moriath

I have an interview for an ACTUAL PUBLISHING JOB next week. It happens to be exactly a year after I started my current job. Sooooooooooo excited.

One of my old school librarians whom I'm still in touch with was apparently doing some schmoozing at ALA midwinter a few weeks ago and discovered Macmillan had a job opening in editorial in one of their kids/YA imprints - an opening they hadn't even advertised yet. She gave me the name and e-mail address of someone to contact directly, so I sent off my resume and a day or two later he e-mailed me back saying he'd sent it along to their recruiter.

Today Joanne from human resources called me! Yaaaaaaaaaaaay!

9:00 am on Wednesday I get to go interview in the Flatiron Building!

Now I'm debating what I should tell my bosses. It's entirely possible I'd get in and out of the interview before my usual work time (9:30 - I'm only four blocks away from the Flatiron Building), but it's also possible I'd be late. I also know that they don't actually care what time I show up; when I was working two jobs and sometimes having to stay at my retail jobs super late they told me I could come in a little later in the day and they wouldn't care. But I still don't feel right about coming in late without prior notice.

So my options are make up some "appointment" on Wednesday morning that might make me late, or tell them I have an interview.

One of my bosses, John, has talked openly with me about what I might be doing next. He's even said that if he hears of an opening at one of the publishers he'd let me know (so far, apparently, he's heard nothing). When they hired me last February they did ask how long I thought I could commit to the position and I said 6 months to a year - a commitment I've definitely fulfilled. So it shouldn't be a huge surprise that I'd be interviewing again at this point. On the other hand, it also feels *weird* to just up and tell them "Yeah, I want to go somewhere else." It almost feels ungrateful. Because I'm very thankful for this job and it's been fun in some ways and I love how laid back it is, but I don't really want to work in bargain books forever and I don't see a lot of room for advancement in the company. My position isn't a traditional entry level position in the company - it's a job that previously has been held by people who work part time and spend the rest of the time in college. No one starts as the showroom assistant and moves into the sales force proper - but none of those other people took on half as many responsibilities as I have over the last year, either.

Wow, this is a rambley entry. Guess that proves how conflicted I am about all of this, huh? Any advice is welcome, and please send me all of your good vibes on Wednesday morning!

I was a responsible book blogger last night and wrote up the post I wanted for today last night. However, sometime between when I started writing and was ready to publish, Blogger went down. And it's been down for over 12 hours now. Down for everyone or just me confirms it's down for everyone, but Blogger is stupid and hosts its status page on their own servers, so if something happens to those servers, no one can actually find out what's going on.

So. Frustrating.

However, I was able to share this link over there before everything went pear-shaped: Controversies in Black Literature Prove Book Sales Aren't Color-Blind. Dude is full of fail, as evidenced by my take down in the comments. Unfortunately I can't do a nuanced follow up post BECAUSE BLOGGER IS DOWN.

I am a terrible person for all but abandoning this blog. I don't think I've ever gone this long without blogging in the ten years I've been doing it.

Holy shit. It's been 10 years since I had my first diaryland blog. I don't think we even had the word blog back then.

Anyway, it would be disingenuous to say I haven't been blogging at all for the past few months: I've been writing up a storm on my book blog. It's gotten some good publicity over the past few months - I was mentioned on the School Library Journal blog, and started a very minor tiny firestorm when I criticized an event at the New York Public Library. But no hard feelings apparently, because the woman who ran that event is the SLJ blogger (and the link came after the kerfluffle). Good times.

I hope to post more over here, especially since I'm really itching to get back into fandom. I'm going to participate in the Saying Yes ficbitathon on LJ, and I'm super excited that there are at least two other Animorphs fans there - seriously, nothing gets me more excited about ficcing that knowing that there are still other Anifans out there. And I'm glad the Ani fans are there, because I think I recognized one other fandom in the five pages of comments so far - and that was the new Sherlock Holmes movie, which I don't think I'm up to writing in yet.

I'm going to go post more prompts over there that don't involve anime-fandom. I missed the deadline (AGAIN) for this round of the porn_battle, so I'll have to get my jollies over on LJ!

OMG. It's been years since I've done fic. I actually had to look up how I used to do headers.

Title: Disastrous
Author: moriath
Pairing/Character: Janis Hawk, with a bit of OMC and OFC
Fandom: Flash Forward
Rating: PG
Word Count: 2,100
Summary: Inspired by Janis' comment in the episode "Gimme Some Truth," about a disastrous high school boyfriend. Janis attends her senior prom.
Warnings: Underage drinking, some teenage shenanigans. Potentially spoiler-ish for episode 1.05 "Gimme Some Truth"

( Disastrous )

The last of my birth control was accidentally thrown out over the weekend. Was harassed by two men on the way to work Monday. Spent an hour and a half on the subway Tuesday morning (it should have been more like 35 minutes). Wednesday was just crazy with phone calls at work. Today had to unpack two dozen boxes and then run off to a gynecologist appointment, where the receptionist is borderline incompetent (Tennessee is another state, not another country), and I ended up just re-scheduling for next week.

Of course, next week I'm going to be in the middle of my period, so I'm not sure how much of an examination the gynecologist will actually be able to do. But Monday is the longest I can go before I get more birth control; any more than that and I'll have been more than a week off of it and I would prefer not to have my hormones go any crazier than they already will be at that point. I've had the patch for almost 5 1/2 years now - my body is more comfortable functioning WITH those hormones than without them.

This week just really, really sucks. And I don't even get to relax and have the weekend to myself because Billy's family is coming to visit.

I'm really tempted to just flop on the bed and CRY at this point.

So I've been ducking into various Verizon Wireless stores this week trying to figure out where I can get the best deal for my own cell phone plan. I've been on my parents' plan since I was 16 and really, it's at the point that I need my own phone plan. Now that I've got the raise at work (yay!) I can finally afford one (at least for me - we might be keeping Billy with his current plan since technically it's a work phone).

Walking by the new store by my apartment tonight I saw a sandwich board saying they were having a 3 days sale. Well that's interesting, so I go inside and see what it is. Apparently a bunch of phones are free for the duration of the sale and he wants to check my account to see if I'm eligible. I explain that I actually want a new plan because I'm on my parents' at the moment. He says that in order for me to get off that plan, my dad (and yes, he did jump to the conclusion that it was my dad who was the primary account holder. That happens to be true but I still don't like the assumption) would have to be there (physically, in the store) to authorize me to have my own account.

"But my dad's already done that," I explain. And he has - he had checked earlier this summer to see what needed to be done to get me off of their plan and had it put into the computer system that I could leave whenever I wanted.

This sales rep didn't want to hear it - wouldn't even look it up to check.

I got so, so angry I snapped "That's not correct," and stormed out of the store. I was actually mildly scared of how angry I was, but mostly I'm just PISSED. Because, seriously, that's bullshit. I don't think I've been told I needed my dad to do something for me since I was 10. Haven't needed my parents for anything since I turned 18 (well, haven't needed them for anything like getting my own cell phone - clearly I love them and need them on a regular basis, but for things like moral support and presents ;-). To be told that as a 24 year old woman I still needed my father's permission to have my own cell phone account just pissed me off to no end.

Guess I'm going back to that store in Manhattan that is giving away free Blackberries.

In an attempt to organize my life and make sure I balance out Shit That Needs to be Done with Shit I Like to Do that has No Redeeming Value, I've blocked out a rough schedule for my evenings:

Monday: Library/reading
Tuesday: Writing
Wednesday: Video games
Thursday: Library/reading
Friday: Writing

It's a good schedule. Last night went well; didn't have to return any library books (because Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is boring as fuck thus is taking way too long to read and is keeping me from other, more exciting books) so I spent it reading and lounging with Billy (because according to the thermostat on the fan it was 89 degrees in the apartment - and that actually may be the highest reading on the thermostat, so it was probably hotter).

Tonight was supposed to be writing night. Writing at the apartment doesn't work - it's an unholy mess right now, which distracts me from my writing, plus the cats always want attention. Correction: Cricket always wants attention. If I'm on the bed, Gopher will hop up next to me and relax and Coyote will lounge on the end of the bed near my feet, but Cricket feels the need to hop up on my chest, pressing her bony little paws into my boobs with all her might going "Hey! Hey! Wanna pet me? Wanna pet me? You wanna pet me! Hey! Hey!" Not helpful. So I figured, hey, I'll do what all great writers do and head to a coffee shop. I've only got Starbuckses in my neighborhood, but that'll work, right?

Wrong.

Neither Starbucks in my vicinity has adequate seating. I passed one up because not only were there no seats when I arrived, but it was turning into a sauna thanks to the wall of windows facing the sunset. So I went to the other one, which I was sure was bigger, but I must have been mistaken. When I walked in there was one empty table, but only one person in front of me in line, so I figured I had a good shot at getting that table. So I ordered my Mocha Frappucino and buy a fruit and cheese plate ('cause omg I was starving), turn the corner from the bar to sit at my table...and there was another woman there already. NOT the woman who had been in front of me in line. I honestly have no idea where this woman came from. I stood around for five minutes, seeing if anyone was going to vacate one of the other tables (everyone had empty drink cups, so it wasn't unreasonable to think that maybe they'd be leaving), before I got fed up and left.

So now I'm back home. An hour wasted. And Billy is apparently upset because he tried to call me when I was on the subway for some directions. Tonight is not my night.

So today it took for fucking ever to get lunch. I went to the Bistro Truck, which I loved during their soft opening but today I swear it took 20 minutes to get a fucking burger. I watched FIVE people who ordered after me get their food before I did (one person ordered as my burger was put in it's cardboard tray...and then she GOT HER FOOD before they acknowledged my poor burger). They slightly made up for it by not charging me, and by having an effing delicious burger, but only slightly. I might try them again - but only when I take the subway down to Union Square. With the walking too much of my lunch time is taken up.

But after I got my burger and was on my way to the park, this woman randomly stopped me on the sidewalk to compliment my "look." I thanked her and was about to move on when she asked me what I did for a living.

I don't know how I feel about this, but I swear my first thought was "omg, isn't this how models get discovered?!" Not that I have any illusions about a possible career in modeling, but it was my first thought.

Turns out the woman was a Mary Kay "Independent Sales Director" and wants to meet with me to discuss being a Mary Kay sales assistant, LOL. Yes, the girl who hardly knows her way around a foundation compact should be selling expensive makeup. But I took her card and who knows what will happen?

Still, totally bizarre.

Is the addme community incapable of recognizing capital letters? Because I swear there isn't a single post there right now that uses a capital letter. None at all.

It's a little ridiculous.

Kinda debating joining it - I've always wanted to do an RP but could never find one that fits. It's not using the original Animorphs, which is kind of a bummer, but it IS set in New York City, so I totally want to create a character that's straight out of my neighborhood, lol. Though if everyone else is in Manhattan, being a 30+ minute subway ride away from the action wouldn't be very practical.

I just gotta say, today got off to a rough start. People are not meant to be awake at 6:30 in the morning - especially when they went to sleep at 12:30 (I put Sims 2 back on my computer yesterday and spent most of the day playing it). But it turned out pretty awesome.

Work had its stressful moments - I'm now in charge of finding substitute books when an individual title in an assortment is out of stock (in laymen's terms: sometimes a store will say "I want 100 kids books" so we put together an assortment of kids books - 32 titles with 3 books each and a 33rd with 4 books . But since we just grab randomly from our inventory, sometimes we'll come up with a title or two for an order that is out of stock or is being stored at a different warehouse. So now my job is to find replacements for those titles). I used to only have to find a book in the same category, but now I need to find books that match the category AND the same price, that hasn't already been included in the assortment. It's a tall order sometimes, but I'm managing.

Day was brightened first by getting ice cream at my favorite Big Gay Ice Cream Truck. Doug, the guy dishing out the ice cream all day, is always SO cheerful and smiley. I don't know how he does it. And his toppings are always fabulous - blueberries with saba is my new favorite thing ON THE PLANET.

Day got a million times better when I came home and found a card in the mail from my cousin Jenny. Jenny and I were never close, because her mother's a little crazy and was hellbent on keeping her husband (my mom's brother) and her kids away from his side of the family (this came out after their messy divorce, caused by her affair with the band teacher). So we were never close, but I know in the aftermath of the divorce my mom and uncle have gotten close again and on the few occasions I've been back in Michigan for family gatherings I got to see him and Andy, which used to be rare.

I haven't seen Jen in ages, however, because she moved out to Baltimore 5 years ago, and it always worked out that when she would go back to Michigan for holidays, I had plans elsewhere. But I've kept minor tabs on her through my mom, and that's how I found out late last year that cousin Jenny was gay and living with her girlfriend.

When it was time to send out wedding invitations, I knew I wanted to invite Jen and her girlfriend, but no one was getting me the girlfriend's name before the invite NEEDED to go out, so it ended up going to Jen & Guest. The day after the invitation went in the mail, of course, Mom called to say "Oh, yeah, the girlfriend is named Sarah." ~sigh~ So I sat down and wrote Jen a nice long note telling her that the "and guest" wasn't meant as some sort of slight, I just hadn't known Sarah's name! I assured them that, despite the wedding being in Holland, they wouldn't be the only gay people there and told Jen that I was bisexual.

So today I get the card from Jen, addressed to Billy and I and hyphenating our last names, which made me giggle. It was a big, solid card so I actually thought for a second it was a wedding invitation - Mom had told me Jen and Sarah were planning on getting married within the next year, so it wasn't out of the question. Instead it was a wedding card (plus check, also made out to Billy and I with a hyphenated last name - mine first, incidentally ;-) and a lovely, long letter from Jen apologizing for not RSVPing for the wedding, thanking me for the follow up letter, and updating me a bit on her life with Sarah.

I'm still grinning about it, and incredibly happy. I added her on Facebook so we'll be able to catch up without resorting to old-fashioned letters again, lol. Hopefully we can have something of a familial relationship, even if its in cyberspace :-)

I've been lax on blogging lately. My bad.

Last week was exciting. Billy was in a short play through school - it counts as a real, professional New York acting credit, which is super exciting. It was at The Players theatre, which happens to count Bill Murray among its members. He was in the building that night for some other event, but ended up wandering in to see the last of the plays (missing Billy's, unfortunately). But we were a bit star struck - it was our first New York celebrity sighting!

Actually, my first celebrity sighting period, unless you count young adult authors as celebrities.

My mom came into town to see Billy's play, which was excellent (both the play and Mom coming in). Poor thing got soooooooooooooooo overwhelmed with all the options of how to get from the Newark airport into the city that she finally just paid an extra $20 and hopped on the shuttle bus to deposit her just a few blocks north of where I work. So on Monday night we went out for dinner then saw Billy's show, and then on Tuesday she took one of those double decker bus tours, which had a stop in Flatiron, so we met for lunch when the tour bus swung through and then met again after work for dinner at Bluesmoke and shopping at Macy's (the Macy's). Then I got her back on her bus and sent her home. It was a short trip but fun - she'll be back with my dad over Labor Day weekend (Mom's been out here three times already in the past year and Dad hasn't been once).

Rest of the week was uneventful until Sunday when my awesome friend from college, Emily, took the train into the city to hang out with me. OMG, there are no words for how great it was to see a familiar face again. I was hardly the social butterfly back in Ypsi, but at the very least I could always chill in the forensics room to see people. Here in New York there's not even a handful of people I know socially, and thanks to us all being adults with jobs we have to plan ahead all of our get together. So Emily and I got brunch in the village, did some shopping and wandering, and got cupcakes at the famous Magnolia bakery. SUPER FUN TIMES.

Oh, last week I also attended a seminar panel on getting a media job. I figured for $25 bucks it couldn't hurt to check it out. One of the panelists was actually a children's book editor at Viking, so I figured at the very least I'd get some useful tips out of her. Overall they didn't tell me anything earth shattering - most of it I'd heard before. But they did encourage us all to really think about all the people we know and said that dropping an old acquaintance an e-mail to say we were job hunting couldn't hurt us. So I e-mailed a handful of people, including the woman at Perseus who interviewed me back in October and Sharyn November, another editor at Penguin who I met at ALA way back in 2002, and BOTH of them responded saying they were passing on my resume: at Perseus an editorial assistant position just opened up, at now my resume is on file at the Penguin HR office. It's such a boost to my confidence to know that there are a couple of people out here who are willing, in some small way, to vouch for me as a potential employee.

Work yesterday and today was extremely chill. One of my bosses is in Tennessee until Thursday so it's just me and John, who's super laid back. He told me to go home an hour early yesterday (but still put regular hours on my time sheet) and today he felt bad for actually making me work, so he bought me lunch. I have absolutely no problem doing tedious work at work - it's actually more exciting than my fall back inventory project - but John always feels super guilty about it so he buys me lunch. Not that I'm complaining ;-)

If anyone's curious about what happened at ALA last week regarding BBYA, I did a follow up post on my book blog. (Short version: proposal to sunset BBYA was changed to a discussion item, lots of discussion happened with no decision made as to BBYA's final fate - that's for another board meeting another time)

I know there are some people on my flist who are working in libraries/studying to be librarians, so I thought this might be of interest to some of you.

This weekend at the ALA conference, the YALSA board is going to discuss the possibility of eliminating the Best Books for Young Adults list. I wrote up a long and somewhat emotional response my book blog over here that explains a bit about what's going on (and provides links to people who are actually involved with ALA/BBYA/YALSA/other-abbreviations who can give more logical insight) and how BBYA has affected me as one small bit of argument for why the list should continue to exist in something akin to its current format.

It's a slow day in the office, and no one else is here at the moment, so I figured messing around on IJ is a legitimate use of my time :-)

Update on Epic Gas WTF 2009: Twitter/Facebook followers know that the gas company showed up mere minutes before Billy had to leave for rehearsal on Wednesday. And then proceeded to tell Billy that the stove/oven was still broken (it was unclear where the leak was actually coming from still). When I got home I asked the super to look at it, and he determined the regulator was broken. So the stove guy came by yesterday (allegedly - I had to leave my key with the super because Billy has class all day Thursday), but didn't have the right part. Hopefully he comes by today with the right one because I'm tired of not being able to cook (we had a huge batch of groceries delivered on Monday and I don't want my veggies to go bad!). Luckily, my boss took pity on my yesterday and gave me $20 so Billy and I could order pizza for dinner, rather than repeating the balogna sandwich dinner of Wednesday evening.

COUNTDOWN TO THE END OF MY TIME AT BANANA REPUBLIC: Got my schedule for my last week and it doesn't completely suck! 11:15-6:45 on Sunday, then the usual 6-10 Monday and Thursday. And then I'll volunteer for a short shift on Saturday because it's holiday pay and it's not like I have any other plans for the 4th. Only working a morning shift though - not a chance in hell I'm volunteering to close on my last day.

Computer update: Computer started acting extremely wonky last week - clearly had a virus, the type that doesn't let you open up Spybot or Malware Bytes. Downloaded AdAware which would run, but never cleaned out the virus for very long. Bought Norton AntiVirus, which did better, but there was also one pesky program that would never leave. And then sometime overnight Wednesday my computer froze and whenever I tried to restart it on Thursday it would go to blue screen of death immediately after I booted it up. And Safe Mode wasn't an option - I can't remember the last time I actually got safe mode to work on my computer.

So Thursday after work I selected the non-destructive recovery option on the computer and reinstalled the whole OS while all of my files were saved on another part of the drive. Woke up early this morning to start fiddling with settings and the like - running my antivirus program again (since whatever virus I had was probably backed up with my files), messing around with Google Chrome (really, really love the concept of the browser. Hate that they don't have an efficient adblocker, so I'm sticking with Firefox for awhile longer). As of 9:00 am this morning, the computer was looking good - Norton had found a virus during its quick scan and got rid of it with no problem. Still can't run Safe Mode, though, which troubles me and probably signals that before too long I'll have to replace the computer. Can't afford to buy a whole new machine right now, though I'm hoping to get a Netbook soon for writing (and free wifi over in Madison Square Park intrigues me), or perhaps I'll hold off until the fall to see what these Android-powered smartbooks are like.

You know your evening is going to go to hell in a handbasket when you turn onto your street and see no fewer than three firetrucks parked in front of your apartment building.

When I got to the front door, there were two firemen there talking with a guy from the gas company. I asked if we were allowed to go inside and the gas guy said sure, sure - wait, what apartment did I live in? I told him and he was like "Ding, ding, ding! We have a winner" and got on his walkie talkie to tell someone that the "occupant was on her way up to the unit."

So...I pretty much ran up the stairs (my grocery bag of milk, bread and ice cream banging against my knees) to find half a dozen fire fighters crammed into my hallway, standing with the door to my apartment wide open.

Turns out there was a gas leak in my apartment. Not the building, my apartment. When the super took apart the gas hose that connects the stove to the gas pipe in the wall, we found a giant hole in the hose. As he told Billy later last night, it's a wonder we're still alive, what with the size of that hole.

I spent a good part of the evening freaking out because I couldn't find any of the cats (I think I was looking for something to focus on rather than the fact that I could have died from the gas). The firefighters all said none of them had run out into the hall, but they had also opened the window screen so one of them could come in that way (...but they did that after busting down my front door. So now I have a sticky lock and a giant dent in the door that is a little disconcerting). So I was freaking out that a cat or three had decided to make a run for the fire escape.

Coyote turned out to be hiding behind the refrigerator. Gopher...I have no idea where he was hiding. I looked into all of the usual hiding places before coaxing Coyote out, not finding him, but after I shut Coyote up in the bathroom (with the window wide open, of course - I had to leave the door to the apartment open for awhile and didn't want to risk anyone running away after the gaggle of firefighters left) I came back out into the living area and Gopher was walking across the rug.

Cricket I didn't find until everyone had left and I'd turned on the light - it was only then that I could see a faint bit of light reflecting from her eyes from underneath the far corner of the bed. She didn't come out until after we came back from dinner that night.

So at the moment we have no gas. The gas company is going to come between noon and six today, but Billy has to leave for rehearsal by 3, so who knows if anything's going to get done. He's also in class all day tomorrow, so if they don't show up by three then we're not gonna have gas again until Friday. Balogna sandwiches and hot dogs for dinner, I guess.

Oh, and ice cream. I did pick that up yesterday, after all.

Subject = totally true. Was walking down Fifth Avenue with Diana, and we walked past a guy with a real live cat on his head. In the rain. It was the world's most chill cat.

Day started at the Big Apple Con which was...kind of underwhelming. A packed room full of comic book sellers, and then another room that was the artists' alley/autograph area...with 99% of the autographers being scantily clad Playboy models. Yeah. So Diana and I and another friend of hers hung around for a little while, said hi to the people she knew, and then Diana and I took off to...wander.

We ended up at the Fashion Institute and since it was starting to rain we went inside their free museum to see the exhibit on "Seduction" which was really interesting. The idea of a museum exhibit about fashion and its role in seduction/sexuality is awesome. It was a rather limited exhibit in some ways (only covered from the 1750s-present) but man oh man were some of the shoes sexy. And FIERCE.

Then lunch at Rickshaw Dumpling Bar, wandered through Madison Square Park and the BBQ Block Party, before heading down to the Union Square area where we stumbled upon an awesome bar. Lillie's is an Irish-Victorian bar that we stumbled upon because they had a cool little band playing early in the evening - fiddle and banjo and flute and probably another instrument or two. We shopped around Union Square a little bit before heading back to Lillie's for a drink. Excellent bar menu with really reasonable prices for imported beers and ciders. I had an amazing Swedish pear cider. So fun.

Probably could have been improved by seeing that cat on the guy's head again. 'Cause that was really freaking cool.

Now going to watch Season 3 of Voyager with Billy. Very nice end to the day :-)

So the governor of Alaska is back in the news again (really, has she left since November?), this time because David Letterman made some off-color jokes about her and her family. Palin is demanding an apology on behalf of the women of America (oh, so now you care about us, Governor Palin? /snark).

A friend of mine on Facebook posted a long note that basically said "I expect Letterman to apologize when you apologize for being an idiot and letting your idiot daughter talk about stupid abstinence."

I may or may not be exaggerating the number of times "idiot" was used in his note.

A bunch of people agreed with said friend, but it really didn't sit well with me because...and this is hard for me...I think Sarah Palin is right.

Because my computer is buggy I haven't been able to actually watch Letterman's clip, but from the bits I've been able to read online, there are two jokes that were objectionable: a comment that one of Palin's daughters got pregnant by A-Rod during a Yankee's game, and Palin took time while in New York to buy new clothes to update her "slutty flight attendant" look. Palin's demands for an apology focus on the former joke (Letterman claims the daughter he was joking about was 18 year old Bristol, while it was Palin's 14 year old daughter that actually attended the game, meaning that the joke definitely has icky statutory rape undertones), but really it's the second joke that I have a problem with. Calling a woman a "slut" is about the lowest form of discourse we have in this country and one of those insults that has become so normalized that too many people (including pretty much everyone commenting on my friend's Facebook note) fail to recognize that it is even a disgusting, misogynist insult.

I actually had a rather stimulating debate in the comment thread with another woman about whether it was "worth" getting riled up over the slut remark - we had to agree to disagree because she absolutely thought there was nothing wrong with the joke (and also kept coming back to an argument about how we have to hold female, gay, and non-white comedians to the same standard of discourse we were holding a white guy...I'm not sure where exactly that tangent came from).

But the sort of comment that inspired me to come on here to rant (because I promised that I would stop hijacking the comment thread over there), is repeated calls for Palin to apologize for various remarks she made about Barack Obama during the campaign before it would be appropriate for Letterman to apologize. Like when she said being a small town mayor was like being a community organizer, except for having actual responsibilities.

Okay, I'm in agreement that I thought that was something really dumb to say because clearly I don't think being a community organizer is a bad or worthless thing. But it is on a totally different level of discourse than jokes about her sexuality or her daughters' sexuality because, faulty though Palin's reasoning may have been back during the campaign, it was an attack on Obama's record and past employment. It's the duty of politicians to analyze each other's records and keep each other as honest as they can - no the McCain/Palin camp didn't do a good job of that (in this democrats opinion), but things like the community organizer thread to their attacks was based in some sort of policy. Calling Sarah Palin a slut and talking about her family has absolutely nothing to do with her politics (and there are oh so many political ways to attack Governor Palin).

Basically what my feelings boil down to are 1) Palin doesn't owe anybody an apology for reasonable political beliefs and actions and 2) Even if she did owe an apology for her actions, that doesn't mean Letterman doesn't owe her (and/or all of America's women) an apology.

...And I think I'm done. Good night.

I officially gave my notice at Banana last night! July 4th is my last day of working there (for now - I'm leaving open the possibility of working there during the holidays ~sigh~)

But anyway! Three more weeks! And then I'll finally start having time for myself (and Billy) again!

I got an invitation today to the (high school) graduation party of my middle school librarian's daughter.

Mrs. Dobrez Cindy knows I can't go, of course, and even noted that this isn't a gift grab, she just thought I'd like to see how the senior pictures turned out (I saw a preview of them back in January when I dropped in to the library) - but I'm sure that if I were closer, or planning a random trip to Michigan, I would be welcome at the tiki bar.

Oh, man, I want a tiki bar so badly. /random