Thanks for the support!
High five!
Just a quick note to let you all know that the response to the Man Boobz pledge drive has been amazing. I am once again humbled by the outpouring of support.
Thanks, everyone, for the donations! I appreciate each and every one of them, big or small. (Sorry I’m a little behind in sending out the personal thank yous; I’ve been sidelined a bit by migraine this week.)
Given how well it’s gone, I’m going to wind the pledge drive up a little early this time, and stop with the naggy reminders, because I know how annoying those can be.
Thanks again, everyone!
Oh, just one more naggy reminder, and that’s it!
Posted on February 21, 2013, in announcements, kitties, pledge drive. Bookmark the permalink. 119 Comments.
PP’s point is that he never has a point.
It’s great, isn’t it? I met my three best friends online and we’ve met a few times in meatspace (damn,I have got to find a better word than that, it’s dire) and had a wonderful time each occasion.
Glad to hear the donations drive is going well! My contribution was embarrassingly small, but I promise that if I land one of the jobs I’m applying for, I’ll swing more your way.
Also, many thanks to whoever-it-was[1] that recommended Pontypool on whichever-it-was other thread! My partner said it was so great that he wants more Manboobz movie recommendations.
(Preferably movies low on the gratuitous violence as he refused to watch the rest of Utopia with me after that torture scene.)
[1] Google is refusing to remind me who it was.
Have you seen Stranger than Fiction, nerdypants?
- David Futrelle
The times, they are a-changin. My word, David has a history to him.
So, nerdypants, what sort of films do you and your partner like? Any particular genre?
February 22, 2013, 2:12 am: Fact Finder finally finds out that Futrelle did not spontaneously fart into existence to facilitate Manboobz.
Fart into existence….I may have snorted wine out my nose, bravo, Tulgey
That comment would have gone well in the Making Up Shit About Futrelle thread!
Uh, Fact Finder, I know you think that last link is some sort of “gotcha,” but I’m rather curious what you think an out-of-context quote from a book review of mine about two books on Victorian sexuality is supposed to prove. I mean, it’s not even a quote from me, but from a Victorian feminist.
CONTEXT IS MISANDRY
I, for one, am appalled to learn of your sordid history of reading books and having opinions on them.
My God, you mean I’ve donated money to someone old fashioned enough to believe that words have meaning?
Oh, the shame of it all…
On the other hand, I may have to withdraw my financial support if you diss Victorian feminists too much; I was educated at a school founded by radical feminists in 1875. Miss Buss and Miss Beale made the Jesuits look like amateurs…
David, I just got paid today so I’ve sent some cash your way! I really enjoy this blog and I think the community around it is fantastic. Some really wonderful, funny folk here. I lurk a lot and don’t post as often as I’d like (shy!), but I love you guys, I really do!
Glad to hear the Drive is going well!
And sorry to hear about your migraine, David. Those things are horrible, I’ve had a couple myself and my younger brother gets them regularly and has done for years, poor thing.
Hope you’re feeling better now.
Hey, IR/PP/FF:
Thanks for the link to David’s article. It was an excellent and interesting read. I appreciate all the work you’ve done here to support us feminists. You’ve certainly done an excellent job of raising my own self-esteem, not to mention my admiration and appreciation for David and the clever and compassionate people who comment on this blog.
Oh blast. “admiration and appreciation”, “clever and compassionate”
I’m apparently on an alliteration kick. My brain does this to me sometimes.
Happy Friday!
@nerdypants, the last few films I saw that left me really impressed were “Argo” and “The Fall” (starring Lee Pace - not a new film, but really amazing).
IR’s inability to understand what he reads is almost impressive. He will probably interpret that sentence as me calling him impressive.
It’s David quoting a Victorian feminist who is criticizing the use of that force by “purity societies” to change the morality of women.
This is supposed a gotcha?
And happy cat dance for David! It’s payday so I’ll throw a few bucks in the jar when I get home.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-_wsawRCOI
leftwingfox: This is P-P. Words mean what he wants them to mean, ergo he is never wrong.
He’s not right, but that’s a different issue.
@Ellex: I loved The Fall. So much crying. So much pathos, and angst, and Lee Pace… Who is, of course, pretty much perfect.
Also, David, remember that if your opinions of Victorian feminists have changed in 20 years, that’s MISANDRY.
Seconding about the Argo recommendation! I enjoyed it very much.
@howardbann1ster
Have you read any of the interviews with Tarsem Singh about making The Fall? The behind the scenes info is nearly as fascinating as the film itself. There was no script. The little girl spoke almost no English at first. For a time, the cast and crew thought Lee Pace really was disabled and couldn’t walk. All the locations are real places.
http://www.avclub.com/articles/tarsem,14243/
Thanks ellex24 and The Kitteh’s, I’ve noted those down.
The Kitteh’s: We don’t really have a preferred genre. His only requirement is that it isn’t gratuitously violent. He also likes movies where (as he puts it) “people talk to each other and say stuff”. I also tend to like fantastical things.
I certainly wouldn’t be recommending violent films, I don’t like that at all. Oh, don’t be put off by Will Ferrell being in Stranger Than Fiction: it’s not at all like most of his stuff. Plus Emma Thompson and Queen Latifah and Dustin Hoffmann are in it too.
Let’s see, if you like UK films, I’d recommend Cold Comfort Farm, The Full Monty, The Queen, Billy Elliot (the accents are a bit impenetrable), The Remains of the Day (good, but a downer). Red Dog is a recent Oz film that’s good for both a laugh and a weep. I don’t really recommend The Lion in Winter - a talkfest, all right, but very stagey, and Katharine Hepburn as Eleanor of Aquitaine is too much for my suspension of disbelief to handle.
Oh, and if you can find them, try The Norman Conquests. They’re three intersecting short plays by Alan Ayckbourn, and the BBC made them in the 70s or so. Tom Conti’s the star. Very, very funny and clever - all set on a weekend and taking place in the kitchen, living room and garden of the house, so you have to piece the story together in your head. (Tom Conti plays Norman and the “conquests” are his attempts at affairs.)
I didn’t really go for Stranger than Fiction (Doad loves it). I liked Will Ferrell in it when I normally don’t like him at all, but I think that if a really good book by an acclaimed author is central to a movie’s plot, then it has to actually sound like a good book.
If you have trouble with the accents just turn on captions till you get the hang of them. You will be surprised how quickly you can train your ear that way.
Oh, I’m used to English accents - I’ve watched mostly English TV all my life - but the particular northern ones in Billy Elliot are fairly heavy.
RE: Kittehs
Meeting cool people is always awesome. I’ve done a lot of wandering in my time, so I’ve been able to meet… at least ten now. I look forward to meeting more as time goes on!
I’m hoping to be back in the US next year. My bff (who I met on the internet) and I want to go to Chicago. She’s in LA and hasn’t been, and I’ve spent a couple of days there and really liked what I saw. We’re hoping to do it by train and go through the Colorado mountains, and meet up with my other bffs who live in Illinois and have a GIRLY GIRLY GIRLY holiday. Well, a hanging-around-art-galleries-and-shops girly holiday, anyway.
It’d be really cool to meet any ManBoobzers in LA or Chicago, though I don’t know how much time I’ll be able to allot for the holiday overall.
The train is pricey. From LA you’lll take the Coast Starlight to Portland (it’s loverly) and then change. It’s not the Empire Builder, that leaves Seattle, so I think it’s the Thunder Chief. I’d recommend getting a sleeper, because it includes all your food, and is much more comfy. If there are delays you will certainly eat more food than the difference in price equals.
I think the train wasn’t hugely different in price from the plane. I looked at it last visit (went from LA to Milwaukee - it’s as close as Chicago to where I was going) and the main difference was the time.
Yeah, I think we’d be saving for a sleeper. We’re both past the age of wanting to curl up on train seats to sleep, and that’s good to know about the food being included. The accommodation shouldn’t be too bad, we’ll be sharing the hotel with the friends we’re meeting.
Coast Starlight sleeper passengers also get a mini bottle of champagne and get to go to a wine and cheese tasting
Not terribly good wine or cheese, but free!
It’s railway food, of course it wouldn’t be that good!
Trivia: railway food has been crap pretty much as long as there have been railways. I saw a tea-making set, sort of like a kettle in a hamper contraption, from about the 1850s (possibly earlier) in the Railway Museum at York. It was made for people who’d had railway tea and never wanted to drink the stuff again.
I’d be up for a LA meetup, if it works out Kittehs’! And I’ve always wanted to take the train cross-country!
Cool!
The food on the trains is good. The cheese is so-so, the wine is local, and varies. If you have Jose as your parlour car attendant (The Coast Starlight has a vintage parlour car), he is wonderful. The only thing you pay for, if you have a sleeper is your alcohol.
It’s well worth the money to get a sleeper for anything more than 24 hours.
Re: train food, I only know the metro north and Pennsylvanian lines, but he other has much in the way of vegetarian food. And if you’re vegan, enjoy your bagel if they haven’t sold out yet?
I always either pack lunch, or plan the trip with a longer transfer around lunch time (the Philadelphia station has a variety of food).
I’d hope it was better on the longer lines, but you may want to at least pack a sandwich just in case.
Also, I’m back from Boston and thus actually here. Totally killed my feet at the fine art museum, totally worth it. Kitteh, nothing of Louis XIII, but they had a portrait of Louis XIV. And some Pollack, a couple van Gogh’s and Monet, and Mondrian’s Composition in Blue, Rd and Yellow (the red and yellow were much lighter than I expected). Plus a whole bunch by John Singer Sargent and some Cézzane’s.
…and an outer sarchopus that my mother touched when she asked if it was like the thing we put the coffin in — “hands off the exhibit! And yes” >.<
Also, this and a curtain of beads in the modern art section that I had way too much fun with. Plus a very sexy harpsichord. Quite the variety in the Art of Asia, Oceania and Africa wing, but I could barely walk by that point and kind of rushed it (and then fell out of bed straight onto the worst part of my foot trying to answer the door for the room service guy with my fucking wine, yesterday was fun)
Oh, and among the Roman busts was “Livia(?)” with her nose busted off. To which I could only say “if that’s her, she totally deserved that”
I misspelled Pollock, I am a terrible person and will be sitting in the corner of shame if anyone needs me >.<
I wasn’t going to say anything but…. Cézanne.
Argenti, that sounds like a marvellous trip! LOL about your mum touching the sarcophagous, my mother was exactly the same in our museum-visiting days.
I hope you told her “Hey, I know his stepmother!” when you saw the pic of Louis XIV.
Argh, museum fatigue, yup, know that well. Even if you haven’t got back/leg trouble already, it’s exhausting.
I’ll probably take sandwiches or something on the train, just because I like to eat between meals. Good to know everything’s covered by a sleeper fare. I don’t drink. And for a 48 hour trip, there’s no way I’m sitting up the whole time. I’d be in serious pain by the end of it.
Spelling, how the fuck does it work?!
Really hilarious part about her touching it was she’d grabbed me when I started to wander over one of those “do not cross” marks on the floor. And then she pokes a 2,000+ year old stone artifact. Go mom!
And no, I didn’t even point out Louis XIV, she was gawking at furniture or something (there were many jokes about how those chairs would never be suitable for Martin’s delicate bum)
Most of the freedom trail and then the EA concert on Wednesday, lunch with LBT and then the aquarium on Thursday, the museum yesterday. I’m fucking exhausted! (And the aquarium’s huge cylinder tank is being remodeled and thus closed, I haz a sad over that)
Sounds like a fun trip!
ROFL wish I could have heard that!
There’s a shop near work that sells, ahem, pretentious designer furniture that would kill Mr Bony Arse Martin. It’d kill well-padded me to sit on; it’s all metal grids and hard wood and fibreglass, and I can’t see it being used anywhere except the reception area of some wanky corporate building. Every time I pass it, I smirk thinking of how outraged the Cushionless Cad would be if he saw it.
And it’s designed by a man. The traitor!!!
I took the Empire Builder when I moved from NY to Seattle. Great three days.
I like train travel, and I’ve never had the chance to do a long (ie more than a few hours) trip on a really comfortable train. It’s a great chance to see more of a country.