Michelle sported her J. Crew ensemble over at the Tonight Show last month, and J. Crew's not only featuring her outfit on the site, they've even purchased a Google AdWords campaign for it.



You, too, can channel the first lady-to-be in a Pembridge-dot pencil skirt ($148) and Italian Deco tank (was $148; select colors $99.99), but sadly, you won't be getting one of the Crystal-Button Colorblock cardigans, which have all been snapped up (probably not by Republicans).

The clothes do seem to be a huge distraction lately, as Rebecca Traister points out in her piece over at Salon called "The Momification of Michelle Obama": "The majority of the coverage of Michelle Obama in the week since her husband was elected has centered on her clothes."

More from Traiser: "The Associated Press wondered what kind of first lady Michelle will be, and concludes, "the kind of first lady this country has not seen in decades." You mean, the kind with a high-powered job? No, "the mother of young children."



There's been a lot of hype over Michelle donning "accessible" clothes (no Cindy McCain $5,000 de le Renta suits in mustardy green HERE!) -- her first public foray into fashion on The View is credited with both softening her image and selling out the $148 White House/Black Market dress before the episode even aired.

But there are a lot of people I know back home who still are NOT going to dish out $148 for a simple dress, or $450 for an outfit. Accessibility is in the eye of the credit-card holder.

So... ARE we focusing too much on clothes, from Michelle's sundress to Sarah Palin's $150,000 of Neiman splurges (sorry, but .... drool! I simply MUST run for office someday, dahling)?

As always, we must turn to Google for the truth of the matter:

"michelle obama dress the view" = 413,000 hits
"michelle obama j crew" = 294,000
"michelle obama job administrator" = 2.3 mil

OK, at least we're starting to start out our priorities.

Post to Print 350,000 More Copies of Election Edition

From article: The Post is printing an additional 350,000 copies that will be for sale at 7-Eleven, CVS, Giant, Harris Teeter, Safeway, Shoppers Food and Pharmacy and other retail retailers around the region.

Today's the day, my little chickadees. I shivered in the predawn darkness outside my polling place with 200 or so of my closest buddies, who all looked like they'd showered, groomed and consulted with a personal shopper before hitting the line at 5:45 a.m.

I hope they enjoyed seeing me in hot pink sweatpants, a free sweatshirt from my old job (three sizes too big) and a hand-knitted hat whose closest color match could only be termed "kaleidoscope." And large uncovered pores, I haz dem.

Tonight I'm freelancing for the Associated Press on results in Prince William County, Virginia. Polls in VA close at 7 p.m. so I should be able to scarf down some chicken pad Thai before then. Yes I can.

(My too-much-extra-time-in-Excel graph inspired by GraphJam)

I'm about to lose electoral college control and I think I like it, like it.


Political beliefs aside, I am sooo looking forward to watching like 17 hours of political coverage from my TiVo once I get home on election night. No spoilers, pls, kthnx.

Slate's calling like, hundreds of e.c. votes "Safe Dem" and a whole buncha others "Lean Dem," so I'm thinking Barack's gonna come out of this with oh, about nine thousand and twelve electoral votes.

But when it comes to a dance-off, the election may go another way.


I do, however, most heartily regret the existence of any person who Photoshops Sarah Palin's head onto a bikini body.

I'm a decent Photoshopper too, but I use my skills for good, not evil.

Time Inc:
RIP 600

Gannett:
RIP 3,000

Star-Ledger:
RIP 140

Christian Science Monitor:
Goes paperless
(I can just see the tombstone now.)


At least Twitter is still going strong, right? ... RIGHT? Oh, good GOD.

All this stress. I needs me a Vivanno^TM Nourishing Orange Mango Banana Blend. Bananas cure everything.

I've been through media layoffs before, from a company that started with A and ended in L and maybe had an O in the middle, but I'm not really sure. It was surreal to sit in the multipurpose auditorium where Santa would come to visit employees' children sprung briefly from the company daycare center across the street... where we created care packages for home-bound senior citizens on volunteer days... where we got discounted flu shots, donated blood, and ate brownie triangles on launch days ... and where we were, on a sunny October morn one year ago, receiving our severance packages in thick, navy blue folders that were not in any way pink, nor slip-like.

Do I miss my happy little company fambly? Yes, yes I do. Sure, I can joke about it NOW... but many, many more media cumps are following suit.

I predict an explosion in Blogspot accounts any second now. And three, two, one...

So of course on every Web site, blog and/or magazine's list of "ingenious" money-saving tips is to ditch the $4-a-day Starbucks habit. I have to ask: What kind of person spends 80 bucks a month on coffee without realizing they spend 80 bucks a month on coffee? (Let's see: Coffee, new boots or interest-bearing savings account? COFFEE, obvs.)

On Newsweek.com today:
A Venti-Sized Recession? The more Starbucks a country has, the bigger its financial problems.

Naturally, I'm suspicious that this can be tied in a neatly wrapped package with a shiny silver bow, but here we go: "The Seattle-based coffee chain followed new housing developments into the suburbs and exurbs, where its outlets became pitstops for real-estate brokers and their clients. It also carpet-bombed the business districts of large cities, especially the financial centers, with nearly 200 in Manhattan alone. Starbucks's frothy treats provided the fuel for the boom, the caffeine that enabled deal jockeys to stay up all hours putting together offering papers for CDOs, and helped mortgage brokers work overtime processing dubious loan documents."

Still awake? Yeah, me neither.

Now, there's nothing I like more than coffee. Possibly a Nintendo Wii, if I had one. But tying the Starbucks excessplosion into the housing crisis? Ehh... I rent. And I will forever, until someone can figure out a way for me to save tens of thousands of dollars for a down payment without reducing my monthly iTunes expenditures.

What we really need is some way to, oh, CAFFEINATE the economy. We're not gonna pull ourselves outta this mortgage/Starbucks/McMansion ditch with just one Vivanno^TM Nourishing Orange Mango Banana with Matcha Blend.

Mark Malkoff knows what to do, and he started it back when this economic meltdown was still solid chocolate, long before it was shaved into curls and drizzled on the foamy surface of a 200-degree beverage.

Indeed, he made a purchase at all 171 Starbucks locations in Manhattan... in one day.

• Yes!
We!
Carve!
(.com) [by way of Daily Kos] shows off Obampkins! ...Barack-o-lanterns?


• New York Times piece on Cindy McCain makes her out to be a sad, lonely lady who's been shunned as the floozy John left his first wife for. It starts off with this telling anecdote:

"Cindy McCain was new to Washington and not yet 30 when she arrived at a luncheon for Congressional spouses to discover a problem with her name tag. It read “Carol McCain.” That was the well-liked wife John McCain had left to marry Cindy, to the disapproval of many in Washington. Fearing that the slight was intentional, she slinked to a half-empty table that never filled. “No one wanted to sit at her table,“ said Barbara Ross, , a friend who was not surprised when Mrs. McCain announced a few months later that she was moving back to Arizona. “It was like high school.” And McCain is POed -- Fox News fires back.


• New endorsements for Obama - Colin Powell, Chicago Tribune (who has NEVER endorsed a Democratic candidate), Chicago Sun-Times


• Did youse guys hear about this when it happened, ‘cause I sure didn’t: Richard Fuld, CEO of Lehman Bros., got punched in the face at the company gym after it was announced they were goin’ down: "He was on a treadmill with a heart monitor on. Someone was in the corner, pumping iron and he walked over and he knocked him out cold.”


• Target: Women goes after the Disney Princesses. Finally! Someone needs to put those pretty little things in their place. I think Cindy McCain has been pursuing a career as a Disney princess, incidentally. P.S., Did you know that Al Gore helped start Current TV? I read it in his book "The Assault on Reason." Seriously, he did. This isn't like how he helped start the Internet.




• David Brooks: Sarah Palin "Represents A Fatal Cancer To The Republican Party" - Huffington Post. Wow. Harsh.


• McCain “Loves Being the Underdog" - CNN.com. Well, yeah, who DOESN'T love being the underdog? I love being an underdog almost as much as I love parking tickets, the smell of moldy bread and having to walk my dog at 2 a.m.

This moment on 'SNL' went WAY too quickly. Personally, I'd been hoping for a Jennifer-screams-and-passes-out moment like in 'Back to the Future Part II' when the teenage Jennifer encounters her 47-year-old alky self in 2015.

One of my heroes, Joan Didion, has a piece up on Salon this a.m.: "Belief" in the surge translates to "success" in the surge; does Palin have a better life story than Biden; what was up with the "lipstick on a pig" bid-nez?

Time got wasted in the familiar ways. The presence of Barack Obama in the electoral process allowed us to talk as if "the race issue" had reached a happy ending. We did not need to talk about how the question of race has been and continues to be used to exacerbate the real issue in American life, which is class, or absence of equal opportunity. Instead we could talk about what Barack Obama meant by "lipstick on a pig," and whether it was appropriate for him to go off on vacation "to some sort of foreign, exotic place." The "foreign, exotic place" in question was of course Hawaii.

Anyone who complains that Barack gets to go to Hawaii regularly is just jealous. Trust me.

I am drinking Yoo Hoo for the first time since I was about 12. My workplace always has various sodas in the fridge, but the addition of Yoo Hoo was too powerful to resist.

It is not as good as it was when I was 12.

Other things that were way better when I was a kid:

• Fun Dip


• Boy bands


• Hot Dogs


• Chewing on the rubbery feet of Barbie dolls


• The fact that members of The Baby-Sitters Club spent 10 years in 8th grade


• Dot-matrix printers

Sweet deity in a bicycle basket! It's not like I regularly turn to Dear Abby for advice on my oh-so-post-modern existence (can't even REMEMBER the last time she discussed how hard it is to hold up a 1200-page Ayn Rand on a crowded Metro) but I couldn't believe the idiocy she's spewing today.

DEAR ABBY: My boyfriend and I have been living together for a year. We split all the bills -- rent, utilities, etc. -- in half.

A few nights ago I asked him how he felt about paying for half my birth control pills, which amounts to $40 a month. Because neither of us is ready for children, I think we should share the expense.

Am I out of line to ask my boyfriend to split the cost with me? This has become a hot topic at work. The guys don't agree with me, and surprisingly, most of the women don't, either. What is your take on this? -- ALL IN LOVE IS FAIR

Abby responds that it's HER expense, not theirs: "As I see it, there are two kinds of expenses when people share a dwelling: joint expenses and those that are personal. Prescription drugs usually fall into the latter category." So is it only her "personal" expense when she starts spewing out bebehs that need dydies, milks and college educations because he's too cheap to pony up for a couple of Trojans?

Abby also suggests that if a man needs Viagra, it's his expense and not the woman's. Now, I don't necessarily agree with that either, except that it's been more than obvious for a very long time that women still make less than men for doing the very same job. But why is Viagra always the obvious counterpart for birth control pills? I would argue that Viagra is (well, somewhat) necessary, but not compared with a pill or other method that would prevent the average woman from becoming pregnant 10-15 times in her life.

Psst:

Reproduction is prohibited, but not impossible.



Another wonderful moment from this creepily narrated but brilliant video:

"There are three types of virgins:
A. Virgins by choice
B. Virgins by way of poor social skills
C. People who should be in Group B, but claim otherwise for reasons of prestige"

Anyhoo, watch it NAO!

In case you haven't already seen this, oh, I dunno, EVERYWHERE?

It was elbow-to-elbow after hours last night at Nanette Lepore in Chevy Chase, where they held a party for the opening of the new boutique. Yes, I was there! And newsflash, so was Nanette herself, glowing amid the pink recessed lighting of the shop. (Everyone looked so rosy.)

Champagne, teeny noshes, three-piece band popping out Euro jazz, but unfortch, most of the clothes were moved away to make room for party space. Sad! However, I ogled the off-the-rack goodies around the edges, including a single soft-tastic purple coat, size 0 and $525. Le sigh. (Avail in blue at Bloomie's. And Stella McCartney also has a great fuzzy purple coat this season.)

Goodie bag: Nanette Lepore perfume, logo umbrella and a copy of Capitol File. I gave the mag to my boyfriend. He reads it for the pictures.

K Street Kate (who I haven't met, btw) has piccies.

Store:
5449 Wisconsin Ave.
Chevy Chase, MD (just across the DC line opposite from Mazza Gallerie)

Here's my um-brella-ella-ella-ella:

Newsflash: It seems that Barack Hussein Obama has gay parents! Oh em gee.



Courtesy of failblog.org

1. It's possible to be both full and hungry at the same time.

2. It's perfectly acceptable to eat a hot dog at 10 a.m. when you've already been up for half a day.

3. Likewise, it's OK to eat half a pound of pasta and go to sleep at 9 p.m.

4. Sometimes, despite all that hot dog and pasting eating, Spandex is actually a good choice of attire.

5. If someone tells you you're "looking strong" ... you're not.*


* A fact I'd long suspected, but no one's actually told me that lately. Rah! I must be getting better.

Escape
Carolyn Jessop, 2007

During this spring's raid on the ranch, former polygamist wife Carolyn Jessop made the rounds of news shows, talking about a life of squabbling with sister-wives, constant pregnancy and arbitrary rules. I decided to check out her book because I'm incredibly nosy.

Even though she got out (I mean, consider the title if nothing else), I found myself incredibly disturbed and depressed by this book. Everything in their lives was such a mind-trick. Jessop believed it all because it's what she grew up with, but life got more and more extreme on the compound until schools were closed and women were on virtual lockdown with expired car registrations and empty gas tanks.

Jessop finally escaped the Yearning for Zion with all eight of her children, then won legal custody of them in the first court battle of its kind. The brainwashing runs deep, though -- her oldest daughter was never comfortable with life "on the outside" and returned to live on the compound on her 18th birthday.

Purchase on Amazon here.

So, I do triathlons. This is my second year. I'm slow, but I'm mighty. However, the picture in this post is NOT of me. I do not look good or happy while doing a race, no matter how excited I actually might be on the inside.

But this weekend's race presented way more challenges than swimming 1K, biking 40K and running 10K.

Yes, kiddies, despite the fact that the Nation's Triathlon was in the city where I've lived for 10 years, I got lost on the way there -- got lost to the point that I had to go into Virginia and back again to get on the right track. I got literally the LAST parking space in the athletes' lot by staring someone down.

I know, my Pontiac Vibe is just that threatening.

Then I got to carry my stuff like a mile and a half around the Tidal Basin. Good God, where is a sherpa when you need one?! I was so late that I heard them doing the National Anthem when I was still quite a bit off, getting sweaty from the intense humidity that had already started at 7 a.m.

I knew there was a very, very good chance they wouldn't let me into the race since I was so late.

When I arrived, the main athlete entrance was closed. I knew it had closed at 6:45 a.m., so I knew I'd have to beg. Officials assured me there was another entrance that was still letting people in ... but I couldn't find it.

So I literally hopped the fence to get into the race area. (Threw my huge pile of gear/crap over first.) Fortunately, bike racking had been the day before. Set up my area as fast as I could -- helped that for some weird reason, I had an ENTIRE RACK to myself so I completely spread out.

Luckily, I was in a later swim wave -- we didn't go out until around 7:50. Got in the water, silver caps not pink this time, FINALLY (women 25-29 ALWAYS seem to get stuck with white or pink, ugh).

So I was legally in the race, despite having to basically SNEAK in in the first place. But the weirdness was not over.

The bike stickers were not sticky enough and there were stickers on the ground EVERYWHERE. Before I'd seen one, all I knew was that I ran over something big and white with my bike and had to stop because the intense hissing noise made me think I had a flat.

Me: [Censored]

I'd never had a flat on a race before. So I ripped open my repair kit, got out ALL my equipment, flipped the bike upside down ... and the front tire was still firm. And the back tire was, too. WTF? Then I realized someone's bike sticker was lodged between my brake and my tire, which was what was making the hissing noise! I was so sure is was a flat that I'd gotten all my gear out ASAP to do it quick. Oh well, at least it wasn't a flat. I repacked my gear and got going.

Around the Maryland state line, we came on a huge dead German Shepherd dog that clearly had been there for QUITE awhile. I was bothered by that because that was someone's pet ... but I was also annoyed that race officials had put so little effort into sweeping the course, for, oh, I don't know, 80-pound dead dogs lying in the road for the past week?

About five minutes after that, I RAN OVER A SQUIRREL WITH MY BIKE.

I repeat: I RAN OVER A SQUIRREL WITH MY BIKE.

The day just kept getting weirder and weirder. The little scamp ran out in between my wheels -- there was no was to avoid him on such short notice. Bump-ba-bump.

Me: NO! [beeep]! OH GOD!

But I looked over my shoulder and he was running away without a limp so I guess I just got his tail.

The guy behind me complimented me on not crashing.

Final, though less surreal moment, was between the bike and the run, asking a girl for a squirt of her sunscreen. She gave me, literally, an ice cream scoop size of sunscreen and then I ended up dropping most of it INTO my sneaker, though I put it on anyway, because seriously, that's just how the day went.

Fabulousosity from Tina Fey and Amy Poehler in the 'SNL' season premiere.

Ani DiFranco wrote a poem shortly after 9/11 that she later set to music and published on her album "So Much Shouting, So Much Laughter."

Fan-produced vid here:



and once upon a time
we were moonshine
rushing down the throat of a giraffe
yes, rushing down the long hallway
despite what the p.a. announcement says
yes, rushing down the long stairs
with the whiskey of eternity
fermented and distilled
to eighteen minutes
burning down our throats
down the hall
down the stairs
in a building so tall
that it will always be there

More lyrics here.

Slate's got an interesting article up about measuring the effects of the under-30 vote:

...On Election Day 2004, kids turned out in record numbers: About 4.6 million ! more people under the age of 29 voted in 2004 than in 2000. Yet 18- to 29-year-olds accounted for only 17 percent of voters—roughly the same as in 2000—because the geezer vote also grew. As a result, youth mobilization was declared a myth, perhaps unjustifiably. "We rocked the vote all right," Hunter S. Thompson said at the time. "Those little bastards betrayed us again."

Read the rest...

"The Girls Who Went Away: The Hidden History of Women Who Surrendered Children for Adoption in the Decades Before Roe v. Wade"
Ann Fessler, 2006

This compilation of personal histories brings forward birth mothers of the 1950s and 1960s -- in other words, victims of the "unwed mother" homes of the time. This isn't something you'd want to stretch out by the pool to read. Each story is achingly sad; most women didn't want to give their babies up but were forced to by an army of doctors, nurses, social workers and angry parents. For many, the pain of that loss has never gone away.

Fessler herself was adopted. When the book opens, she's known her birth mother's name and location for years but has been afraid to go, instead opting to interview dozens of other birthmothers. Finally, near the end of her project, she seeks out her own birthmother, who got pregnant by one boy and engaged to another. Her fiancé offered to help raise the baby, but she felt it wouldn't be fair to him. After hearing so many legacies of loss, Fessler must have seen this as a stinging rejection by her birthmother.

I do wish Fessler have done more research and presented more of a factual history in addition to these women's personal stories. However, she is a photographer first and foremost, and I think it shows in the construction of the book. That's all right. This book has a place, especially because decades later and in a society where this sort of thing would never happen anymore, people still don't talk much about that time, the time before.

Purchase on Amazon here.

Sarah Haskins of current.tv never fails to amuse.

The District Sample Sale opens its doors on Tuesday, Sept. 9 and I am rarin' to go! General admission tix are $40; VIP tix get you in an hour earlier, at $250. I'm getting in for free thanks to my jobby-job.

In case you've never been to a sample sale, a bunch of local boutiques offer up their unsold, end-of-season merch for deeply discounted prices. In the past, sample sales used to be limited to actual "samples" -- the size 0s and 2s that usually end up on the mannquins -- but these days things are fortunately a bit more democratic.

DC Shops participating in 2008:
Caramel
Daisy Too
Green & Blue
Ginger
Harriet Kassman
Hysteria
Lettie Gooch
The Little Shoebox
Periwinkle
Proper Topper
Sangaree
Simply Soles
Sugar
Sherman Pickey
Terra
Urban Chic
We One You Too
Wink

Want tix to this twice-a-year event? (Uh, YEAH, who wouldn't?)

Visit www.districtsamplesale.com.
General admission: $40
VIP admission: $250 (early entrance + sweet goodie bag)

So Sarah Palin’s 17-year-old daughter Bristol (after Track and Trig, I do think Gov. Palin deserves a nomination to Baby’s Named a Bad, Bad Thing) is joining the Jamie Lynn Spears Club. They do grow up so fast these days.

I wonder if Bristol received abstinence-only education. But I don’t think we should criticize her. Millions, of teens have sex every year. Whether she didn’t know enough to protect herself or her method of birth control failed, she was one of the unlucky ones who got stuck. If Bristol had quietly sought an abortion, we’d never know about it, but that’s her choice and I’m not criticizing her for it.

What I am criticizing is 1., the anti-education stance that some people somehow think is helping today’s kids, and 2., the fact that John McCain knew about Bristol’s pregnancy ahead of time and still chose Gov. Palin. That seems very strange to me -- that even if he was personally OK with it, wouldn't he stop to think that, oh, I don't know, it just may hurt his campaign?

I look forward to seeing how this story develops...

Um, sorry, tricked ya. I've been working long hours this past week and spent today attending a high school reunion, so there is no Sunday Night Interwebs Roundup tonight. Please don't cry yo'selves to sleep, gentle reader(s?).

Console yourselves with one of my fave Brandon Hardesty re-enactments:

My first perception of McCain’s choice of VP was, “Crap. Crap crap crap. He chose a woman. A woman I’ve heard of and read articles about and crap, it’s a woman. A pro-life woman. That’s smart. That changes everything.”

I am inclined to think that McCain generally dislikes women. But I also believe he would do pretty much anything to get elected, including selecting as running mate one of those people with boobies who are supposed to wear pretty dresses and cook meatloaf for dinner and pop out 10 born-again Christian, God-fearing, Walmart-shopping babies. Or, you know, a mouse-huntin', rifle-totin' hockey mom.

Fortch, the blogosphere/intertubeland educated me about her microscopic resume, including serving as mayor of Wasilla, AK (pop: 6700) and her own mini-scandal (Troopergate). I figured since I’D heard of her, she had to be experienced and well-known, even as Alaska gov, but OK, turns out not so much.

McCain is now 72 years old. If his VP has to take over, is this really a person who is ready to run this country? I think we all know the answer to that.


P.S., My boyfriend loves moose. It's pretty much his spirit animal. He is going to hate this person.

Happy 89th Birthday to my cool-as-hell grandma!

I am psyched about the new Madewell 1937 store that's now open in Tysons Corner. It's the funkier, cheaper version of J. Crew, who I have come to dislike for its proto-First Lady wear and soaring prices. Really, who does J. Crew think it is? If you can afford to buy their clothes these days, you're actually probably NOT shopping there.

But seriously? If the model above were blonde, I would have taken this shot for a rejected cover of Debbie Gibson's Electric Youth.

And I prefer my Youth to be more Sonic than Electric.


My other issue with Madewell? Their models all look like seven-foot tall cowboys who have pursued freelance work as World War I flying aces. I love to look at these clothes, but I think I would actually mock myself for wearing them.

... That might not be enough to prevent me from buying that mango-colored cardi, though.

And I fell asleep during his speech.

Sad, sad news: GLBT activist Del Martin (far right), who was part of the first couple to legally wed in California in June, has died at the age of 87.

Martin was born in 1921, studied journalism at Berkeley, married, had a daughter and divorced before she met the love of her life, Phyllis Lyon (left), in 1950. The couple married in San Francisco when marriage was briefly legalized there in 2004, and were the first couple to marry in California in June after the CA Supreme Court OK'ed gay marriage.

My first reaction on hearing her death was immediate sorrow that she only got to enjoy three months of marriage this time around with her partner of 58 years. But at least she lived to see it.

Recommended listening: “Feminist Housewives,” Bitch & Animal

• Those two guys are in a statistical dead heat. However! Here’s something you may not have thought of: Those wacky pollsters only call LANDLINES. Now, who’s most likely to NOT HAVE LANDLINES? The young, the urban, the less well-off ... Now, wanna take a gander at whom those peeps might be voting for? Right. Interesting that we haven't heard anything about this fact, since I feel like this is probably skewing the polls quite a bit.

• The Midwest Teen Sex Show has a new episode up! If you’ve never seen this Webcast before, um ... It’s not what you might be thinking.

• “Bush declares 'major disaster' area in Florida.”
Yeah, well, I claim a ‘major disaster’ area in pretty much everything Bush declares, so we’re even. (But seriously, you can make a donation toward Hurricane Fay disaster relief at the American Red Cross Web site.)

• Plus, Much Glorious Bonus Learnings! I learned from the above CNN article that someone other than Jeb Bush is now governor of Florida. My research (yeah, thanks, Wikipedia) tells me that he’s been out of office since January 2, 2007. Way to keep up with the times!

• No matter what you post on Twitter, you always sound like a jerky jerk. Then again, so do my friends usually.

• Feministing's Weekly Feminist Reader is up.

• Bestest video I saw this week:

Blood and Guts in High School
Kathy Acker
1978; 165 pp.


I read this because it's on the list of 1001 Books to Read Before You Die (...Only 991 to go 'til I can, well, die!!! Ew.) and it sounded, well... just disturbing enough to be interesting.

In fact, I found it totally disturbing and violent and weird and obscene. Keep in mind, I don't use "obscene" meaning it should be banned, just that it's really, REALLY naughty. The book is supposed to be the journal of a punk girl living as a sex slave, cobbled together with thoughts, dreams, a long discussion on "The Scarlet Letter," pornographic drawings, you know, the usual.

It definitely has a punk/S&M bent going. The first half was a struggle to get through but later on there were some nice, though brief, pieces of writing. I've read that smart people love this book and dumb people hate it. I still don't know what to think of it, so I suppose that puts me somewhere in the middle.

In closing, I recommend AGAINST reading this in public because I just never knew when a drawing of huge genitalia would pop out at me.

Consider yourself warned.

Sure, Barack Obama announced his running mate, but let's devote CNN's resources to video interviews on Britney Spears' new diet plan!

I especially love how CNN host Brooke Anderson obvy has some inkling that, oh, 1200 calories a day is a tad extreme, and her correspondent stops her in her tracks with an admission that at her "boot camp" (they can't call it "fat camp" if you're already skinny) that was her calorie limit too. And poor Brooke Anderson just soldiers on, trying to convince her panel that Britney's regime is extreme: "...But not for an extended period of time, right?" (Do we need PANELS of people to discuss Britney's new body? Yes. Yes, we do.)

The word "hero" gets thrown about so much these days, but when Brooke starts in on how Britney never really had a weight problem to begin with, well, let's just say she's the greatest American hero since John McCain decided to stick around for more torture. *cough* But he doesn't like to talk about that.

She's got a point. Brit Brit popped out two kids back-to-back, was all sorts of bipolar and jacked up on boatloads of Cheetos. (God I want her life. For the Cheetos endorsements, anyway.) Really, I think it's OK for her to have been, oh, a size 12 or so for a bit.

"I think you have to remember though, that Britney sort of helped to repopularize the midriff," intones (what IS "intones"? but somehow, she's intoning here) VH1's Janell Snowden.

So that means she must never change, just like Subway's Jared has a no-weight-gain clause in his contract. Mmm plastic meat!

Um, anyway, nice to see a MSM anchor who gets it. Even if she won't take a hint from her Britney-must-be-as-thin-as-Nicole-Richie-before-she-got-knocked-up-and-thrown-in-the-clink-for-72-hours interviewees.

God, I love Sarah Haskins.

There are two things Mike & Chris hate: bright colors and women who smile.

Nonetheless, I'm trembling with desire for the jackets in their new fall line.

First of all, I'd be pretty down with sporting this not-a-jacket but not any other identifiable article ofclothing ($164) to the Place of Media where I work. The tweed pants are nice too, but I think that women who weight more than 17 pounds aren't allowed to wear tweed pants, so I'm out.







.... Are those ... leather pants? Um, well, if so, I'd declare those safely out of the range of work-acceptable attire for my sort of folk. I'm digging that bib-slash-military look around the neck of this get-up ($383), though.

Hey, lady, what are you looking so grumpy about? Is your Botox mingling with your hair bleach and creating deadly, deadly fumes? You're wearing like $2,000 bucks' worth of clothes. Can't you look at least a LITTLE excited about it?

I can't afford a $383 Kimball Zip Up Jacket, and I'm doing OK! I'm able to throw back my IKEA covers every morning, jam my feet into some Target boots and shuffle off to work sans $383 Kimball Zip Up Jacket. Though if I could have a $383 Kimball Zip Up Jacket, I would.



It's a pea coat! No, it's a khaki car coat! No, it's an Anson Zip Up Hoodie ($194). I like the asymmetrical lines and the model's silvery eye shadow, so that's good enough for me.


Finally, I would probably sell most of my belongings for these boots (and at $565, I'd actually only need to sell, like, maybe my couch and one other big thing). But please don't test me on that.


Just THINKING about the potential suppleness of these babies makes my heels start to bleed from those unforgiving Martens in my closet. (I've been mashing their heels with a mallet daily, I swear.)

Referred from Jezebel comes the uncomfortably named What to Expect When You're Aborting.


Recommended Reading: This Common Secret: My Journey as an Abortion Doctor by Susan Wicklund. I read it in May and could barely it down. I even cried once. I feel like everyone who's a human should read this, prolife, prochoice, everybody.

I look forward to reading about the above blogger's journey, who asks, Where's the Juno of the abortion world?

Ricky Martin is the proud father of twin baby boys born via surrogacy. I strongly suspect he has a partner quietly waiting in the wings to raise these babies along with Martin. Sure, it’s polite of the MSM to not mull over this fact publicly. But frankly, it irritates the heck out of me that people don’t feel comfortable enough to be open about who they are.

Then again, Martin could just be a cleavage-loving, uber-straight hunk of man who just hasn’t found the right girl to bring home to momma. But I don’t think so.

While I'm sooooo not a fan of him, I wish all the best to the new family, however they roll.

OK, this is great. Those long annoying URLs (say, from Google maps or an online catalog page) can be transformed into a short, easy-to-type, easy-to-share URL courtesy of TinyURL.com.

My two favorite places to get free music:

LastFM - free weekly downloads of dozens of edgy, indie, you're-so-cool-can-I-please-be-you music

And astonishingly, UrbanOutfitters.com, which only offers one playlist (around 20 songs) per season, but is consistently awesome. The only problem is the music puts me in a shopping mood. Can't imagine why.

Heard of Ideeli? It's a fashion free-for-all site that lets you purchase luxury pieces at deeply discounted prices ... but the clock is ticking. You never know when a new item will pop up. Members are e-mailed when an item is about to be available for sale. "Second row" members (meaning those with a free membership ... like me) can't purchase until an hour after "first row" members have had their chance.

The sale times are random (think 11:41 a.m.) which sorta kept me glued to my e-mail account for the first few days, but I haven't purchased anything yet ... although I've been tempted. (Seriously, Moschino sunglasses ($95 on ideeli)? SO futuristically cute.)

The other catch? Membership itself is usually closed. You need an invite code (I got one through Spa Week) or you can get on their mailing list to hear when membership opens. So if you have a lot of time on your hands (and a thirst for $900 handbags going for a mere $500), this is your happy hunting ground.

Kori: Have you read Breaking Dawn?

Me: Reading it now. You?

Kori: Yeah, reading it now.

Me: I skipped to the end though. I had to know.

Kori: It's a total soap opera.

Me: They always are!

Kori: Yeah ... I decided to put it down for the night when the pack was wanting to attack now that they knew Bella was preggers w/ a monster. What a ridiculous sentence.

Me: Hahaha, yeah the next whole part is really boring. Also, why is every character so emotionally constipated?

Kori: I get SO frustrated w/ Bella. She's literally the worst heroine ever. If you can even call her that.

Me: Sometimes the drama they manufacture among themselves doesn't even make SENSE. Yet, we read.

Kori: But I don't know if I'd ever want my teenage daughter reading about a girl who DEVOTES her life to a guy.

Me: You know what it is, it's porn for teenage girls. A guy who only holds them all night long and doesn't want sex.

Kori: What do the vampires do when Bella gets her period?

Me: Also, people are SO stupid in the book. There's a part when they use donor human blood to drink (not really a spoiler).
Edward: Don't worry, no one died for this.
Bella: But whatever do you possibly mean???
Edward: I'll explain later.
Me: Um, hello?!?!?! People don't need to DIE to bleed. It's donor blood? IDIOT.

Kori: Hmm, yeah, they should just sip on some donor blood for special occasions.

Me: Like in champagne flutes.

The D.C. mindset falls somewhere between “work” and “work work work.” I consider myself laid back, but I do triathlons and read 50 books a year for fun.

I’ve worked in media technically since I was 11, when I was made copy editor of the middle school paper. There has to be a special place in heaven for a pre-pubescent girl who knows what Stet means. Just sayin.’

Because I’m supposedly oh-so-laid back, I have zero career trajectory but greatly enjoy (or maybe I just enjoy the stories) tasks such as assigning a freelancer to write a review of Flipper’s grave, ghost-writing the blog of a famous teen pop star (I don’t think I’m allowed to say who) and editing college application essays for a company whose tagline says something about all their editors having gone to Harvard.

I did not go to Harvard.

Well, technically, I visited once.




So who am I to be writing this blog? I’ve managed a Webby-nominated online show ... and I’ve also interviewed celebrities so minor and faded that I’m embarrassed to even say who they are. I was on my feet for 20 hours covering W’s second inauguration ... and I also provided coverage on quilt shows. In July. In Tampa. From Washington.

The funny thing about it is that I’ve always worked for huge media companies. It’s just that in huge media companies, there are television anchors and featured columnists, and there are also people doing the inane things that you’d never even imagine someone doing.

That someone is me, and just because I read 50 blogs a day, and download hacks for The Sims 2 in my spare time, and make tomatoes in photographs look their reddest ... Um. Well, it means something. Maybe I should ask a featured columnist.