Journey to the Center of the Meme

Today I saw an evergreen social media post entitled “Did You Know These Things Had Names?”

It’s one of those internet chestnuts that have been floating around for years with no attribution to an original source. Which is a terribly annoying paradox of the internet, namely, the more popular and universal (and memefied) an image or text becomes, the less likely it is that its creator will ever receive proper credit. “We love this, it belongs to the world now,” say millions of people (cough, Boomers), who in any other context would swear they oppose socialism, as they click the Share button on Facebook. And off it goes, taking the first step on a journey to the de facto public domain.

As a would-be writer, I find the memefication process both frustrating and somewhat inspirational. Writers, artists, photographers - anyone who falls under the 21st-century umbrella of “content creators” - all want to be recognized for their work. It’s partly an ego thing, but it’s also very much a money thing. Let’s face it, even when John Lennon wrote “Imagine no possessions, it’s easy if you try,” he backed it up with an ironclad copyright. If his lyrics were to go the way of “Amazing Grace” or “Moonlight Bay,” Yoko Ono would find herself possessing bupkus. And Hell hath no fury like an Ono screwed out of her piece of John’s legacy.

That’s the money part. The ego part is simply this: Most anyone who creates wants their creations to be seen, and by as many folks as possible. There might be a million people who claim to have created the “You Had One Job” meme. But somewhere out there is the person who actually did - and even though they’re absolutely anonymous, they see their creation shared in a thousand different variations a thousand times a year. That’s got to be a rush. It’s slightly less notable than knowing you’re the babysitter who first read a ghost story to little Stevie King, but it’s pretty cool nonetheless.

With that in mind, here is the unattributed “Did You Know These Things Had Names?” meme:

After I screenshotted this bad boy, I decided I would try to trace it to its source. As this particular meme contains more words and therefore presumably required more research to create, I figured there had to be a recognizable author attached to it somewhere. So I went a-digging.

The earliest version of the “hey, here are some funny names for obscure things” trope that I could find via Google was from 2014, and that was a Buzzfeed listicle by Dave Stopera. Which suggested two things: One, that it almost certainly didn’t originate with him; and two, that it was probably a Reddit thread at some earlier point.

A Reddit search told me, much to my surprise, that this list of words apparently wasn’t an aggregation of other people’s fun facts that Dave claimed as his own. Huh. So I kept looking.

A bit more digging led me to a link to a 2019 article from Reader’s Digest Canada (which is an actual thing) called “18 Things You Never Knew Actually Had Names.” It was attributed to “Emily DiNuzzo, with files from Mitchell Symons from the book The Weird World of Wonders.” And it consisted of a list of words that more or less mirrored the meme.

Interesting (or maybe not) aside: Emily’s article got around, also appearing in the American, Australian, and Asian editions of Reader’s Digest. But the Canadian website is the only one that actually attributes the contents to Mitchell Symons. Even a worldwide legacy publication like Reader’s Digest has contributed wilfully to the memefication phenomenon. 

Ask your parents about Reader's Digest,
Drunkards under 40.

In any event, this was a clue! So…who is this Mitchell Symons? Turns out that was an easy Google. He’s a British writer who worked for the BBC, wrote a column for the Daily Express, and wrote questions for the first UK version of Trivial Pursuit. He’s also written a slew of books in the “amusing but useless knowledge” genre, including Where Do Nudists Keep Their Hankies?, How Much Poo Does an Elephant Do?, and Why Do Farts Smell Like Rotten Eggs? Sort of like the “Imponderables” books by Dave Feldman (Do Penguins Have Knees, etc.), only with weird British humor.

Answering this question is outside
the scope of this post, sorry.

Symons also wrote a book called There Are Tittles in This Title, also known as The Weird World of Words (note to Reader’s Digest: not The Weird World of Wonders). Now, I haven’t read or even laid eyes on this book, but it’s well represented on booksellers’ websites from Amazon to Goodreads. And nearly all of them feature the same promotional blurb to describe its contents, which includes the phrase “useful lists of things you never knew had names.”

Without actually reading the book, I can’t say definitively that those “useful lists” form the basis of the meme. But since Emily DiNuzzo copped to using Mitchell Symons’ book (albeit with a bastardized title) as a source, and since online listings for that book seem to describe the meme to a T, I’m going to say pretty confidently that this popular list of obscure words is in fact the work of Mitchell Symons. And I’m here to give him credit for what has up to now been an anonymous bit of internet content.

Really, was that so difficult? OK, it was a borderline obsessive search that few, if any, other people would bother with before smashing the Share button. But I feel good that I’ve helped to de-anonymize a single meme.

The De-Anonymizer is on the case.

Unless I’m wrong, in which case I’m contributing to the internet’s other main problem, which is gross misinformation confidently put out as true.

But that’s a topic for another day.

I Am an Elephant: The Autobiography of a Google User

A Twitter account I follow (@notcapnamerica, and if you're on Twitter you should totally follow him, because he’s a wild ride) recently commented on the crazy amount of stuff Google claims to know about you in the “Ad Settings” portion of your account.

This is where I would embed or at least screenshot that tweet, except that I can’t for the life of me find it again. Twitter’s search function is, let’s charitably say, not robust. And Chris pumps out content at an insane pace. It’s not like I could scroll through his last few dozen tweets and find the one I was looking for; he’s tweeted, retweeted, and replied hundreds of times since then. Also, I’m not good at this stuff.

Actual photo of me attempting to type
the works of Shakespeare.

Anyway.

Turns out you can go to adssettings.google.com and see exactly who Google has composited you to be based on “personal info you've added to your Google Account, data from advertisers that partner with Google, and Google's estimation of your interests.” That composite snapshot is then used by Google to determine the content of all the 12,000 sidebars, pop-ups, and other “suggestions” you see every day in the course of your intertubes browsing (in Chrome by Google, of course - Chrome is the browser equivalent of Kool-Aid manufacturing its own drink cups with appropriate cyanide dosages pre-printed on them).

It’s an interesting way to build a personality profile, in much the same way that having six blind men grope an elephant is an interesting way to learn about elephants. 

With that in mind, let’s unpack Google’s methodology for gleaning my identity, at least the online version of it.

“Personal info you’ve added to your Google Account”: I just checked, and literally the only information I’ve added to my Google profile is my IRL name and two email addresses (my everyday Gmail and the email for this blog, which I use as a backup contact). I haven’t told Google my gender, my birthday, my employer, my hometown, or whether I prefer bechamel or marinara in my lasagne. On this score, they’re flying blind. Of course, there are myriad other ways Google could access that information about me - see below.

“Data from advertisers that partner with Google”: This is a huge catch-all category. Google captures an enormous amount of information about us when we’re online. I’m totally complicit in some of it: You know how your contact info conveniently pops up when you’re buying something from a website, even if you’re not logged into an account for that website? Google has all that. Or the nifty way you only have to enter the CVV for your credit card, and all the payment fields populate? Google knows where you’re spending your money. I have ample opportunity to opt out of storing that information, but I’m as lazy and trusting as the average schmuck, and I. Just. Don’t.

Then there are the passive channels by which Google extracts personal information from my browsing habits. Some of these are quite mysterious. I mean, I get that if I buy a pair of shoes from Zulily, I’m going to be seeing shoe ads on MSN for the next few days (currently estimated at anywhere from two to 61, 734). I can grasp that if I place an Office Depot order on my work computer while I’m logged into Google (which I typically am), I’m going to see ads for Office Depot on the Facebook app on my phone. Google totally has tiny data elves that hop around from device to device, sprinkling bytes of my personal information on each one like magic dust (see Stephen King’s “Ballad of the Flexible Bullet” for the care and feeding of these elusive creatures).

But how is it that when I ask the Siamese Kitten if she likes the new cat food I bought, I’m suddenly seeing ads for Chewy.com, a website I don’t use and have rarely if ever visited? (Don’t pretend you don’t ask your pets for their blessing on the purchases you make for them. Just don’t.) I don’t want to get into conspiracy-theory territory, but let me tell you, if Google has that level of data extraction technology at its disposal, it’s way too late to be fashioning tinfoil hats, people.

Fortunately, Archie McPhee has us covered.

Finally, there’s this: “Google’s estimation of your interests.” Now, I know this probably refers to some algorithm that plots the statistical likelihood of my interest in Brand B based on my interaction with Brand A. But I like to think there’s a human component involved, too, say, a shadowy call center where a small army of human analysts matches my online activity to ads of potential interest. I imagine these virtual tastemakers are all disgruntled former users of eHarmony, are overwhelmingly named Donna or Craig, and have extensive track records of failed relationships that were based entirely on a shared love of a particular flavor of an obscure soft drink. Who else would have the uncanny perception to assume I want to explore the world of dollhouse furniture because I spent five minutes clicking on area rugs on Amazon?

Not a sponsor, but Safavieh does offer
quality rugs at reasonable prices.
Let's see if that turns up in my profile.

All of this is leading up to the following presentation of Who I Am, by Google. According to the Ad Personalization djinns, I am:

Female: Yes! One for one!

55+ years old: Ooooh, sorry. Also, how dare they? I may be antisocial, boring, eccentric, and weird. But I am NOT over 55 (yet).

Interested in Celebrities & Entertainment News: Guilty as charged, if rather vague. If they’d pegged me as an incorrigible Benedict Cumberbatch fangirl, I’d be more impressed.

Not a Parent: I always thought a disproportionate part of my identity, both on- and offline, was bound up in being a mom to my Precocious Daughter, but I guess not. Also, what a weird category. It’s not that there’s a box for “Parent” and I don’t check it. It’s that I specifically check the “Not a Parent” box. There’s 21 years of branding shot to hell.

Interested in Shopping: I mean, yes? In that I’ve bought many things online, especially since the onset of the pandemic. I’m not sure how that differentiates me from hundreds of millions of other consumers, though. Pretty lazy profiling there, Google.

A Homeowner: 1. Google’s cache of information about me goes back at least five years. 2. Google apparently has no mechanism for modifying categories that are at least five years out of date. Sorry, plumbers and landscapers whose paid ads appear in my social media: You’ve been robbed.

Interested in Urban Transit: This one is pretty cool. I’ve looked up local light-rail schedules many times. I’ve also frequented the website for a bus service that PDaughter has used to travel between Dallas and Austin (although not recently). Congrats to Google for successfully placing me in a category not based on obvious sources like Uber or Lyft (which I’ve never used).

Employed by a Very Large Employer (10k+ Employees): On the other hand, what? In my entire adult life I’ve been employed by one company that fit this bill, and it was before I ever had an online presence. In fact, I looked it up, and I left that job before the World Wide Web even existed for public use. All the companies I’ve worked for since then don’t have 10,000 employees combined. I...well, you get the idea. Epic fail, Google.

Holder of a Bachelor’s Degree: Yes. Correct. I don’t even know how often that factoid has ever come up during my browsing activity, but they nailed it.

Interested in Combat Sports: Go home, Google Ad Personalization. You’re drunk.

Like Dogs: Who doesn’t? But yes. Possibly related to this photo from 2016:

Am Married: See homeowner status above. Also, LOL.

I urge you to check out your own Ad Personalization settings if you’re hooked into the Google hive mind like me. It’s interesting, for sure. I want to point out that literally the first items you see on that page are a checkbox to opt out of Ad Personalization entirely (not that I completely trust that Google will actually allow that with a simple check) and a link to pretty impressively detailed information on which websites participate in ad customization and which will allow you individually opt out if you wish. Also, you can simply not be logged in to Google when you’re not actively using its services (for instance, I’m writing this post on Google Drive, which I can only do because I’m logged in, and I could easily sign out once I’m finished).

Honestly, knowing what Google thinks it sees when it looks at my online activity, I’m not too worried that the Deep State will be able to pick me out of a lineup based on my profile. I have security software that provides some level of identity theft protection (and again, I could boost my personal security by deleting cookies and stored credit card info if I wanted to). And basically, I have faith that the bad guys of the Internet will, like the blind men of Indostan, stroke my squirming trunk and conclude that, after all, I am indeed some kind of snake.

Your mileage may vary. Happy browsing.

Not My Mother's Motherhood

A couple of days ago, Precocious Daughter said to me, ever so casually, "Oh, by the way..."

Record scratch. Freeze frame.

Now, if you've ever had a child, you know that "Oh, by the way..." is a heavily loaded phrase. It's the offspring equivalent of a woman saying "It's FINE."

It's not sexist if it's true, you guys.

And just let me point out that this particular child is a legit grown-ass woman with a car, a job, and a fat college scholarship.

Still.

OK, so a couple of days ago she casually dropped this: "Oh by the way...I think I might have a date this weekend."

Sure. She hasn't had a love interest in more than a year. So...great.

"I think we're going to see the new Jurassic World movie."

Weekend movie date. Classic. I'm on board.

Then I asked: And who is this person?

Thinking she's going to name someone she went to school with, or a friend of a friend, or even someone she met at work.

Her answer?

"I met him on Tinder."

ME. OBVIOUSLY.

My daughter - who just graduated from high school - has met someone on Tinder.

ON. TINDER.

Because in 2018, teenagers have Tinder accounts, I guess.

Wut.

David Tennant supports me.

Now, PDaughter was very willing to share information about this...person. Who is her age, and who lives in a very good neighborhood (in Drummer Boy's neighborhood, in fact), and whose social media accounts are actually clever and not creepy at all.

And they've been communicating on the regular prior to setting this date, and according to her, he's raised no red flags, i.e., hasn't discussed dismembering squirrels or supporting Trump.

Still. My baby girl met someone by swiping right.

Or left. Or...I don't know shit about Tinder, to be honest.

Anyway, she's planning on meeting this TOTAL STRANGER this weekend.

I understand that every relationship begins with two total strangers.

Mine with Drummer Boy included.

But...but...

I got nothing.

What do you guys think about this development?

Delightful Men and Their Siamese Cats

A few years ago, I wrote a post called "Beautiful Women and Their Siamese Cats."

Holy crap, it was six and a half years ago.

Where does the time go?

Over there. It definitely goes over there.

Anyway, it's become one of my more popular posts. I don't know if you know this, but people on the Internet like cats. Go figure. A lot of the hits come from people searching for cats, or Siamese, or, presumably, Jane Fonda with a cat on her butt. I don't judge.

But it's not only female celebrities who like Meezers. A bit of searching turned up a whole bunch of famous dudes cuddling with these soft, fluffy, affectionate, loud-mouthed little assholes. I thought I'd share some of them with you.

Anthony Perkins seemed to like Siamese kitties.

I'll resist the urge to say "one psycho deserves
another." Oh, wait.

Andy Warhol dug things that were weird and non-conforming, so it's a perfect match.

It's not easy to snuggle with tomato soup cans.

James Mason had a suave manner and distinctive voice, just like a Siamese cat. And also could be a little creepy, again just like a Siamese.

I'll bet this one was named Lolita.

Siamese cats are graceful and light on their feet. Just like Fred Astaire.

I know from experience that sticking your finger in a Meezer's
mouth is a good way to get gnawed on.

A young Michael Landon found a Siamese cat to be a fine reading companion.

Mind the claws, Little Joe.

I'm not sure what's on Peter Lorre's mind here. But if it's something diabolical, he's in good company.

I love how they're giving each other side-eye.

It's not just actors who like Siamese, though. Here's Tom Jones getting inspired to sing "What's New, Pussycat?"

His fans apparently threw cats onstage in addition to panties
and hotel room keys. Lucky cats.

Unfortunately, these bright-eyed kitties weren't enough to free Syd Barrett from his demons.

In which case, they were truly
powerful demons.

Fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld is said to be quite fond of Siamese cats.

He has excellent taste.

Poet, songwriter, and lover of Brel Rod McKuen took inspiration from Meezers (probably).

Everybody needs a furry muse.

And finally, if you follow Ricky Gervais on social media, you know his best friend Ollie.

Her little white-tipped paws are to die for.

Excuse me, I have to go pet the Siamese kitten now. She's in a rare state of being curled up and not having murder in her eyes.

But I'll still steer clear of her sharp point bits.

Purple Pt. 2

OK, so, the response to last night's post about putting a purple streak in my hair has been overwhelmingly positive.

Actually, I have a nose.
But thanks for your concern.

There will be exhaustive coverage of this when it actually happens. Um...this month. Or possibly next. But DEFINITELY happening.

In the meantime, here are today's headlines.

President Trump's "Keep Muslims Out of America Because They're Bad, MMMKay? v2.0" executive order has been blocked by a federal judge in Hawaii.

To quote Press Secretary Sean Spicer,
"Uh-oh, here comes Moana."

Whatever.

Also, the Fed raised its key interest today and indicated that two more raises are coming in 2017.

Also also, there was significant pushback on the idea that the Trump administration - which took power on January - can be credited for anything positive that has happend in Q1-2017.

I don't know.

Here's what I know.

If you want me to put a purple streak in my hair, address that here.

If you oppose that or simply don't care, post about it here.



(The above is honestly delightful, no matter what your opinion...)

Opinons (without obscenely jealous responses) are more than welcome.


Go.

Please Read This Rejected Nonsense

If you follow my Facebook page for this blog, you know that I recently submitted a piece to hip, cool comedy website McSweeey's Internet Tendency. And it was rejected.

But you guys, it was rejected really nicely. With a brief, concise, but quite constructive explanation.

I literally have never felt so positive about a rejection, you guys.

If you don't currently follow McSweeney's Internet Tendency, you totally should. It's chock-full of smart, satirical, arch, hip humor that somehow manages to be not cloying and precious more than 80% of the time.

Anyway, whereas McSweeney's declined to publish my piece, I will now post it here on my little old blog.

I thought it was funny. I hope you do, too. If you don't, I'm probably going to ignore you, because how else can I justify continuing to write? Right?

*****

On the Reason I Was Unable to Complete My Humorous Article Conflating the Speech Patterns of Holden Caulfield and Donald J. Trump

(An Unpublished Submission to McSweeney's Internet Tendency)

Dear McSweeney’s:

First, I think you’re terrific. I really do. A lot of internet sites, they’re phony, you know? They want you to think they’re smart and funny and all. But when you look at ‘em close - and I mean really goddamn close, not just with one eye or when you’re thinking about the ballgame or the stock market or something - but really good and close, they’re phony. Not good. But I like you, McSweeney’s. And I mean that. I never lie about things like that.

Here’s the thing. I wanted to write something for you. That’s what I started out to do. Write something, send it in. Maybe you would publish it or maybe you wouldn’t, I don’t know. It’s your lousy website, you know?

What I wanted to do - what I was trying to do - was come up with this funny piece about Holden Caulfield and Donald Trump. You know? Like, “who said it? Holden or Trump?” I’ve seen things like that on McSweeney’s before. And they made me laugh. Not always. I mean, Christ, I don’t just go around laughing my head off at everything I read. I have standards..

So anyway, I thought I’d give it my best shot. I do consider myself a pretty smart person. I figured I could write something for McSweeney’s. I mean, you look at some of the people who write for McSweeney’s every day. Every day. Like that’s all they’ve got to live for is seeing their name on some stupid article on the internet. Losers. But I thought, hey, I’m a smart guy, and if those guys can do it I sure as hell can. So I gave it my best shot.

This is where is gets a little screwy. I was writing - and you know, I write everything down in a notebook I keep with me. I write in it daily, almost every day, without fail. I get off on words, I guess you could say. And in case you didn’t know, I have the best words. Ask anyone.

So I’m writing. And I’m writing, you know, Holden Caulfield would say this, and Donald Trump would say that. And it’s funny, right? It’s funny goddamn schtick. I spent a lot of time on it, and I thought it was good. I thought it was pretty beautiful, in fact. I imagined that all my friends would read it and laugh like it was just about the funniest damn thing they ever saw. Not that I need my friends to do that. I’m pretty sure I don’t have any friends who read McSweeney’s, anyway.

But you won’t believe what happened next. I can hardly believe it, and it happened to me. I’m going along, writing to beat the devil, and I stop to read back what I’ve written. That’s what you do. Probably you don’t know this, but that’s what writers do. And I’ll be damned if I couldn’t figure out who I’d meant to say what. Like, to my mind there was no difference between what was supposed to be Holden’s words and what was Don’s. I swear to God, there was no difference at all. Sad.

What it was, see, I didn’t know what to do. As I said, it was supposed to be funny, but now it seemed sorta creepy, me not knowing who was supposed to have said the things they said, you know? It was weird. I was kind of mad, if you want to know the truth. Here it was supposed to be funny, but instead it went off the rails and everything.

Anyway, long story short, I went out instead and had a few drinks and hired a prostitute.

And that, McSweeney’s, is why I didn’t finish my article like I meant to. Maybe I’ll try again in a few days. Maybe, I don’t know. I’m sure I will. And you know what? It will be goddamn tremendous.

With love and squalor,

Chuck Baudelaire

You Guys Are Like a Shot of Adrenaline to My Heart. In the Best Way Possible.

On Sunday a hacker stole $1,200 out of my bank account to buy - get this - a home security system on Ebay.

This was the best thing that happened to me all weekend.

Seriously, if you read my last post, you know I ain't lyin'.

Indeed, Mr. President. Testify on my behalf.

Let me stop right here and say THANK YOU. All of you who commented and tweeted and texted your love and support when I was feeling lower than a snake's belly...thank you. You honestly don't know how touched and gobsmacked your messages made me feel. I don't know why you keep coming here and letting me fill up your screens with my rants. But you all rock.

And I didn't mean what I said about your belly, little guy.
It's quite fetching.

Today I'm better. But yesterday I felt I had driven away the two most important people in my life - my Precocious Daughter and my darling Drummer Boy - with my weaknesses and flaws and insecurities, and, you know, the disproportionate amount of free time I spend systematically brining my brain with spirits. I wasn't just feeling sorry for myself. I mean, yeah, I was feeling sorry for myself. But I wasn't just feeling sorry for myself. I was locked in a battle for supremacy with my worst demons, and the victor was going to take the tacky, cheap prize that was my soul.

Mine is the 50-ticket level of souls.

Pretty dramatic, right? I'm treading fairly lightly on the events of this weekend only because I know how many of you understand. Yes, even those of you do a far better job than I of pretending the world is snark and roses and clever things you've pinned...I wouldn't dare expose your pain. But we understand each other, yeah?

Yeah.

Drummer Boy knows I am not my demons, and he's waiting for me to come to the same conclusion. Always waiting, no matter how low I sink or how loudly I roar. Because he loves me.

This morning PDaughter sent me a text that made me cry, right there at my desk. At the end of it, she wrote, "You are...my role model for the kind of parent I want to be some day. I love you!"

Best kid ever.

That was today. But yesterday...

So there I was, feeling forsaken and alone, when I had a thought. Did I mention that my email got hacked on Saturday?

My email got hacked on Saturday. I've been using the same Yahoo email account for almost 20 years and -

Laugh it up, furball.

- and for last couple of years I've been getting more spam than actual legit mail. But I'm a creature of habit, and I had A LOT of online stuff linked to that account. Lazy, all right, I'm lazy and didn't want to mess with it.

But on Saturday I discovered that someone using my email address had signed up for about 500 different newsletters, websites, etc. All those confirmation messages were clogging up my inbox.

And there were about 6,000 more in my spam box.

I know, right?

So I finally decided it was time to chuck the leaking sieve that is Yahoo's account security and switch everything over to Gmail. I'd spent quite a bit of time on Saturday - in between bouts of self-pity and ennui - changing account IDs, changing passwords, exporting years of messages and contacts.

But on Sunday, as I was idly wondering how my current mental state could deteriorate further, it occurred to me that I should check my bank account. My email had been hacked before, but never had I actually experienced monetary loss. Still, this breach was an order of magnitude higher than anything I'd previously seen. So I logged into my bank account.

I don't really know what $1,200 means to each of you in terms of financial impact. Maybe it's a good night's poker winnings. Maybe it's your entire safety net against disaster and then some. To me, it's a not insignificant sum of money. Let's just leave it at that.

But seeing that amount deducted from my balance - when I know damn well I hadn't spent it - launched me into action. With far more energy and sense of purpose than I had displayed in several days, I quickly determined that my Ebay account had been compromised. The idiot thieves had already sent $1,200 to a seller's PayPal account, and they had another $1,200 worth of stuff in my cart, ready to check out.

I say idiot thieves, because fortunately they were thieves who were idiots. They had changed the shipping address on my account to their address in El Paso. They had also changed the email address associated with the account to their personal email, which triggered an alert to my email, conveniently including the IP address of their computer.

These are not the criminal masterminds you're looking for.

So I quickly called my bank and had the transfer of funds (fortunately, still in pending stage) halted and my debit card shut down. Then I called Ebay and had the transactions canceled and my account frozen.

I'll get my money back (I haven't yet, which is a tiny bit worrisome, but I'll get it back). I'll put all my accounts on lockdown and stop linking debit cards to them wherever possible. I'll shut down that Yahoo account (snif, goodbye dear companion...although, as my friend SuzyQ pointed out, since the name on that account was strongly linked to my marriage, it's probably a symbolically healthy transition).

The point is, being the victim of hackers and thieves (and stupid ones at that) distracted me from my overweaning sense of loss and hopelessness. By the time I had the situation somewhat under control Sunday night, I realized it had been several hours since I'd had the opportunity to brood over my emotional burdens. And I felt...better. Not completely better. But you know in Pulp Fiction where Uma Thuman ODs and then gets the shot of adrenaline to her chest and sits up and screams? She probably didn't feel better, but she was much closer to being alive than she had been a few moments earlier.

I for one am glad that "better" is a relative term.

Today I'm still down $1,200, I'm still wobbling back from the brink of a depressive episode, and I'm still pondering how I'm going to tame that 80-proof monster who has me by the short hairs.

But I got this.

And I got my Drunkards, and my kid, and my Drummer Boy.

And I'm feeling pretty rich right now.

Men Can Be C*nts, Too

Ah, the social media are aflame with indignation.

No, Mr. Vice President. Indignant, not hold-me-back-Imma-kill-him
enraged. Dial it back.

And what is today's source of approbation and feather-ruffling?

It's this charming article on some website you never heard of by some guy you never heard of entitled "Why I'll Never Date a Feminist."

Here's the link, if you want to experience several mildly revolted chuckles.

Yes, it's another piece bashing feminism, written by someone who manifestly has no clue what feminism is but has decided it must be the key to his inability to have a fulfilling romantic relationship with a woman, it simply must be.

I told her she was smart for a chick, and now
she's mad. Goddamn feminazis, amiright?

That's why the author chose the provocative, aspirational title "Why I'll Never Date a Feminist" instead of the infinitely more accurate "Why Strong, Independent Women Aren't Attracted to Me After Hearing Two Minutes of My Uninformed Blather About How Strong, Independent Women Are the Devil."

Simply put, this article contains so much misinformation, so many tired stereotypes, and such a high level of casual misogyny that I seriously combed the website that published it to make sure I wasn't being duped by an unusually convincing satire page. Nope, it's for reals, although it's the kind of website that puts up a poll like this one:

This makes the classic leading question
"Have you stopped beating your wife?" seem
nuanced in comparison.

Anyway, I'm just going to thoroughly trash all this guy's angry, creepy assertions about feminism and, really, women in general. Because after all, people who berate feminists are essentially publicly casting their vote for a feminine ideal that is submissive, weak, and inherently inferior.

By the way, at this point I don't give a damn if you agree with me or not. My dander is up, people. So up.

You guys. I think I finally found the tattoo I want.

Let's dig into this dude's clueless rant, shall we?

If you look for a reason to hate men, chances are you’re going to find it.
Boom. Opening line. The old "feminists hate men" canard. Truth bomb #1: Feminism has nothing to do with hating men. I suppose there are women who identify as feminists who "hate" men. But feminism didn't teach them that. Truth bomb #2: Feminism has NOTHING TO DO WITH MEN. It's about empowering women. Which includes not allowing men to make every damn thing about them. That's not how equality works.

Men’s Rights Activists have taken flight with a new philosophy called "Red Pill" which aims to point out how derogatory, hypocritical and vindictive third-wave feminists can be.
Ah, yes. "Men's Rights." The "All Lives Matter" of gender politics: Let's pretend that when people whose rights have been violated demand their rights, our rights have been violated EVEN WORSE. I wonder if feminists won't date you because you consider them derogatory, hypocritical, and vindictive. Naaaah, must be because we really are derogatory, hypocritical, and vindictive. Le sigh.

By the way, click on that Red Pill subreddit link at your own risk. It probably won't make you hate men, but it will make you question why angry, disrespectful tools are given free reign on the Internet.

Women are more likely to graduate college, they live longer, are less likely to die in the workplace, less likely to go to prison and extremely less likely to die in war-time combat.
All that sounds pretty pro-woman, right? Go Team She! Until you realize that this sentence is presented a evidence that "[the justice system] fails men." Again, these are all positives (with the exception of the combat statistic, because until earlier this year military women weren't allowed to have active combat roles), which have been turned into negatives because we're succeeding in all these areas for the sole purpose of emasculating men. Obviously women get no intrinsic reward from success; all that matters is outdoing those icky men.

It's soooooo obvious.

People who are more loyal to their gender and not their significant other don’t make good partners.
I have no clue what this even fucking means. "People"? Who the hell are these "people"? This person (who is a feminist, have I not made that clear?) is loyal to people who are intelligent, kind, supportive, and loving. Those traits are by no means exclusive to any gender identity. Neither is being shallow, bitter, and ass-faced dumb. By the way, the writer spends his entire article being "loyal" to his own gender. What's that about you "rejecting" feminists? Riiiiight.

It’s evident that gender politics is hurting our culture. More marriages are failing and women are reporting that they’re unhappier now than ever.

Oh, marriages are failing because of gender politics! Of course! It has nothing to do with both men and women repudiating the outdated notion that marriage is forever, no matter how miserable you are. Nothing to do with both men and women realizing that they can be independent and self-sustaining. Nothing at all to do with the fact that divorce rates have actually been steady-to-declining for years now, you lie-spreading asshole. And as for women being unhappier than ever? Speaking anecdotally, I'm a) happier than I've been in many years and b) recently divorced.

Maybe one day, men and women will stop trying to eliminate the lines between us and realize it’s the differences between the sexes that make romance, family and love an enjoyable experience.
And we finish with the classic fallback myth about feminists: That we want men and women to be the same. That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard. I don't want us to be the same. I don't want to have a penis, and I sure as hell don't want Drummer Boy to have a vagina. I don't want to look like a man, talk like a man, pee like a man, because I'm not a man. I'm a woman. And I'm a feminist. And I love being with a man, in all his sweaty, ball-scratching glory. I love being with my man specifically, because he's an amazingly good person who happens to have naughty bits that complement mine. I think everyone deserves an amazingly good person with whom they're romantically and sexually compatible.

And I think no one should be with a hate-filled jackhole who blames an entire gender for his/her own feelings of insecurity and fear. Not cool, random writer of this ridiculous article.

Your mileage may vary. But this feminist thinks men and women who aren't complete assholes are awesome people.

Oversharing Time!

I'm home today, taking a mental/physical health day from my IRL job. I've been running at about 150% effort/stress level for several weeks now, and today my body, when I attempted to get out of bed, simply said "nope lol." I did manage to get Precocious Daughter off to school, but then I went back to bed for several hours, and now I'm just chilling and wasting time on the Internet. It's my preferred therapy.

I love Google SO MUCH.

I ran across a Facebook post from my friend Hawk (he of Amaizing Jim Corn fame). It's one of those "fill out and then copy and paste as your status" posts that ask for all kinds of personal information about you. Hey, I'm deeply self-centered, so I can't resist those!

But I thought I'd post it here rather than on my FB page, so that all my Drunkards might have the opportunity to 1) share personal information that is no one else's business and b) lay bare the most mundane and trivial details of their lives, thus validating the Internet's existence for one more day.

Feel free to copy and paste this list - here, on FB, on your own blog, on the brick wall next to the train depot, wherever.

We're all family here. Whether you know it, or can come to terms with it, or not.

Here we go.

(via Facebook)

Revealing deep, dark secrets about myself on the internet:

Let's take a break from politics and learn about each other!!!!!!😊
1. ARE YOU NAMED AFTER SOMEONE? I don't think so.
2. WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU CRIED? Probably the 4,657th time I thought (while drinking) that Drummer Boy didn't love me any more.
3. DO YOU LIKE YOUR HANDWRITING? NO. It's deteriorated so much thanks to keyboards. I must admit, however, that it has improved since I cut back on my caffeine consumption.
4. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE LUNCH MEAT? Ham. But PDaughter only likes turkey, so I rarely get to have a ham sammich.

5. DO YOU HAVE ANY KIDS. I have a beautiful young woman to whom I gave birth. Every day I realize she is no longer a kid.

6. IF YOU WERE ANOTHER PERSON WOULD YOU BE FRIENDS WITH YOU? I honestly don't know why any of my amazing friends want to be friends with me. I'd probably hate me if I weren't me, tbh.

7. DO YOU USE SARCASM? Sarcasm? Moi?

8. DO YOU STILL HAVE YOUR TONSILS? Oh hell yes. Also my wisdom teeth and appendix. Pry them from my cold, dead body, mofo.

9. WOULD YOU BUNGEE JUMP? Maybe....

10. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE CEREAL? These days, Honey Nut Cheerios, because that's the only kind in the variety pack that PDaughter doesn't like. Back in the day I was a fiend for Raisin Bran.

11. DO YOU UNTIE YOUR SHOES WHEN YOU TAKE THEM OFF? Ain't nobody got time for that.

12. DO YOU THINK YOU'RE STRONG? There's no other excuse for why I'm still here.

13. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE ICE CREAM? I don't do sweets these days, but I used to be an absolute junkie for Baskin-Robbins' Peanut Butter 'N Chocolate. Yum.

14. WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU NOTICE ABOUT PEOPLE? Whether they're armed.

15. RED OR PINK? Not a huge fan of either, but I do own much more stuff that is pink than is red.

16. WHAT IS THE LEAST FAVORITE THING YOU LIKE ABOUT YOURSELF? My ability/compulsion to procrastinate.

17. WHAT COLOR PANTS AND SHOES ARE YOU WEARING RIGHT NOW? Khaki shorts, no shoes.

18. WHAT WAS THE LAST THING YOU ATE? Triscuits with Rosemary & Olive Oil. Mmmmm.

19. WHAT ARE YOU LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW? The air conditioner.

20. IF YOU WERE A CRAYON, WHAT COLOR WOULD YOU BE? Purple.

21. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE SMELL? Drummer Boy.

22. WHO WAS THE LAST PERSON YOU TALKED TO ON THE PHONE? The maintenance guy at my apartments.

23. FAVORITE SPORT TO WATCH? Football

24. HAIR COLOR THAT'S REAL? Dishwater blonde, with glittery bits of silver. Yeah

25. Eye color? Blue.

26. Do you wear contacts? No, I fall asleep on the sofa too often. But I did for many years

27. Favorite food? Pizza.

28. SCARY MOVIES OR HAPPY ENDINGS? Why not both?

29. LAST MOVIE YOU WATCHED? Don't remember...seldom have that much free time.

30. WHAT COLOR SHIRT ARE YOU WEARING? Black.

31. SUMMER OR WINTER? No.

32. HUGS OR KISSES? Yes.

33. FAVORITE DESSERT? Don't do sweets.

34. WHAT BOOK ARE YOU CURRENTLY READING? Gone with the Wind. Again.

35. WHAT IS ON YOUR MOUSE PAD? LOL, do people still use those?

36. WHAT DID YOU WATCH ON T.V. LAST? A couple of episodes of House Hunters.

37. FAVORITE SOUND? The ocean.

38. ROLLING STONES or BEATLES? The Beatles. 

39. WHAT IS THE FARTHEST YOU HAVE TRAVELED? Melbourne, Australia.

40. DO YOU HAVE A SPECIAL TALENT? I have the power of EDITING.

41. WHERE WERE YOU BORN? Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

Your turn!!!! Copy, paste.

And...proceed.