Um, the US government runs Medicare. Pass it on.
Group Interview About Gender
Yesterday I did an interview with a few other contributors of the On the Issues summer issue – Our Genders, Our Rights – do check it out.
RIP Ted Kennedy
The Senate has to do the right thing to honor Ted Kennedy’s memory: pass health care. You know they have to, now, & so we have Ted Kennedy’s last gift to the working classes of the US.
LOLCat Carrier
For those who have ever had cats who have to be put in carriers:
(Actually, ours just get in them, for the most part. They’re very good cats.)
Not Really Around
In the next four days, I am packing up someone’s truck with our stuff which they’ll then drive to WI; meeting with an elected official about ENDA, dropping off the last of our donations; putting a bunch of stuff into storage, and finally, at long last, packing up the kittoi and the car and heading to WI.
So I won’t be around much. Consider this my annual blog vacation.
Today’s NYT
There’s one great article about women in the world which to some degree states clearly that feminism is not dead & shouldn’t be, and another article, a book review, talks about the relationship between money and sex as laid out by the sex workers who wrote the essays in Hos, Hookers, Call Girls and Rent Boys
Friday they had a good article about Caster Semenya written by Alice Dreger.
Moving Thoughts Pt. 1
I’m going to be an Old Person for a moment, so bear with me, but I just went through a lifetime of cassette tapes – and yes, I am keeping some – ones that my artist friends made me, or ones that were particularly good compilations (especially if they have music I haven’t otherwise tracked down in another form yet), compilations used at parties – it seems I used to throw a lot of parties, go figure – and other rare & interesting things, like a tape of Yul Brynner singing Romany songs.
& What I was thinking, in choosing a bunch for one of my students who likes cassette tapes – he has an older car that plays them – is that Kids These Days won’t have this kind of physical detritus to part with painfully at some point in their adult lives. I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing, but it is a thing, & I wonder what that means for them. I feel similarly about vinyl (although I know that’s kind of hip again, apparently) — these were all Things of Love, fetishy tokens of friendship and a shared love of music. So what do the kids swap these days when they have a crush on someone? Playlists? Seems a cheap imitation, but I suppose love & friendship are still the same, & heartbreak too.
Questioning Photos
At the TransOhio “Fabulously Fluid” performance night, I got to see Adam Apple do a fantastic performance based on Dylan’s signs that was intense & personal, & made a whole bunch of us in the audience cry.
This series of gorgeous photos asking questions about gender by L. Weingarten reminded me of Adam Apple’s performance, which I found on YouTube (even if the video/audio quality is crap, it gives you an idea).
MSNBC
MSNBC just did a really good job talking about the gender binary, chomosomal variations, and the athlete Caster Semenya. Props to them!
S. Bear Bergman’s Next Book Due in October
It’s true, it’s true! I’m reading an advanced copy of Bear Bergman’s next book, The Nearest Exit May Be Behind You. Arsenal Pulp is hir publisher this time around, & the book is due out in October.
You can get it through an Indie Press bookstore.
If you haven’t read Bergman’s Butch Is a Noun, now’s the time to do so.
Watch this space for a review and an interview with Bear.