pantryslut

pantryslut @ 2012-05-22T21:52:00

2012-05-23T05:19:30Z

Today my children were whisked off to a unexpected playdate and I had a blessed hour and a half all to myself in the afternoon.

I promptly fell asleep on the couch.

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Eclipse!

2012-05-21T19:20:16Z

G. and the kids and I drove up to Redding to watch the eclipse yesterday. 3+ hours there, 3+ hours back. abostick59 tagged along in the back of our rented minivan.

First of all, OK, minivan. With a built-in DVD player to keep the girls entertained! I think we may be sold on the idea, if not the reality quite yet. After a childhood full of building my muscles on the sliding van door, though, I am still freaked out by doors that close themselves.

Simone chose to skip viewing the eclipse in favor of playing with another slightly younger girl on the concrete stage in Redding's big central park. They built big piles of leaves and pretended to be dinosaurs eating lunch. April took a break to peek through her special glasses with the rest of us, however. Then she ran circles around the park until she tired herself out. We changed them into pajamas and diapers at a gas station on our way back after they feel asleep in their carseats.

The weird sickly sunlight triggered a serious sense memory of my "first eclipse," in 1999 in Germany. On my 29th birthday, as it happens. There is nothing else quite like that light, and it's so hard to capture what it's like.

Redding folks (and visitors) were very friendly, the park was busy but not too crowded, and all in all it was a lot of fun. Definitely worth the excursion.

Next time I pack a picnic.

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pantryslut @ 2012-05-20T22:17:00

2012-05-21T06:17:02Z

Today's excursion involved an eclipse!

More tomorrow. That was a lot of ~~driving~~ passenger seat occupying and I am tired now.

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pantryslut @ 2012-05-18T23:59:00

2012-05-19T08:18:36Z

Today's excursion with children involved yoga class, ice cream, two toy stores, and the playground. Capped off by catching the 57 bus after only waiting 5 minutes instead of the previously requisite 40 minutes to an hour.

They tried bubblegum ice cream today b/c it was blue. Where I come from, of course, blue ice cream is Blue Moon, not bubblegum.

Yoga with kids reminds me both how fucked up my hips and back are right now, and also how much yoga helps.

I wore my children's UV-protective legwarmers over my forearms today to protect my new tattoo from the sun while I was out. Nobody said a word about my unconventional fashion choice, despite the large purple starfish pattern they sported. Even my girls just kind of shrugged.

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I got some bad news, kid...

2012-05-19T06:58:56Z

Simone: "I don't want to watch Dark Shadows until I am five."

Me: "OK."

Simone: "Yeah, it's too scary. I want to watch Hunger Games."

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A tangential aside to a comment somewhere else

2012-05-17T03:11:54Z

As I live in Oakland, I must express some entertainment at the thought that someone thinks the tactic "call the police before a potential minor incident and expect them to show up rather than laugh at you and then pointedly hang up" is in the least effective. I had a car torched on my block in the middle of the night and the police couldn't even be bothered to file an incident report.

Oh, also, I used to work in a domestic violence shelter in Chicago, so my expectations are extra-low on this point. Cops don't show up before a crime. That's not their job.

A fascinating display of faith in the power of the police state, though!

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pantryslut @ 2012-05-16T09:59:00

2012-05-16T17:00:25Z

Remind me to talk about migraine and cognitive fog sometime soon. The short version of it is: I used to think it was just that thinking through intense pain was hard, duh, but if you take away the pain and thinking is still hard? Light bulb.

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no comment

2012-05-16T01:49:27Z

Simone: "What do mermaids eat?"

Me: "I dunno. Fish, probably."

Simone: "And what else?"

Me: "Hm. Seaweed."

Simone: "And what else?"

Me: "I don't know. What else?"

Simone: "Mermaids eat pirates."

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I Join the 21st Century

2012-05-15T03:22:24Z

I now own a smartphone.

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New Tattoo Debut and Notes

2012-05-14T17:32:03Z

1. Zack at Sacred Rose did the ink. We had fun bonding about being, shall we say, alternative parents. He's very sweet and warm and did a great job. I am very happy.

2. This is my first tattoo not inked by a woman. However, since Sacred Rose is owned by Karen Roze, I feel like it's still in the spirit of things.

3. What does it mean? Kisses and hugs. Triple X. Open orifices. That sort of thing.

4. But I reserve the right to tell strangers "I am a World Tic Tac Toe Champion."

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What I Did for Mother's Day

2012-05-14T05:12:50Z

New tattoo. Pics soon.

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pantryslut @ 2012-05-13T11:31:00

2012-05-13T18:51:31Z

Yesterday I had tea at Tal y Tara. It was kind of an adventure; fortunately, ultimately the good kind.

I was having a bit of a stressful day yesterday, for a variety of reasons. The result of which was that I landed a migraine in the mid-afternoon. I lay down to try to dispel it and got about halfway when it was time to get up and go to tea. This was going to be my Mother's Day tea. We'd decided not to make reservations in part because we weren't sure of our timing. I really wanted to go, so I risked climbing into a car to drive to the Richmond district from Oakland with an ebbing headache. This was perhaps not the smartest move ever.

I don't throw up and the headache only gets a little worse by the time we make it all the dang way to the foggy, foggy Richmond. Fog is good because it means less sunlight which means less pain behind my eyes. Steven lets me out at the little shop's huge barn door and sets off to find a place to park.

I walk in and find that almost the entirety of the shop is taken up by a huge, huge baby shower, complete with a table full of presents and two more tables full of ladies in deliberately silly hats.

The hostess kindly but firmly tells me that if I don't have a reservation, they cannot seat me. I ask to use the bathroom before I leave, as it's been a long trip. They point me to the back.

I come out, after admiring shelves and shelves of riding boots stashed in the bathroom, to find Steven sitting at the single table not taken up by the baby shower. I think at first that they have allowed him a spot to rest before he takes me away again, but no. He's been seated and is waiting for a menu, which arrives promptly.

It turns out that he was seated personally by the mother of the owners, who chose to overrule the hostess. The owners themselves are out, one of them having given birth the day or so before. The rest of the staff, besides her and her husband, consist of the college-age friends of the owner's niece. They are, shall we say, not a polished crew. And they are attempting to keep a huge baby shower happy and occupied. Plus me and Steven.

They are out of the first tea I request. I have a backup. They are out of crumpets, but offer to toast some bread for Steven instead. The bread turns out to be homemade marble rye. They run out of ham for the tea sandwiches and make us two turkey sandwiches instead. They forget to charge us for two items. They apologize for making us wait for things, even though the wait isn't all that bad considering.

They do not seem to realize that everything after I got out of the bathroom is gravy as far as I'm concerned.

At the first sip of tea and bite of protein (egg salad, risky considering my recent nausea and heightened migraine senses), my headache disappears and I am able to completely enjoy my meal. Which is very tasty indeed, as is the tea.

The owner's mother comes to chat with us and I confess that this is my Mother's Day outing. "I'm so glad I seated you, then!" she exclaims, adding, "you two have such kind faces." We talk about the twins for a short spell before she goes to rest her feet with a friend.

The rest of the staff makes audible plans to head to a club, leaving one of them behind to cut cake for the baby shower, who are wrapping up their party, and then clean up. That's fine. It sounds like they earned it. And we've finished our tea and our toast and our motorloaf sandwiches, and I am having to cover my mouth to hide the giggles I get every time they apologize to us. I believe this counts as "rough-hewn charm," or something. This place is as full of charm as they come. Not professional, not polished, but sincere. I am suddenly having the best day ever.

And then I headed to PPO and read about succubi, serial killers and knitting. More about that later.

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Dora, Diego and the Teaching Lie

2012-05-12T18:14:20Z

I am having trouble with Dora and Diego's science curriculum.

My girls love Dora and Diego's individual shows. And, hey, they feature brown people and catchy songs and Spanish vocabulary and wild animals and all of that good stuff, even if I find their constant near-yell annoying and the pace really slow (and Dora's imitation-computer bits totally unnecessary).

Earlier this week, Dora was drawing a rainbow bridge across a chasm to get to her destination. When she got to the bottom of the rainbow, she pulled out her purple crayon. "Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple!" she exclaimed.

"That's not purple, that's indigo!" my children replied. "And she forgot violet!"

And then this morning, Diego needed to replace a bunch of strawberry plants destroyed in a storm, so he brought some strawberry seeds.

Except as any strawberry gardener or farmer knows, strawberries, while they have seeds, reproduce most effectively by suckers.

I know what Dora and Diego are doing, and I know that the teaching lie is an entrenched pedagogical technique, but I may have mentioned once or twice over the years how much I loathe it (and why).

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pantryslut @ 2012-05-11T12:09:00

2012-05-11T19:38:23Z

"Like George W. Bush, [Mitt Romney] was an essentially frightened, unloved young man who came of age under tremendous pressure to live up to a famous father, who failed to distinguish himself as a scholar or an athlete and was relegated to the sidelines, whose desperate jocularity was shot through with a kind of unexamined sadism. Both men have forged a path to success via an alarming absence of self-reflection."

http://therumpus.net/2012/05/the-week-in-greed-6-to-behave-like-the-fallen-world/

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SF Silent Film Festival Schedule is Live!

2012-05-11T18:46:31Z

The Mark of Zorro with Douglas Fairbanks!

I mean, there's lots of other tasty stuff, too. (Pandora's Box! The Cameraman with Buster Keaton! von Sternberg's Docks of New York! Pola Negri as The Spanish Dancer! and OMG, South!)

But do I have a ridiculous weak spot for Douglas Fairbanks? Yes I do. Errol Flynn can go fuck himself; I hear he enjoyed that sort of thing...

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pantryslut @ 2012-05-11T09:58:00

2012-05-11T17:04:18Z

This post by Rawles Marie Lumumba (via jimhines) sums up everything I've been feeling lately about the Bechdel Test.

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pantryslut @ 2012-05-10T11:18:00

2012-05-10T18:26:32Z

Now I am somewhat seriously considering doing a review series and/or blog of media for kids, because I definitely need something along the lines of Common Sense Media for social justice concerns. Like, if I watch this am I going to be offended by the fat jokes? The gender politics? Is Ashton Kutcher in brownface going to pop up unexpectedly? Is it based on a toy? Does it assume weird things about classroom and friend dynamics and motivations? Is it just plain dumb or annoying? etc.

Or, you know, does it show families built on a model other than mom-dad-kids? Is the main character someone other than a small white boy? Are there POC at all? Non-tokenized, ever? Are boys and girls allowed to be friends rather than rivals and/or love interests? Does it pass the Bechdel Test?

This wouldn't be a thumbs-up/thumbs-down sort of thing, and although I am aware I would get accused of being the PC Police I already own that badge* so why not?

First person who says "be the change you want to see," though, gets thumped on the head.

* Actually I don't, but if someone made me one I would wear it with pride. Or hey, even an icon.

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What I Want For Mother's Day!

2012-05-10T17:51:05Z

I want a Mother's Day Mix Tape!

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Avengers No Spoilers

2012-05-10T04:29:54Z

I saw The Avengers, I enjoyed it very much, there is enough chewable stuff to chew on and I am chewing. Most specifically, I enjoyed the way the theme of "how do nonpowered people cope in a world full of superpowered people?" played out in various ways without it being thunderingly obvious. Making Natasha one of the main viewpoint characters (for lack of a better phrase), and all the civilian POV shots at the end, helped in that regard.

I liked this Bruce Banner a lot. He and Tony Stark are totally homo for each other, if you didn't notice.

And this time there were only a few moments where Scarlett Johansson looked like she'd just stopped chewing gum the moment before the camera turned to her. Seriously, I give her her due for this movie.

P.S. I chose to see it in 2D and I don't regret it.

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pantryslut @ 2012-05-08T11:59:00

2012-05-08T19:08:10Z

OK, considering last week's incident with our copy of Where the Wild Things Are, this line from Maurice Sendak's NYT obituary made me smile.

"Roundly praised, intermittently censored and occasionally eaten, Mr. Sendak’s books were essential ingredients of childhood for the generation born after 1960 or thereabouts, and in turn for their children." (emphasis mine.)

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pantryslut @ 2012-05-07T20:04:00

2012-05-08T03:34:48Z

Today the ladies and I made lemon ricotta pancakes and ate them with macerated strawberries. I told them I was the slicer and they were the mixers and gave them the wet and dry bowls to stir. They enjoyed watching me separate eggs. The only problem is that it's hard to halve a batch and leftover lemon ricotta pancakes are not very appetizing. So I am vaguely contemplating a lemon ricotta pancake trifle. With macerated strawberries, of course.

Then we walked down to the Bird Sanctuary playground on Lake Merritt. My children made a friend there -- a girl named E., who told me she was a pirate because she had a pirate costume at home. A boy's pirate costume. She and my daughters formed an instant girl gang and ran around the playground chasing boys twice their size and growling. For hours. Taking breaks to hide under their "ship" in the shade and build sand castles together. E. shared her medal with Simone, and her brother's medal (oops) with April. E. was also, as noted, very talkative, or if you prefer verbally assertive. Not as chatty as Simone, but pretty close.

If E.'s parents (who were a little more concerned about her aggressiveness than I was) are there next Monday, I think I will overcome my shyness and ask for their contact info. IIRC E. may be biracial East Asian/black (if I'm not misemembering and/or confusing playground people) so that's another reason to make the effort. I have a hard time bridging the "we don't have to be best friends but our kids might be" gap, I confess. I'm having this issue elsewhere, too.

P.S. It's hard not to pity E.'s younger brother.

We took the bus home (actually two short bus rides, with transfer). The girls passed out. I made Cobb salad for the adults' dinner, and it was good.

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Summer Day Plans

2012-05-07T20:11:03Z

This is just a list of "day trips" for me and the kids for the summer. If anyone's around during weekdays and wants to tag along, holler. Suggestions also welcome. But otherwise this is just for my reference.

* Cole Valley/Golden Gate Park: Ice Cream Bar, Koret Playground
* Mission: Dolores Park, ice cream, Tacolicious or somewhere similar
* Mission: Coronado Playground
* Rockridge: Frog Park
* North Berkeley: Totland
* Ferry Plaza -- Tuesdays and Thursdays are farmer's market days.
* Downtown SF: Children's Discovery Museum (formerly Zeum), carousel
* Can I get to Aquatic Park by public transportation?
* Can I get to Lake Temescal by public transportation?
* Oakland Museum
* Hayes Valley -- Smitten and the climbing structure on Octavia
* UCBerkeley Botanical Garden

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pantryslut @ 2012-05-07T09:31:00

2012-05-07T16:31:51Z

Simone: "Mommy, did we use a ladder to get out of your belly?"

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The strange details of our personal stories

2012-05-04T17:04:10Z

A review of a new cookbook called How the Hot Dog Found Its Bun shook forth a long-buried memory of mine.

We never ate hot dog buns when I was a child. We ate our hot dogs on inexpertly folded white bread. No, we didn't slice them like a sandwich (my grandmother did, though), we just hoped that the bread would hold together long enough to finish our meal.

This worked better the softer and whiter the bread was.

I think this memory was buried in part because I never eat white bread any more...

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Perverts Put Out! May 12

2012-05-04T03:05:20Z

Originally published at Lori Selke. You can comment here or there.

I’m reading at:

PERVERTS PUT OUT!
The Maypolar Disorder Edition

A springtime celebration of the rising sap, featuring brilliant performances by Greta Christina, Midori, T. R. Moss, Thomas Roche, Sam Sax, Lori Selke, horehound stillpoint, and Mollena Williams, co-hosted by Carol Queen and Simon Sheppard.We can guarantee it’ll be good, dirty, vernal, venereal fun!

Saturday, May 12, 7:30 pm
The Center for Sex and Culture
1349 Mission Street, San Francisco
$10 – 20 sliding scale, no-one turned away. A benefit for the CSC.

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