10 Things I Hate About Misogyny*

You know I couldn't possibly pass up an article entitled "10 Traits Men Look for in a Girlfriend". That's like asking my dog to walk away from a steak just sitting there on the table, unattended. So, let's review the inevitable misogyny. (I wrote this before looking at the article. Don't worry, I'm not psychic, these things are always misogynistic.)

Apparently, they saw me coming. I can't copy and paste the text, so I'll have to just print it out and retype it. (How dedicated am I?)

1. She has a life of her own and it's pretty good to boot.

Okay, that's not bad. Maybe I'm wrong about this.

2. She never makes the first move.

Oh, dating articles, you never fail to disappoint.

This issue has been debated to death, and there is no true consensus. But Daily says that she strongly believes women should never, ever pursue a man. Instead, she suggests waiting for the man to initiate and plan dates. Her reasoning: If the woman is always the one calling, she will never know if he is really interested in her or if it's just convenient for him. She may find herself questioning the relationship every step of the way. Men simply aren't programmed to think like that and are therefore better suited to the chase, Daily says.

So . . . I'm supposed to have a "pretty good" life without you and sit around waiting for you to call and you to decide when we go out. Okay then. Also, false dichotomy. There is a lot of room between "she always calls" and "he always calls". How about both parties call and both parties set up dates? Why should the man have all the power in this dynamic? Oh, right, because men are hunters and women are gatherers and evo psych blahblahblah.

Bullshit. I bet any guy trying to start a relationship with a woman who only ever calls back has to wonder how interested she is in being with him. Men are not from Mars, women are not from Venus. Call him. Initiate. If it doesn't work for him, go find a man who isn't stuck in a misogynistic mindset.

3. She is Sexy without being Trampy.

Oh. my. Odin. I am the keeper of the male sex drive and I must manage it with the finesse of a . . . I don't even know what. I must ensure my shirts are low, but not too low, my skirts are high, but not too high, my clothes are not too tight but not too loose, my makeup just sultry enough and not . . . You know, I have other things to do with my time. I dress like I dress. If you don't like it, too bad. I am not responsible for anyone else's sexuality, I barely have time to deal with my own.

This means something different at the beginning of the relationship than it does down the road. In the beginning of courtship, a woman should refrain from making any comments that are overtly sexual. She also flirts by using nonsexual touch like placing her hand on his forearm or even the knee, but only briefly. When the relationship gets more serious, and presumably more intimate, sexual touch and public displays of affection are more appropriate. At this point, it's okay to play footsie under the table.

So, at first, I must pretend that I've never heard of sex, but touch, but only on the arm or the knee- briefly- and then I have to whore it up. *sigh* This is just exhausting.

4. She waits to have sex.

Yes, they invoke oxytocin. I guess because it sounds all sciency. See women? We're fucking stupid. We're at the mercy of our hormones. Orgasms cause the release of oxytocin and once that happens, you can't help but love the guy you fucked. And then he'll run away because guys hate commitment. Can't even stand it. You know, except for every guy who asks a woman to marry him. *sigh* Really, this is just exhausting to try to keep up with.

5 and 6 are obvious and stupid, so 7:

7. She never turns on the pressure.

Oh, right. Are you ready to get married and have a family? Don't even bring that up, he'll run away so fast, he'll leave a sonic boom in his wake. You must trick men into marriage. You cannot ever be honest about anything, ever.

Men have a distinct aversion to any sort of pressure.

Really? Like pressure at work, pressure at school, pressure at sporting events?

8. She does not take crap from anyone.

Really? Like always waiting for him to call, like never ever discussing the future to avoid stressing out her delicate flower? this is contradictory, Daily! You are asking me to take crap and then telling me to never take crap? Which is it?! WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME?!

9. A good woman always chooses a good man.

This is a trait men want? That's not a trait, that's an axiom. An axiom that defines the goodness of a woman by the goodness of the men she chooses to date. Nice.

10. She knows that love is the biggest part of the dating equation.

Glad we cleared that up! Is there any way to write an article about dating that doesn't sink into the depths of misogyny?

*See, I changed one word, and now it's my title. Cleverness!

In Which I Come Perilously Close to Dividing by Zero

Today is Secretary's Day*. I know, right? We make sure offices across America actually do something, anything, and we get our own artificial holiday, too? It's a betrayal of capitalism, I tell you.

Seriously, I know I am merely a secretary, to be derided and dismissed, doing "woman's work", without a college degree. I am generally referred to as one of the "girls"**, and any expression of gratitude for all the things I do every day to ensure that my bosses actually have work to bill for is delivered in a joking tone. Mind you, this is from the guy that doesn't know how to turn on a computer in a day and age when almost all filing with all courts is done electronically. Yeah, laugh away, buddy. I'm sure you could learn it all in the 20 days you have to file that brief.

This is a typical day for me:

Print out all emails. There are at least 20 every morning, most of them have Word or Adobe attachments. This takes at least half an hour.

Reply to emails in complete sentences translated from the vague instructions given. "Tell him I'm okay." Sure. I can make a paragraph out of that.

Type dictation. The boss who dictates is a nice guy, but I deeply suspect English is not his first language. (This is not unreasonable. His mother emigrated from France as an adult- after spending two years in a concentration camp. Oddly, he's the only partner who isn't Jewish.) In conversation he is fine, but as soon as he starts dictating, he entirely drops "a" and "the", subject-verb agreement, any understanding of singular and plural, all understanding of verb tense and, quite frequently, any remembrance that sentences require subjects and verbs. I have to translate that on the fly, for at least two hours every day.

Retype handwritten materials for the man who writes entirely in code. Technophobe boss handwrites his materials, which wouldn't be so bad, except that he abbreviates everything. That sentence, as written by this man, would be: Tnp bs hadwri h matls, w wn't be so bd exc tt he abb evyt. Wtf am I supposed to do with that?

Perform corrections to typed materials. Dictating boss can't spell. Really can't spell. And he has the handwriting of an otter on meth.

Answer constantly interrupting phone calls from complete idiots who don't listen to a word I say and who seem to think that I'm involved in some vast conspiracy to keep them from talking to their lawyer, who is standing right next to me and would love to take their phone call, if only I would let him. Oh, and they think they're funny.

Find files. In a file room larger than my house with no filing system whatsoever.

Make copies. Sometimes of entire files, sometimes of one page, because the person with the juris doctorate is too fucking good to put a sheet of paper on a copier and press start. It is beneath them.

Translate my boss for billing. My boss has me open files under a name he will never refer to the file by again. Which would be fine if he'd put the file number on the billing sheet. He doesn't. Which means that I spend a portion of each day trying to figure out which file he means to have billed for 2.5 hours of work.

Find [person]. Last week, in the driving rain, I spent my lunch hour wandering around downtown looking for an associate attorney. My boss needed to ask her a three word question that could not possibly have been that important to anyone, ever, in any alternate universe, not even the one where dividing by zero is possible and always results in purple.

That is a regular day for me, guys. That's not an extraordinary day where I get to type a 35 page brief in 2 hours or anything. Just a regular day.

For that, on Secretary's Day, I get . . . nothing. In years past, we all got huge baskets. "Hey, thanks for not greeting Mondays with a flamethrower, here's a gross of bagels!" Not this year. This year I get jack shit.

Here's a lesson in capitalism: my boss may as well have handed me a memo that said, "Please be as annoying and nonhelpful as you possibly can without getting fired. Seriously, have at it," because that's exactly what I'll be doing.

*Hilariously, there is a Boss' Day, but as I've said to my boss, every day is boss' day.

**I once inquired about child labor laws, but it sailed right over the attorneys' heads.

I'll Show You Desecration

I don't agree with spray painting statues, however, this to me is the money quote:

Pink paint was sprayed on the face and hands, and the $80,000 statue was tagged elsewhere with offensive symbols.

$80fucking000?! Don't ever talk to me about morals again, you hear? How many children could you feed with $80,000? How many homeless people could you shelter for $80,000? How much medicine could you buy with $80,000? So you bought a statue instead?

That woman is grieving for the statue. Do you think that she ever approaches that level of despair over abused animals or homeless people or uninsured dying of treatable illnesses? I'm guessing not.

Fuck off.

[edited to make the quote more clear as being a quote]

Female Stereotypes- They Are So True. Now Stop Fulfilling Them.

She is wearing the Mascara of +5 Smug Face.

Amy Alkon sees rude people, apparently when looking in the mirror. Her job title is, as far as I can tell, "Advice Goddess", which makes me think that perhaps the field of advice giving is not quite as hard to get into as I think it is*. So, let's put Amy's advice giving skills up against mine:

I have an online dating issue. When a man and I are going to have our first phone chat, I set up a specific day and time so we don't have to play phone tag. This allows me to schedule around it and be prepared and at my computer viewing his profile when we talk. I take the man's number and call him, because I'm not comfortable giving out mine right away. During my several years of online dating, the percentage of guys who aren't there at the planned time has been about 90. Many never contact me again, even to explain or apologize.

You know, this seems reasonable to me. Why should she give out her number first if she isn't comfortable with it? (I suppose she would have to accept if the man felt the same way, but clearly they don't.) I also don't see why she should just be waiting around for some guy to call. A specific call time really doesn't strike me as being outrageous, but I am a very organized person. Maybe it is weird.

I think it's very rude for those men to agree to this specific call in time and then not answer the phone. If they are offended by this request, they could just say so, or contact her to cancel it with some stupid excuse. Really, anything other than simply no showing would be better than no showing.

See, that's why Amy's a Goddess and I am not. The menz aren't being rude by agreed to be at a certain place at a certain time, the woman is being rude by requesting it. Not even just rude- she is all things that are wrong with women.

A woman can be a little premature in setting up who wears the ball gag in the relationship.

um, wut? Since when is "I will call you Thursday at 6:30" equivalent to ball gagging someone (which is a metaphor that is rather nasty towards the kink community. They enjoy ball gagging as a consensual activity.) Oh, I see, they are menz, and menz are like the wild animals of the Serengeti: they cannot be tamed. Asking them to be at a certain place at a certain time is just the same as cutting off their testicles! And then displaying said testicles in a jar over the fireplace!

Telling somebody they need to talk to you at a specific time might work fine in business, but because men tend to be wary of controlling women, it's a risky tactic when you're vying to maybe become a guy's girlfriend, not his supervisor. But, here you are, not only setting the call time but informing a guy that he'll be doing the waiting and you'll be doing the calling. Very possibly, there's more in your e-mails that suggests you're bossy and controlling. If so, for a guy, this can foreshadow a lot of being ordered around by you: "Sit. Stay. Repeat after me, 'I'd love nothing more than to turn off the playoffs and join you in watching Valerie Bertinelli kill her abusive husband with a shovel in the Lifetime Movie Of The Week.'"

That's right, it is totally unreasonable to ask a person to pick up their phone at 6pm on Thursday! It's completely insane! And making a man wait for a woman to call? Why not just paint his toenails pink and slap some lipstick on him? He's your bitch now! Menz do the calling, women wait!

Ahem. Nongoddess advice: If a man is really that turned off by the thought of him waiting for you to call, you do not want to date him. If his ego can't handle that tiny role reversal, imagine what will happen when you ask him to put a plate in the dishwasher.

I also enjoy that Amy assumes that the writer is super controlling and her emails, which Amy has never seen, are just odes to controlling behavior. Amy has no way of knowing that, but women, you know.

And good job dragging out some tired stereotypes to fill your word count, Amy. Hurhur- womenz don't like sports. Womenz like sappy movies. Womenz are controlling bitches trying to trap a man into watching chick flicks while the Superbowl is on. Gah! At least be creative about your misogyny, Amy.

Now, maybe you have a peculiar attraction to rude men, but more than likely, you just need to try something new: Relax a little. Give out your number. Not your home number, connected to your address, but the number to your cell or one of those pay-as-you-go phones that isn't traceable to you. Should you start getting unwanted calls, put the thing on silent or give it to some wino and tell him to answer it by breathing heavy and asking, "Are you wearing crotchless panties?"

Yes! Give out your cell phone number to random internet strangers! That sounds like a great idea! That's completely untraceable, right? Or spend even more money on a paygo phone, and then give it to a . . . fuck? wino? . . . stranger and let them deal with the abusive phone calls. That's called charity!

Seriously, though, wino? You are not a good person, Amy Alkon.

Instead of trying to wring every bit of uncertainty out of your life, accept that there might be a little phone tag. When you do get on the phone with a guy, step away from the computer and your spreadsheet of questions. Your goal shouldn't be vacuuming him for data; it should be having fun getting to know him. If you're having fun, you'll be more likely to sound like fun -- like the sort of woman who keeps the spark in a relationship (and not by tasing the guy whenever he's a little slow to take out the trash).

You aren't fun, letter writer. You are a boring person. Fun people like to waste their time waiting for people to call. It's what women do, after all. Stop trying to have time for things other than men and waiting around for men and being more attractive to men. What do you think you are, a man, deserving of respect and suchlike?

Why is Amy Alkon getting paid for her writing and I'm not? That's just proof there is no god, right there.

*Which is not a good thing, because if I can enter the field of professional advice giving, I will give out advice designed purely to amuse myself. "First, put on a mouse costume . . ."

How Not to Address Weight

[trigger warning: weight, eating, fat shaming. please enjoy this nonjudgmental otter instead.]

Weight! It's like a gun!

I would like to start this by saying I have spent almost 13 years with a man who has ranged from overweight to obese to morbidly obese and back again the entire time I have known him. He knows what his weight is. This is not some sort of mystery to him. He has tried all the diets and exercises you can think of. The thing is, he eats about as much as I do and the same foods that I do, yet I'm never more than the lower end of my recommended weight range and he's never less than overweight. My body likes to be thin, his body likes to be overweight. That's all there is to it.

My husband does not need to be told he is overweight. He certainly doesn't need this bullshit:

Structure House, a North Carolina-based weight-management facility, offers an online refer-a-friend program in which an e-card with details about Structure House's offerings arrives in your pal's inbox, with a note reading, "I saw this program online and thought I would share it with you."

Translation: Hi! I saw this business advertising itself, and I thought I'd help them out by humiliating you and ending our friendship! Aren't you glad I found a stupid way to tell you I'm an asshole?

Experts are divided on whether this is an effective — or especially friendly — way to tackle the topic. But it speaks to the fact that weight loss is an extremely sensitive issue that leaves many at a loss for ways to broach it.

Experts are divided? Are half of those experts house plants? Because while I am not an expert in assholery, it took me all of 0.1 seconds to see exactly how rude that is. What do they think the reaction is going to be? ZOMG! I had no idea I was overweight! I only live in this body and I was completely unaware of that fact. Thank you so much for letting me know! Really, fuck off.

Here's a clue: don't broach the subject. There is no reason to. There is no more reason to discuss someone's weight with them (unless they themselves begin the conversation) than there is to broach the subject of their bad haircut or their poorly decorated living room.

Here, I'm going to say it really slowly and really loudly: DON'T. DO. IT.

Your friend knows zie is fat. It would be literally impossible to live in our culture and not know that. In fact, people of normal weight generally think they are fat because every image you see, in magazines, on TV, in movies, celebrates people we actually should be deeply concerned about, because despite what they say, no model or actress is achieving concentration camp thin by eating at McDonalds.

But, hey, I'm not an "expert", and clearly I do not properly appreciate the tremendous immediate danger of obesity:

"If you saw a loved one with a sore on their arm that could be a melanoma, you would ask, 'Have you had that checked?'" says Lynn Grefe, president and CEO of the National Eating Disorders Association. "If you think their health is at risk, it's not a judgment, it's a concern. If you saw someone with a gun to their head, you would try to take the gun away. If the person is at risk for diabetes, they could lose their sight, they could lose their legs. The person, in a way, has a gun to their head. They may not know what to do." [emphasis added]

Ah, the proverbial gun to the head. It may sound familiar if you are an atheist, because we get that, too. It's just as fucking stupid in this context. I added the bolding above to point out just how ridiculous that statement is. Your obese friend may well not know what to do about their weight, but you don't, either, so just shut the fuck up.

Let's be honest: nobody knows what to do about obesity. If they did, we wouldn't have so much of it. Diets don't work, exercise isn't the cure everyone thinks it is*, and often, obesity has more to do with lack of access to quality foods and opportunities to exercise than it does with ignorance or lack of desire to lose weight. Telling someone they're fat doesn't help any of that. So shut the fuck up and stay that way.

A critical first step is keeping the conversation centered around health.

Grefe suggests asking your friend if she or he has had a recent physical. Offer to help locate a doctor and attend the appointment.

"Let's see where they are on the map," Grefe says. "See if they have high blood pressure. See if there's undetected diabetes. Keep the approach on health."

Friend: So, been to the doctor lately?

Overweight Person: Yes, actually. I just got over a sinus infection.

Friend: But, did you have a physical?

OP: No, I did that 6 months ago.

Friend: Do you have high blood pressure?

OP: Nope. 116/74 just yesterday at the drug store.

Friend: Do you have frequent urination, blurred vision or unusual thirst?

OP: What the fuck?

Friend: You're fat!

OP: *punch*

There's no way for that conversation to end well. Leave the health concerns to the doctor and SHUT. THE. FUCK. UP.

edited to add: Please visit the Cynical Nymph for a continuation of this discussion.

*Exercise is good for you, but it can increase appetite over the calories you burned exercising. Some peoples' bodies love being fat. They just do.

Please Remove Your Wallet from Devvy's Vagina

This is Devvy. She is surprisingly calm for having everyone's wallet in her vagina.

"In lobbying for defeat of a congressional plan that would cut off taxpayer support for the abortion business' leading player, Richards claimed: "If this bill ever becomes law, millions of women in this country are going to lose their health-care access ­ not to abortion services ­ to basic family planning, you know, mammograms." But Live Action workers who called 30 Planned Parenthood business locations across the nation said "every single one admitted they could not do mammograms."

I will never have a mammogram, but having one is a personal decision and expense. The Outlaw Congress has NO authority to steal the fruits of your labor to fund abortions or mammograms.

Devvy apparently wants to find out about her breast cancer when it's difficult to impossible to treat, because that's how she rolls. The rest of us, however, are not looking forward to radical mascetomies, radiation and chemotherapy.

Here's the thing Devvy, and I'm sure it's hard to listen to facts and logic with even one wallet in your vagina, let alone 300,000,000 wallets in your vagina, it is far cheaper to pay for cancer treatment in the earliest stages than in the later stages. And here's another thing: unless you want to cut off all health care access to the poor, which you probably do, eventually that person is going to end up in the ER and then they will run up an enormous bill everyone gets to pay for.

Would you, Devvy, find it to be a better idea to change your brakes when they start squeaking, or after you cause a ten car pileup on the highway? One costs, what, $250 max, the other hundreds of thousands of dollars, if not millions if you end up killing someone. Now, changing the brakes when they squeak is like giving out free pap smears. The ten car pileup is not giving out free pap smears and instead treating women with end stage cervical cancer in the ER.

Ignoring, of course, that "poor women should die preventable deaths so that my taxes can be 0.8% lower" is sociopathic and appalling on every level.

Having a test for cervical cancer is a personal expense.

One I certainly can't afford, but I don't think Devvy cares. As far as she is concerned, another person's cervical cancer should impact her exactly as much as another person's hair style and she cares just as much. Probably less, actually, as she doesn't have to look at anyone else's cervix.

That's not a political position, that sociopathy. I'd mention that, again, it's not good economic policy, either, but I really think that the police should be checking her yard for human remains every so often.

"How many times have we heard female politicians bleat about "women's issues" during elections? How many times have we heard the old chant about "empowering women" from female members of Congress? The feminization of Congress and our state legislatures is destroying constitutional government, running America into oceans of unpayable debt and breeding generations of helpless women, whining for mother government to take care of them and their every need.

Cancer is not a woman's iss-

Fuck it.

There are 10,000,000 more unemployed people than there are jobs. And they want to cut off unemployment benefits and lower taxes even further on the wealthy. 1 in 7 Americans experience food insecurity and food prices continue to rise, so let's cut food stamps. More than 40,000,000 Americans have no health insurance and a person without healthcare is 50% more likely to die of cancer than a person with health insurance, but health insurance is a privilege to be enjoyed by the few. Our bridges are crumbling and occasionally collapsing, but investing in infrastructure is wasting money that could be given back to the rich in the form of more tax cuts. GE paid no taxes last year. The banks crushed our economy by securitizing mortgages, but let's deregulate the market and bail them out with taxpayer money.

Do you see the disconnect here? What we are doing is not working. It is not working. What language do I have to say that in before people understand?

The GOP is, at this point, like a person pouring gasoline on a fire to put it out and, as the fire climbs higher and higher, insisting that if they just put enough gasoline on the fire, eventually it will work. Oh, and it's the country that is on fire.

Just for fun, here's the wallet-vagina line:

Get my wallet out of your vagina because you have no constitutional right to steal the fruits of my husband's fixed retirement to pay for your abortion.

She's bitching that her husband's social security is being used to pay for abortions through Planned Parenthood. Now that is some performance art quality irony right there.

On Settling

Me, embracing my natural hair texture- frizzy.

Feministe ripped apart a pair of articles about how women should "settle" for men they don't particularly like or feel attracted to because ZOMG!marriage and ZOMG!dyingalonewithyourcats and other such things that feminism exists because of. (Honestly, a feminist's work is never done.) Actually, the first article was about the men you should settle for, including men with bad hygiene, the second is how to make yourself into someone a man will settle for. Did you know that being a successful woman puts you in the category of women men settle for? Neither did I. (Never, ever done.)

I would like to make a point about settling: it's seriously fucking disrespectful to the person you are settling for. It's hard to think of something more disrespectful.

I have been the settlee. I know? Shocking, right? I'm fabulous! I am the hawtness, mostly of the mind, and snarky and cynical and obsessed with sci fi and video games- who doesn't want that?

Ha! Well, lots of people, and that's okay. I don't want most people, either. That's why romantic love is special, because it is not something you can find with just anyone. Love isn't like finding a lab partner- you! you're breathing, get over here!- it requires so much more than just basic compatibility, although it requires that, too.

Anyway, I have been the settlee, and it sucks. It hurts to know that someone is constantly having to overlook what they don't like about you. Yes, I know, relationships always require overlooking flaws and annoying habits, but this is bigger and more basic than that. There was something about me, namely my face, that he just couldn't find beautiful. Oh, and my height, he preferred tall women. And my hair, brown is so common. And my breasts. They're really not all that large. At all*. I'm not a supermodel, but I do expect that the person who claims to love me and want to be with me would find me beautiful despite all that.

Settling hurts the person being settled for, and more than that, it deprives them of the opportunity to find someone who wouldn't be settling for them. Someone who looks at them and sees beauty, someone who loves their sense of humor, someone who considers their geekery a turn on instead of something to be overlooked. That's not kind at all. That's just selfishness. That's just saying I want companionship/sex/marriage/whatever and fuck what's good for zir, I'm getting what I want.

Yeah, just don't do that to people. It's not right.

*Basically, he wanted a cynical Victoria's Secret model with a sarcastic streak, raised on Star Trek. All I can say is good luck with that one, buddy.

You Are the Fourth Best Commenter I've Ever Had

Meet Swingcat.

How to attract women in a few short wordsby Swingcat. Yeah, you just know that's going to be good advice from a man who respects women as people. A man named Swingcat. Swing cat.

One of the most effective ways I've found for generating massive amounts of attraction in women, emotionally compelling them to want and reach and chase for more of you, is what I call "Tension Loops."

"Tension Loops" sounds like something you might see for sale at a kink convention. Unfortunately, it is not.

A Tension Loop is when you do something to create unresolved emotional tension inside a woman, increase it, release it by bringing closure to it, and then spark it all over again.

Soap opera writers use Tension Loops to keep women enraptured in their fictitious dramas for months - sometimes years!

Oh, my.

Mastering the Tension Loop gives you the kind of power over women that, at first, might scare you. But if you're thinking that this is what I wanted to share with you, you're wrong.

Wait, what?

What I'm about to reveal is Jedi mind shit. We're talking Yoda power! And you don't have to become Darth Vader to reap the benefits of Push-Pull.

Yoda power? Great, now I'm picturing Yoda roofieing women at bars and dragging them back to his . . . whatever he lived in.

Push-Pull is whenever you emotionally push a woman away from you and, then, emotionally pull her back in. Each Push creates an emotional space for each Pull.

Oh, see, I call that jerking someone around. I also call it something I won't put up with for 10 seconds because I don't play games with assholes.

Here's an example of this I've used probably over a thousand times. At some point while interacting with a woman I might take her hand and praise, "You have the most amazing smile I've seen tonight... It makes me feel so happy inside!"

She'll usually respond with, "Thank you!"

Then I'll count the fingers on my other hand and say, "You know what: actually there were four other girls with really amazing smiles tonight as well. Out of them, you have the
fourth best smile. I'm going to call you number four." And then I'll push away her hand.

More often than not, women demand, "Nooo! I want to be number one!"

I'll usually retort with, "Alright, I'll promote you to number three for being feisty."

Okay, is there anyone who reads this blog who would respond with Pleasepleaseplease make me number one instead of fuck you, you fucking jerk along with a drink to the face for using the word feisty? Anyone who raised your hand, please make an appointment with a therapist right now. This instant. We will wait. You have serious self esteem issues and should not proceed further in anything before you clear that up. Seriously, you are an active danger to yourself. Please do something about that.

You're done? All right then.

Do women find this derisive and mean? Not at all (Note: once in while you'll encounter a psychologically damaged woman who doesn't think this is cute. She is the exception and not the rule. My advice: run Forrest run).

Oh, I see. I only find that not cute because I'm psychologically damaged. Only if you define psychologically damaged as possessing the self esteem at least equal to that of a garden slug. Although the advice to run is sound, because if you've said that to me, you'll want to get out of the way before I return with a heavy object.

Most women find this funny, charming, andplayful. More importantly, it generates attraction: the emotion of wanting and reaching and chasing for more of you.

Funny? No. Although your reaction to what I do to you might be funny, I suppose. Charming? Not by any known definition of that word, although the author does seem to have a rather loose grasp of the English language. Playful? Only in the same way that you might find my foot meeting your groin at a high rate of speed playful.

Push-Pull is the crème de la crème of attraction tools.

Master Push-Pull and you'll leave women no choice but to feel attraction toward you... even if they're repulsed by your physical appearance.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Ahem. No, not done yet. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA. If that is the pinnacle of attraction tools, we have nothing to worry about.

However, my friend, you're in luck because… I've put together acourse where you'll receive a college education on Push-Pull (Heck, even the information page about this course teaches useful skills for triggering attraction in women).

My course is the only place on the planet where you can learn Push-Pull, giving you the power with women only a tiny elite group of men posess..

You know, without the necessary commas, I think the elite group of men are tiny, as well. Actually, that probably goes without saying. Maybe he didn't misplace a comma.

This is one of those situations where my ethics get in the way of my not being poor. I could totally spew shit at least this stupid and make tons of money from desperate and very disturbing men, but I don't want to unleash more of that upon the world.

Damn ethics.

Privilege Displays in 140 Characters or Less

Even David Bowie is at a loss to describe your fail.

The world had better hope I don't take it over right after reading stuff like this, because that's not going to end well for anyone.

@RealKidPoker: I'd be the WORST at Price is Right! Brought 20k to buy a monitor, it was $350. @MandaLeatherman can vouch for how clueless I am with prices

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Wow. It must be awesome to have so much money laying around that you bring $20,000- cash, apparently- to buy a fucking monitor. Here, let me show you my superpower: Jiffy Corn Muffin Mix is $0.44/box at Walmart, $0.48/box at Redners and $0.50/box at Redners. I didn't look up those prices, I just know that. I know, to the penny, what everything costs at every store in the area because I have to. Fucking douchebag.

@babesmcphee: OMG i was saying how i couldn't afford the gas to fly daddy's jet to the riviera this summer, and this barista totally rolled her eyes at me.

That better be a joke, or I'm going to have pin a prize on the barrista for not jumping over the counter and pummeling this woman. If it's not a joke, what do you want to bet she tipped her a nickel?

@tonywright: I wish I had a USB port in my head. Then I could download and transfer knowledge to others so they could actually converse with me.

Pretentious, party of this guy.

@brettschulte: I gave my cleaning lady a raise today, even though she didn't ask, as my own little contribution to fighting the recession.

On the one hand, can you pay the person who has access to your toothbrush and your toilet enough? Probably not. On the other, "cleaning ladies" are generally poor, because why else would you clean someone else's toilet, so this guy is doing exactly what the government can't figure out: putting money into the hands of people who need to spend it. So, it's a wash on how I feel about this.

@joshuabaer: fan belt light came on in the 911 so now I'm driving the Cayenne Turbo S - the backup, backup car. Trying not to think about the Tesla...

So . . . your penis is -1" long?

@denisejoyce: How do you write thank-yous for off-registry wedding gifts? "Thank you for adding something else to my to-do list" doesn't seem polite.

Well, now I know what to do to both appear polite and be obnoxious at the same time the next time someone invites me to some 3 day wedding extravaganza. Someone who makes 100x what I do, has owned their own home for 5 years and yet had 3 different wedding registries. I'm a little bitter.

@SonaliT: Watching a LOT of fashion mistakes go past whilst waiting for the bus. This is why I don't use public transport.

I'm so sorry my lack of fabulous wealth does not please you, can you ever forgive me?

@ozskier: Great, now any douchebag with 199 can say they have a MacBook Pro. Not backing this.

Find another status symbol, asshole.

@labur: All I want is just one day a year when I'm not visually assaulted by uglies and fatties.

We're so sorry. You just tell us what day that is this year and we'll all stay home.

@ughman: A woman ordered a breakfast sandwich with sausage and bacon, while I had a whole-grain blueberry muffin. Am I justified in feeling superior?

No, no you are not.

@suzannegolden9: We WALKED to the grocery store this morning. We are ADORABLE. And green.

Oh, I'm ADORABLE and green? I thought I was just poor. Silly me.

@seanochoa: Is it strange to think that I was called by God to point my co-workers to the Hope and Love of Jesus Christ in this uncertain time?

Yes, yes it is.

@jc: Ladies, if you tell me your favorite restaurant is a franchise, we're probably not going to get along.

Yeah, well, I figured we probably weren't getting along anyway. Note: On my budget, Olive Garden is awesomely fancy.

@ezrabutler: Omg. They tried to give me a cappuccino in a paper cup. I could die.

Is there some other way to get a cappuccino? I has confusion.

@davidrankin: When I visit people's houses for the first time, I examine their bookshelves when they go to the bathroom. I'm rarely impressed.

You know what that reminds me of? The episode of MTV Cribs wherein Moby said the same thing about other celebrities' homes and claimed not to own a mirror. Moby shaves his head, but he doesn't own a mirror? This was followed by Moby showing off at least $1,000,000 worth of recording/music gear. Mmm-hmm.

And for the ultimate in twitter etiquette:

@labeet: Keep forgetting to say hello to all new followers. If I'm not following back it's because I found your stream uninspiring - at best.

Reminding us all that "unfollow" is as easy to click as "follow".

A One Page Essay to Earn $1 More Than Minimum Wage

First of all THIS. McDonalds promises to add 50,000 new jobs and all I have to say is fuck you, Evil Empire. Fortunately, someone else said it a little more eloquently than I could manage given the provocation:

McDonalds, and so many other companies offering jobs, offer low paying, part-time jobs, without benefits, so that such companies can make mind-numbing profits. They are not interested in providing jobs to the people, they are interested in making as great a profit as possible. Creating new jobs creates new money-making markets; but they want to have these markets run by people who are paid as little as possible, an insignificant amount of money for the work they do and the money they help generate. The lower the salary and benefits they can get away with, the greater the profit. The average worker is being used by them as servile servants, and they are told if they are not willing to accept this fact, many others will be willing to take their job, and so they should just be quiet and not cause any problems. We are told that they should be willing to be paid little and be grateful for the crumbs they are being given. Hard work, after all, pays off – just, of course, we often forget who benefits from the hard work is often not the one who does it! [emphasis added]

Exactly. Ex-fucking-actly. I type until my joints swell and ache and who makes the money around here? The same guy who took away my sick days because he could. Don't ever forget that. Unless you work for yourself, working harder isn't benefiting you. It's benefiting your boss. And if you think, given the evidence of just the last two years alone, that you're going to get something out of it- a raise, a promotion, job security- I have a lovely bridge in Brooklyn you can have for the low, low price of $500.

I would also like to share something so twisted and ridiculous, I can only assume the local McDonalds franchises are run by an evil genius whose house should be searched for the world-ending laser it no doubt contains. I know someone who works at a local McDonalds*. He has been recommended for the position of crew trainer. Unlike normal shift workers, crew trainers get 40 hours per week guaranteed, rather than the oh-so-clever not quite enough hours to require benefits, and crew trainers make $1 an hour more than minimum wage, so $8.75. Whoo!! Living the high life right there! Working at McDonalds and making a little more than $18,000 per year! Be still my heart!

You know what he has to do to earn these fabulous riches? Write a one page essay about why he would be a good crew trainer. Don't worry, it's one page double spaced. Yes, typed. On a computer. And printed out. On a printer. Isn't that fucking speshul? (For the privilege blind: generally speaking, an adult desperate enough to find working at McDonalds full time a good deal probably doesn't have a computer or a printer. Those things cost money.) Don't worry, I got done writing, typing and printing it out for him an hour ago, but fucking really? That much hoop jumping to make $8.75 at fucking McDonalds?

I guess simply holding your boot to someone's throat gets boring after a while. And desperate groveling is so entertaining.

*McDonalds are franchises, which means that different McDonalds under different ownerships may have different policies, so this may only be true for the McDonalds where I live, which are all owned by the same person. Also note that unemployment in my area is so high that jobs typically held by teenagers, such as part time worker at McDonalds, are all held by adults. Desperate, poor, at the end of their ropes adults.

The Friend Zone

I have this . . . acquaintance* who asked me about the "friend zone" and how to avoid it the other day. If you're not familiar with the concept, the friend zone is that hideous place wherein you know a woman and you have to talk to her and be all nice to her, but she doesn't give you vaginal access.

And that right there is my problem with the entire concept. What a bother, what a burden, what a horrible thing to be friends with a woman. Because what fucking good are we if you can't stick your penis into one of our orifices, amirite? Talking to us without getting at least a blowjob? What the fuck is that about? Listening to us and knowing as as people without the payoff that is sex? Who does that voluntarily? Honestly.

I don't think this guy is a bad guy. The friend zone is a cultural staple in the US, much discussed, much derided, generally acknowledged to be a place to avoid. I'm sure it didn't occur to him exactly how insulting it was to have this conversation with me, the woman he's never going to experience any sexual activity with, the woman he was asking for advice from . . . you know, the woman he's currently in the friend zone with.

Seriously though, how insulting is that? I'm not saying that I don't think people, both men and women, are highly sexually motivated. I'm not saying that there is a certain degree of disappointment to wanting to engage in sexual activity with a person who does not feel the same way. However, it is insulting that my friendship is some sort of horrible gag prize when you're not getting access to my vagina. It is telling of the patriarchy/rape culture that friendship with a woman is the undesirable result of not getting sexual activity, isn't it?

Anyway, this is what he was told, by other men, concerning the friend zone: don't wait too long to get laid, or you'll be stuck in the friend zone, loser! This was what I said in response to that: it doesn't take me, or any woman, long to decide whether or not we'd like to fuck you. How quickly you "move" on us isn't changing that, i.e., if we wanted to fuck you, we would, if we don't, nothing you do short of rape is going to do anything about that (and rape isn't sex, anyway).

It is possible, however, that we may initially have wanted to fuck you, but further acquaintance with you introduced us to facts about you that made you undesirable (oh, 5 kids by 2 different women and you don't pay child support on any of them? awesome!), but it's not like we wouldn't have figured that out anyway. Though I suppose you at least would have gotten laid in that situation, huh. Asshat.

*I can't really call him a friend, but I've known him for a long time. You know, one of those.

31 Is Greater Than 30

A day in the life a pain patient:

I filled my prescription for Vicodin March 1. It is a 30 day prescription. (That's important, so keep it in mind.) I call March 28 to request a refill. Mind you, my doctor's office requests that call 48 hours in advance of needing a refill.

This is what happened next:

I call the pharmacy that night and the pharmacist (or tech, I have no way of knowing) tells me they did not receive anything from my doctor. Okay, that happens every few months. Somewhere between the doctor prescribing it and the prescription actually arriving on the fax machine at the pharmacy a disconnect happens. The next day, I spend 20 minutes on hold with my doctor's office to find out that, yes, they sent it yesterday. I need to have the pharmacy call them. Okay.

I call the pharmacy back. This new person on the phone says, "Oh yeah, we got that yesterday. At 4:00."

Three hours before I called.

Why did they lie to me? Because it was set to be refilled on April 1, and CVS* policy is to lie to customers receiving narcotic refills to avoid "difficulty". No, she didn't use the word "lie", yes she did use the word "difficulty".

You mean like the the difficult of spending 20 minutes on hold with my doctor's office while at work to find out what happened to a refill for no reason at all? That difficulty?

Anyway, she assured me that my prescription was filled and I could pick it up first thing April 1.

Back to basic math, my prescription is for 30 days. March has 31 days in it. Holding the refill until April 1 has me picking up my prescription on the 32nd day- of a 30 day prescription. Needless to say, I was at CVS when they opened at 8am. (My doctor's office said something about federal prescribing guidelines- because small government is good unless it concerns people's bodies, and then the bigger, the better.)

My prescription was not ready. It was not in bottle all marked up with warnings, waiting for me. In fact, it could not be filled until 8am April 1. I then had to wait 25 minutes for a person with the equivalent of a Master's Degree to count to 90**.

And then she discovered that I wished to pay with cash and she didn't have a drawer in her register. "If you have a credit card, this would be so much easier."

Oh, the inconvenience. I bleed for you.

*A woman once worked as a pharmacist for 2 months at a CVS with absolutely no training. She was not caught because she failed to do the job properly.

**I have that beat. I once waited 1.5 hours for a person with the equivalent of a Master's Degree to slap a label on a prepackaged tube of steroid cream. It would have been quicker to train my dog to do it.