search on a catalog computer and said, "Pretty lady, where are you going?" Both guys exhibited crazy, base-head behavior. Smelly, close talkers who I gave the death glare to immediately. The death glare involves a stern face, a raised eyebrow, and the look that I get that says "are you fucking kidding me, asshole?" I gave it a lot in my twenties apparently. It's why I never dated much! It kind of looks like this face that my cat Stevie gives:
One thing I'm learning here, it's to bring out the death glare more often. Sometimes I walk around with it on the default setting. It helps weed out the crazies on the street.
The other day, some random Indian guy came up to me as I was walking to my bus and tapped me on the shoulder and said, "Hi, how are you?" To which I said, "Good?" because who says this if they don't know you other than salespeople, right? He then asked where I was going and if I was Indian. Yes, you read that right, "Where are you going? Are you Indian?" No, sadly, I'm not from India, but the pick-up line used here was superb, no? I told him I was Cuban and he said, "Are you sure?" all quizzically like I'm lying, which if I was, wouldn't you just accept it and leave me alone? I mean, would you really be like, "You are lying, you are in fact Indian and are lying to me. I deserve your time!"WTF!? And so I said, yes, it's true. And then he was disappointed! Dude, seriously? Not only do you have an Indian girls only plan, but you are so bad at deploying it I feel bad about myself. Am I a loser magnet too? People who know me, don't answer that.
Anyway, I checked out one Mexican cookbook and nothing else because they didn't have anything I needed. Not even reference items that were in the catalog. The librarians were all nice and knowledgeable, but seemed a bit stressed. The budget cuts once threatened to shut down all of Philadelphia's libraries, so I can imagine they don't have time or energy to gussy the place up, but it's so sad to see a lovely building not as shiny and beautiful as it could be. In the very city where the first library opened its doors to the public, no less.
Anyway, on to Library Letdown:
I went to the Free Library of Philadelphia, center city branch, on Monday. It's a gorgeous building:
I walked up the grand staircase in the lobby and was in awe:
Maybe because it was a rainy day, or maybe because it's been treated poorly due to budget cuts, but I found the whole building to be pretty depressing. Don't get me wrong, there are tons of books, and it's huge, but once you get into the separate departments, you find that though the architecture is beautiful, it isn't being used to its fullest potential.
When you get there, the terminals all direct you to the same web search you can do from home, but you quickly find that when you do a search, you aren't in the library where your book happens to be!
Can you tell where you click "search"? No? Well that's because there is no search button. Once you enter a phrase to search, you click "Author, Title, Subject, etc. Those are the search buttons.
Then when you get to the book you are searching for, it's hard to figure out where it is because the location of the item is buried under a bunch of other information:
Right there at the bottom under "Holdings' is where you look to see if it is in the branch you are standing in, and guess what? Nine times out of ten it is in another branch. Look how many branches have Dead Until Dark:
There were two copies held by the Central Library, and neither were available. I get that, it's a popular book, but I found that it can take up to 6 weeks to get it from another library! You can just drive there and pick it up in less time. No information about interlibrary loan was available, and it was hard to find a call number that corresponded to the Library.
Even worse, I walked down to the lobby and saw no signage for a checkout desk. Usually, in any library you walk into, whether they be academic or small public libraries, the circulation desk is clearly indicated. Not so here, I had to go to the "Popular Library" section, where they keep the most popular titles, DVDs, and test reference books. It seemed like a silly, redundant section and was really small. There I found some self-checkout machines and two actual library workers, both dressed in grubby t-shirts and jeans. They looked like they were dressed for moving day and I thought maybe I was in the wrong place. Damn. I could not have gotten away with looking schlubby at the library I worked at. And who would want to!? It may be a low paying city job, but damn if you've given up on looking decent on your way out to work, you should really take inventory. The librarians in the other departments seemed more professional, but why was circulation so laid back?
Two, count 'em, two library weirdos talked to me. I'm a freak-magnet, and libraries are also freak-magnets, so I figured it was par for the course, but these two dudes were heavily strange. One walked by and whispered "looking very cute todayyyyy" so creepily that I thought he must have been singing along to a song, but no, he was looking at me.
Later another one came by as I was doing a search on a catalog computer and said, "Pretty lady, where are you going?" Both guys exhibited crazy, base-head behavior. Smelly, close talkers who I gave the death glare to immediately. The death glare involves a stern face, a raised eyebrow, and the look that I get that says "are you fucking kidding me, asshole?" I gave it a lot in my twenties apparently. It's why I never dated much! It kind of looks like this face that my cat Stevie gives:
One thing I'm learning here, it's to bring out the death glare more often. Sometimes I walk around with it on the default setting. It helps weed out the crazies on the street.
The other day, some random Indian guy came up to me as I was walking to my bus and tapped me on the shoulder and said, "Hi, how are you?" To which I said, "Good?" because who says this if they don't know you other than salespeople, right? He then asked where I was going and if I was Indian. Yes, you read that right, "Where are you going? Are you Indian?" No, sadly, I'm not from India, but the pick-up line used here was superb, no? I told him I was Cuban and he said, "Are you sure?" all quizzically like I'm lying, which if I was, wouldn't you just accept it and leave me alone? I mean, would you really be like, "You are lying, you are in fact Indian and are lying to me. I deserve your time!"WTF!? And so I said, yes, it's true. And then he was disappointed! Dude, seriously? Not only do you have an Indian girls only plan, but you are so bad at deploying it I feel bad about myself. Am I a loser magnet too? People who know me, don't answer that.
Anyway, I checked out one Mexican cookbook and nothing else because they didn't have anything I needed. Not even reference items that were in the catalog. The librarians were all nice and knowledgeable, but seemed a bit stressed. The budget cuts once threatened to shut down all of Philadelphia's libraries, so I can imagine they don't have time or energy to gussy the place up, but it's so sad to see a lovely building not as shiny and beautiful as it could be. In the very city where the first library opened its doors to the public, no less.
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
Night Turns Into Day
All of the art in this post is by Natalie Dee
You figure out that this could be over any day now. You could get a 9-5 and have to be up when it's still dark out. I mean, like that could happen tomorrow! So you let yourself enjoy a little late night reading and when the bed looks so warm and inviting after taking the dog for a his morning walk, you feel like you should take advantage of this beautiful time and snuggle up with a dog that also looooves sleeping in.
You say to yourself, "don't feel guilty, when you're working this will be a fond memory." You try to push away the realization that while snuggling, you are also anxious, because you really don't have to leave the house today, and that feels weird.
You start to get a little bummed out when you wake up because there's nowhere to rush off to, so you sleep in more and breakfast starts to look a lot like lunch. I swear, I have had days where I get a bunch of stuff done in the morning and keep going going all day. Writing, doing bills, figuring out how to get medical care, junk like that. And then I'll have a totally lazy day where I get up late and take a nap! I have so much time now and it feels like I'm either too anxious to enjoy it. Anxiety, by the way, does not make for good writing. My writing has been really sloppy and I've had the hardest time getting down my thoughts on paper the way I see them in my head. I need a reset button. I'd like to reset to the feeling I had when the apartment was finally free of the last box and my hopes were ridiculously high.
What if I start to get really odd from not having regular decent work relationship contact with people? Like how professors get when they go on sabbaticals that involve researching Civil War-era documents in a library in some small town. I remember one professor I knew looked confused when I said hello after a sabbatical. Not because they didn't know me, but because the situation of being talked to while they were thinking and processing was a strain.
What I'm basically saying here is that I'm not doing bad, but I'm not really doing good. I'm doing OK.
On days where I'm just OK, I'm less likely to post. I've hit a strange point, and not only because it is 3am on a Tuesday (or technically Wednesday). Though in retrospect, maybe check-ins with my psyche shouldn't be done at the witching hour. But having nothing new to write about...sucks. Here's hoping things change soon. I mean, it's Dracula Month so I have that going on. But it would be cool for things to start looking up on any of my fronts, Universe. Yeah, I called the Universe out just now, so what?
Maybe tomorrow I'll tell you all about my magical adventures in the nation's first library? Where you can almost hear the ghosts of library patron freaks of the distant past....
Monday, September 27, 2010
Harry Potter's Life is Freaking Sad
I decided to have a Harry Potter marathon this weekend, and watched all the films one after another. I had read the books very sporadically, and I saw the movies when they ended up on HBO (except the Half Blood Prince, which I saw in the theater). I am surprised at what the story looks like when you see it all in a row. It's a dark and brooding story, but I never realized how deeply depressing it is.
Spoilers for the Deathly Hallows book may be ahead...
Many of you have probably heard of Harry Potter. I'm not sure how many of you are fans and have seen the films, but even if you haven't, you probably know it's about wizards and witches and a school for wizard kids. Most of the cutesy fantasy stuff gets into the trailers and commercials. Stuff like the candles that float all by themselves, lighting the great hall of this beautiful boarding school:
Or the fun magical charms and curses that the students learn
Or the silly fun that's made of goofy students whose spells don't work right
There are hints of the darkness in the story early on in the form of school bullies like Draco Malfoy
And mean teachers like Severus Snape
But let's get real, folks, this story is about complete and utter tragedy and sadness. Like, from beginning to end!
The Tragedy of Harry Potter
Not only are Harry's parents killed when he is a baby, but they basically die defending him from an evil sorcerer who is still at large. As an orphan he is given to his uncle's family (the Dursley's) to be raised as basically a prisoner. He's not considered part of the family, he is often pad locked into his bedroom, and they treat their own son so preferentially that he is the only one in family photos.
Once he gets the intel about who his parents were and how they died (the Dursley's didn't tell him), he gets to go to wizard school at Hogwarts, where he finds a couple friends (Hermoine and Ron) and at least one enemy in Draco Malfoy. And of course there's the big enemy in Voldemort, the guy that killed his parents.
Over the course of the movies (the movie stories are most recent in my memory), he at first has to grapple with the huge mind-shift that must happen when you find out that a) your parents were killed and didn't die in a car accident like you've been told, b) they were magical wizards which are real and you are too, c) an evil magical wizard killed them and is currently unaccounted for, and d) you are eleven years old. Christ.
Then he has to fight this super-strong murderous wizard for like 7 years. Each year he is basically tortured from afar by this guy. He has awful nightmares, the scar that Voldemort gave him as a baby hurts sometimes, he is put through a series of deadly tests that are all sabotaged in some way. His story is front-page news and everyone refers to him as "The Boy Who Lived," which sucks in a million ways. To be remembered simply for surviving and to be thought of as either a huge hope for the future (pressure) or the sad remains of a loved wizard family (pressure!). He gets treated like a special kid in the worst way.
The adults who have information about his past, present, and future are really REALLY vague about it and sometimes don't tell him things that he needs to know to stay alive. The only adult men in his life that he builds close ties to (Dumbledore and Sirius Black) die before the series end. He loses like 3 father/father figures in the course of the story!
You can write an epilogue that tells me he marries Ginny Weasley all you want, but I think that guy is effed up forever. He should totally have been Severus Snape by the end of the story, burdened by a fate and a past he had little control over.
I found that by the end of the Order of the Phoenix, I was so deeply sad about his story (knowing, of course how it ends) that it took me a day long break to get back to it. And this story has a supposedly happy ending!
The best thing this series did for me was introduce Hermoine Granger, one of the best female characters ever. I heart her nerdy lovely overcompensating little heart. I can't even say I see myself in her too much because she's so much more A+ than I ever was. But the nerdyness, the love of information, the desire to always have the right answer and being kind of pissy when you don't have it, that's totally me. I love how fierce she is about the downtrodden and how she fights back when cornered. She threw an amazing punch that landed on Draco's jaw in Prisoner of Azkaban that made me think the books shoulda put her at the center. Hermoine Granger rules forever into all time. And eventually she works for the liberation and fair treatment of house elves.
And seriously, I think that it is simply inconceivable to me that Hermoine would be interested in Ron Weasley. He's totally the worst Weasley. And there are a lot of them! He's a blubbering idiot who, for a person raised in a wizarding family of 9 people, has little understanding of body language or subtext in a conversation. Or even the literal interpretation of a conversation. He is brave on occasion, but damn if he isn't going to be a lifelong project for our lovely Hermoine, who will be fixing things he's broken and reminding him of basic information forever. I just can't see her being into someone so not smart or good at spells. I never got that. Does she respect Ron? Really? He's loyal and willing to stick up for his friends, but is that all you need in a partner? Is she so insecure about her abilities that she needs someone less smart around to feel better about herself? That would make for a sad story. I would have liked to see Hermoine with Harry, because they seem to both be burdened by the expectations and assumptions of their family line and yet fight hard to make things right for themselves on their own terms. But even more, I would have liked her to find her own guy, separate from the trio. But maybe I'm just super hard on Ron.
I obviously love the story, and am kind of amazed that little kids got into it on such a large scale. I know people had problems with the witchcraft and stuff, but those are crazy people. What I'd be interested to know is if people would be cool with their kids reading such a dark story, if they had known how it was going to turn out and what horrible trials Harry and his friends would endure. I like dark stories and I'd probably let my kids watch whatever they wanted, but when you look at the stories altogether, damn if it isn't some depressing shit.
Side note: While typing this, M. who is a smart and curious guy, but who hates Harry Potter movies, asked me what I was blogging about and this is how our conversation went:
M: What are you blogging about? Are you blogging about me? (He always asks this and it's never him)
Sweet Lady: Harry Potter
M: Are you blogging about how you're in loooove with Harry Potter?
Sweet Lady: No, I'm actually not attracted to Harry in the series.
M: Who are you attracted to?
Sweet Lady: Guess which one I would be attracted to. (At this point I'm clearly thinking it's obvious, but I'm also realizing he has no clue because he hates all things magical and has never seen the movies)
M: Gargamel?
Sweet Lady: Seriously? Gargamel from The Smurfs?!
M: Well I don't f*%$ing know!
Sweet Lady: Severus Snape (showing him my Google Image search of Severus in his many stern poses)
M: The old guy!?
Sweet Lady: But...
M: All I have to say is: old balls.
Sweet Lady: Sigh
And I talk shit about Hermoine's choices.
Spoilers for the Deathly Hallows book may be ahead...
Many of you have probably heard of Harry Potter. I'm not sure how many of you are fans and have seen the films, but even if you haven't, you probably know it's about wizards and witches and a school for wizard kids. Most of the cutesy fantasy stuff gets into the trailers and commercials. Stuff like the candles that float all by themselves, lighting the great hall of this beautiful boarding school:
Or the fun magical charms and curses that the students learn
Or the silly fun that's made of goofy students whose spells don't work right
There are hints of the darkness in the story early on in the form of school bullies like Draco Malfoy
And mean teachers like Severus Snape
But let's get real, folks, this story is about complete and utter tragedy and sadness. Like, from beginning to end!
The Tragedy of Harry Potter
Not only are Harry's parents killed when he is a baby, but they basically die defending him from an evil sorcerer who is still at large. As an orphan he is given to his uncle's family (the Dursley's) to be raised as basically a prisoner. He's not considered part of the family, he is often pad locked into his bedroom, and they treat their own son so preferentially that he is the only one in family photos.
Once he gets the intel about who his parents were and how they died (the Dursley's didn't tell him), he gets to go to wizard school at Hogwarts, where he finds a couple friends (Hermoine and Ron) and at least one enemy in Draco Malfoy. And of course there's the big enemy in Voldemort, the guy that killed his parents.
Over the course of the movies (the movie stories are most recent in my memory), he at first has to grapple with the huge mind-shift that must happen when you find out that a) your parents were killed and didn't die in a car accident like you've been told, b) they were magical wizards which are real and you are too, c) an evil magical wizard killed them and is currently unaccounted for, and d) you are eleven years old. Christ.
Then he has to fight this super-strong murderous wizard for like 7 years. Each year he is basically tortured from afar by this guy. He has awful nightmares, the scar that Voldemort gave him as a baby hurts sometimes, he is put through a series of deadly tests that are all sabotaged in some way. His story is front-page news and everyone refers to him as "The Boy Who Lived," which sucks in a million ways. To be remembered simply for surviving and to be thought of as either a huge hope for the future (pressure) or the sad remains of a loved wizard family (pressure!). He gets treated like a special kid in the worst way.
The adults who have information about his past, present, and future are really REALLY vague about it and sometimes don't tell him things that he needs to know to stay alive. The only adult men in his life that he builds close ties to (Dumbledore and Sirius Black) die before the series end. He loses like 3 father/father figures in the course of the story!
You can write an epilogue that tells me he marries Ginny Weasley all you want, but I think that guy is effed up forever. He should totally have been Severus Snape by the end of the story, burdened by a fate and a past he had little control over.
I found that by the end of the Order of the Phoenix, I was so deeply sad about his story (knowing, of course how it ends) that it took me a day long break to get back to it. And this story has a supposedly happy ending!
The best thing this series did for me was introduce Hermoine Granger, one of the best female characters ever. I heart her nerdy lovely overcompensating little heart. I can't even say I see myself in her too much because she's so much more A+ than I ever was. But the nerdyness, the love of information, the desire to always have the right answer and being kind of pissy when you don't have it, that's totally me. I love how fierce she is about the downtrodden and how she fights back when cornered. She threw an amazing punch that landed on Draco's jaw in Prisoner of Azkaban that made me think the books shoulda put her at the center. Hermoine Granger rules forever into all time. And eventually she works for the liberation and fair treatment of house elves.
And seriously, I think that it is simply inconceivable to me that Hermoine would be interested in Ron Weasley. He's totally the worst Weasley. And there are a lot of them! He's a blubbering idiot who, for a person raised in a wizarding family of 9 people, has little understanding of body language or subtext in a conversation. Or even the literal interpretation of a conversation. He is brave on occasion, but damn if he isn't going to be a lifelong project for our lovely Hermoine, who will be fixing things he's broken and reminding him of basic information forever. I just can't see her being into someone so not smart or good at spells. I never got that. Does she respect Ron? Really? He's loyal and willing to stick up for his friends, but is that all you need in a partner? Is she so insecure about her abilities that she needs someone less smart around to feel better about herself? That would make for a sad story. I would have liked to see Hermoine with Harry, because they seem to both be burdened by the expectations and assumptions of their family line and yet fight hard to make things right for themselves on their own terms. But even more, I would have liked her to find her own guy, separate from the trio. But maybe I'm just super hard on Ron.
I obviously love the story, and am kind of amazed that little kids got into it on such a large scale. I know people had problems with the witchcraft and stuff, but those are crazy people. What I'd be interested to know is if people would be cool with their kids reading such a dark story, if they had known how it was going to turn out and what horrible trials Harry and his friends would endure. I like dark stories and I'd probably let my kids watch whatever they wanted, but when you look at the stories altogether, damn if it isn't some depressing shit.
Side note: While typing this, M. who is a smart and curious guy, but who hates Harry Potter movies, asked me what I was blogging about and this is how our conversation went:
M: What are you blogging about? Are you blogging about me? (He always asks this and it's never him)
Sweet Lady: Harry Potter
M: Are you blogging about how you're in loooove with Harry Potter?
Sweet Lady: No, I'm actually not attracted to Harry in the series.
M: Who are you attracted to?
Sweet Lady: Guess which one I would be attracted to. (At this point I'm clearly thinking it's obvious, but I'm also realizing he has no clue because he hates all things magical and has never seen the movies)
M: Gargamel?
Sweet Lady: Seriously? Gargamel from The Smurfs?!
M: Well I don't f*%$ing know!
Sweet Lady: Severus Snape (showing him my Google Image search of Severus in his many stern poses)
M: The old guy!?
Sweet Lady: But...
M: All I have to say is: old balls.
Sweet Lady: Sigh
And I talk shit about Hermoine's choices.
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Again
Sorry for the lack of posts, folks, but my internet provider is the worst ever. I swear, there are 12 hours where nobody can get on the web. This means no interwebs, no Netflix instant download movies (which I live by). I had to go outside and look at trees. So mad! Yesterday, the internets went down during The Sixth Sense. Do you want to know which part? The part where the kid says "I see dead..." Yeah, the best part!
Anyway, this post was supposed to be about hipster archetypes that I never see anymore now that I am millions of light years away from Los Angeles. It got eaten. I will have to rewrite it in Word and post it tomorrow.
When things get frustrating, I turn to the only think that can help (besides cocktails or pills), cute things falling asleep or cute things laughing.
My favorite Cute Thing falling asleep (besides Radley, who does this all the time):
My favorite Cute Things laughing:
Anyway, this post was supposed to be about hipster archetypes that I never see anymore now that I am millions of light years away from Los Angeles. It got eaten. I will have to rewrite it in Word and post it tomorrow.
When things get frustrating, I turn to the only think that can help (besides cocktails or pills), cute things falling asleep or cute things laughing.
My favorite Cute Thing falling asleep (besides Radley, who does this all the time):
My favorite Cute Things laughing:
Friday, September 10, 2010
Workin' Hard
Fully entering my upswing, I have updated the Sweet Lady Shop on Etsy, so if you are in the market for my gothy goods, go get 'em.
I'm also writing, hoping to turn in another chapter on Monday. Which would leave me with only 2 chapters and some revisions. Wish me freaking luck ok. Like miracle worker, one in a million, against all odds kinds of luck. I want to enjoy Halloween without having any chapters left to write. Is it possible? Let's hope.
In addition to all this stuff, I am still reading random paranormal fiction, doodling in my sketchbook project book, and enjoying my adopted city. Good times.
My in-laws surprised us with a very cool gift: a mini-fridge. For those of you who haven't taken a look at my apartment pics on Flickr (or don't remember), we have a tiny refrigerator. I am pretty sure it's the kind they put in RVs. Which is citified, but cumbersome. I haven't had a cold Coke from the can in forever. They got us a small fridge, which we've managed to squeeze into the kitchen by force, and now our sodas are cold, ice gets made on the regular, and fruits and veggies are easy to find.
Also, I entered a chance to purchase this Let the Right One In 24x36 screen print poster:
The artist only had 250 prints available, so I had to enter a lottery to get a chance to buy one. And I won! I just got it today and it's so much more beautiful in real life! These things happen in 3s, right? I should play the lottery. I totally should.
I'm also writing, hoping to turn in another chapter on Monday. Which would leave me with only 2 chapters and some revisions. Wish me freaking luck ok. Like miracle worker, one in a million, against all odds kinds of luck. I want to enjoy Halloween without having any chapters left to write. Is it possible? Let's hope.
In addition to all this stuff, I am still reading random paranormal fiction, doodling in my sketchbook project book, and enjoying my adopted city. Good times.
My in-laws surprised us with a very cool gift: a mini-fridge. For those of you who haven't taken a look at my apartment pics on Flickr (or don't remember), we have a tiny refrigerator. I am pretty sure it's the kind they put in RVs. Which is citified, but cumbersome. I haven't had a cold Coke from the can in forever. They got us a small fridge, which we've managed to squeeze into the kitchen by force, and now our sodas are cold, ice gets made on the regular, and fruits and veggies are easy to find.
Also, I entered a chance to purchase this Let the Right One In 24x36 screen print poster:
The artist only had 250 prints available, so I had to enter a lottery to get a chance to buy one. And I won! I just got it today and it's so much more beautiful in real life! These things happen in 3s, right? I should play the lottery. I totally should.
Saturday, September 4, 2010
Fall! Coping Mechanisms!
I don't exactly know how seasons work, but yesterday it was summer and today it's fall. Seriously. I drove through Fairmount Park today to get to Target (more on that later) and leaves are turning yellow, the grass is drying up, and the wind is whipping fallen leaves all over. It's 74 degrees and the breeze is chilly. I heart this weather! I cannot contain my excitement! I expect a great cooling off period and crisp mornings and rainy afternoons tout de suite. My windows are open! Yes!
I had a bad week this week. I was still having it yesterday.
Confession time:
Usually, I either a) fix the thing that's wrong, b) cry about the thing that's wrong, c) go buy something to make me feel pretty, or d) eat "anger food." In that order. If the first one doesn't work, I go on to the next thing. Ending at "anger food," which is food I like and treat myself with but is most likely bad for me. I haven't had an anger food run in a while. I don't eat a lot of it (this isn't a binge/purge story), I just buy candy and chocolates, which are things I don't really have around the house. M doesn't have a sweet tooth and I prefer cupcakes or home baked things. My mint Milanos/vodka/Martha Stewart Halloween magazine extravaganza a few posts back is an example. Just 4-5 of those cookies and I'm like, "OK, you were angry, but you have to get over it, move on. New crap is gonna happen that will make you forget about this crap right now." I mention the food thing because finding my favorite foods has been a little tough here.
I knew it was a different world over here, but the little things, like not finding Mother's tiny chocolate chip cookies, those are the things that get to you. There are inexplicable things that make no sense. Dreyer's ice cream is named Edy's here. Same packaging, branding, everything, just a different name. Why? Sometimes you'll think, "well, I guess that's a west coast thing that doesn't exist here," but then you'll see it a week later in another market and wonder why one Super Fresh has it but another doesn't. There are food secrets here, and just like with street signs and good Chinese food, you basically have to find out for yourself through trial and error, because nobody will tell you a damn thing. Andersen's Pea Soup, where are you?
It's all about learning what the Philadelphia version of my LA things are. That's taking time. Also, not having a perfect storm of annoying things happen all at once is good too.
For instance, I went to the Target in South Philly on Wednesday to try and ease my bad week blues. This place is not really a Target. I mean, if you went to Target's website and looked up the locations of all of the Targets, you'd see this one on the map, and it has all the branding in place, but if you actually went there? Nope. It will forever be known to me as post-apocalypse Target.
I have only been to that one a few times because it's hella far from my place. That Target is a war zone. It's not that it's in a bad neighborhood (it's not in the greatest neighborhood, but that's not the problem), it's that nobody seems to actually work there. On Wednesday I went and there were no carts in the front of the store. Carts strewn all over the parking lot, workers casually strolling around not making eye contact, while me and several other people just looked around aimlessly and threw up our hands, saying "Well I guess there's no carts, then." It's like a rain dance or something. If you look helpless and exasperated and say what is happening out loud, you hope the siren song reaches the ear of the manager, who dispatches people to find some carts. But not at the post-apocalypse Target. Managers don't give a crap there. The irony here is that you don't actually need a cart! Why? Because the shelves are not stocked with half the products, and the ones that are there are out of place, or littering the dirty floor, or trashed looking. Fun times!
Complaining about Target is dumb, I know, but I used to looove going there. It's cheap, and it's got decent style, and I don't care that it's awash layers of corporate filth and that I have a false consciousness and that capitalism will eventually kill us all. The damn place allows me to get some retail therapy (coping mechanism option C), and until I have the medical coverage to pay for decent therapy, Target is my effing happy place.
Post-apocalypse Target ruined my much-needed happy place experience. Having a bad day and then going to Target to undo it, even if I don't buy anything, has been the way of my people since at least 1999. It's tradition!
So, I was bummed, got the energy up to go grocery shopping, got mad at the grocery store for not having my foods and also being bad at customer service, then went to Target to ease the pain and was totally denied. Travesty, I know. Going to the good Target in Fairmount Park today made up for it. I looked at the fall clothes, strolled down aisles of lovely home goods, bought organizing office things, and maybe I also came home with Red Vines. Did the good Target experience cause an upswing? Does it truly hold that much magical power over me? Everyone has to have a coping mechanism for bad times. What's yours? You can respond anonymously. I'm interested!
I had a bad week this week. I was still having it yesterday.
Confession time:
Usually, I either a) fix the thing that's wrong, b) cry about the thing that's wrong, c) go buy something to make me feel pretty, or d) eat "anger food." In that order. If the first one doesn't work, I go on to the next thing. Ending at "anger food," which is food I like and treat myself with but is most likely bad for me. I haven't had an anger food run in a while. I don't eat a lot of it (this isn't a binge/purge story), I just buy candy and chocolates, which are things I don't really have around the house. M doesn't have a sweet tooth and I prefer cupcakes or home baked things. My mint Milanos/vodka/Martha Stewart Halloween magazine extravaganza a few posts back is an example. Just 4-5 of those cookies and I'm like, "OK, you were angry, but you have to get over it, move on. New crap is gonna happen that will make you forget about this crap right now." I mention the food thing because finding my favorite foods has been a little tough here.
I knew it was a different world over here, but the little things, like not finding Mother's tiny chocolate chip cookies, those are the things that get to you. There are inexplicable things that make no sense. Dreyer's ice cream is named Edy's here. Same packaging, branding, everything, just a different name. Why? Sometimes you'll think, "well, I guess that's a west coast thing that doesn't exist here," but then you'll see it a week later in another market and wonder why one Super Fresh has it but another doesn't. There are food secrets here, and just like with street signs and good Chinese food, you basically have to find out for yourself through trial and error, because nobody will tell you a damn thing. Andersen's Pea Soup, where are you?
It's all about learning what the Philadelphia version of my LA things are. That's taking time. Also, not having a perfect storm of annoying things happen all at once is good too.
For instance, I went to the Target in South Philly on Wednesday to try and ease my bad week blues. This place is not really a Target. I mean, if you went to Target's website and looked up the locations of all of the Targets, you'd see this one on the map, and it has all the branding in place, but if you actually went there? Nope. It will forever be known to me as post-apocalypse Target.
I have only been to that one a few times because it's hella far from my place. That Target is a war zone. It's not that it's in a bad neighborhood (it's not in the greatest neighborhood, but that's not the problem), it's that nobody seems to actually work there. On Wednesday I went and there were no carts in the front of the store. Carts strewn all over the parking lot, workers casually strolling around not making eye contact, while me and several other people just looked around aimlessly and threw up our hands, saying "Well I guess there's no carts, then." It's like a rain dance or something. If you look helpless and exasperated and say what is happening out loud, you hope the siren song reaches the ear of the manager, who dispatches people to find some carts. But not at the post-apocalypse Target. Managers don't give a crap there. The irony here is that you don't actually need a cart! Why? Because the shelves are not stocked with half the products, and the ones that are there are out of place, or littering the dirty floor, or trashed looking. Fun times!
Complaining about Target is dumb, I know, but I used to looove going there. It's cheap, and it's got decent style, and I don't care that it's awash layers of corporate filth and that I have a false consciousness and that capitalism will eventually kill us all. The damn place allows me to get some retail therapy (coping mechanism option C), and until I have the medical coverage to pay for decent therapy, Target is my effing happy place.
Post-apocalypse Target ruined my much-needed happy place experience. Having a bad day and then going to Target to undo it, even if I don't buy anything, has been the way of my people since at least 1999. It's tradition!
So, I was bummed, got the energy up to go grocery shopping, got mad at the grocery store for not having my foods and also being bad at customer service, then went to Target to ease the pain and was totally denied. Travesty, I know. Going to the good Target in Fairmount Park today made up for it. I looked at the fall clothes, strolled down aisles of lovely home goods, bought organizing office things, and maybe I also came home with Red Vines. Did the good Target experience cause an upswing? Does it truly hold that much magical power over me? Everyone has to have a coping mechanism for bad times. What's yours? You can respond anonymously. I'm interested!
Friday, April 30, 2010
Street Freaks
Two posts in one day? I'm making up for lost time, but also just happened to have a discussion with M. about our future in Philly. We are actively looking at apartments now, and not in the "let's see what the neighborhoods have to offer" kind of way, but more of a "this apartment could be where we live" way, which is a thousand times more fun. Now, a cocktail and a half in, I decided a good question would be: would you live on a street that had an embarrassing name? M. claimed that streets aren't really named that way anymore and we won't have to worry about it in Philadelphia. Maybe not, but I looked it up (like I always do) and found the following:
-- Apes Hold Road, Crisfield, Maryland, USA
-- Bucket of Blood Street, Holbrook, Arizona
-- Convict Hill Road, Austin, Texas, USA
-- Corpse Way, Wakefield, England
-- Cut Throat Lane, Swanmore, England
-- Devil's Backbone Road, Cincinnati, Ohio, USA
-- Dead Man's Walk, Thornhill, England
-- Drunk Horse Lane, Westcliff, Colorado, USA
-- Falling Health Place, Mikwaukee, Wisconsin, USA
-- Grave's End Neck Road, Brooklyn, New York, USA
-- Malfunction Junction, Garden Valley, Idaho, USA
-- Pig's Ear Road, Grantsville, Maryland, USA
-- Long Tongue Warning Lane, Flockton, England
-- Roast Meat Hill Road, Killingworth, Connecticut, USA
-- Shades of Death Road, Warren County, New Jersey, USA
-- Shooting Butts Road, North Island, New Zealand
-- Skunk's Misery Road, Lattington, New York, USA
-- Squeeze Guts Alley, Truro, England
-- Tripe Slitters Lane, Skipton, England
-- Boner Street, in Willacoochee (Georgia)
-- Clit Court, in Albany (New York)
-- Climax Street, Pittsburgh (Pennsylvania)
-- Cock of the Walk Lane, in Maumelle, (Arkansas)
-- Hooker Street & Pleasure Road, Madison (Wisconsin)
-- Pettibone Place, Milwaukee, (Wisconsin)
-- Pinch'em Slyly Place, in Charlottesville, (Virginia)
-- Slim Bottoms Road, in Mount Vernon (New York)
-- Tickled Pink Drive, in Gualala, (California)
I'm thinking England is a strange place, but other than that, what I was most excited about was Bucket of Blood Road, in Arizona, about a half-mile away from the very highway we will be traveling on our trip across the country! We're still debating whether or not it's worth a stop. Well, by "we" I mean I'm still trying to convince M it's going to be an amazing photograph.
I don't think I could really live on Clit Court in Albany. I would never have parties and certainly couldn't apply to a job using that address. I can't believe I even care, but it turns out I do. Or what if there's a street like "Enil" that sounds like "anal" when you say it. Can you take a cab ever? Or do you get dropped off a block away? These are the things I think about. I'm a total lost cause.
Have you encountered any of these streets in real life? Or any other odd/weird/crazy named streets? I want to know!
-- Apes Hold Road, Crisfield, Maryland, USA
-- Bucket of Blood Street, Holbrook, Arizona
-- Convict Hill Road, Austin, Texas, USA
-- Corpse Way, Wakefield, England
-- Cut Throat Lane, Swanmore, England
-- Devil's Backbone Road, Cincinnati, Ohio, USA
-- Dead Man's Walk, Thornhill, England
-- Drunk Horse Lane, Westcliff, Colorado, USA
-- Falling Health Place, Mikwaukee, Wisconsin, USA
-- Grave's End Neck Road, Brooklyn, New York, USA
-- Malfunction Junction, Garden Valley, Idaho, USA
-- Pig's Ear Road, Grantsville, Maryland, USA
-- Long Tongue Warning Lane, Flockton, England
-- Roast Meat Hill Road, Killingworth, Connecticut, USA
-- Shades of Death Road, Warren County, New Jersey, USA
-- Shooting Butts Road, North Island, New Zealand
-- Skunk's Misery Road, Lattington, New York, USA
-- Squeeze Guts Alley, Truro, England
-- Tripe Slitters Lane, Skipton, England
-- Boner Street, in Willacoochee (Georgia)
-- Clit Court, in Albany (New York)
-- Climax Street, Pittsburgh (Pennsylvania)
-- Cock of the Walk Lane, in Maumelle, (Arkansas)
-- Hooker Street & Pleasure Road, Madison (Wisconsin)
-- Pettibone Place, Milwaukee, (Wisconsin)
-- Pinch'em Slyly Place, in Charlottesville, (Virginia)
-- Slim Bottoms Road, in Mount Vernon (New York)
-- Tickled Pink Drive, in Gualala, (California)
I'm thinking England is a strange place, but other than that, what I was most excited about was Bucket of Blood Road, in Arizona, about a half-mile away from the very highway we will be traveling on our trip across the country! We're still debating whether or not it's worth a stop. Well, by "we" I mean I'm still trying to convince M it's going to be an amazing photograph.
I don't think I could really live on Clit Court in Albany. I would never have parties and certainly couldn't apply to a job using that address. I can't believe I even care, but it turns out I do. Or what if there's a street like "Enil" that sounds like "anal" when you say it. Can you take a cab ever? Or do you get dropped off a block away? These are the things I think about. I'm a total lost cause.
Have you encountered any of these streets in real life? Or any other odd/weird/crazy named streets? I want to know!
Friday, March 19, 2010
Greed
Thought I wasn't gonna make it today, didn't you? Well, cocktail in hand (because it's Friday) I am here to bring forth another deadly sin. P.S. I might get saucy on account of the vodka.Greed - A desire for material wealth so strong that it gets in the way of spiritual growth; a desire for more than one needs or deserves.
Punishment in Hell: taking a swim in cauldrons of boiling oil, which is A-OK with me.
Greed is really one of the more horrible sins. I mean, not only is it about not sharing, which is totally uncool, but it's about hoarding stuff that you may never use. As previously mentioned, UNCOOL.
I encounter greed all the time, and greedy people are hard not to notice, but I try really hard not to be greedy myself. I actually have the opposite problem most of the time, I usually feel like I don't deserve stuff. M is trying to break me of that, because it really upsets your mojo at the roulette wheel or the slots. I mean, you have to believe! You can't put Debbie-Downer energy out there before you set your chips down or you're sunk. Am I right?
"Greed, for lack of a better word, is good." - Gordon Gekko, Wall Street, 1987
Capitalism depends on greedy fuckers like this, or at least unrestrained capitalism does. Today, we all benefit from these greedy fuckers. We get cheap clothes and shoes, affordable heirloom tomatoes, and clean hotel rooms. The kinds of labor involved in the service, farming, and outsourced factory work that fuels our economy is all about corporate greed. If corporations really believed in their Workers Rights documents (they've all got 'em), they would have the same ethical standard no matter who is working for them or where they work. We are the most "unequal nation in the developed world," according to Too Much Online, a web-zine that put out a top 10 list of America's Greediest a few months ago. They are as follows:
10. Richard Anderson, CEO of Delta Airlines
Despite a loss of profits, Delta seems to continually reward Anderson with raises, shares, and a bunch of perks while they lower seating capacity on planes, raise prices for tickets, and charge up to $30 for you to check a bag! Meanwhile, it's not even Anderson's only gig. He's a director of a medical technology board that awards him $188k a year.
9. George David & Marie Douglas-David
George is CEO of a company involved in defense contracting, which has had just the peachiest time since 9/11, earning him the top perch on the list of best paid defense technology executives. He and his wife just went through a messy divorce, in which she asked for more than their pre-nup designated in alimony. She aruged that to cover her "basic expenses" she would need not the $20,000 a week agreed upon, but $53,000 a week. "Among those basics: “$4,500 a week for clothes, $8,000 for travel, and $1,500 for eating out.” A WEEK! And what does she even eat? She's approx. 98 lbs!
8. Steve Wynn
A Las Vegas pioneer, Steve Wynn has enough money that he can put an elbow right through a Picasso and be like all, "bummer," and go on with his day. True story. He's in the top 200 of Forbes top 500 richest people. He's ridiculously rich in a town full of excess. Despite his $900 million fortune, Wynn gave out the requisite demotions and job cuts in February of last year, saving his company $80 million. But "in November Wynn Resorts announced a special $4-per-share dividend. Total cost of the dividend payout to Wynn Resorts: $492 million. Total dividend check that will go to Steve Wynn: $88 million." Nice.
7. Robert Rubin, US Treasury-Secretary, Citigroup senior strategist
This guy had a big hand in the economic downturn during hist stint as Treasury Secretary by helping roll back New Deal reforms that prevented some of the greedy bullshit that went on during the Bush2 administration, and as Citigroup's senior strategist, he managed to be around for their disgraceful $65 billion loss. He managed to rake in $126 million plus perks from his tenure there.
6. Andrew Hall
I'm not even gonna shorten the Too Much review of Hall, you should know all of this:
"If you happen to be Andrew Hall, the world’s most celebrated commodity trader, you don’t care what other people think. Hall waged a four-year battle — against his neighbors in the posh Connecticut town of Southport — to keep a 80-foot-long concrete sculpture on his lawn.
The neighbors won, and Hall had to remove the concrete eyesore. He promptly replaced it with two garishly painted "cartoon-like” sculptures of cars.
Hall can afford plenty of sculptures. He took home $100 million betting on oil futures and other commodities in 2008 — after picking up a quarter-billion over the previous five years — and stood to receive another $100 million this year.
But his employer, Citigroup, balked. Citi, by that time, was sitting on $45 billion in taxpayer bailout dollars, and handing $100 million to Hall, the honcho of Citi’s commodity-trading subsidiary, would have created a PR disaster for the bank — and the Obama administration as well.
Hall didn’t care. He demanded his trading fee. Citi ended up having to sell off Hall’s subsidiary, at a bargain basement price, to end the Hall headache.
Our story, to be sure, does have a happy ending — for Hall, Citi, and federal pay czar Kenneth Feinberg. Hall will get his $100 million, but not until next year. That deferral let Citi claim a zero pay expense for Hall in 2009, and Citi’s pay outlays for the year now show up about $100 million less than last year.
This accounting razzmatazz helped skew the 2009 executive pay totals for the seven biggest bailout basket cases and enabled pay czar Feinberg to claim that pressure from his office had, “on average” reduced executive cash comp at the seven by an impressive — and thoroughly misleading — 90 percent."
5. John Chambers, CEO of Cisco, the internet network company
4. Rupert Murdoch, media mogul, owner of Fox
Rupert isn't American, so I don't know why he's on this list, but he's for sure a greedy mofo. He's one of those people that makes so much money that they don't really exist in the real world. They exist in this fake ether-world of the super-rich, where shit just doesn't matter. Seriously, your tears? They mean nothing. I mean, if you can channel them into a box-office smash and promote the shit out of your tears to the extent you are contractually obligated to, well, cry away, but otherwise, WTF? We're trying to eat our $1000 chocolate mousse with real gold flakes. Stop with the noise.
Despite his gajillions of dollars, he wants to charge you, yes YOU for reading news on the internet. NEWS. On the Internet. Place of all things free. I'm telling you, he doesn't really live here with the rest of us.
3. Mark Herd, CEO of Hewlett-Packard
Ever wonder why printer ink costs so damn much money? I mean, the printer itself costs about the price of like 3 printer cartridges. How is that effing possible? Well, thank Mark Herd, who is milking cartridges that cost $3 to make. He cut 6,000 workers last year and gave people demotions (some up to 15%, which makes me, a lowly adjunct at a Cal State feel bad for them, because I'm only at 10% cut.), Raising his douche quotient even more? He took a pay cut of 20% in "solidarity" but made that tidy sum up in new stock awards.
2. Richard Scott, Columbia/HCA Healthcare Corp. CEO
A quote from Scott,
“Do we have an obligation to provide health care for everybody? Where do we draw the line? Is any fast-food restaurant obligated to feed everyone who shows up?”
Just fuck this guy, is all I have to say.
But Too Much has more:
"The federal government went on to indict key Columbia/HCA personnel for “bilking Medicare while simultaneously handing over kickbacks and perks to physicians who steered patients to its hospitals.” The company ended up pleading guilty to 14 felonies and paying $1.7 billion in criminal and civil fines.
The board of Columbia/HCA, then the nation’s biggest for-profit hospital chain, would go on to ease Scott out the door, but ever so gently. He left with a $10 million severance package and stock worth $300 million.
See, fuck this guy.
1. Larry Ellison, CEO of Oracle business software
He apparently buys up companies, fires everyone and then gobbles up their customers. After laying off tons of people, he buys yachts and sales them in rich guy yacht races. He also ranks as a total jerk because he pledged $115 million to Harvard but then didn't pay because it was all based on Harvard president Lawrence Summers. Not that Harvard needed the money, but still. It's shady.
Summers, as a side note, is famous for his feud with Cornell West, who totally rules, and for giving a rousing speech at a conference about how women don't make it in academia in the sciences not due to discrimination, but due to biology. He claims that socialization or cultural reasons are negligible. Dude! Really? Not surprisingly, 88% of tenured faculty during his presidency were men. This is the kind of loyalty Ellison has, to dudes who suck at an exponential level. Looks like my chances at Harvard have just been tossed out the window....
There's actually a joke about Ellison:
“What’s the difference between God and Larry Ellison? Answer: God doesn’t think he’s Larry Ellison.”
He supports the push for mandatory national ID cards, has had his fair share of insider trading lawsuits that he's wiggled out of, and manages to donate only 1% of his staggering income each year to charity. A winner! #1
Vampires aren't particularly associated with greed, but as greed and vampires both become important cultural narrative themes, they are bound to intersect. The painting above that shows greed via George W. Bush and our Lady Liberty was painted by comic artist Alex Ross and rules!
I have yet to see Daybreakers, but I hear it has its share of corporate America greed symbolism. When I see it, I'll be sure to publish an in-depth review.
Sure, vampires are greedy for blood, and if I remember in Blade III/Blade Trinity, there was a plan by the baddie to use the homeless as blood farms, which is super greedy, but overwhelmingly, the other sins seem to come forward in vampire lore. The only time they overlap is when the vampire has an aristocratic legacy and feels he or she deserves more, or there is a clear element of hierarchy in vampire culture which is a result of old vampires hanging on to outdated traditons. The Sookie Stackhouse books and True Blood explore the vampire kings and queens, all of whom do the same stuff the super-rich and royal do, namely exploit, dabble in narcissism, and give less than two shits about anyone else.
Anyone want to add to my greedy jerks list? Do so in the comments!
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