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Another shameless plea

You know what's going to happen if you don't vote for my friend Doug, right? If you don't vote, a band that sounds like Nickleback might win instead. All those other bands sound like Nickleback. We can't have another Nickleback. This is why. That's funny, right? It's also kind of sad. Vote for Doug.
pounded out by Wendy at 9:22 AM

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Curves: the clean-up

Oh my God I loved writing that last entry, but now is where the smoke clears.

There's been discussion elsewhere about what the hell we should do about this whole Curves/Gary Heavin business. Curves is a franchise, and from what little I know about franchises, I bet a boycott would mostly hurt franchise owners--at least some of whom probably don't share the same views as Heavin. When I wrote this last night I hadn't thought much about what I'd do if I was a Curves member; I just saw anti-choice lobbying and comfy little gym presented side by side and weighed against each other as if they were equally significant, and that pissed me off.

But then, consider that out of all the businesses, institutions, and mind-bogglingly rich individuals who give money to icky pro-life causes, it happens that one of them is Gary Heavin. Which is to say, nearly two million women might know who Gary Heavin is, if you just count the Curves members alone. That's a lucky thing when you think about it: when it comes to knowing the enemy, this guy's in our sights.

A pro-choice reader and new Curves member wrote me to point out the franchise factor in terms of profits going to anti-choice organizations, and she thinks it could be a neglible amount. That might be true, but I don’t know for sure, so I've edited the previous entry to be less specific about the numbers.

People's feelings seem to vary on this sort of thing: some want to know exactly how much money goes where; others see it in more symbolic terms and think any amount is too much. I'd love to see a pro-choice organization to do the math and figure out a donation amount sufficient to buy a soul back from Curves, so to speak. Or better, put on a walk/run/bike athletic fundraiser in order to match some of the money Gary Heavin gives to Operation Screw Us Over, and offer special incentives for Curves members, especially if they train for the event at Curves. Hell, we could form a whole bitch army and send them to train at Curves if we really got our shit together, and now I'll leave it at that.
pounded out by Wendy at 8:40 PM

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On Curves & Choice

So whenever I check my referrals I notice I get at least one or two searches a day for Curves Gym, which I mentioned in this entry about a year ago. I didn't join Curves for various reasons--the hours weren't great and neither were the membership fees; the fact that it was in a storefront was unsettling to me. All kinds of bad theater, fringe religions, and pyramid scheme recruitments have happened in storefronts, and my impression was that Curves was just a little bit like all three of those. Mostly, though, it just looked kind of boring. It wasn't for me, I thought, but I could have been making excuses, too.

But a lot of you wrote me and said Curves is a good place. From what I've heard, it is okay--in fact in a lot of ways, it's great. I can't possibly hate the concept: Curves loves the fat chicks, and our moms, and the whole sedentary sisterhood of North America; Curves wants us to be comfortable; Curves wants us all to work it because Curves knows we can! I'm being a little hammy here, I know, but hell, I'm all for it. Curves seemed to have the same philosophy I did in a different flavor--more flowery, maybe, and with a hint of Jesus, but close enough.

I don't want to think any less of those values now, even as I read online and in Bitch magazine about how Curves entrepreneur Gary Heavin is an anti-choice activist. I mean, the guy funds "crisis pregnancy centers" with money from the Curves franchises. He's "stepped up to the plate in a big way" by rounding up five million dollars to bring down Planned Parenthood in Texas. (And it seems like at one point in his life he was way too into the belief that God provides for unwanted children, because he sure as hell didn't feel like paying child support.)

So, yeah, I think this guy is a total shitpig, but to be fair, there are other pro-life dickheads and companies out there. I get that some tool is always going to be backing up truckloads of money to the front doors of organizations who lie to women about their health care and say 9/11 is God's punishment to our country and other really fucking endearing things. What I don't get is the idea that this anti-choice bullshit is somehow an acceptable tradeoff for a goddamn gym.

No, really, think about it: A GYM. A gym that makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside. For fuck's sake, it's not even a fully equipped gym. Part of your membership fee goes to buy cuddly fetus puppets or some crap and you don't even get showers? If my sweat pays for DVDs of The Silent Scream you can motherfucking bet I want towel service.

For those of you who are against abortion, this is not about arguing with you. This is also not about making anyone feel guilty about going to Curves, whatever your position. By the same token, I don't think anyone should get off saying that Curves is just a cheesy gym for housewives and they'd never go there anyway. Instead we need to think about how nearly 200 of these places are opening a month and what that means in a country where it's getting increasingly, depressingly common for a woman to have to drive for hours to get to a family planning clinic. If you find this stuff distasteful, can you really say "But Curves is empowering," and have it be completely all right? The whole woman-friendly, fat-friendly, make-me-feel-like-a-natural-woman happy environment in Curves is a great idea, but I don't know if that makes it a feminist phenomenon. Mostly it sounds like swell marketing to me.

If you go to Curves, I understand you had good reasons for joining; if you aren't crazy about where your money ultimately goes, I honestly don't know what you should do. I just don't think the benefits of Curves in any way balance out what's happening in places like Texas.

I mean, what the hell is worse: feeling all pudgy and intimidated at a Bally's, or being poor and at the mercy of some nutty CPC clinic staff who will make you wait a fucking month before they tell you that you're pregnant and, oops, sorry, you're in your second trimester? Like I can't stand Step Aerobics classes, but at least I know Suzanne the instructor won't call me a fornicator and keep me from getting the Pill.

Do you get how I think there's a little fucking disparity here?

This is sort of about abortion rights but it's about other things, too. I'm getting a little tired of bicep curls passing for women's power. I'm glad so many of you believe in your health and I'm glad that you feel good about yourselves. I'm glad that you know the feeling of taking control of your own bodies. It's a great feeling, but consider who you're paying to feel that. Maybe we should all be doing more to offset that very great cost.

(p.s.: I couldn't find a way to fit in a link to the March for Women's Lives that happened in D.C. weekend, but I thought I'd mention it, in the spirit of doing things.)
pounded out by Wendy at 12:11 AM

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Dogsigns

In case you're ever walking around in my neighborhood and you're wondering which building is mine, it's the one with the handwritten apartment for rent sign specifying NO DOOGS ALOWED.

The same day I first noticed that sign, I went out for a walk, because the weather was nice and I needed to procrastinate about a lot of things, and on the parkway grass of this kind of tatty little house near the elementary school, I saw another sign. This was also handwritten and dog-related. It was very hastily scrawled. It said:

Open letters and sandwiches

So has anyone seen this New City article yet? I don't think it's online and I wonder what I was quoted as saying. This reporter called on Monday and I babbled about Mimi being the reluctant queen of blogs. You people should have been at the Gaper's Block reading, where she was just swell, and I had a fine time reading from this entry. Afterwards we got all soggy drunk at this place Carol's, where there is country dancing and "hot sandwiches," according to the sign. I suppose you could have stood between me and Mimi and been part of a nice warm blogger sandwich, although as bread slices go we aren't terribly symmetrical in terms of size. I kept sloshily pointing at her and saying "sheezgotta book too." If you were one of the chipper young men we were talking to you probably thought we were totally full of shit.

To the guy I met briefly a couple years ago on a really shitty personals date: How did you like my reading? I bet you were hoping I wouldn't notice you sitting in the table right in front, looking all uncomfortable and stuff! I'm sorry you had to pay ten bucks at the door to see someone you'd hated on first sight! I bet THAT was a pisser! Also, I'm sorry I kept asking you questions about your rock opera on our date. I learned from that experience that when one mentions they've written a rock opera, the last thing they want to do is actually talk about it, or, for that matter, talk about anything at all, or even really do anything that involves occasional eye contact. Which is why I resisted shouting HEY HOW'S IT GOING WITH THE ROCK OPERA?! into my mic on Friday night. I hope you appreciated my restraint.
pounded out by Wendy at 9:41 AM

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Here it is, you people. HERE.

The YOU SHUT UP Story told by Sour Bob, recorded just last night in the alley behind Simon's Tavern.
pounded out by Wendy at 8:16 PM

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One more time...

In case you missed or were wilfully ignoring the previous announcement, I'll be reading tonight at this party. Stalk me and Mimi and Sour Bob and other pretty people. I'll be the one in the denim jacket. You'll be the one in camouflage, right? Ooh, you know what it takes to impress me.
pounded out by Wendy at 12:11 PM

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Full! Frontal! Yarn!

You don't even want to know how wiggy I got when a friend referred me to this StitchGuide site, which features cunning little Quicktime videos demonstrating various knitting stitches. I could lie to you and tell you that I like watching these clips because they're helpful. However, the truth is that I do not view them for educational purposes: I watch them because, well, they sort of excite me. I mean when I first clicked on this one, I got this little mental tingle, like, "Yeah! That's it! Just like that! Yeah!" I played it a couple more times and I swear I thought, "I can't wait to go home and do that to some YARN." This is pure stitch-on-stitch action and I can't get enough.

And come on: look at the nails on those hands. Do I not have a point? While I don't mean to cast skanky aspersions on the skilled and likely very wholesome owner of those hands, you usually don't see nails like that onscreen unless they're pressed into Ron Jeremy's ass cheeks. However the lighting in these videos is very nice: soft and tasteful, like Cinemax.

I'm not so much into this stuff. I don't know, it just looks uncomfortable. I'd want to use a safe word.

I'm not saying I'm freaky or anything. But you can't ignore the fact that the word "knit" is "kink" spelled, you know, backwards and wrong. SO WRONG IT'S RIGHT, BABY. So wrong it's right.
pounded out by Wendy at 5:09 PM

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Eye yi yi

I'm pretty sure that yesterday I had a visual migraine. The kindly elder doctor on that page describes precisely what happened to me and his nice friendly face and very informative article reassures me that I probably do not have a brain parasite. I had been knitting and I hadn't really been paying attention to the sort of swimmy motion going on in the peripheral vision to the right of me; I just assumed that things in that corner of the room were really... uh, busy. Then I realized something was up and I FREAKED OUT just a little.
pounded out by Wendy at 11:33 PM

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Vote!

Okay, so when I was in NYC Doug picked me up from the airport and gave me a ride back, so the very least I can do is vote for his band to win this big battle of the band thingy. If they win they'll get a chance for a record contract with Epic, which is almost as cool as a free ride to LaGuardia, I think. Did you ever have anyone do something like that for you and you felt like you couldn't thank them enough? Well, then you should vote for Doug's band, too.

Also, to be fair, I listened to the other bands. The other bands sound like poo and their band names are tepid and silly. We don't need any more groups using the Adjectivenoun Smooshedtogether formula, or calling themselves American Vaguely High-Concept Something-Or-Other, or being all serious and going by a name that sounds like a book about recovery. (I don't know what to say about the extremely meek-sounding solo artist stage name. The only thing really going for it is that it doesn't end with "Imbruglia.") Anyway: they're pure ass, those other bands. They're mouth-breathers who don't have it in them to do brilliant songs like this in their spare time.

Also? I feel bad for when Doug parked his car by Central Park so we could visit the Met, and I thought he checked the meter so I didn't ask if he'd paid it, even though I'm usually really compulsive about that thing, and it turned out he didn't check the meter and he got a BIG TICKET. You know how that happens sometimes with people you know and their cars? And you're like, "God, sorry, man," and they're all "that's okay, it's not your fault," and you know that of course it's not your fault at all but you still feel an icy little pit of helpless regret deep inside? VOTE FOR DOUG'S BAND AND THAT FEELING WILL GO AWAY FOREVER.
pounded out by Wendy at 1:58 PM

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Gapers' Block Party

What are you doing on Friday? You could come to this thing at Ann Sather's and see me read. Or you could come to see other people read and just, you know, humor me. You can BYOB. You can B me YB. Chances are I'll be a little nervous and could use a little B. B it on. Yes.
pounded out by Wendy at 8:30 AM

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More on NYC

I really should just show you my photos from New York and end it at that. Not pictured: Flocks of wild turkeys seen on the Merritt Parkway between Connecticut and New York, causing occasional traffic delays; buskers on the subway trains who used paper bags full of change as nifty little rhythmical instruments to such charming effect that I was afraid of being caught smiling (nobody else was on the R train); a hot knish; a mind-bogglingly slow wiener dog in a sweater on Sixth Avenue; Doug and his wife being swell hosts (though there are some pics on his site and audio commentary, too); sunrise on Sheepshead Bay; Kat; patterned hose; the very cozy House Of Dana; White Castle, and a sign in Chinatown for the Dream Come True Beautiful Hair Salon.

Many have written to explain the straws. In general the mouths of New York are more cautious than my own. I'm told that unspeakably filthy things happen on and around innocent East Coast soda cans while they are in storage. It's not like out here, where hymn-singing Mennonite children carefully wipe the morning dew off each can of Diet Coke with a fresh towel. Fine, so I never thought much about where the top of my can has been. But come on, not every can is on top of the pallet where the rats scurry. Maybe I'll take my chances.

I'm sorry to everyone I haven't emailed back lately on account of being in New York and I'm sorry to everyone in New York that I didn't get to see while in New York, and to everyone I haven't yet emailed about how I didn't get to see them while I was, well, you-know-where. I hope to return in the fall.
pounded out by Wendy at 9:23 PM

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Things you notice right away about New York City when you come from someplace else:

How much older the buildings are It's not like I've never seen 19th century bricks or anything--we're all very respectful of our older buildings and our architectural heritage and so on here in Chicago; we're very rah-rah about our old shit. But the very old buildings in New York are grimly, compellingly old in a way that doesn't make you think too much about history. Instead you sense that the people who built these places are just VERY DEAD NOW. Dead from very old diseases, like catarrh and marasmus and quinsy, and dead from being trod on by horses, too.

How many more goddamn people there are everywhere at every moment Is there a street festival somewhere? A parade? What? What are you all doing outside right now? It's just Chinatown. Is it Buy A Knockoff Handbag Day? What?

Straws Wrapped soda straws were offered every single time I bought a can or bottle of Diet Coke in New York. Either the vendor/clerk/waiter would hand me a straw, which I would accept uneasily, as it is not part of my regular soda transaction, or else he or she would direct my attention to the straw dispenser, either by nudging it towards me or pointing at it as if to say "Straw? Take straw." Is it so very Midwestern of me to not require this distance between my beverage and my mouth? Is it a bad thing in New York to take unmediated sips from bottles and cans? Explain the straws, please.
pounded out by Wendy at 12:22 AM

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New York stuff (part 1)

I'd never been to New York City and then suddenly I saw it all at once. I saw it from the plane coming in. The landing pattern turned over the city, and the view from my window skimmed the buildings for a moment. Only the moment grew longer and longer, and the view turned into something I almost recognized (I'd been studying the map); and then I saw the Empire State and the Chrysler buildings from above. We were flying straight up Manhattan and over Central Park. I didn't even think to take a picture because it didn't feel like I was there yet.

I liked Brooklyn. No, I loved Brooklyn. I realize I was in almost all the boroughs on this trip--I went through Queens to get to and from the airport; I went through The Bronx on the drive from Connecticut. People keep telling me I don't ever need to go to Staten Island.

But as for Brooklyn: I saw the cutesy parts and some of the crazy parts, and also the Welcome Back, Kotter high school and the neighborhood where the opening scenes for Saturday Night Fever were shot. And Coney Island, though it was closed at the time. The time was 4 am. Brooklyn!

Manhattan was good, too. Manhattan itself smacked the hell out of the bottoms of my feet. But I expected that to happen.
pounded out by Wendy at 11:17 PM

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