cats and dogs living together

Perhaps it is a true sign of spring that Marcy is now able to enjoy basking in the rays of the sun on the porch . . . even if her nemesis Jacks is also enjoying the same lovely sun.

out with the old and smelly, in with the new and shiny

Dahl's is a local grocery store chain here in Des Moines, Iowa. The Ingersoll location was the very first grocery store I entered when I moved here. Once I saw that they had a decent selection of vegetarian products and my very favorite soy creamer, I knew I could live here.


Anyway, the Ingersoll Dahl's is closing--being replaced on the very same lot by a bigger, brand new super-duper fresh and clean store. Today was the last day of the old store, so I took a few pictures for historical purposes. Note the sad and lonely cupcakes!

what is the meaning of creamy?

For my 100th post, I thought I might combine my love of popular culture with a keen appreciation of kitsch by displaying this creepy soft core camay soap commercial from the 1970s.

Could she say "creamy" a few more times?

Philosophers on parade

This promises to be an interesting film. Eight philosophers, walking and talking, each for ten minutes. Judith Butler is one of them! Directed by Astra Taylor. She's only 29. It's called Examined Life.

The ultimate question is will it be showing in Des Moines, Iowa? Who fucking knows!

Non-breeders unite!

Marcy, the lovely Chi above, is my baby. I don't have a human baby. In many ways I have chosen not to have any children for what I consider ethical and social reasons.

Here's my gripe. Or question, rather. I have many, many dear friends who do have kids, and who lately seem to be having them more and more. I started this thing a few years ago (inspired by my friend Darcie) when my first local pal had a baby boy. I arranged a dinner delivery service for the new family by organizing myself and other friends to take dinner to said newbies every couple of days after the sprout comes out. I have done this now, either by organizing or participating, four times, for four different families. Four delicious dinners, made lovingly by me, for four very deserving new families. I don't mind that part.

What I mind is that there is no occasion when I am likely to get dinner delivered to me. Why is this? Why do we reward and celebrate reproducing, and not just life in general? Or some other non-reproductive achievement? It's much like Carrie's complaint on Sex and The City about supporting marriage (and not singlehood) with lavish parties and gifts. I object! Why do we celebrate only normative behaviors?

The Vatican hates women

This morning, my wonderful mom (feminist inspiration that she is) asked me if I had heard the latest from the Pope. She wanted me to guess what the Pope thinks is the most significant cultural event in terms of women's liberation and independence. What is his holy Popester's take on this pivotal cultural event? Could it be the pill? Working outside the home? No--it's the automatic laundry machine.

Apparently The Vatican agrees with a 1950s Whirlpool vision of emancipated womanhood. Ladies! Girls! Bitches! All we really need is a washing machine!

Personally, I'd like a dishwasher and someone to rake my leaves in the fall.

Hilarion candy review

Sugar Babies are a poorly designed candy. As far as I can tell: 1) They are essentially sugar with some brown flavor mixed in. 2) I can not stop eating them until I am physically ill and incapable of eating them again for at least eight months.

I'm not sure why I find the above candy review (brown flavor!?!) posted on Tiny Showcase so fucking hilarious, but I do. Jon Buonaccorsi wrote this one. In case you don't know about it, Tiny Showcase is a wonderful web site that releases a small affordable art print every week on Tuesday evening.

Brazz Tree

Amazing music recommended by my friend Melisa. They're called Brazz Tree . You can purchase their disc at C D Baby.

Jan in the Pan vs. Pre-pan Jan

One of my very favorite movies of all time is The Brain That Wouldn't Die . That's Jan in the pan up there--occasionally called "Pre-pan Jan" by my students during the brief time she spends with a body in the early parts of the movie. I love this movie for its campy ridiculousness as well as for its keen gender commentary.

It is worth watching for the stilted and terribly clunky filmmaking alone--but it also provides some amazing insight into gender and power relations in mid-century western culture.

My favorite line from the movie is when Kurt, Dr. Bill Cortner's intrepid assistant, says to Jan in the pan, "You're a freak of life, and a freak of death!" Soon after this statement the monster in the closet rips his arm off. Poor Kurt.

Best commercial ever (so far)

How can you not love this singing doggy ?

Victory Dance FAIL!

Who ever knew a table tennis game could inspire such jubilent madness???

More Mindsticker Madness!

1960's Tab Commercial (Be A Mindsticker.)
Uploaded by dampier

Here's another mind-blowing Tab commercial. Mindsticker, indeed. After watching three of these mindsticker commercials again and again, I think I've figured out the main purpose of Tab. It makes you completely unable to DO anything except wander around aimlessly, tossing balls, picking up shells, traversing stairways in a jaunty fashion, and of course attending to your offspring. Tab is not designed to keep you thin--it's true purpose is to make women into listless creatures who pose no threat to society.

Too many babies . . .

Although I can't say I'm a fan of our cultural obsession with reproduction, isn't it interesting that the MSM seems to adore families with multiples such as the Duggars and the Gosselins, but yet they are having a big old fun time harrassing the woman in California who had eight children at once?

Why the disparity? Why is she "octomom" and Jon and Kate are media stars? (Well, stars to some--here's an intriguing critical article about the Gosselins) Why are the Duggars "Eighteen Kids and Counting" and have a fucking TV show? The Duggars are members of the Quiverfull movement which advocates as many children as "God" wants you to have. I guess God also wants women to die young from wearing the body out after carrying so many pregnancies.

As much as I enjoy the machinations of the media I think their treatment of the woman in California is hateful, misogynist, and deserves a bit more scrutiny. What is it? Why do we celebrate certain overblown families and vilify others?

I think it's in part because she is single, has done what she wants with her own body, and resists our heteronormative fantasy of the traditional, patriarchal family. Maybe it's because she didn't conceive from intercourse--but then neither did Jon and Kate. Anyway, ideally we should all stop having children altogether--our planet can't take any more humans.

By the way--is his name really Jim Bob? Come on.

I love you, Farm Sanctuary!

Farm Sanctuary is an amazing organization dedicated to rescuing, saving, nurturing, and sheltering farm animals. They have two sanctuary locations, one in New York and one in California.

I think the work they do is very important and makes a huge difference in the world. Check out their web site!

What I love more than anything is when I get to read about a particular animal they've rescued, such as Wendy the wayward chicken! Here's her story. Isn't she beautiful??


And here's Whitney, and his story of abandonment on a roadside in central California.

Little Richard goes on . . .

Groovy 1973 video of Little Richard waxing poetic about Jimi Hendrix. Awesome.

vaginas and muffins

Do you ever have one of those days (weeks!) when you just seem tired? Exhausted? I feel that way today. I woke up at 7:00, fed the furry one, made coffee, answered about seventy emails, and then took a shower. Then I got my hair cut at 9:15 after drinking a burger king mocha BK joe to help me wake up (didn't really help). Then I went to the Beaver-Dahl's grocery store to get some muffin mix so I can make muffins for the Vagina Monologues bake sale at school. Then I came home, checked email, took Miss Marcy out and took an hour and a half nap.

Now I'm awake--Marcy and I just returned from another brisk walk, and I must clean my house, bake those darn muffins, deliver them to the Vagina carnival, and then, who knows? Perhaps I will watch the last two hours of Five Days, this really intriguing BBC/HBO miniseries about a family that vanishes.

But what I really want to do is just get back into my cozy bed . . .

corn mazes scare the crap out of me

Iowa corn. From a corn maze I went to last fall, or the fall before. It was weird, the corn maze. You had to get a card and hole punch it at various numbered stations along the maze. At first we were wandering randomly, happening across stations, hole-punching away. We humanities types tend to meander.

Then, the science person in our group became frustrated and took control. He announced we were to follow in numerical order (!) and thus progress in an orderly fashion through the maze. I'm almost sure that if he hadn't forced us to do this, we might still be there.

At one point, my pal Maura and I came across a small girl. We asked her if she was lost and needed help. She looked at us disdainfully and asked us if we needed help. Was it so obvious that we were clueless? Yes.

back when I was adorable and controllable

Kindergarten was such a lovely phase of life: naptime, playtime, snacks, little dresses, tights, recess, nice hairdos, girls and boys segregated in pictures, and the fabulous Mrs. Brady.

My friend Carmen sent me this picture of my very own K-class from a million years ago. I'm fourth from the left in the front row.

Alan Keyes is fucking nuts

In case you didn't know, Alan Keyes is batshit crazy!

Mindsticker songs stick in your mind!

Okay, I admit I'm becoming obsessed with these mindsticker commercials, but this one takes the cake. Really.

It's creepy in a very Stepford Wives kind of way. I can't decide if the voice-over guy sounds like HAL from 2001 or a tour guide from Westworld.

Be a Mindsticker?

1960's Tab Commercial (Be A Mindsticker.) 2
by dampier

Wow. I'm not sure what else to say, except I may never drink a diet beverage again.

Mindsticker???

Thanks to feministing for the link.

Peter Cameron is a genius

I love author Peter Cameron. Ever since I read a sublime story by him when I was in college many moons ago ("Memorial Day" in his collection One Way or Another ) I have followed his work.

One of his recent novels is Someday This Pain Will be Useful to You. I read it almost in one sitting, and it is beautiful. I don't use that term easily, but this book is truly beautiful and very, very good.

Got this one from The Daily Beast . . .

We have a celebrity in our house . . . Argos does not enjoy being photographed, and thus when I try to take his picture he slinks away. He is lovely.

Trader Joe's, the musical!

Those of us in the know all love Trader Joe's. My friend Melisa sent me this fabulous video of a fake TJ's commercial. Of course they don't even need commercials!

What they (we) need (desperately) is a TJ's in Des Moines, Iowa, where I live so I don't have to drive to Minnesota or Chicago to go to one. Watch the video--it's fantasticalicious!

White Creatures and Plum Hedgehogs

I love this little plum hedgehog, created by etsy seller marjji.

I realized the other day that so much of my art collection depicts little creatures; mostly little white creatures, sometimes in ways that make them seem vulnerable. What does this mean, do you suppose?















(clockwise from left, Then You Showed Up by Cathy Nichols, Girl and The House by Katrine Kalleklev, Prickle and Ponder by Luca Tripaldi and Untitled by Kit Malo)

Glen Baxter is a very strange, talented artist, cartoonist and author. I collect postcards of his artwork. I bought my very first one, about a million years ago, at a now defunct book store in North Hollywood, California, called Dutton's.

I just love the weirdness of his work--I find it hugely funny, strangely beautiful, and a bit sad.

This is a picture I took when I first moved into my house, standing in my empty living room looking outside. Right now this image appeals to me as it seems to reflect my looking forward out of the cold and darkness, into the warmer, greener, and sunnier season of spring.

We had a lovely bout of such weather here in Des Moines, Iowa, yesterday--it was 62 degrees! Today the weather-bots predict that we may get 5-10 inches of snow on Friday. Hmmmmmm.

Holy crap! My fabulous alma mater, Humboldt State University, has the best "marching" band ever. They are the Lumberjacks, and they do the best, craziest, most joyful and energetic stuff like not really marching but what they call "scattering."

Once when I was in the dining hall they burst in and ran around the hall, playing music loudly and disrupting the meals of each person--it was awesome. They also sometimes go to the local airport when someone related to HSU shows up--when I was in school they surprised the president as he was coming back from a fundraising trip at 7 a.m.!

Here's another more intimate video of the Marching Lumberjacks!

Just in case anyone was wondering what to send me for Valentine's Day, here is an image of the best chocolate in the entire human planet!

See's dark chocolate Bordeaux. Mmmmmmmmm . . . oodles of deliciousness!

David Rees, the genius behind Get Your War On and My New Fighting Technique is Unstoppable, who spent the eight torturous years of the Bush administration making me laugh so hard I thought I might piss myself, is still hilariously funny. He is a hilarion, as my brother would say. Check out his web site. He has recently posted a truly fucking great review of Taken (new fascist Liam Neeson movie).

"Fidelity": Don't Divorce... from Courage Campaign on Vimeo.
I dare you to watch this video and not be moved . . .

My dear friend Carmen sent me this picture from our 9th grade graduation day back in 1976. Damn--look at the awesome hair! I see so many people in this photo that I still remember to this day with love and fear and joy and all the emotions one has in junior high. Amazing.

Holy shit! The Passion for Christ Movement has a new campaign against masturbation. Here's a link to their site so you can read this for yourself: Passion For Christ Movement. And there's a T-Shirt!

Way to alienate humans (especially females) from their bodies! What is the matter with these people? I truly don't get it. Disturbing, ridiculous, frightening, and just plain wrong. Thanks to feministing for the heads up and the link.

Winter is almost over . . . so right now this is the fantasy image I have in my mind: Marcy, green grass, blossoming trees, a cool breeze in the warm sun.

Here's another artist I really like. I met Dolan Geiman and his partner Ali Walsh this summer at the Des Moines Art Festival. Here's one of his famous box prints: This one's called Field Guide Tennessee.

You can see his work at his Etsy shop, read his blog, or visit his website!

Sometimes I miss Humboldt County . . . this is the beautiful Arcata Plaza, very close to my undergraduate institution, Humboldt State University. The Arcata Plaza Cam is fun to watch (surveillance, anyone?) but it doesn't always work. Check it out, anyway.

I have a crush on Reza Aslan. He is the author of No God But God and also writes for The Daily Beast. He also has his own web site, of course: www.rezaaslan.com.

I like the way he thinks.

The world is becoming a very scary place for comic strip artists. Many alternative weeklies and newspapeprs are cutting comics to save money. We need to support their work by writing to the alt-weeklies. Here's one of my favorites comic artists, Red Meat by Max Cannon. (click on the strip to enlarge)

Ironic, since I'm a vegetarian, but it's not really about meat. Check out his work here: www.redmeat.com.

Can we just all say thank you for president Obama? Here he is after signing the lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Restoration act into law. It's the first bill he has signed, it's fucking awesome, it's about time.

Just found this short film on YouTube while I was doing research for class tonight. Amazing. Heartbreaking, in a way. It made me cry.

I am slightly obsessed with abandoned seating. That is, I love the idea of couches and chairs left on the side of the road. I sometimes take pictures of them. My plan is to compile a lot of pictures to make a photo essay about abandoned seating. Here's one that is currently across the street from my house! Lovely.

The fabulous Roadside Scholar alerted me to this artist, Grant Haffner. Here is one of his paintings, entitled "Head of Pond Road." He is soon to have his first print ever, available at www.povevolving.com.

I love this stuff.

Someone asked me once why my blog is called innocent donuts. The answer is that it is a reference to a very beautiful and haunting scene in Cruddy, one of my favorite novels of all time.

Another amazing trend from Ashley Goldberg and Drew! Ashley and Drew have decided to create these incredible porcelain hanging pieces with their wonderful artwork. I love them--and I'm happy to say I'm the proud owner of this version! Check their Etsy shop for more versions . . . sublime!

I found another incredible artist on Etsy. Her name is Kat Hannah, and her work is beautiful, luminous, and just a little bit creepy. I'm often attracted to art that has a tinge of melancholy. Check out her etsy shop, too. This piece is called Defiant.

Now is the time for joy! President Barack Hussein Obama . . . Yippee!

I have been waiting for this day for a long time--and by this day I mean the LAST day of the Bush regime. And now I have something much more exciting to look forward to than just Bush being gone--I have an intelligent, calm, progressive new leader. But first, a small tribute to getting rid of George Bush! This comic is by the amazing, smart and prophetic Tom Tomorrow. Check out his work and blog at: www.thismodernworld.com.

This is what happens when you have a nice ribbon rainbow hanging thingy and forget to take it down for winter.

Being from California, acknowledging the Rose Parade is a tradition I'm ambivalent about. Sure it marks the new year, yes, there are lots of pretty floats that are obviously created by very talented people who put in hours of labor, but--the rose Parade also has a tradition of being viewed by virtually everyone across the U.S., unless you're too cool or too hungover to watch it, and of course what people see besides the damn floats and the marching bands is the fucking amazingly beautiful weather. It is unfailingly sunny, mild, and just overall fabulous on New Year's day, just so the zillions of people in the frigid northeast and midwest can see the people in shirtsleeves and sandals enjoying life OUTSIDE on January first.

Anyway, I'm not a big fan of the parade, but invariably I have it on every year so I can catch a glimpse of the City of Burbank (where I grew up) float. This year, I had to watch the stupid parade like THREE times to see the damn thing.

Usually a day or so after the parade the float people deposit the Burbank float in the parking lot of Verdugo Park (aka Verdruggo Park when I was in Junior High) so people can come and see it up close and personal. I took some pictures. Here they are. Happy New Year!

I came across this wonderful artwork today, via The Roadside Scholar (link at right) who always has such great appreciation for everything in the world. She links to another blog, who links to this image. It is a print of the United States with each state's "motto" emblazoned on its face. The work is by artist Emily Wick. I really like it a lot. You can buy it here:
www.twoeyeballs.com

I've decided that I really dislike the last book in the Virgin Vampire series. Beginning with Twilight, the first in the series, a read which I actually enjoyed, the novels have seemingly declined in their ability to keep me interested and less disgusted with the blatant patriarchal, misogynist, sexist, romantic bullshit.

I have visited Stephenie Meyer's web site a few times, and although I congratulate her for creating a publishing phenomenon that centers on a female protagonist, or MC as my students might say, I resent her anti-feminist thread. Of course not every book has to be "feminist." But why, I ask you, why does the single most popular YA book right now, perhaps ever, have to be about romance? And not sexy, funny, empowering romance, but old-fashioned, chaste, practically abusive-masculinist-heteronormative romance? And why does Bella have to be such a fucking idiot? Why does her life have to revolve around feeding her father and leeching onto her vampire boyfriend? Why can't we ever have a female MC who eschews romance for something more interesting? Empowering? Enlightening?

My students sometimes complain when I make them read Seventeenth Summer, a wonderful, lyrical book from 1942 that is in so many ways the Ur-text for YA. They complain because it's very lyrical and descriptive (read: boring to contemporary teens) and it does have Angie's (the MC) life revolve around Jack--but, the novel also has Angie LEAVE Jack to go off to college. Proto-feminist, I say. I guess I long for another Angie--a modern version of Angie who recognizes that romance has it's place, but should not be the be-all end-all of a young woman's life.