"When I do not want to say things in real life I often say them here." — Mimi Smartypants
Unsolicited opinions on books, movies, TV shows, consumer products
There were stories in sweat. The sweat of a woman bent double in an onion field, working fourteen hours under the hot sun, was different from the sweat of a man as he approached a checkpoint in Mexico, praying to La Santa Muerte that the federales weren’t on the payroll of the enemies he was […]
No, I don’t have anything to say about Greece. I don’t like what’s going on in the Eurozone, but I’m not the person to turn to for answers. Actually, “greeking” is a term associated with those fake license plates you see in car commercials. Fake plates in car ads have always bugged me. Why make them generic […]
This showed up on the io9 website today: I’m suffering from cognitive dissonance, because io9’s choice of a graphic to accompany its story about women dominating the Nebulas is the cover of a Nebula-winning book written by a man, Jeff Vandermeer. Granted, the strongest and most well-drawn characters in Annihilation, as in Authority and Acceptance, the other books […]
My give-a-shit meter is close to zero. I’m in a rage slump, kind of like a manic-depressive on the down cycle. Something will set me off again, probably sooner than later, and I’ll be back to normal, ranting and raving about injustice, racism, and stupidity. Ooh, did I just feel a rage twinge there? So how ’bout them Duggars? […]
The body turns in the stream. Where the new bridge crosses the Ganga in five concrete strides, garlands of sticks and plastic snag around the footings; rafts of river flotsam. For a moment the body might join them, a dark hunch in the black stream. The smooth flow of water hauls it, spins it around, […]
You Can’t Read That! is a periodic post featuring banned book reviews and news roundups. YCRT! Mini-Rant From a long editorial titled The Erosion of Free Speech on a conservative think tank’s website, I learn that more than 300 students and professors at Valdosta State University in Georgia signed a petition demanding the withdrawal of the American Library Association’s […]
You Can’t Read That! is a periodic post featuring banned book reviews and news roundups. YCRT! Banned Book News I linked to an earlier story on this in a previous YCRT! post, but here’s more on the censorship of an 85-year-old Tintin comic in Canada. After a single parental complaint, a Connecticut school superintendent overruled teachers and […]
Oh boy, Fox News again. Last Thursday Donna and I drove to Davis-Monthan Air Force Base so she could renew her military identification card. The pass & ID office was packed, and Fox News was playing on the TV in the waiting room. Yes, military members skew conservative. Yes, many of my colleagues feel Fox News is “their” […]