almost dr. jacks saves the world

jacks has moved and will not be returning

2008-07-08T14:39:00.000-07:00

i have moved to wordpress! i know! holy sh*t - i have come into the 20th century but have not quite made it into the 21st. still - look at me! my new blog over at wordpress is called the thoughtful spaz. i hope you loves it. here is the link so update your business:

http://thethoughtfulspaz.wordpress.com/

come! see! love! comment!

(there is a new post over there waiting for you)

jacks is into food porn

2008-06-18T14:02:00.000-07:00

during this past week (and a bit) of procrasinate-y goodness, which was inflected with bouts of hardcore writing (my theory chapter of all things), and which resulted in my new nickname: jacks the vamp-paper slayer, i realize that i can multi-task. no. i kick ass at multi-tasking. what are these things i can do at once, you ask? i can watch food network food porn AND write academic papers.

impressive, no?

i have had a recent personal victory. after many, many months of trying to convince t-bone that we do in fact need more television, and not less, as he ridiculously suggests, i managed to score us classic cable. well, more specifically, i trapped t-bone with a cableman and basically forced the cableman to install classic cable while my poor dear love could only politely scowl from the corner. ah, passive aggression. keeps the love alive. there are two points that need clarification here: while t-bone likes television, he thinks it is perhaps mind numbing and that we should do talky/thinky activities instead (noble, but misguided); and classic cable is just one step up from basic cable. the main difference is that with basic cable there is no food network. and no food network means no food porn. you see my dilemma.

so while i have been diligently working away at my theory chapter, i have also been marking time if you will, with copious amounts of food network. i love the southern lady who can't keep food out her mouth long enough to talk to the camera, let alone her many grown sons that she seemingly forces to cook with her. i love the skinny italian woman who makes the richest italian dishes but never seems to gain a pound. i think she's magic. and i also love the really tall atlantic canadian dude who cooks off the top of his head in his own kitchen for his family. how do i get a gig like that? i mean he prolly writes off his kid he's got such a sweetass deal. i once saw him at a winery in the niagara wine region in ontario and i want to talk to him so bad. but i could figure out what to say and knowing me it would have been something really lame like, "dude you are tall. like really tall. taller than you appear on t.v." and then realizing that was stupid i would have gone on to ask him if his relative tallness interferes with his cooking. it would have been seriously humiliating. kind of like the time i was eating at the table next to brian orser and i couldn't stop staring at him. poor dude was just trying to have brunch with his mom and his partner and all i could think about was how i wanted to tell him i wrote a speech about him in grade 5. that he was my hero. i was like 25 at the time. thankfully, t-bone and others saved me from that doomed interaction.

so basically, getting back to food porn, i realized that what your parents always told you is untrue. you can and should watch television while working. more employers need to get behind this idea. especially if it is something that significantly motivates. like yummy, yummy food. t-bone remains puzzled about why i watch hours and hours of the food channel and never cook anything i see on there. never write down a recipe. never reproduce the pornographic goodness that is the food network. i tell him that i am getting inspiration. but perhaps this inspiration is not only food-focused but reaches into the innermost corner of my psyche and makes me productive. i hope i didn't write anything provocative for my supervisor to see. thank gawd my dissertation isn't about food.

for interwebs porn for those of you without the food network (poor darlings) there is this great new blog - patent and the pantry. enjoy!

movie madness

2008-06-08T11:44:00.000-07:00

i have just reached a turning point in my life. i have set a personal record. gone to a place of no return. i watched three movies in the theatre in three days. look at me. a personal best. what movies, you ask? well it is a colourful line-up. first there was sex and the city which i didn't think i was going to see because i didn't think it would translate to film. it did just fine. second was the strangers which i shouldn't have seen due to the fact that i like to be scared by supernatural events but not by roving bands of psychopaths with no clear motive. third was indiana jones and something about a crystal skull. all of these movies were entertaining. one made me want to shop. one made me almost pee my pants. and one made me sing "dr. jones" by aqua every time someone called indie dr. jones. all in all - good times.

i struggle with movies at times because it seems like it is hard to turn one's critical lens off. i like to say that the study of sociology has forever ruined my full enjoyment of film. there are some movies i can't watch because they actually make me feel stupid. and really, if you think too hard about most films, their strict adherence to formula, their underdeveloped one-dimensional characters, and their incessant "hidden" marketing strategies should make us feel stupid. we morph from citizens to consumers. from collectives to wholes. from humans to currency.

that said, sex and the city infected me with shopping fever. and i don't think it is going away.

i have always been the feminist in the crowd that is wearing make-up. a dress. polish on my toes. as i get older, and more women define for themselves what being a feminist means, i find more long-haired, paint-faced, skirt wearing feminists. but: the women of sex and the city feminist? this is certainly a puzzle as they have the potential to be but it also makes me want to wear heels. real bad. which is ridiculous. anyhoo. i have decided to use my feminist powers for good and provide you with a brief dissection of the sex and the city women from a quasi-feminist perspective:

carrie: she is successful. cute. funny. smart (we think). fashionable. quirky. kissed a women (alanis no less) for fun once. she has made a name for herself in a tough city. she picks a*sholes to date, but we all make mistakes.

samantha: f*cks everything and encourages others to do the same. the woman should receive a medal, or at the very least, a gilded set of anal beads.

miranda: prolly the one true feminist on the show. highly educated. articulate. balances child and career in a no-nonsense way. consistently reminds women of the battles that have been fought for what they have, and can do, now.

charlotte: um. anyone? bueller? forget it.

so, in sum, despite the fact that the women of sex and the city live in privileged white and largely heterosexual monogamous paradise, there is a silver lining.

and it involves shoes.

i don't actually know what a red herring is

2008-06-03T17:03:00.000-07:00

academic projects are, for the most part, red herrings. take mine for example. i say that i study online dating - which is true - but only to an extent. do you feel lied to? deceived? undermined? well you should. but don't be a baby about it. what i mean is that often research topics are vehicles (distractions for the audience) that allow us to study that which truly interests us - in my case again those things are gender, sexuality, technology and media studies. so when one says something like "i study online dating" they in fact mean something entirely different. however, we fear that if we told you what we were actually interested in, you'd stop listening. and in most cases, that would be true. but sociologists are at an advantage. they are the lucky ones of the academic world. they usually study things that people are interested in. of course, this results in people thinking that they already know everything about your work, but whatevs, at least they are engaged.

last weekend i went out with my new favourite neighbour-friends who, amazingly, were engaged by the theoretical direction my project was taking. granted these women are bright. warm. receptive. open. but really, i asked myself, do they really find this interesting? shockingly, they did. and it made me fell all warm and bubbly inside. primarily, i am interested in subjectivity which is really just a way of saying, states of being in the world. with gendered subjectivities we have few options, male, female, and well, at present, that's it. what has always profoundly resonated with me since i figured out what poststructuralism meant in my undergrad is that male and female exist in dichotomous relation to one another, meaning that they can only be understood as a relation - a diametrically opposed relation, where one is what the other is not. what i have recently come to understand about these forms of gendered subjectivity is that men and women are not only related to each other in this binary structure but that the structure itself is intelligible within the broader structure of heterosexual relations - that is, men and women exist, to some extent, in the service of the heterosexual imperative that exists in most contemporary societies.

have you ever wondered why there is only one "appropriate" way for human beings to come together? why only a man and a woman can come together in loving relationships to the exclusion of all others? if that man wants another man, that is something "else" - and needs to be labeled otherwise (thus resulting in other binary forms such as straight and gay), if a man and woman want to engage in sexual relations with others, that too is labeled something "else" - something deviant. unusual. being heterosexually coupled is not simply a choice. it is a compulsory activity. this is not a new idea for me as it has been central to feminist thinking for a while. however, it wasn't until i read something by french radical lesbian feminist monique wittig that it clicked. i had the academic equivalent of an oprah "aha moment." i know - exciting, eh?

wittig argues that:

“...it would be incorrect to say that lesbians associate, make love, live with women, for “woman” has meaning only in heterosexual systems of thought and heterosexual economic systems. lesbians are not women.”

friggin' profound, no? while asserting that lesbians are not women may on the surface seem exclusionary, when we look deeper, we understand that it is meant to be so - as a radical embrace of that difference, or abjection. but it is also ultimately subversive. to say that lesbians are not women is to question the false cohesion that binds women to men, and to men exclusively. for wittig, the category of woman is problematic insofar as it excludes other modes of being, that is to say, lesbianism for example. but to deny the status of woman opens up the possibility of plurality. different modes of being that are not demanded by a heterosexual imperative. by a femininity - a "womanliness" that is limited, limiting. predestined by virtue of the vagina.

i have made this post unfortunately dense but it has been fun, if only for me. i'd love to hear people's reactions to notions of alternative subjectivities, beings. can we live in a world of "monstrous bodies," as technofeminist donna haraway calls them, of difference not defined within the confines of nuclear families, male/female relations, and intelligible bodies - that is, bodies that "make sense" to us, and engage in sexual relations that are condoned and not condemned, are coherent and "manageable." or do we understand a need for inclusion. of making space. of diverse forms of being that acknowledge common humanities.

just asking.

jacked on spirituality

2008-06-02T10:38:00.001-07:00

all right. i can't hold it in any longer. i'm all jacked up on spirituality and i gotta tell somebody. EVERYBODY. now i usually disdain of all things new agey and spiritual while vaguely believing myself to be somehow enlightened through the discipline and sacrifice that comes with ten years of post-secondary education. what indeed comes from those ten years, for myself and my colleagues, is more akin to bleeding stomach ulcers, constant low-level anxiety (coupled with fits of crying over lost youth, having to complete a dissertation bibliography, and the loss of one's "lucky pen") , and if you are really lucky, three-week migraines that require neurological intervention.

however, i digress.

so a loved one bought me a bunch of books about spirituality which of course i disdained of at first (not that i didn't appreciate the gift and the sentiment - i am not that big of an ass). i was like, "all right. i'm not gonna lie. i watch oprah. but is it possible that she holds the key to my spiritual awakening? f*ck no," or some close approximation of that. i'm a cynic. it's in my blood. that is why i am a disdainy-pants. but as it turns out, people are accustomed to staying in mindsets that are safe and require little effort. they believe things like "i am never going to change," "happiness is a fiction," "low-level anxiety is good for my skin," without ever trying to change. because let's face it, change is hard. you have to do stuff. you have to work at it. it is like my relationship with the couch. i would like to believe i have a healthy relationship to my couch. it loves me. i love it. i have even written parts of my dissertation from it. but do i indeed have a healthy jacks-couch relationship? prolly not. the couch's comfy cosiness often prevents me from running, walking, well - moving - and enables television watching which is the antithesis to reading which everyone can benefit from. so although i love my couch, it might just be an easy (and deliciously comfy) excuse not to change habits. not to engage with different dynamics of self, but to think instead that self is set in stone and it is capable of little else, least of all genuine change.

granted, i'm no ekhart tolle. and this moment too shall pass. but even if all i take from my recent spirituality kick is the notion that it is possible to change the structures of my life that seek to limit myself and others (and relatedly to judge, worry, anger, etc.), then it is time well spent, no?

"proof" that the internets is a scary place to dwell

2008-05-29T10:26:00.000-07:00

vancouver is abuzz with the news, and the notion, that a young couple would try and sell their seven-day-old baby on the popular online classifieds page craigslist. this post is neither about the morality of such an act nor an investigation of the act itself. it is about the media framing around the decision to attempt to sell a baby on the interwebs, and how, as always when it comes to media portrayals of the internets, this "proves" that cyberspace is a dangerous, and potentially (culturally) damaging, place to dwell.

as the story goes, on tuesday may 27, 2008, a 60 year-old woman browsing the website came across a ad tagline that read MUST HAVE!!!!!!!!! and upon opening it, discovered the advertised "product" was a "very cute" baby girl. having a number of grandchildren of her own, this woman informed the police in the event it was not a joke or a hoax. police then tracked the couple down in the west end apartment through the cellphone number provided in the ad. the couple was arrested for public mischief and the child has been removed from their care.

interestingly, the immediate local media coverage of this event focused on the woman who reported the posting, who was said to believe in angels and who was being touted as a heroine. much of the emphasis on this woman neglected the fact that craigslist is a self-regulating community meaning that members (users) flag posts for any number of reasons from level of appropriateness to general maintenance and organization of the site. no doubt this woman did the "right thing" in reporting inappropriate behaviour, but her actions reflect what is expected of craiglist users. as an "internet user" (the identifying label under her name explained), this woman was held up as an exemplar of the regulating morality the internet is understood to lack. thus, the wild west imagery associated with the internet persists while self-regulating communities like craiglist have been operating since pre-web days.

my frustration with this story reflects a broader frustration with popular culture notions of the internet as a scary place, and moreover, a place where social rules and mores are somehow non-existent. we do not become different people on the internet, we bring our identities, our problems, our life circumstances online with us. there is no break between ourselves online and off. the fluidity of our experience is captured in our presentations and representations online. this young couple is having a bad time. their baby was unexpected. instead of dumping it on a hospital doorstep, or setting it free on a bed of reeds, they turned to another everyday aspect of their lives, the internet. this does not reflect the depravity of contemporary existence. it reflects the different ways that people have to do what they have been doing forever - even if it reflects a part of humanity that makes us uncomfortable, that is the fact that some children are unexpected, and ultimately not wanted.

this story has a particularly gendered and normalized aspect to it as well, which ultimately accompanies any critical investigation into constructions of technology. it is better therefore, to think of this young couple as "known to police," familiar with drugs, and generally monstrous - and taking that monstrosity to that place of anonymous, dangerous, unregulated danger: the internet - than to think about the structural conditions of their lives. the poverty that would lead them to such an act, the desperation they must feel. the internet is a place to blame that doesn't talk back, that will remain a place of fear until we recognize that we are the internet. the constitutive force behind the technology we produce, enable, and use.

technology is the humanity of today, not the danger of tomorrow.

vegas almost killed me

2008-05-20T13:04:00.001-07:00

instead of being dead, my bloggy friends, i am just suffering from a seven-day migraine which was post-vegas induced. here are a couple of things i have realized in the past two weeks (four days spent in vegas, and the remainder spent in a post-vegas induced personal headache hell):

the united states is indeed a place of overindulgence. i know cause huge food portions, 24 hour a day oxygenation, and vats of alcohol almost killed me
the desert is hot
i don't like to gamble. it makes me feel nauseous like when i spend too much money on jewelry
migraines are not the thing of myths and fairy-tales like i once thought. migraines are the devil
that if indeed my headache was brain-tumor-induced like i originally thought (shut up - you're a hypochondriac) i would call my brain tumor paul
cirque de soleil is perhaps the most spectacular thing i have ever seen. i have no idea what gave me the impression that it would be like an expensive circus. wait. maybe it is an expensive circus. but sooooooooo cool.
i can eat and digest most of a 99 cent half-pound foot-long hot-dog. pretty impressive, right?
migraines are a good excuse not to write my dissertation
i don't own anything skanky enough to truly fit in in vegas
i like mexican inspired beer that already contains salt and lime. i also enjoy walking around with alcohol even though when i first arrived in vegas and saw people walking around with necklace-like contraptions resembling the eiffel tower full of booze i was like, "classy. i would never do that." my resolve was gone by day two
i equate smoking indoors with pissing in the corner. all indoor smoking, even in one's own residence, should be banned. it is perhaps the worst thing in the world. 'cept for migraines
i prefer sitting by a pool to the following: sight-seeing, walking, drinking, talking to others, experiencing something new, BUT not to eating. yup. eating wins.

that is about it. i am going to go off and feel relatively sorry for myself. however, my migraine has turned a corner so i think i might live. that is, as long as paul remains dormant.

why i don't talk about my dissertation at parties (anymore)

2008-05-01T16:52:00.000-07:00

despite the fact that i will one day revel in being referred to as "dr. jacks" (without the "almost"), i shy away from the label of expert. we could chat about why this may be (not knowing of what i speak, making things up, blatant lies;), but suffice to say that i try follow in the footsteps of the most unpretentious woman i know, my supervisor. plus, pretentious people, in general, give me the shits so there is no reason to be one of them. and, most of the time, when i tell people i am a graduate student, and a phd student at that, they invariably (no joke, invariably) say "good for you!" like a am a potty-training toddler that just waved bye-byes to mr. poopy. so proclaiming expert status, whether i wanted to or not, would prolly result in something equally horrifyingly humiliating like someone trying to change my diaper and/or burp me. like you don't wear a diaper. anyhoo. my point is that you don't always get the response you are looking for which is why i am less and less inclined to discuss my dissertation topic at parties.

for those of you who know me, and those of you who don't cause i keep telling you, i am an attention-whore. this results in interesting choices such as dramatically changing my hair and then disdaining of anyone who draws undue attention to it or choosing ridiculous things to study and then reacting with horrified anger when they say things like "you got a master's degree after spending a couple of months on a nude beach," "sociology is a nice hobby but you can't feed yourself with it," and my personal favourite, "well what is your phd actually in? online datingology" (followed by guffaw, guffaw, guffaw). most people's reactions, are by and far, very positive. so positive, in fact, that i often get advice on how to do my doctorate. the standard party conversation goes like this:

stranger: "so what do you do?"

me: "i am student, which basically means not gainfully employed in any meaningful way."

stranger: "oh yeah? that's cool."

me: "actually, i am a graduate student. i study sociology. but it is basically equivalent to unemployment and poverty-like conditions."

stranger: "you're doing your m.a.?"

me: "nopers. i'm a phd student."

stranger: "GOOD FOR YOU!!!"

me: "gee. thanks."

stranger: "what is your thesis on?"

me: "i study online dating."

stranger: "no you don't!"

me: "yeah. really. i do."

stranger: "well that's interesting!"

me: "not what you were expecting, huh?"

stranger: "NO! i didn't even think you could study that!"

me: "yup."

stranger: "so how successful is online dating? i mean how many people that you talked to get together?"

me: "i don't really study that."

stranger: "cause i mean, if you algorithmically calculated all the components of a good match, well then, you could -"

me: "i could sell my work to an online dating company?"

stranger: "YES!!! all it would take would be crunching the numbers and then putting together a detailed proposal -"

me: "are you an engineer?"

stranger: "yeah! how'd you know!?!?!"

this exact situation has happened to me twice. the exact same thing. and i wasn't at an engineering convention about how to sell your work in the marketplace. swears.

so since chatting about my dissertation isn't getting me the popularity i feel i want and deserve (read: need), perhaps i will start talking about it more on here. cause all ya'll can't talk back.

and all of you certainly can't be engineers. (not that there is anything wrong with that).

oops, we did it again...

2008-04-30T11:38:00.000-07:00

so as it turns out, t-bone and i don't ever learn. as you may or may not recall, we once got lost and almost died during the buntzen lake floating bridge disaster of easter weekend 2008. well, funny story, we totally got lost a couple of days ago in the equally sucky-ass pouring rain debacle of random running day in the university endowment lands. i know what your thinking: running, rain, endowment lands? when did you become such a vancouver douche? well, let me tell ya. it all begins with one relatively bad idea (which i am going to, of course, attribute to t-bone - [sidenote: t-bone selected his own pseudonym. not that it doesn't rock, i am just trying to establish a long line of, shall we say, "interesting" decision-making] but i digress...). the relatively bad idea is "getting into shape" through the ridiculous practice of getting your heart-rate above couch-surfing. and so, the badness begins.

t-bone just turned 30 and i made him a present cake. for those unaware of my genius, i will just say that a present cake is a cake made out of presents. bet you wish you'd thought of that. anyhoo - in this present cake there was a board-game, a camera, a tonne of candy and chocolate goodness, and a book. this book is entitled the beginning running handbook and was recommended by friends. basically it is a 13-week program that teaches you how to run. and, as it turns out, running isn't actually that bad (so says the person who likes walking because it is basically sweat-free exercise-lite). so we are on the second week and in order to fit running three times a week we sometimes have to be creative about when and where we run because our schedules don't always match up. this is how it came to be that we were running, in the pouring rain, in the forest at roughly 7pm on a monday night.

the actual run, despite being 44 minutes (alternating running and walking), went okay. as usual, i almost barfed about midway through and at any and every uphill section. but that isn't out of the ordinary. neither is the situation we found ourselves in on the way back. basically we were lost. which wasn't a big deal. at first. so it has just begun to pour again and we realize that the terrain looks familiar. we had walked in a circle on the way out of the woods. curious. so, we consult the map, realize that we are unaware of what direction we are actually going in, and then randomly choose a direction. upon reaching that exact same point of familiar terrain a little while later, we realized that we were f*cked. while i am not a panicky person, i once again realized that we might die out there, in the gentrified woods of the endowment lands, and no one would hear our screams. plus, we were literally soaked, having not brought raincoats to our near-death experience. so, okay, i'll admit. i panicked a little.

so roughly two hours after we entered the woods for a 44 minute hike, we made it out alive. so again, i know what you are thinking: 1) you're idiots. which i can accept. 2) get a f*ckin' compass, you idiots. k, but don't be so harsh. 3) f*ckin' die out there, see if i care. now that's just mean. in any case, i will update you as to either how stupid we continue to be with regard to our health and safety (or you will see us on the news huddled together in a back alley after a run gone wrong that ends in a police/fireperson rescue scenario) or when we get a compass. also, if anyone has developed the microchip locational devices that are used for lost pets for people, just let us know. someone should know where we are at all times. seriously.

my dissertation scares me like thinning hair and my nose getting bulbous with age

2008-04-22T16:08:00.000-07:00

alrighty. so back to the problem at hand. you see, i have this dissertation thingy to write. and it's a lotta words. lemmie tell ya. what i have accomplished so far (while not entirely true) feels like what my blog post pic illustrates. a whole lotta nuttin'. i mean sure. it is kinda like writing the great american (canadian?) novel. it's big. it has to start somewhere. and it feels like it is never gonna end. i don't want this to be a bitch and moan session - oh pobre me - i have the entire summer to write a draft of a dissertation that like, four people total, will probably end up reading. i know, i know. woe is me. rather, i would like to either shame myself into it (a particular strategy that i excel at) or at least come up with a productive means of, you know, doing something, um, productive. as a side note, last time i visited the dentist, i asked the dental hygienist to shame me into flossing more (even though she didn't notice that i floss, um, sporadically - and i'll try to stop saying um now) and she thought that was 1) self destructive in some way and 2) kinky. i have since changed dentists. i mean, if you can't productively shame me into action, what good are you?

so i have this weird thing that i know i'll finish, and i know i'll finish in good time, but i need to fret about it. i need to be all like, "damn, i'm procrastinating, isn't that bad?" or "i have a new deadline, poor me, huh?" maybe it is the exorbitant attention i need, OR maybe it is part of my process. this is a conclusion i came to perhaps a couple of years ago (or like, yesterday) and i have tried to go with the flow of it instead of resist it. a fellow blogger, author and artist recently remarked in her facebook status that faith means more than effort (you know who you are). i guess this is the resounding idea behind my "process" idea. i fret. i worry. but i always have faith that what must get done will get done. and it does. faith instead of effort. i should get it tattooed. another one of my dear sweet friends, J., frets for fun i'm sure. and it makes her a functional adult and academic. perhaps fretting makes us feel important. functional. or dysfunctionally productive. or somethin'.

so back to shame. i actually think shame operates as a motivator for me. doesn't anyone else feel this way? i mean, you can be shamed by someone and their judgement can motivate or it can squash. which sounds better to you? perhaps it is highly dysfunctional, but i think the best kind of shame is personal shame. it is a motivator, a sidekick, a best friend. or maybe just mine. whatevs. my point is, that everyone's process is unique, possibly dysfunctional, and ultimately productive, right? we all get stuff done. i mean obviously, we should all be less judgmental, to others and ourselves, but don't we all live in a world that compels us to live up to the expectations of others in order to avoid their disappointment and our inevitable shame? perhaps it is just a matter of not taking responsibility of oneself. i mean, i have to assume that my supervisor cares about deadlines set, or dissertations written, otherwise why would i produce? i have to create a spiral of expectation and shame. otherwise nothing matters - right? i'm not a masochist okay? i'm just justifying why i am not doing stuff, why that is okay, and why it will all work out in the end. in an obviously tongue-in-cheek, non-creepy way. right? gulp.

as for productivity, here are some simple solutions to take my mind off actually doing work.

1) obviously, faith, not effort. perhaps my dissertation will be written on faith alone. does that mean i can take a vacation?

2) personal shame is the answer to all life's roadblocks.

3) watch oprah when experiencing writer's block.

4) assume my supervisor has more investment than i do in actually getting things done. that way, they will. come hell or highwater.

5) go outside and drink chai lattes (my new ingestive of choice) for inspiration.

6) instead of doing research, make phonecalls. long-distance ones to people you haven't spoken to in a long time in order to maximize the call length and time-wastage.

7) make lists on your blog that mean nothing. to anybody. including yourself.

8) enjoy facebook's new chat system.

9) consider ways to make my life more eco-friendly in acknowledgment of earth day. and/or get irritated by sandra bullock schlepping her soy-based candles after following #3 above.

10) consider other career opportunities that do not require a completed phd. suggestions?

any others to add? also, feel free to shame me now that i've fired my dental hygienist. and don't go easy on me as this could happen to you.

indecision

2008-04-14T19:19:00.000-07:00

so i changed my blog title. don't judge. i am allowed to be indecisive. at least in the blogosphere. (blogosphere - what does that even mean? don't think too much about it, says the new media studies student. just. don't). indecision does not come easy to me. and that's not something i'm proud of. cause for years i lived in a world (a sphere perhaps?) of black and white. and that's tough lemmie tell ya. tough.

gynormous life decisions have always come relatively easy to me, e.g., while i faltered for a week during christmas break during my first year of university, desperately wanting to drop out and become either a chef or a florist (much to my parent's chagrin and resounding "nos"), by the new year i knew i was going to be a phd student one day. and well. here we are. i would like to say it's the little things that get me and while that may be true, it is really the small to medium decisions that boggle me. such as: where should i eat for dinner instead of making dinner? should i like camping? how many drinks are too many? and, my personal favourite - should i continue to think about the health of my arteries or should i just give in and eat french fries all. the. time.? so far, arteries are winning. but i'm not happy about it.

i made a decision to write a short blog entry - something i can't seem to accomplish due to insufficient short-range wit and the fact that this blog may or may not be turning me into an even more rampant egomaniacal attention whore (could you talk more about yerself much?). i don't seem to be sticking to that decision. but maybe that is just it. as long as i have the big life decisions covered i can completely live a life devoid of simple decision-making. some decisions are easy: should i go on a reality t.v. show? no. would i like to? yes. do i like summer? yes. would i like it to be summer all the time. maybe also yes.

i have recently been thinking a lot about having one's own "take" on everything. which is essentially like having a position - perhaps deciding on an opinion - and then deciding to act upon that decision. my take. your take. everybody has a take. that is what makes people seem so annoying sometimes - your takes don't add up or they don't agree with your take. i also think decision-making is about confidence - the confidence to stand behind your take even though everyone else thinks it is spastically uninformed. in my youth - the heady days of "should i be a chef or a florist" - my take was the law. there were no other takes. my take ruled. that was what living in a world of black and white was like. i didn't see shades of gray. as i get older - and with a recent birthday under my belt - i realize that life is full of shades of gray. if we can cobble together a take, than that's something. enough perhaps. existing in academia teaches me this anew every. single. day. and this is not a bad thing. it is perhaps instead an altered mode of being.

so i made a decision to change the name of my blog. and i may or may not stick with it.

so there.

a life in pictures: flickr meme fun

2008-04-12T15:35:00.000-07:00

k - i'm not good at taking pictures. actually, i'm really, really bad. so as desperately as i want a flickr site, i don't have one because a) i take horrible pictures that no one wants to look at, and b) our camera is broken and i don't know how to use it anyway. anyhoo - i was over at sugar sweet, one of my new favourite blogs, and she did this cool flickr meme thingy that i am going to steal because it looked super fun. also, this being the eve of my day of birth, it seems like a fun way to take weird stock of your life, and in pictures no less, which is fun (and elusive to me, a picture-taking spaz). so theses are the rules of the flickr meme:

1. go to www.flickr.com
2. type in your answer to the question in the "search" box
3. use only the first page
4. copy the html and paste for the answer

here goes! (please note: i did not answer questions that appear on sugar sweet's that i thought were dumb, e.g., my favourite disney princess). i may or may not have added others. i can do whatever i want cause i am the birthday girl).

1. what is your first name?

2. what is your favourite food?

3. what is your favourite colour?

4. who is your celebrity crush?

5. what is your favourite sunday activity

6. favourite drink? (for me, a tie)

and

7. dream vacation?

8. favourite dessert?

9. what do you want to be when you grow up?

10. what do you dream about?

okay - that was stupid fun. do it! i feel inspired to not only take better pictures but also to regularly take stock of the beauty that my life holds. and is.

(also, i thought i was cheating cause i thought you had to use the first picture and i was choosing from the whole of the first page. my post-catholic schoolgirl guilt was wasted cause that is part of the rules - you can choose any from the first page. jeesh.)

why i'm a bad blogger - installment # 5

2008-04-10T09:50:00.000-07:00

i thought it might be time for another rousing rendition of my mediocrity at crafting and maintaining this beautiful blog. since this is my like, fortieth-ish post, i am now an expert on why my blog pales in comparison to those that people read religiously and comment on. some of this list may seem familiar while other aspects of suckage will be entirely new. as always, comments for improvement are welcomed but will resultantly make you unlikeable. just so you know. enjoy.

1. this blog continues to be about nothing. i have recently refurbished my "about me" and "interests" sections. it made me feel better despite the fact that you didn't notice. don't pretend you did.

2. because this blog is about nothing, i will never be paid consultancy fees for anything. shitbags of hell.

3. t-bone has recently pointed out that i not only frequently have spelling errors, but that i always do. thanks for that tidbit.

4. i may or may not have mis-named my blog. i mean seriously, even i skip over blogs with titles like hate in them because i am trying to spare myself the entitled vitriol of others. what was i thinking? i hated my other blog. however, i am desperately in love with this one.

5. do people even blog in the summer? i mean, is this blog going to contribute to my pastiness? i really need a tan - like even a spray-on one. seriously.

6. i am even starting to think the minutiae of my life is interesting. is this a blog-induced state equivalent to navel-gazing in the social sciences (mainly anthropology - i mean, i'm not judging, i'm just saying...)?

7. i think all lists must contain 10 items.

8. all i want to blog about is big brother - till death do us part. hey - you know how i feel about being judged about my reality television choices. so stop it. now.

9. i have ceased and desisted sharing my blog. that can't be good. and if i do i always tell people that they won't want to read it. how is that for a sales pitch?

10. i can't seem to talk about anything related to my dissertation which is both a positive and a negative thing. i mean, this blog is about procrastination, right? suggested to me by the one and only dr. beth, who has in fact completed a dissertation, hence the dr. appellation. almost dr. jacks can't even talk about online dating much less have a blog about it. poor almost dr. jacks. is this what i should rename my blog? methinks i am on to something.

okay, so what has this installment of bad bloggerness taught all of us? not much. but it does suggest that i maybe should change the name of my blog and perhaps share it will others with the same kind of resounding endorsement i give to referrals to my hairdresser or for people to watch flight of the conchords. seriously. watch it. its friggin' awesome folks.

vote now if you think i should change my blog title to "almost dr. jacks changes the world" or some other fabulous suggestion you wonderful people have.

11. i change my blog so often, people can't even find it, let alone figure out what it is about (just a preview of bag blogger installment #6).

livin' on the eastside makes an awkward "E" symbol with fingers of left hand

2008-04-06T15:00:00.000-07:00

so roughly more than a half a year ago i moved to east van. where the hip-est of hipsters live. you can live on main street (which is where hipsters now go to procreate) or you can live on cambie where it was once uber hipster-y to dwell. but the real deal on hipster-living is in east van baby, where commercial drive separates the hipster from the poser. for those who don't live in vancouver, this distinctions between the hipster-ness of neighbourhoods is lost on you. but for those who live in the "couve" (an appellation given by a visiting ontarian friend who would not cease and desist calling it that no matter how much i insisted that it sounded like a euphemism for vajayjays), neighbourhoods really mean something. because the thing is, in vancouver, you pick a neighbourhood and then you live and die by its friggin' greatness. wherever the individual vancouverite lives, it is the neighbourhood against which ALL other neighbourhoods pale in comparison. maybe this works similarly in other cities that insist on having way to many distinct and unique hoods. or maybe it is just because vancouverites have to be special no matter what form that specialness takes be it from their raw food diets, their insistence on climbing mountains for fun, or taking their equally unique and special dogs EVERYWHERE with them. i dunno. you decide.

so i moved from the westside to the eastside which is equivalent, to some, to moving from the beaches neighbourhood in toronto to scarborough (i would say the bad part of scarborough, but is there a good part? man, i'm a jerk). because the downtown eastside (dtes) is infamously known across canada as the WORST neighbourhood in canada, the eastside generally gets a bad rap, despite the vibrant community life that characterizes east van generally. i sympathize with the people that are fearful of the eastside because the dtes is perhaps the most unthinkable neighbourhood one could imagine - not because of crime or violence (despite widely held beliefs) but because of extreme grinding poverty and widespread addiction and mental illness - two things that invariably land people on the streets. when you live in pristine largely white and shockingly upwardly mobile neighbourhoods like kits and kerrisdale, the eastside begins about at granville street and characterizes everything thenceforth until you hit burnaby. so yeah, living on the eastside (no the dtes) means something very different, but perhaps more "real," than the tony neighbourhoods that make vancouver so desirable. but what is weird is that vancouver is a young city and so the neighbourhoods, like kitsilano for example, used to be a hippie enclave where you could live a beach bum kind of existence - not too different from the commercial drive neighbourhood of now where hippies gather to exchange patchouli tips and advice about how to keep dreds bug-free. so this brings me full circle back to hipsters - those pioneeering souls who are on the forefront of gentrification - the few, the brave, the musically-obsessed and fashionably-conscienced.

so when i was in cincinnati i roomed with an extremely articulate and intelligent woman who just happened to be ridiculously hilarious. during said stay, she made a joke about hipsters and then abruptly stopped laughing, fearing she had insulted me, whose questionable hipster-like status had not be fully articulated nor denied. i was like, "no dude, that was funny. i'm not a hipster. i mean i don't think i am. oh my god - am i?" i then evaluated the evidence: 1) we have recently purchased property in an up-and-coming neighbourhood. level of hipster-ness: HIGH. 2) i shop in little consignment stores and revel in the resultant questioning about where i got that shirt or those boots. level of hipster-ness: MEDIUM. 3) i recently cut my hair. i now have bangs. level of hipster-ness: OFF THE CHARTS. i had to face a scary truth. i might be a hipster. where did i go wrong?

after consulting the hipster handbook however, i was relieved to find out that while i might approximate certain hipster characteristics, i am not in fact a hipster. this is largely because i don't ride a bike, i have never even heard of the word "deck" (except as a wooden object that surrounds pools), and i do not have less than 2% body fat. also, i own and love my television, which in hipsterworld is equivalent to worshiping the devil. so there you have it. i'm not a hipster despite evidence to the contrary. so suck it.

one final note, while i may not be a hipster, i do believe that my wardrobe is misrecognized in my new neighbourhood as something i like to call "streetworker chic." however, i think the bangs are helping to remedy that. sweetass.

fat fabulousness in porkopolis

2008-04-02T16:21:00.000-07:00

so, i went to cincinnati (previously called porkopolis, swears). and it didn't suck. like. at. all. in fact, it was pretty friggin' fabulous. and leonard nimoy had a little bit to do with it. i know, wtf is that all about? but let me 'splain.

i went to the annual north central sociological association's conference between March 27 and 30. it encompassed a large swath of sociological topics but i was presenting on a fat studies panel. i presented a paper about fat phobia and authenticity in online dating. it was cool.

let me just say that this was my first foray into the fat studies world and hot damn, it was a good one. i have come to realize recently, cause apparently i am a little daft, that conferences are about meeting fabulous people and getting amazing ideas rather than about the "presenting" itself. however, my presentation went well - especially after my last non-academic conferencing debacle (please see here for more information on that little ditty). so after spending seven hours at chicago's o'hare due to weather and wiring difficulties, i landed in cincinnati (and got into a cab with a brand new driver that didn't even know which state we were in. after moving to the front seat, typing things for him into his cheap-ass gps, and still getting lost down a closed-off unlit road in the middle of an electrical storm, i ask him to take me back to the airport. which he did promptly after the third time i yelled it at him. up until that point he was assuring me that he knew where he was going. um, no ya don't dude. please stop taking my life in your hands).

cincinnati, aka porkopolis, did not actually suck - i mean the downtown was nice, had trendy delicious places to eat, and i even got an up-close-and-personal fireworks show right outside my hotel window due to some kind of marathon happening on the day that i left. but wait, i haven't gotten to nimoy yet. but i'm gettin' there. so after some not so spectacular presentations, except one ethnographic methodological paper about "gravers," that is, those people who gather at the graves of famous dead people as ritualistic secularized pseudo-religious activity, i finally stumbled upon the critical crew, on day two, at my panel. these people were wicked cool and i just happened to be rooming with one of them as well - a highly articulate, inspiring, and inspired woman of only 22. i wish i had been all of those things at 22. at 22 i was tanning too much, drinking too much, going to the gym too much, and dyeing my hair too much. ah, to return to the heady days of painfully "healthy" eating, overtanning, and binge-drinking. wait - that is still my life sans the healthy eating and overtanning. forget it. i don't wanna talk about my 20s anymore.

so speaking of food and weight (how is that for a terribly disjointed segue?), i must say that i was absolutely thrilled and enlightened by what i learned about fat studies and the people that constitute it at the conference. SUCH interesting people with a refreshing view on life who ingeniously meld my interests in sexuality, gender, various "technologies," and my new obsession with fat. basically, i have a big fat studies crush and i'm makin' no apologies.

alright. so leonard nimoy. i am not going to tell you about how when i was a teenager i had a life-sized poster of him on the back of my bedroom door, or about how i had a star trek insignia pin that i actually wore. no, this post is not about my teenage crush on pointy-eared-blue-eye-shadow-wearing leonard nimoy, okay? it is about how he has recently completed a photography book of nude fat women - a sample of which graces the top of this post. had i heard about nimoy's project - entitled the full body project - and his explanations of his motivations for it (found here in his artist's statement) - i would have been surprised and pleased, and no doubt, i still am. this is a man who is channeling his creative energy into chronicling the lives of women in the fat liberation movement and to convey the respect these women feel for themselves to others. what i learned at the conference from my fellow panelist, and i think is profoundly interesting to note, is that his decision to capture the images of fat naked women positioned him as a "fat admirer" or "chubby chaser" when he was interviewed by the media. nimoy took a staunch position against taking these pictures as part of a possible sexual "fetish" which disheartened me at first. however, thinking about it further, i have reckoned that what is f*cked up is not his disavowal of the sexual "fetishization" of fat women by saying that he thinks these women are beautiful and worthy of immortalization through film, but that the interviewers were trying to construct what he is doing as "abnormal." that is, unless of course he is "abnormal" by wanting to get with that in which case it's normal. messed, eh?

anyhoo - i encourage you to look at nimoy's project and let me know what you think. i'm going to go back to daydreaming about porkopolis and my reinvigorated fat studies crush.

if you go out in the woods today you might see jacks up to her junk in what could have been a watery grave

2008-04-01T18:15:00.000-07:00

okay, so here is my attempt at playing catch-up. i've been busy, okay. lay off. i have to go all the way back to easter cause it is my favourite holiday, after xmas and halloween (since i was born on a good friday and apparently that means, in folklore no one knows nor believes, i will be a millionaire by my 39th birthday. sweetass), so i have to prioritize and correctly and chronologically relay the minutiae of my everyday life. so here's a little ditty about me almost dying in the woods. it'll be good times. swears.

so i like to hike. so what? it doesn't make me "outdoorsy." or "one with nature." it keeps me active and able to stuff large quantities in my pie-hole without consecutive coronaries or other suchlike adverse effects. plus, it allows for one to still be somewhat lazy but give the appearance of activity (that is, as opposed to running which i disagree with as a practice akin to torture). so anyhoo - i'm hiking - at buntzen lake to be exact which is a pretty place. with a lake. and a trail. perhaps my favourite hiking place of. all. time. 'cept that i almost died there. at easter. like i said.

so the dying part comes in when me and my loved one decide to be troopers and pass our usual turnaround point which is somewhere around a dock and a little suspension bridge that no one EVER goes further than because it requires you to circumnavigate the entire lake. which ends up being about 10km. which is well past jacks' comfort-zone for exercise-that-approximates-exercise-without-being-too-exercise-y. first, beyond the cute little suspension bridge, there was a significant uphill section. i am adamantly and vehemently opposed to ANY kind of uphill. uphill = the devil. second, we think we are lost when we reach a gravel road which we decide to follow (we are lost at this point but in serious denial). third, we are running out of trail mix (which i despise but was nonetheless filling my previously-mentioned pie-hole with). t-bone (aka loved one), locates us on his phone which has gps and we are somewhere between death and the end of the trail. when i realize i am starving i begin to consider eating all of the trailmix cause i figure we might not survive until the morning. apparently i thought t-bone could eat me once the trailmix was gone and i inevitably perished (due to lack of trailmix and the couple of hours i had been without food. this no food for like two hours and death is an assumption i make pretty regularly).

fourth and finally, the floating bridge that promised to be our saving grace because it was to take us directly to the parking lot (directly equalling in 1.5km) was blocked off and barricaded due to the fact that it was decrepit and "unstable" (and in the end, incomplete) or some such silliness. i say silliness because the barricade was instead telling us to go another 3km along the "safer" road route. see, silliness. more hiking? methinks no. okay so of course we chose the bridge. i mean, it was an alive-like situation out there (the movie version where ethan hawke eats everybody. or does he? i can't remember if he finds it morally reprehensible or if he chows down. ah, cannibalism). the trailmix was almost gone, people. we had to take the bridge. so after jumping over the orange fencing and over the half-sunken portion of the floating bridge's beginnings, we were well on our way.

i could tell you we made a good decision. i could tell you that this story doesn't end with us in the water. but that would be lies. despite not falling in, we did make the brave decision to enter the freezing depths of the lake that is buntzen when the floating bridge prematurely ended roughly 20 feet from land. being brave lazy souls we rolled up our lululemon pants (an impulse buy/mistake made soon after moving to vancity), took off our shoes and socks, and waded into the thigh-high icy depths of oh-my-god-what-a-bad-decision-land. i think i almost had a panic attack and was shaking for about an hour afterward due to the shock and the adventure of it all.

and that, my blog friends, is how i survived the easter hike that almost killed me.

i have blogtile dysfunction but i might be a closet rockstar

2008-03-15T17:37:00.000-07:00

okay. in an effort to get over my "dry spell" i have chosen to write a blog post come hells or highwater. excited? me too. in order to cure my "dysfunction," i have chosen to focus not on what i should be focused on, that is, marking and well, um, my dissertation i guess (*eye roll to indicate that i'm so over my dissertation. this bodes well in light of my not having actually written it*), but rather what pleases me. and right now folks, in this very odd instance, what pleases me is singing. so shut up and read.

tonight i am going to rock the house at a friend's b-day party with my very particular brand of karaoke-ing - that is, singing loud, out-of-tune, and generally f*cking fabulously. melikes the singing. despite the lack of talent, only knowing the chorus of every song, and busily posing with my sidekick B. (who goes by the fabulous handle "lipstick" when we perform. i am, as always, jacks. but fabulously spelled jax for some flava. as in flav. anyhoo. back to the story). now before you get any ideas, i am not a karaoke crackpot. this is only my second time. but now that i basically have a partner (co-performer, if you will) with whom i could tour the dingiest beer-curdled joints in this damn city, i figure i am basically a star. if only to my wincing, bloody-eared friends.

when i was seven-ish there were only two things that i wished for: to have ridiculously long hair and to be able to sing like aretha franklin. wait - there were three things - i also wanted to be a mermaid. shut up. as if you didn't watch splash and pine for the day tom hanks would join you in your watery underworld of love. you know you did. but back to the singing. despite NEVER displaying any talent in this arena, i sang my heart out. at school. at home. at church. i sang it dude. christmas was my favouritest time of year to sing and i even went caroling one year. much to the chagrin of my entire community and, most likely, the charity we were raising money for. i even occasionally (and in retrospect, horrifyingly) sang in my undergrad with, no less, my dear friend K. who has the world's. most. beautiful. singing. voice. what was i thinking you ask? i surely wasn't. just like i won't tonight.

this time, in the second incarnation of the smash hit duo "lipstick and jax," i will make a few minor changes. one, i will not have as good a time (this is a euphemism for not drinking as much cheap mystery draft from the sketchy bar). two, i will not let my nostalgia for the '80s be my only criteria for making song choices. i will attempt to branch out into the '90s. and possibly even today. maybe. three, i will sing more country songs because the twangy-ness required covers up my horrible, horrible voice. and four, i will not participate in "group" songs of more than three people as 1) that takes away from me, and 2) it takes away from me and my role in the beauty that is lipstick and jax.

i assure you that i will have fun. because, as in life, it is more about how you perform than any real skill. a pearl of wisdom from one half of lipstick and jax to you dear (and lucky that i don't podcast/podsing) blog reader.

who's sick of the american elections? anyone? anyone?

2008-03-03T15:05:00.000-08:00

so at dinner last night with my fav american couple S. and B., i became aware, once again, that i not only LOVE talking about the differences between canada and the u.s. but that i also have no idea what is going on electorally over there. and for this, sweet baby jesus, i am proud. i mean, maybe it's the profound and crushing disappointment that i felt when bush was re-elected, or the fact that i feel like if i don't now what is going on here, then why should i know what is going on there, or maybe, just maybe, it is that i am lazy. nevertheless. i can't handle any more talk about obama and hillary (please note that people ALWAYS refer to them like this. even though it reflect the sexist use of language as a symbolic representation, that is, calling her "hillary" devalues her authority which is given to men through the use of their surnames). anyhoo. i am having a wtf moment and thought i'd share. i mean, i should care, shouldn't i? does this make me a bad person? or does this make me similar to (some? most? all?) americans in that i have no idea what the f*ck is going on in the political universe (other than, tangentially, my own). oh, and i know that this is a generalization of americans that is inaccurate, all-encompassing, and ignorant. i will not, however, retract it. so there.

here are a couple of reasons i have compiled about why i don't give a sh*t about american politics or the players in it. (where is this ranty rage coming from you ask? the rain, okay? and the fact that i recently watched the documentary outfoxed. and i'm all fired up about nothing. it happens. for reals). okay, so back to the list:

1) it kills me a little inside how people have tried to construct the democratic race as if it is about gender (by which they mean sex) or race. i mean, i know that it is going to get spun that way inevitably, but it just points to how ANYONE, other than a middle-aged, white male (and/or any member of the bush family), is not seen as a valid candidate for the highest office in the united states. this is obscene. what is more obscene is that people argue that feminism is dead, or should die a quiet death, because all kinds of equality have been achieved. really? i didn't get that memo.

2) do i really like/trust hillary clinton? i mean, her presidency would mean that in the last 16 or so years, two families, and two families alone, have held the title president of the united states. isn't that messed up? i mean, how does that happen? huh?

3) i am a little afraid that oprah will in fact be the vice president after something mysteriously befalls whomever his vice president will be. it would be a coincidence in line with point #2. that is to say, not a coincidence. at all.

4) why are all politicians in the united states elevated to the status of celebrity? can't they just be boring politicians that no one knows anything about as they are in canada? i know that macleans is trying to get people to care about the private lives and goings on of canadian politicans on that kinda "social" mp section but i am quite sure that everyone does as i do and completely. skips. that. page. because, seriously who cares what the mp from some 40-person riding in winnipeg does with her time off? hmmm?

5) everything gets soooooooooo blown out of proportion. like michelle obama saying that she is proud of her country for the first time. or clinton (ya see that?) crying. all has to be dissected. analyzed. spun. and it all detracts from what they are saying. like the fact that they want to exit nafta if they don't get what they want. i'm not saying nafta is a good thing. alls i'm sayin' is why don't we look at what this means. not whose hair is fabulous and whose sweater is frumpy. again, amercians can learn something from the frumpy unfabulousness of canadian politicians. i'm just saying.

6) is it spring yet? i want more flower blossoms and sun. and less american politics.

pleeeze.

cum-ing at you april 18th - young people f*cking

2008-03-01T17:06:00.000-08:00

last week i saw a new canadian comedy called "young people fucking." it was low budget and fabulous. as an added bonus, the director, martin gero, was there to introduce the film and then chat with the audience afterward (an unexpected surprise and due to his residency in vancouver). gero was a funny guy. the film was a funny film. largely in an uncomfortable kind of way which happens to be my favourite kind of funny (that and poo humour gets me every time. poo. hehe). and callum blue is in it. need i say more?

i found myself thinking about the film after seeing it more than i expected. i usually think about films if they are particularly dramatic or sad. and then i can't seem to get them out of my mind even if i desperately. want. to. but the quirky-fantastic-ness of this film made me ponder it over and over. so perhaps this is an attempt to get it out of my mind. and onto yours.

the comedy is essentially set in five bedrooms. with five stories. in six acts that span foreplay to orgasm and beyond. if you haven't realized from the title already, it's a good date movie. if, in fact, you want to have sex with said date. it covers threesomes and sex with exs, friends with benefits, and bored marrieds. the only thing it fails to fully probe (hehe, i said probe) is any kind of gay sex, except in a laughable end scene. it was written by gero and his friend (aaron abrams who also appears in the film), apparently largely over msn, and its particular male perspective is obvious. but also funny.

i vacillate between pissing my pants laughing at male-centered comedy - you know what i mean - the superbads, knocked-ups, and every will ferrell movie ever made - and finding myself alienated by the way it attempts to, or fails to, engage women. where women are depicted as the straight-woman. the love interest. the conquest. the unfunny body that propels the story of the man forward. in short, the other. while young people fucking does appear to centre around men, i am going to suggest it could be read differently. but not entirely subversively. it does engage women in ways that we do not often see as it demonstrates how sex is a powerful motivating force for women as well.

there is a successful woman who successfully seduces her ex, a best friend that convinces her long-time pal to f*ck her in amidst the backdrop of some hardcore gangsta rap, and a bored married that suggests a "alternate" route to pleasure (i can't ruin that one - it is too unexpectedly funny). its quirky and women have a role beyond passivity. saying no. being no. to the man's constant yes. this is not to suggest that the movie isn't still male-centric, but rather to say that it has a certain truthful quality to it. in that way that independent small-scale films often do. they surprise you with their true-to-life reflections. and make you laugh your ass of at the sometimes awkward act of sex. this is why its been on my mind. and why you might wanna see it.

here is a review from the pacific cinematheque where i saw it. enjoy.

i should really get paid for this shit.

cotton brain made me do it

2008-02-27T17:36:00.000-08:00

i have been blogging with astounding frequency due to 1) the fact that northern voice 2008 gave me a blogtastic kick in the pants, and 2) i potentially have a virus - the only symptom of which is giving me cotton-headed blurry brain (possibly acquired at the geek show). brace yourselves for some fuzzy-headed nonsensicalness, cause here she comes.

this is gonna be random and i make no apologies. because apparently fuzzy-headedness gives me license to do whatevs. so there. i've been thinking about nicknames, partly due to the idea of being "cotton" or "fuzzy" headed, because i was in fact once known as popcorn head.

yeah, yeah. i know it is ridiculous. but so is having a mother that perms your hair when your like 6. sorry ma. i know perms were in. and that i probably even requested them. just like i requested getting kinks (tem)permanently permed into my cheveux (do they still do that? i might like to get that done now since it was denied me as an 8 year old. poor me. seriously). so popcorn head was the result of having ridiculously blond hair that was permed into very. tight. curls. it didn't stay with me long. about as long as "jack-o-lantern" (a play on my name), and lynn, which i insisted being called whenever playing house. it was my alter-ego. lynn was a kickass preteen who could take care of doll children and drive a car. ah, to be lynn again.

the only name that stuck with me for any length of time was ducky. it was a nickname bestowed by a close friend in highschool who misheard my grandfather calling me, thinking he was actually saying ducky. i liked ducky. it was like, "oh isn't that just ducky." kinda like bad and good all in one. and now jacks. jacks i like. but it emerged from a bastardization of the nickname beefjacky. that's right. all meaty and hard to swallow at the same time. that's me.

so even though no one ever answers my questions (e.g., to douche or not to douche - and i don't care if you all have lives and don' have time to comment on my ramblings - keep in mind i am an attention whore who requires attention to live. it's like superman and whatever the opposite of kryptonite is for him. you know what i mean. don't pretend you don't), i am going to ask about your nicknames. the good. bad. and the ugly.

i'm gonna log off now. partly due to the fact that i have no idea what i just wrote and partly due to the fact that i have no idea what i just wrote.

thank you for your attention.

dumping the "d" word

2008-02-26T18:57:00.000-08:00

(warning: this post may or may not be suitable for the following: actual douches, wannabe douches, and anyone who has a problem with vajayjays. you've been sufficiently warned).

okay. so i have been feeling some guilt about calling myself a starbucks douche. i mean, i have previously tried to validate my use of the term as a subversive strategy. and because, for reals, there are an exceptional amount of douches in the world. however. the question remains: is it appropriate for a feminist to use the "d" word? hmmm. let's ponder.

when i think of the word douche, i think of my dutch aunt. stay with me - this isn't going off the rails. yet. she never fails to use the word douche when i stay with her, as in, "and here is the room for the douche for the morning." okay, douching is not some kind of bizarre, collective, room-specific dutch morning ritual. she means the shower, but she inevitably uses the french term, la douche. my aunt isn't pretentiously co-opting the word. it is just how she learned to say it in english, okay?

then there's the summer's eve douches of my youth. not of my youth exactly (thank baby jesus that it had gone out style as a cleansing trend by my so-called "coming of age"). but characterized that part of my '80s youth that was horrified by the very. thought. of. bringing. back. freshness. every(gulp)time. gawd. i still can't say it without shuddering in my formerly nine-year old skin. bah. (and perhaps this is the very problem. the idea that i had when i was nine, or whatever godforsaken age, that made me cringe at the thought of something specific to women's "parts").

and finally there is the discovery of someone's mother's douche which you crowd around as if you have found a piece of the lost ark. or porn. or the filthiest secret imaginable. that just happens to have a nozzle.

so, okay. before i lose my audience entirely, i would like to bring us back to the point at hand. does douche in fact call to mind any of these above examples? or does it represent a kind of male humour that pillages and appropriates the very intimacies of the human female body for the sake of laughter? or rather, does it stand as a testament to the douche pictured above? has it successfully morphed meaning? in our hypertextual, unfixed meaning, postmodern world can douche mean douche? seriously. i need to know.

what do you think?

(i just want to apologize personally to matthew mcconaughey for a joke that has gotten out of hand. sorry. i'm an a-hole).

non-academics like me, they really like me!

2008-02-25T12:03:00.001-08:00

so i survived the Northern Voice blogging conference 2008. my first non-academic audience. i didn't expect to be so nervous but all i kept thinking was, what the hell are these people gonna say? i mean, with academics, you know you are going to be stared at, evaluated for levels of smartness, and then criticized. i can handle that. i have practice at that (as a girl growing up in catholic school, i actually excelled at coping with this at a young age. i think they even give out awards for those who don't crack by age 9). but non-academics? real peeps? what can you expect from these people? i, for one, had no idea. and that's why i almost hyperventilated.

i made my usual jokes. i threw in a few slightly off-colour ones to appeal to my unknown crowd. i think i may or may not have said something about penises being pink (in response to a woman in the crowd reporting the high incidence of penis pictures being sent to her in the context of one online dating site in particular. i acknowledge that this is a racialized comment. it is like saying pink coloured pencils are "flesh"-toned when they in fact only represent one colour of flesh. for this, i am sorry). i also may or may not have encouraged divorce for those who feel missed out on online dating. what can i say? i was frenzied. hopped up on starbucks new skinny lattes (which i used to have to describe but now i can just say a hazelnut skinny latte! the ease! and now the baristas don't laugh at me. um...did i just out myself as a starbucks douche? methinks i let the cat slip out of the bag. don't judge. unless you are an academic).

anyhoo. overall, it went well. i spent too much time on academic-y stuff which was to be expected. about mid-way through my ramble, one audience member was like, "so what were your conclusions?" and i was like, "okey dokey, let's just get down to business then." apparently non-academics are interested in conclusions. who knew? i am used to just talking a blue streak, throwing foucault out there a few times, and calling it a day. i realized, only after, that the best part of my talk was relaying how dating is dating no matter what. isn't that friggin' profound folks? i didn't know i had it in me. an audience member was like, "so is it different or not?" (okay, they were actually really polite but in my hadn't eaten, skinny latte, nerves-induced state, they all looked like horned devils spitting fire at me, okay?). and it was kinda liberating to be like, you know, it's not. well actually, i digressed and said that theoretically, there are significant differences, like the gendered patterns of dating in particular, but when it comes right down to it, dating is dating. so thanks horned devil with the immaculate insight. i might just have a dissertation here.

or a article for O magazine. whatevs.

why i'm a bad blogger - installment #4

2008-02-19T12:43:00.001-08:00

i'm a bad blogger because i suck at sales. these may seem unrelated, but stay with me, i'll make it worth your while. swears. up to this point, i have not been able to lure my non-blogging friends into commenting in the comment section. i think that i know that they are out there. somewhere. in the interwebnets universe. but they elude the comments section. they are not even anonymously reporting on how irrelevant my posts are. nuttin'. silence. anyone who knows me, knows that melikes attention. so essentially i am bad blogger because i am not selling my blog to those who don't blog and thus not getting the attention i need. like one of my cats, i am an attention whore. and i am jonesin' for a fix.

i like that blogs have the potential for dialogue. the comments section creates a space of/for discussion. now, maybe, you say, you don't say anything relevant to the lives of others and therefore they are not compelled to comment. you might say, your blog sucks. and after i say, shut up, you suck, i will acknowledge that you might be on to something. so i have concocted a top ten list of reasons why people don't comment. here goes:

1. no one actually reads my blog - this is no. 1 because it is the most likely. in that case, i am a bag blogger because no one reads my blog - save for the four people that i am sure of - and even they are not always compelled to comment.

2. no one can figure out what my blog is about.

3. as in life, i talk too much and only pretend to listen. (kidding. i do listen. if its about me).

4. no one likes me. (impossible).

5. my blog has bad breath.

6. commenters need to get drunk with me first. (i am available most days for intoxication, save the days i teach. you'd know that if you invited me somewhere in my comments section. jerks).

7. the comments section is too complicated.

8. people are afraid of openly acknowledging that they know me.

9. people want me to pick a topic and stick to it. (don't fence me in. seriously).

10. lurking is more fun than writing. i get that.

the most common and probable reason, besides all of the above, is that people who don't blog don't feel it is their "place" somehow to comment. i felt this for a long time. i was internet-paranoid: not filling in my email address on any website, not giving any information unless it was to online bank, not commenting on compelling blogs, not participating in any social networking. at all. but now that we as a culture have ridden the wave of facebook's rise (and some say, fall) from grace, we can be the master of our so-called internet domains, no? this bad blogger post will therefore attempt to empower those of you who, like me, are afraid of certain types of internet participation. for fear of spam or public humiliation. i am a bad blogger. so, too, can you be. or you can at least be a friggin' blog commenter in the friggin' comments section.

jeesh.

(don't make me turn this into a blog about cats. cause i'll do it. just watch me).

i like the smell of worms

2008-02-18T18:15:00.000-08:00

vancouver is undoubtedly a kickass city. not in any cultural mecca or fabulous nightlife kinda way. but in its great outdoor-yness. and yes, i know. before you barf over the over-the-top nature bullsh*t that abounds from the mouths of transplanted "vancouverites" (read: ontarians like me), stay with me - i'm not your average nature-lover. i'm more of a reformed indoor-a-holic. so i know of what i speak.

today i went for a hike which really ended up being the sum total of getting lost in a park/industrial park/forested community/golf course. but it friggin' rocked. and it rocked solely because of the smells. you know how certain smells remind you of things. or make you happy. or bring you back to a place that you forgot you missed so much you can taste it. i knew a girl once that wore the same (or close enough to be the) perfume my kindergarten teacher wore. i LOVED that teacher (and the way she read stories wearing a puppet on her hand while switching back and forth between her own voice and the puppet's). so i loved the girl. luckily, i never mentioned the smell to the girl. well. okay. i didn't bring it up that often. today the smell of spring: rotten leaves, fresh grass, fresh air, dirt, and the best of all, worms - was intoxicating. i seriously sucked it in. like the way i imagine people who huff pam do it (i imagine, and do not know, because of the urban legend that circulated in my youth about a couple of kids from the area who sniffed pam and died. just. like. that. this lore was akin to the lore that said if you smoked pot you would inevitably end up a heroin addict. and most likely pregnant. did i mention i grew up in a small town?). anyhoo. apparently wormy earth is the best kind of spring smell. it gets you just in the mood. who knew?

i also got beyond excited about warm weather and the possibilities it brings. in the past, the idea of spring as rebirth made me kinda want to hokey choke (apparently my new expression for all things cliche and hokey that my cynical nature forbids me to accept uncritically - see last night's movie reprisal of tv's knight rider for a graphic example of something that may cause you to hokey choke). but this year spring as rebirth seems kinda fitting. not cause i need a reason to be reborn. but perhaps cause we all need to clear out the cobwebs of our lives.

and keep on squirming in the wormy earth of spring.

bloggyriffic-ness!

2008-02-13T13:55:00.000-08:00

i am officially ridiculously excited about northern voice 2008! as i presenter, and an attendee, i get to do fabulous things like attend the kick-off dinner and meet super cool bloggers (in case you didn't know, blogging the coolest thing ever. EVER). i am especially excited about going this year as an actual blogger and not just as a pseudo-techno-genius. we even get to read our favourite blog entry at an open mic held at the dinner. super coolness.

i have a request for my dear blog readers - will you vote for your favourite of my blog posts so i can bring it along to read? much thanks and appreciation (i may, of course, elect to ignore any suggestions that are 1) embarrassing, and 2) embarrassing). your interactive participation is greatly appreciated and it makes me feel loved and the like. so in the spirit of pre-day v-day love, VOTE!

speaking of valentine's day, i have a few things to say. one is that, on the facebook status recommendation of a friend, i went to see ang lee's new film lust, caution. i kinda adored it in its heart-wrenching, in-appropriate love kinda way. like brokeback, it was unbelievably beautiful as a visual experience, and as a story of compelling characters (the lead woman, wei tang, actually acts more through facial expression than words - a feat in and of itself) who have achingly uncomfortable interactions, both physically and emotionally, it was breath-taking. unconventional love is lee's forte and i love it. love. it. can i have a job as a film critic now? please?

speaking of "unconventional" love, i am particularly excited about speaking at NV 2008 about online dating after valentine's day. my hope is not only to adequately transform my work into something that a non-academic audience cares about and finds relevant, but also try to transfer what i have learned through my research into practical advice. that advice is going to centre around three mains themes methinks: what to expect if you have not online dated before; how to stay motivated to continue the "work" that inevitably comes with pursuing dates online (and how this is differently "gendered," that is, how it is different kinds of work for men and women seeking heterosexual relationships); and what the "dos" and "don'ts" are for both men and women. sounds fun, no?

finally, i am super excited and intensely privileged to be spending another v-day with my love without whom, i'd not know how much love is akin to true happiness and joy.

and i swear to god, if anyone says anything about v-day being about hallmark cards, i'll die.

seriously.

got a haircut, still don't have a real job

2008-02-08T11:31:00.000-08:00

brace yourself for the randomest of random posts. i'm a little hopped up on coffee juice and i can't seem to stop myself from typing. i did, in fact, get a haircut and i kinda cheated on my hairdresser. but we have an "open relationship" which means she told me which of her hairdresser friends i could cheat with while she is in india. so i did. my hair is a little "cute" now (hence the pic of the cat) and i'm trying to deal. with being cute. which kinda makes me wanna barf.

also, i have been thinking a little about flexibility lately. and not the kind one dabbles with in open relationships with their hairdresser. but rather the kind that life demands. the flexibility that requires patience. and well. being flexible. i don't consider myself a person of rigidity but since discovering something called boundaries at a late stage in my life, i kinda dig them. life without them seems chaotic. but sometimes life within them feels stifling.

i still laugh at the time someone called me "easy-going." i am not easy-going. i have truly only met two people in life that i actually think are easy-going. i am fairly certain that both were the result of a near-nervous breakdown. apparently breakdowns can be freeing. i'll work on one to achieve the level of "easy-going-ness" i saw once glamourized in a jack nicholson movie. well. maybe not glamourized. but brain-damaged-ly peaceful anyhoo.

i think accepting your inflexibility is perhaps key to being flexible. pressing up against your own bounded boundaries and deciding they are too smooshy is perhaps therapeutic. not judging yourself for the limitations you place on yourself but being gently persuasive enough to realize that the walls you construct around you are mere facades. hollow of meaning. but securely holding you in place. straight-jackets of self preservation. useful. but too tight. like underwear.

cheating on my hairdresser made me realize that you can step out of your comfort zone.

but you might end up cute. which maybe isn't so bad.

burlesque is best

2008-02-03T11:31:00.000-08:00

first, i must say that teaching - my convenient excuse for everything these days - has been taking over my life and this is why my productivity level for pumping out posts has, in fact, been pitiful. however, in order to come back with a bang, i am going to write about my fabulous friday night when i experienced a burlesque show for the very first time. needless to say, i now aspire to be a burlesque performer despite the fact that i know this will never happen. still, one can dream.

you might remember my foray into pole-dancing not too long ago. this experience was, at best, conflicted, and fraught with dissonances between what it meant to be "sexy" for the gaze of (an)"other" - that is, a man. burlesque on the other hand, kicks the shit out of this notion of the gaze. mostly, in a intensely sexy juxtaposition, you feel object to the bodies on stage. as if your only function is to enjoy the beautiful sexuality that forcefully, aggressively, and uber-sexually demands your attention. you will not look away. feel squeamish. or objectified. you will, in fact, enjoy yourself. because, it just so happens, that burlesque is best.

before i went, i experienced some anxiety around the idea that this was - allegedly - a female-centric, feminist-inspired, expression of women's bodies. i was, in fact, afraid it would be mishandled. mistaken. misappropriated. and essentially be akin to stripping with a greater acceptance of the diversity of women's bodies. but still. a smidge-y ummm...dirty. and not dirty in the puritanical sense. but dirty in the male-defined and focused sexuality way. on the other hand, i was also fearful of it being an expression of our goddesses within. our inner femaleness. our connection to the moon. and excuse me while i puke, but i can't handle my inner goddess. it reduces me far too simply to my vagina.

shockingly, neither of these two worst-case-scenarios played out. instead burlesque ended up surpassing any expectation of predefined sexualities or (biological) determinants. essentially - and quintessentially - it was sexy. really friggin' sexy. and the power of the women on stage was palpable. visceral. and intense.

so what can we learn about the importance of pasties and pussies? well perhaps that the performance of different varieties of female sexuality needn't be predetermined or presumptuous. but that burlesque demonstrates that it is perfect in the power it affords women over their own representation. their (em)power(ment) within their bodies. their clearly defined and articulated agency. and that by wearing the once pariah-producing brand "slut," these harlots can kick the shit out of what it means to be a "properly" sexual woman.

this post was brought to you by the letter P. which apparently i am in love with.

this post is also tangentially related to something hilarious i stumbled upon in my blog travels - i give you the mostly hilarious sarah silverman in her music video producing debut (with special guest appearance by matt damon) entitled "f*cking matt damon."

sarah silverman's f*cking matt matt damon

enjoy.

getting back in the swing and/or living the vacation-life

2008-01-28T12:34:00.001-08:00

here i sit after a week of ridiculous fun filled with boot-buying, overeating, girl-talking wonderfulness. back to my own life. jeesh. since moving to vancity, our ontarian friends, family, and people we barely knew want to visit us. all. year. round. mostly i love it. wait for it. (re)schedule my life around it. but the part i hate. the part i dread. is the end. after you get to have a pretend vacation, put on a few pounds, neglect your everyday friends, and generally have a merry ole time, you have to face what was always in the background. your life. all unshiny. and not new. not like holiday time at all. just dishwashing. and cat feeding. and general life chores. sad really. unless you spin it. maybe i can go on permanent vacation. and pretend like life is just part of the adventure.

now just bear with me here. i am not suggesting denial or other deceptions of the self. i am suggesting a new view. a new paradigm with which one can refocus one's life in the positive. we all have stresses. annoyances. everyday trials and tribulations. and most often we look at the lot of others and think, "i wish that was all i had to worry about." as though life's trials are a matter of kind and not degree. as if we only had to worry about ourselves. our upcoming paper. our upcoming presentation at work. but if we only had to worry about going into an office. doing manual labour. raising a child. then we could function properly in the world. we wouldn't worry. we wouldn't fret. but that is our real self-delusion. we would. plain and simple. we would worry. fret. stress. not matter what. because if you are going to tie yourself up in knots for a paper. a work presentation. a promotion. then you will always and forever tie yourself up in knots. it is who you are. what your worldview consists of. you are programmed to fret. but this is not the only answer.

so what would everyday vacation-life look like? well, for one thing, you must take into consideration your surroundings. if so many people want to visit us out here, it must be pretty kickass, no? so the first requirement is easy. live in a kickass place. check. the next requirement might be a little more existential. love what you do. as monotonous as everyday life can be, vacation-life requires us to see the "bigger picture." the reason you do it at all. and not for the money. for the beauty of doing a good job in a field of your choice. and maybe vacation-life requires us to give, as my wonderful colleague and dear friend S. explains, our entire, 75%. this might sound odd but i think it might be the key to vacation-life. trying to do everything 100% when our 75% is not only good, but great, might ease off some pressure. at least a smidge.

i think the final, and perhaps most important part of living your best vacation-life everyday is a heady combination of taking risks and diversifying the portfolio of your everyday activities. move outside your comfort zone. take up hobbies. volunteer. engage with a world outside your own four tiny (if you live in a vancity condo) walls. i think we act our confident best when we go on vacation. we wear clothes that make us happy. we do different things with our hair. we buy things that make us feel good. we eat without counting calories and grams of fat. we live. and we are happy. perhaps it is as easy as following a passion that we find when we are away. or as simple as being the you that takes chances, risks, and leaps of faith that compel you to travel in the first place. vacation-life, here i come.

this post was brought to you by the tony robbins in all of us.

friendshippy goodness

2008-01-19T11:14:00.000-08:00

a visitation by my oldest and dearest friend from the national near east has prompted a great deal of thinking about friendship. how amazing. wonderful. inspiring. and wonderful it is. i used to think that friendship was about loyalty. commitment. and stick-to-it-ive-ness. cause sometimes, i found, friendship could be painful. or chore-like. with its jealousies, conspiracies, and mishandled feelings. friendship, for anyone who grew up as a girl, could be a battlefield. a series of hurts that one keeps returning to for fear of the different and unknown. girls can be cruel but this cruelty was only stereophonically magnifying our own personal cruelties to ourselves. the suffering of the t(w)eenage heart. when everything is painfully embarrassing beyond words. everything.

somewhere/time in the past, i assumed friendships may not stand the test of time. those unsurmountable differences of time, place, existence. but some do prevail. i don't want to rose-colour the ease at which this evolution evolves, but i do think it is a testament not only to shared histories but to a pair's ability to judge less. to leave behind schoolgirl gossip and the socialization that leads us to judgment, exclusion, and competition. there is beauty in not repeating stories. not reminding of past loves. not carefully constructing the "you" that is best, appropriate, and friendliest in the face of new friendship which often closely resembles dating as we age. friendship sustains us in all that we do but it also continuously feeds who we are especially when we are reminded of who we used to be. grounds us in the reality of what we are.

friendship is perhaps the most important thing in our lives as they continuously flux and change. because friendship is all we have to offer to family, friends, and acquaintances as we get older. we no longer rely on others solely for survival. we must offer something of ourselves to get something in return. i know, i feel it deep within my bones, how important friendship is in my life. i strive to be a good friend. an honest, committed friend. who values each friend as much as every other. i love my friends. they make who i am.

before i tear up, i will just offer that my upcoming awol-ness from my beloved blog is due to one such friendship. a friendship that makes me eight years old again while simultaneously reminding me of how far i've/we've come and how far we have to go. together. and always.

fat and unfit: the paradox of online honesty

2008-01-18T10:11:00.000-08:00

i have been marinating a paper that i plan to submit as a chapter in a upcoming book on matchmaking practices in the 21st century. but, as you well know, i am inordinately obsessed with fat of late. it is all i can see. think about. write about. this fact has been exacerbated by the new year's new you weight-loss resolution advertising and the general cultural obsession with fat on any given sunday. i have been reading about what it means for fat women to inhabit socio-culturally constructed "unfit" bodies and hear how their narratives are imbued with pain, rejection, and despair. it seems that fat sucks. yet it is part of life that non-normative bodies exist. and these women prevail despite slurs and fear-mongering. despite rejection and abjection. they survive.

all things considered, this chapter has to be about how the visuality of fat further mediates the online dating process. seeing fat. inspecting for jiggly bits. coming to terms with disordered BMIs. this is part and parcel of the process for men. they assume the responsibility of policing the bodily boundaries of the women they consider potential dates. they visually inspect. evaluate. decide. but this is not to say that women are agency-less in the expression and inhabitation of their larger-sized selves. the fact remains that women, even in their individual understandings of their embodied appraisals by others, do not hesitate to be who they are. they do not hide in shame, nor "inauthenticate" their profiles. they are upfront and above all else, honest. can we say the same of men who reject, deny, and displace based on a hip-to-waist ratios? not that this is a judgment. rather, it is an analysis. of what matters in matters of online love.

one central paradox that continuously puzzles me is how normalizing discourses elide the actuality of differently-sized individuals. similar to the certainty we feel about fundamental, genetic, inherent differences between men and women, we as cultural producers seem to think that denial of differently positioned bodies is appropriate. that by holding on to ideals of thin fitness, we can compel them. will them. through sheer shame alone. one of the very basic ideas i continuously try to present to my students is that critical sociology provides us with ways of thinking that allow for alternate discourses to be heard. that allow us to reject, or at least critique, discourses of oppression. one such discourse, pervasive in contemporary Canadian society, is the obesity morality tale. the individualizing, isolating, shaming discourse of "it is all your fault."

so perhaps i'm wrong. perhaps it is not such a paradox after all. non-normative bodies are acknowledged.

if only to say, its thinness or death.

sweet, and preggers, sixteen

2008-01-13T16:30:00.000-08:00

there is something beautiful about an articulate, self-confident, pregnant 16-year-old alterna-chick. in the movie Juno anyway. i saw this movie friday with my dear friend L. who is herself an amazingly articulate, intelligent feminist scholar and highly edumacated film critic. L. felt that there is something better than a highly articulate preggers 16-year-old. that is, a more accurate characterization of the life of your average, knocked-up teen. this is where we begged to differ.

several members of my family still hark back to a time (that mind you, never existed) when i was goth. apparently any 16-year-old with a shaved head, long skirt, and combat boots is some kind of goth. this points, i believe, to the overcharacterization of what it means to be a "goth" in popular media. i was not goth. no matter how many times relatives try to wrangle me into a black lipstick wearing, personal scarification performing, trenchcoat-wearing deviant, i maintain my alterna-chickness. cause that is what i was. and that's that. the reason i mention my previous incarnation as the baddest bad-ass (who never did anything wrong in her life, mind you) is because i think this provides the basis of my reading the character of Juno as deeply real, whereas my lovely friend L. read her as overdone. surreal. and ultimately ineffective as a character.

i believe that not only did i know young women like Juno, but that i was one. i was the girl inside my head. and, of course, i thought i was highly articulate. i was exceedingly self-confident. and let's face it - i was 16 years old - therefore i knew EVERYTHING. you couldn't stop me from giving my opinion. telling it like it was. simply being a know-it-all with all of my vast life experience and gritty youth on the streets of middle-class small-town ontario. yup. i was the baddest badass. for reals.

the main difference between me and Juno was that she got preggers and i didn't. and again, if we are facing facts, girls like me didn't get pregnant. even if we did. i remember the girl in my highschool who did get pregnant. at 15. she was the first girl in our catholic highschool that was openly pregnant. and gonna have it. be in for the long haul. she scared the shit out of me. we shared side-by-side lockers and one day i told her how brave i thought she was. she just shrugged it off and was like, "whatever, i'm pregnant, i can handle it." at the time i thought that was the most profound f*cking thing i had ever heard. handle it. dude. that's deep for a friggin' 15-year-old.

so that is that. the difference between L. and i. i lockered beside Juno. i watched her get bigger. i met her baby when her mother brought it to school to visit. i saw it handled. surreally. the point of this post - if i in fact have one - is that young women are profound. they are articulate. they are self-confident. and hopefully brazenly knowledgeable. it is perhaps only after we feel the stings of inequality. at work. at home. know the patronizing intonation in voices when everything we do seems to deserve a "good for you!," and experience the responsibility of expectation. compulsory femininity. enforced propriety. it is then we feel not to stable in our identities as the baddest badasses. and try to live in the judgment our bodies, ourselves, seem to attract. the gaze we can't shake. the overwhelming responsibilities of our "proper" selves. and perhaps we crack a little. we doubt. we don't know everything. and everyone seems to attempt to remind us.

i miss my 16-year-old shaved-headed (not goth) badass self. she was bitchin'. maybe she wasn't the worldliest. and she certainly didn't know everything she thought she did. but she was unendingly brave. infallibly so. she rubbed up against expectation and consistently pissed on it. she was cool.

and i think (hope, perhaps) that i'd make her proud.

topical creams

2008-01-11T13:06:00.000-08:00

when i was doing my master's degree, which as i have previously mentioned, was the ethnographic study of a nude beach, a wise old (to me at the time) phd student told me that like any topic, this topic too would grow tired. old. and i'd be over it. at the time a was taken back, aghast. no, i thought to myself, the novelty of nudity will NEVER wear off. never. that wise old phd student was right. one day and 150-something pages later, nudity got old. tired. boring. hard to believe, i know.

now that i am drowning in my data (40 transcribed interviews + 24 follow-up interviews = a crapload of words to analyze), i fear that online dating too might lose its glossy sheen of excitement. this is the excitement i see on people's faces when i tell them my topic. after they politely ask what my topic is, cringingly awaiting my response that they fear will be boring enough to make them die on the spot, or at the very least, excuse themselves to use the washroom, i tell them "online dating" and the mood significantly changes (not quite so visibly as when i used to tell people i studied a nude beach, but still, a visibly relieved reaction nonetheless). they are excited. happy that i won't bore them. pleased to get an inside peak into the seemingly (the hopefully) seedy underworld of online dating.

perhaps topics begin to bore us because when we translate them into academicese, they lose some of their lustre. their bang. and perhaps that is what has me caught in a holding pattern. how to analyze without dissecting? how to translate without something lost? how to be relevant, topical when nothing about online dating is easily decoded, outlined, expressed in simplistics such as: online dating works, online dating is bad, online dating isn't real dating, etc. the position i have put myself in isn't new. when you choose a topical topic, easy answers are demanded. yet i resist them. and maintain my holding pattern.

i truly believe that much of research is intuitive. it comes from somewhere unknown. within. deep, dark and hidden perhaps. it takes a formidable bearing to follow your gut into the seemingly unintuitive realm. against the grain of easy answers. and toward the itch that needs to be scratched. even though it elides the provocative and slips toward the academic. the jargon-filled. the abstract. it must be done.

so here goes nothing.

why i'm a bad blogger - installment # 3

2008-01-09T11:45:00.000-08:00

at this time of swirly-headed busy-ness, i thought i might take time out to berate myself after realizing the key ingredient that i am missing on this blog which made me realize again that i am a bad blogger. unlike every good movie, i have failed to sufficiently get you invested in the character of me and those in my life. failed to introduce you to my quirks, the lovely people i spend time with, and the rhythm of my everyday life. yes, my dear blog readers, this is an opportunity to talk more about me. and like smiling, me is my favourite. (extra bonus points for anyone who can name where that bastardized movie quote comes from).

my loved one and i usually agree on movies - mainly because he loves movies and is one of those strange people who must, against all odds, watch the crappy films to the end, just in case they miraculously get better. i, one the other hand, pretend to be discerning. but really am a sucker for good characters. characters i can relate to, become one with, and ultimately be invested in. i think that is why i love love stories so much - and i don't mean hokey comedy/romance debacles starring the likes of matthew mcconaughey and j-lo. i mean the beautiful, epic love stories like bridges of madison county and brokeback mountain. gut-wrenching, make-you-cry-like-a-baby love stories with characters you adore, pity, and love yourself by the end. ANYHOO. my point is, characterization is important. and key to the success of well, everything. (oh my goodness, isn't that just a key nugget from the world according to jacks).

another reason i am a bad blogger is because i have no idea how to effectively and efficiently carry out this characterization. i know what you are thinking: it comes with time, the evolution of who you are through an unsaid number of posts. but for those who know me, and know me well, know that i don't like to leave anything up to chance. plus, that takes patience and time. a whole lotta patience and time. (even more super extra bonus points for anyone who can name the song those lyrics come from) and waiting is boring, no? so here is the deal. i will admit to three quirky bits of erratic jacks behaviour and hope that i get some doosies (from all ya'll) in return. here's to hoping!

i) when i was very young, i used to use the clothing racks at sears for unspeakable acts. unspeakable. (and my mother still brings this fact up to anyone who enters the doors of her home. yup. i'm a very lucky person).

ii) i love baby animals. i know this doesn't sound unusual, but the fact that i want to take EVERY baby animal home is somewhat problematic. pigs, goats, caimans, rats, fish: EVERYTHING. is was virtually impossible to travel around south america without filling my backpack with baby things. (and no matter what my loved one says/thinks, i never did. at least that is the story i am sticking to).

iii) every time i get a smidge-y tipsy, i think i can speak spanish. si. jacks + borracho = hablo. mucho hablo.

i don't think this makes me any more endearing but it was a sufficient waste of time that allowed me to talk about my favourite subject. ;)

in other sad (for me, happy for them) news, my lovely friends M. and C. are off to galavant for 6 months and sit on beaches, get tans, and generally have a wonderful freakin' time. while i am happy for their adventure, i am desperately jealous and sad for me. here is to much skiing in their absence to make up for my losses.

alrighty folks, now i want to hear about the quirky characters that read this blog. whether you like it or not, we are in this together.

and p.s. - matthew macconaughey is a douche.

anxious much?

2008-01-05T14:35:00.000-08:00

of course i shouldn't be surprised, but anxiety is alive and well for me and my academic colleagues. in this post-xmas apparent disaster of unfinished papers, projects, living amongst the debris of all those unachievable goals (such as: i am going to read every single book on my topic over the break, i am going to finish all my research, my comps, my dissertation, etc.) that we deliriously, giddily, outlined for ourselves back in the heady days of december, when the holiday season promised to be with us forever, we find ourselves sad, anxious, unmotivated, and most vomit-inducingly, overwhelmed.

everyone i have talked to is either: scrambling to finish something, prep something, or simply keep themselves from dropping out and becoming a chef. or a florist. or working for walmart (not that there is anything wrong with that). psst. i'll let you in on a little secret about those of us in academia: we are overachievers with underdeveloped emotional intelligence. we think to ourselves, "poor us that we have so much to do, so much to become, so much knowledge to pack into the 5% of our brain that we actually have access to." we pity ourselves for getting to do meaningful work. for getting two weeks off a christmas and then, god forbid!, have to go back and slog over the topics that we are passionate about, teaching that helps us to grow, change, and evolve as people, and communities of knowledge that sustain us in friendship and in intellectual growth.

poor us.

it is sad for us really.

however, as foolish as i make it sound, or as facetiously as i try to slough it off, i think all of us suffer from taking ourselves too seriously sometimes. from thinking that we are extremely important. and that, somehow, the world does, in fact and unquestionably, revolve around us. whatever the reason we do this, we start thinking along these lines: that the world will end if the paper doesn't get done, if the course isn't perfect, if the report isn't our finest work. but it never does. and still we worry. we obsess. we overwhelm easily.

as is a common refrain on this blog, i don't have the answer(s). but instinctively i feel the problem lies in the over-evaluation of our own individual importance (not that we aren't all special, ya'll). in seeing the revolutions of the world as too fixed in our own orbits. we don't realize that everyone strives to be and do their best. that people most often don't do things to us (judge, evaluate, disdain) but for themselves (to quell their own feelings of worry, insecurity, uncertainty). that everyone exists in the worry of their own making and are not, could never be, as concerned with what you are doing, how you are doing, as they are in evaluating their own goodness, bestness, ability, inability... perhaps then, the answer lies in a shift of focus. off ourselves and onto others. in being sensitive to the worlds of others' making.

to trust our greatness to the care and nurturance of others.

or perhaps...

we (well, um, i) could just chill the f*ck out. ;P

new year, new you (?)

2007-12-31T15:16:00.000-08:00

first, a confession. i used to hate new year's. it always seemed like a forced-fun event. an arbitrary evening to slug back champagne and watch the eerily youthful dick clark on television. or attend parties full of people you didn't know. new year's always felt like a competition, an end in the means, an inevitable drunken debacle. but now, i see it differently. almost hopefully. at best, with cautious optimism. a dreamy rebirth.

that is why i have cautiously entitled this post "new year, new you (?)" because i beg those who try to shed their old, their pounds, their particular "question mark" problem to abstain this year, from abstaining itself. i, too, used to think the new year should beckon in the new and improved jacks. one who swore less, was fitter, a better person, smarter, happier, more well-rounded. but i was under the false impression that to be shiny new jacks, i had to give up, avoid, abstain, decrease. this ultimately left me unhappy. trying to shed rather than trying to gain. trying to close rather than open. i'm good at this. shedding to the bare minimums to perfect those while losing sight of what's more.

last year, i attempted something radically different. i added instead of taking away. i splurged instead of showing restraint. and now i have something ridiculously good to show for it. and it didn't take much. didn't feel like persevering. not like a chore. or a burden. but fun. essentially, i got fun for new year's.

at the end of 2006, i made a commitment to volunteer. i became a big sister. and now my life has a new dynamic that makes me feel good about myself. not too this or that. not not enough. not a work-in-progress. but a real live giver. doer. contributor.

now i tell you all this because i am cautiously, optimistically, breathlessly constructing new add-on goals. not take-away ones. and i'm all giddy with the possibilities. overwhelmed even with the notion that i can choose anything and, as my track record so far can attest, achieve it. that is really a crazy realization.

that i can do anything.

rather than i'm not enough.

i should be relaxing

2007-12-27T17:45:00.001-08:00

isn't it weird that you desperately crave downtime and then go stir crazy? i guess xmas downtime isn't really downtime though. it is kinda a fake break. you still run around like an idiot buying gifts, then doing everything until you can open the gifts, then open the gifts and in between see everything you know, cook and eat countless meals and generally do everything christmas-y imaginable like (deep breath) watch movies, eat chocolate, roast chestnuts, drink eggnog, drink rum and eggnog, drink copious amount of beer and wine, drink hot chocolate (i think i've mentioned i like to ingest stuff), spend time with friends and family, travel to see friends and family, shop some more, pay bills, go to fantastic holiday movies, and see lights, trees, and more lights whenever possible. and eat and eat and eat.

so i guess it isn't surprising that when you get a second to yourself, your head is still spinning. so today, when i should be relaxing, i am thinking about how i will be presenting at the Northern Voice Blogging Conference in february. a year ago this february, i attended the 2007 installment Northern Voice and marks my inauguration into the world of blogging. i had no idea it could/would be this much fun. it also marks a little over a year since the official start to my fieldwork (which is sadly done now. which is why i am supposed to be writing. not procrastinating. by writing a blog. a blog i thought i'd never have. anyhoo). so of course, to come full circle, i am going to talk about online dating at this conference and i gotta tell ya, i'm pretty friggin' excited about it.

over these fine holidays we visited with our lovely and talented friends L. and D. they are academics, have interesting topics of research, and generally treat life like a challenge. that is, they never run from the difficult. as top athletes and top minds, they will not be swayed from goals. taken off course. dissuaded. we talked about our dissertations (and collectively tried to avoid the always sickening "is it almost finished" question that NO ONE should EVER ask a phd student. EVER). while talking, i've realized that my educational journey has taught me one thing. that although it seems that nothing is getting done, that progress is stalled, that there is no end in sight - there is because i am just marinating. stories for me come from a place inside that i do not quite understand. probably will not ever understand. but i have learned to be patient. to wait. because they are coming. in a burst of what i would like to call inspiration, but rather resembles a kind of anxiety-induced near-expiration, it comes out. all flowy-like and rapid.

so knowing this one thing about myself, i have decided to call on my blog readers if, indeed, you are out there and are yourself cautiously awaiting the inspiration to expirate, to tell me your burning questions about online dating. to remind me what is the most compelling part of the oceans of data swimming in my head. what would you like to hear about the how tos, the practices, the processes of online dating of you were, in fact, attending the 2008 Northern Voice Blogging Conference? because this is a "non-academic" conference, i want to tell stories. and with your burning questions, maybe my marinating can turn into cooking. or grilling. or whatever one does with marinated stuff. you know what i mean.

i know it is a lot to ask at christmas. but consider it a gift. yes - ask yourself why you haven't gotten me a gift already. yeah, that's right. where's my friggin' gift?

huh?

i'm full

2007-12-26T18:04:00.000-08:00

i was going to title this post as the next in my sequential ordering of "bad blogger" posts but i'm too full. i think i am on a tryptophantastic high. anyhoo - i'm a bad blogger because i was under the impression that bloggers take christmas holidays. but i was wrong. all the blogs on my blogroll have faithfully and miraculously replenished themselves with the same insightful, witty, and creative stuff of always. so you heard it here first folks: bloggers don't get a holiday. armed with this knowledge, i too will try, high on turkey and massive quantities of carbohydrates (including my grandmother's kick ass stuffing which i am proud to say i can adequately approximate), attempt to write something. insightful. creative. witty. jeesh.

holidays make me think of food. which is obvious if you take into account that i stuffed myself like a christmas turkey moments before realizing my requisite duty to my dear, dear blog. also, this past christmas eve, i watched the new version of hairspray (and btw, wasn't there an old version with ricky lake? did i dream this? is this the turkey talking? help me out here folks). the film is about difference and accepting difference (exemplified in the themes of life-as-a-fat-girl who wants to be famous and a racially segregated baltimore seeking integration through the vehicle of a local television show aptly named the corny colin show or something equally retro-tastic). this intersection of holiday feasting and fat phobia apparent in the film resonated compellingly as i think about what is ahead for many this new year. that's right folks. exercise. dieting. the quest, as one gym i saw today advertised, for the "new you" this new year.

i, of course, pig out on holidays. take a break from everything. including worrying about how big my thighs are or how flappy the skin under my arms is when i wave (chicken wings i believe they are called). and i guess we all do. it is why we have holidays - to take a break from the always and everything of worry. plowing ahead. getting through the day. and perhaps this is why we panic when the new year hits. not only were we dissatisfied with our bodies in the everyday but then we went ahead and ate. and ate. and ate. (now i am making myself slightly hungry thinking about all the chocolate under the tree. i know. i'm full and still frothing at the mouth for dark chocolate. i never said i was strong. or not disgusting. or well-disciplined). getting back to the everyday means allowing those voices to once again control us. mentally measure our thighs. watch the flaps of skin flail.

what i was most astonished by watching hairspray was not how distracting john travolta was as a woman or the fact that christopher walken can still move like he did in his deer hunter days. nope. it was the fact that a young woman was portrayed who was strong. uninhibited. proud. talented. and fat. this is an image we never see. isn't available. does not exist in hollywood. but there she was. beautiful and bold. never once wincing at the slights, the insults, the discrimination against her fat that the movie depicted with hilariously horrifying (a expert john waters technique) clarity.

i don't want to get into a conversation about how the media does this to us. to women. and increasingly to men. because it is not enough. to think we are put upon. agency-less. void. but i do want to encourage thinking about difference as a way of experiencing the world. we can worry about our "new selves" - which are just copies of what is ultimately similar (that is, youthful, thin, fit, active, well-adjusted, happy - the list goes on. and on. and on) - as something beyond the confines of our embodiment and the narrow ways we have to inhabit those bodies. rather our "new selves" can be defined by different categories. and we can perhaps realize, much to our surprise and decreasing worry, that our "old selves" are increasingly habitable. because difference exists. no matter how hard we try to stamp it out with resolutions. to encourage our bodies to be something other. ultimately, and unlikely, similar.

and perhaps a smidge less fabulous.

now where did i put that chocolate...

the un-sexy pole dancer

2007-12-18T10:31:00.000-08:00

this past sabbath-day-of-rest, i was pole dancing. with a "learn to lap-dance" chaser. perhaps i can explain. apparently, pole dancing is the number one choice these days for bachelorette parties and it just so happens that my lovely friend A. is getting married, so what better way to prepare her for what's to come than do things like "pretend your shy" (i'll let you decide what that is on your own) and "ask for your tip" (something i can see coming in very handy). i found myself conflicted from the beginning. first there was the issue, if you remember from a previous post, that i hate heels and therefore don't have any. basically, i felt inadequate and unprepared without at least one pair of stilettos or plastic-heeled hooker boots (don't pretend you don't know what i'm talking about - just because they never leave the bedroom doesn't mean you or your loved one don't have any).

i settled on a new pair of no-heeled turquoise boots because they are cute. and who doesn't feel sexy in some slouch turquoise ankle boots? turns out, i don't. i'm not sure what i could have worn to feel like a sex pole dancer but it would have had to be a lot less. a lot. then there was the fact that every move was broken down into parts, so things that you might customarily do that you, at the very least, think are sexy, somehow became very unsexy-fied. sexy-less. sex-less.

and i couldn't help but feel conflicted. once, a lone time ago, i watched a pole dancing party on t.v. (an attempt to inform about the popularity of the phenomenon i suppose). i was incensed by the end. granted, i get incensed about the way women's sexuality is regularly portrayed on television and i get particularly incensed about the way in which it gets packaged and presented to us at so-called 'sex' parties. as if we are there to get an education about what our partners (if they are male) know, want, and like. pole dancing was eerily similar.

don't get me wrong. it was fun and it was an experience. the teacher was an athlete in the art of the pole dance and my jaw literally dropped when she did a little routine at our request. but it is based on the presumption that we can feel sexy, be sexy, as women primarily when we conform to men's desires. when we act naughty. shy. aggressive. there is something strange - beyond the notion that we would pay and not be paid for such work - about a group of women getting together and grinding over invisible partners in a big multiply poled room together, no?

i don't want to sound like a prude, or an anti-sex feminist, but i wonder why we as women can't get together and define the ways we would like to be sexy. and i don't mean by talking about our vaginas. or or maybe i do. i think the sense of displaced anxiety and general discomfort with ourselves (or perhaps, just myself) is about a refracted desire. a desire we have seen before but does not constitute our own. i don't mean this post to be biologically essentialist - as though desire is something men and women have and is not, itself, constructed by allowable acts and gendered arrangements. that is not my intent. my only point is that in the hierarchy of desires, women's is somehow other. undefined. easily usurped by the lure of the male-desire driven strip club.

as final thoughts, i would like to reiterate: that i'm glad i did it, i would like to come up with alternative desiring practices for the future of bachelorette parties, and i would like to wish all ya'll happy holidays. because every pre-christmas post should be about pole dancing (you'll be happy to know that i want to say something about "north pole dancing" but i won't because that would be lame. see how i protect you from myself dear blog reader?;).

why i'm a bad blogger - installment # 2

2007-12-14T12:05:00.000-08:00

i'm a bad blogger, or simply an annoying person, because i think that since i have begun blogging - everyone must. i'm like one of those people that finds a new restaurant and the EVERYONE has to go, reads a new book and EVERYONE has to read it, turns a certain age and then EVERYONE has to be that age. well, perhaps the last one is a bit of a stretch, but you are smelling what i'm cooking. suddenly, i can't help thinking about the fact that everyone i know is interesting, have compelling pursuits, and are talented in the arts of the mind (is that immodest to say? everyone i know is fabulous ergo, i'm fabulous? (fyi, i just accidentally put a "t" on the end of ergo, because i thought it was silent, and found out that ergot is actually the name of a species of parasitic vagina among certain grasses and grains - no joke, look here. don't say i never taught you anything, especially about the interspecies cornucopia of vaginas).

anyhoo. i am going to continue to be a bad blogger by attempting to make my fabulous friends torn among the doubtless fabulous blogs my other fabulous friends are wont to make now that i have incessantly insisted that everyone must blog their respective and collective fabulousness. whew. that is a lot of immodest fabulousness.

in closing, i am going to leave you with a collection of words i am not super fond of. of course i had to name my blog "i hate my blog" thereby compelling me to think of things i actually do hate and thereby perpetuating hate on "i hate my blog" blog. a disclaimer: i love love. swears. just look at previous posts.

gross words:

* panties - however, panties has significantly grown on me. when i was 11, saying panties to me could have resulted in copious amounts of vomiting.

* mustache - it is gross to say and gross on people's faces. for real.

* skakum - a country road near where i grew up.

* taste - i don't actually hate the word taste but i hate when waiters and waitresses ask you how something "tastes." i find that a deeply personal question that should not be asked flippantly. :P

* speaking of vaginas - the t word. i can cosy up to the c word in a subversive kinda way, but the t word? please. it's horrible.

what are some of your unfavouritest words? what words give you the creeps? induce vomiting? tell me - i need to add to my repertoire...

i should be at the gym

2007-12-10T17:07:00.000-08:00

instead of being accountable to my fitness regimen, and my cardiovascular health and the like, i have instead opted to sit on my couch and write on my blog (please refer to post image for my current philosophy on life). instead of being a conscientious body technologist, i am thinking about going to cincinnati in march to a fat studies conference. as i previously mentioned, i am thinking a lot these days about fat, its meanings, narratives, and morality tales. in a recent discussion with friends about the conference resulted in a conversation about the meaning of "fat" and if it can truly be subverted with the rearticulation of "fat" as a subversive term. using fat in common parlance seemed to cause unease, dis-ease, with any notion of empowerment bandied about at the table.

i balked at the idea that we cannot get out from inside the hate that breeds hurtful slurs, pejorative parlance, unhappy embodiment. but it provoked thought about the power of words, the making and unmaking of our collective realities. the connection i make here to my own state of laziness has nothing to do with any equation between laziness, the gym, and fat but rather about the morality tales we tell ourselves about our own relationship to proper embodiment, desirability, and the amount of "like"ness we can have in relationship to our corporeal forms.

everyone has the voice that encourages them against or toward their desired bodily forms. don't eat that. eat that quickly so it doesn't have time to stick to your hips. thighs. ass. going for a walk/gym/run feels good. getting up off the couch is for losers. etc. the same voice that tells us were not worthy. too simple. not sufficiently complicated to keep the interest, get the job, make it work...

i guess i want to relate to fat through my own body. position myself up against its problematic, pregnantly possible, potentially persistent edges and embrace it. as it affects my thoughts. dreams. will to exercise. everyone has a tale to tell. an "i beat fat" or "fat beat me" story of failure or adventure. of daring to dream something other. or live in a state of heavy flesh. i think fat provides us a window onto our tiny voice. our unarticulated anxieties. our unpronounced denouncement of our fleshy cages. fat signifies a freedom of will. and a failure of control for those who subscribe to a moral discourse. but can fat be other? why can't fat be more? can fat be more?

i think those at the conference in march will teach me so.

lists

2007-12-07T12:59:00.000-08:00

i am currently reading a fabulous poetic book called how the blessed live by this fellow vancouverite writer/blogger here. the main character has this lovely habit of writing deliciously rich lists that are chalk-full of meaningful life lessons, reflections and paradoxical states-of-mind. i have decided to make my own list of pet peeves which will be reflective of nothing mentioned above but will please me on a listless friday afternoon when, of course, i should be working...

i) when stores are obviously closed and they leave their blinking open signs on. i always think, "oh, they're open late" and then am crushed when i cannot, in fact, get my keys cut in an hour at midnight.

ii) amateur porn. really? must you? stop it.

iii) cat fur tumbleweeds in my apartment that even a swiffer can't wrangle.

iv) being sweaty and cold at the same time (this happens less since moving to the westcoast but it happened in o-town all the time. it's the second coldest capital after moscow, don't-cha-know?).

v) that you can't eat poutine for breakfast, lunch, and dinner without adverse health affects.

vi) sickness of any kind. after two flus, one pukey and one not last winter, i am officially a germaphobe.

vii) roman numerals.

viii) boring research.

viiii) people that don't like christmas. this, my friends, is virtually unimaginable.

x) not having a cellphone for the two times a year i need it.

xi) wearing tights. it's a faulty crotch thing. i seriously believe it can't be helped. or they would fix it, no?

xii) high heels. wanna love 'em and wear 'em. can't. or won't. you choose.

xiii) anything with eggplant. the word moussaka makes me throw up in my mouth a little.

xiv) any movie with nicole kidman (save for moulin rouge but that is ONLY because ewan macgregor saves the day).

xv) roman numerals - really, what is up with these?

xvi) plane travel. i always get stuck in the middle seat.

xvii) how i can never go to the theatre and smell popcorn and not eat it.

xviii) being late. which i'm gonna be if i don't stop blogging!

thanks for indulging me. i feel better now.

i love love

2007-12-03T16:03:00.000-08:00

despite my blog title alluding to hatred, i actually love lots o' stuff. i love cats, beer (and how i wish i didn't!), teaching, learning, reading, walking, EATING, christmas (holidays in general), my family, my friends, my love, and love itself. yup. i love love. lots. it explains why i tangentially study love - dating is meant to lead to love, no? - and why i while away countless hours talking to my friends and loved ones about love. i have come to wonder about how love exists in degrees as well as in ways i don't fully understand. there is love that is really fear of loss. love that is jealous. love that is new. fresh. shiny. there is lasting love, love that is fleeting, and love that is so sweet it makes your teeths hurt.

love is often perceived as a mystery. an elusive and wispy creature that strikes at a moments notice. when you least expect it. when it rears its head and emerges surprisingly, "at first sight." love is constructed as fragile, easily lost, hard to capture. what function does this notion of love have? is it a moral tale: those that are nice, kind, willing, able deserve love? to get love, you must give love? to be unloved is to be nothing. to be lonely. to be somehow undeserving. or is it a tale that neatly sets us up in institutions of marriage. of bondage. of cycles of unproductive reproductivity? or is it a fairy tale? a non-existent make believe that invades our imaginations and limits our own creativity. narrows our view of possibilities. perverts our gaze. none of the above i say! because i am a love loving unromantic. non-romantic. anti-mantic.

i think love causes us to do things we wouldn't otherwise. makes us feel compelled to emote. and emote lots. i am a believer in listening to what love tells you to do without succumbing to fantasies of utter fulfillment. perfection. or mistake the fleeting love of the beginning for what must always be.

i am often asked if i believe in soulmates. soulmates are another pervasive theme in my research as many of my research participants are motivated to online date in order to facilitate a faster, more efficient, route to their soulmate. and the honest answer, is yes. i believe in soulmates. but i don't believe you find your soulmate all packaged and clean off the shelf and ready-to-go. i think you find your soulmate like you find your favourite sweater. the perfect pet. your favourite spot on earth. or maybe it/they/he/she finds you. maybe love is a fiction. a fantasy. a pre-fab house. fake. unstable in hurricanes. not so fire-retardant. but i don't think so. what is lost by believing in love? what is gained by resisting it?

if i put my feminist hat on, i could say many things about what is gained by resisting love. total independence. lots of time not spent on emotional labour. lots of money saved on fluffy wedding dresses and expensive catered meals. but i think, even as feminists, we can imagine a love that doesn't confine us. belittle us. congest our lives with cleaning and rearing. we can love and be free.

but perhaps only if we critically imagine love as a constructed mystery.

and not a for-real sherlock holmesian one.

the largesse of fat phobia

2007-12-01T14:28:00.001-08:00

i've been thinking a lot about fat lately. not in the "i want to lose five pounds" kinda way but more in the "fat phobia is a pervasive theme in my research that i eventually have to turn into a dissertation" kinda way. i have never thought so much about fat. other people's, my own, my cats'. i had an msn conversation yesterday with my friend A. who lives in far off korea at the moment and we discussed, well, what else? fat. we discussed how fat is that last bastion of overt oppression. where one can say discriminatory things about another's weight in a group and not be reprimanded because that person just happens to be fat. as though it is a moral weakness. an all too obvious display of livin' the good life.

fat phobia seems to represent a number of different things. it is reviled as a blatant example of being being off the mark of some kind of ideal, some kind of normative standard. yet the phobia produced and displayed is much more visceral than simply the result of some kind of non-conformity or failure to fit into an ideal (which A. and I also problematized for being too simplistic - is there but one ideal? how can we all live within our awkwardness, our large feet and noses, our stretch marks and pocked faces if we are all striving toward one, someone's, version of what's id/r/eal). no. fat phobia is about fear. it is born from within and spit out like venom in hopes it will shield us. protect us. from that which is other. out there. in its largesse.

i have become enchanted by this blog here called the 101 Reasons I Hate Being Fat. it is an introspective and honest account of living with fat in a culture of fear and loathing around fat. similarly, i watched an episode of oprah who paraded individuals who had lost massive amount of fat about for her ew-ing and ah-ing audience. such an achievement that we even had to see a man pull the skin that formerly stretched over his large stomach from inside the very large pants he used to wear. interesting.

i don't have any answers as yet (not with regard to my own work anyway) but one notion keeps occurring to me. fat phobia, like other phobias, or fears based around difference from sameness, is just that: about difference. it seems to me that in a society that greets/treats difference as subversion, fat fits the bill. because overweight people (according to medicalized discourses of proper BMIs, that is) are targeted as "different," they must pay the price. become marginalized. stigmatized. fat is less about health in these instances than about rightness. moral turpitude. fiber.

fat simply isn't (th)in.

reasons why i am a bad blogger: installment #1

2007-11-29T17:11:00.000-08:00

in what i hope will become beloved feature of my blog, i present why my emergent blogging abilities suck. this is done solely for the purposes of improvement and not for purposes of pure masochism. because grad students LOVE masochism. it's how we do. reason number one that i am a bad blogger is as follows:

i don't not provide my readers with paragraphs. apparently this eases the reading process and makes reading inane blog posts more palatable. who knew? i thought my endless ramble of text was visually appealing. even seductive. apparently reading masses of meaningless text sucks ass. i get that.

henceforth, i am committed to paragraphs. i say, "the more, the BETTER!".

another, somewhat related reason, that i am a bad blogger is that the rules of grammar, at times, elude me. i mean, what actually are grammar rules? did we learn them? when? and can i get my time spent in like grade one through twelve spent on learning the english language back? please?

i realized this grammatical elusiveness when i was meeting with my lovely fellow soci phders who talk about such matters as grammar. we are potentially the coolest group of hipsters one can find. ;)

also, i can't properly pronounce the word "egg." i hope this doesn't interfere with my blogging.

finally, i think when people use the word "douche" to describe a person, it is freakin' hilarious. i have committed to trying to use this word subversively as a feminist and not perpetuate the misogyny that gave birth to this trend.

this final point is a testament to how i am a bad person however. not a bad blogger.

egg.

ode to reality television, otherwise known as: hook it to my veins

2007-11-28T15:44:00.000-08:00

the impossible dreariness of today compels me to write on my beloved blog. i have been thinking lately about the function of procrastination and i believe graduate students excel at the art of procrastination like no other (what else is graduate school if not the procrastination of many of the socially proscribed compulsions of life - partnering, procreation, post post-secondary life in general - or at least this is how i imagine my grandmother sees it). today i want to comment on my other love, that is, television. an aside: i have a friend, S., who i have known a long time. whenever i call S. and ask what she is doing, she says, "watching television." never t.v., never 'the tube,' never anything but that lovely word: television. i love calling television television because it harks back to a fictional time when television was an art, an alternate way of seeing, a transporter to other lives, loves, maybe even lurid, sordid, and unspoken yearnings. anyhoo. my televisual eyes were not fully opened until i discovered, and fell desperately, consumingly, all-encompassingly in love with reality television. when i was thirteen or so i discovered the real world but that was just the beginning. i think my reality television love really began with the onset of the survivor era. when EVERYTHING became fodder for the lens of the reality phenomenon. what i love most about reality television is that it actually provokes discussion about what is "real" and what is not. in effect it exposes the lie that we are not always already mediated by that which surrounds us. frames us. alters us. for me, reality television cannot be about reality but must be. that is its central paradox. why it cannot be 'real' is of course a matter of modern truth-making in a postmodern world. but why it must be is the more compelling concern. when i see discussions about the ethics or problematics of how to correctly capture the 'real' and properly package it for television, i listen intently. for example, the recent kafuffle about the new american series kid nation provides an interesting example. cries of child labour, exploitation, enslavement and the like. as though relatively well-off children having the opportunity to demonstrate that children are in fact capable, able, and not desperately in need of suffocating 'protection' for cameras (and the entertainment of the masses) is damaging. as though putting children in a former ghost-town with bunches of rules and no adults is somehow real. or is it not? isn't the problem that actual child exploitation is a little too much to bear? a little discomfiting on a wednesday night at 8pm when we'd rather watch t.v.? isn't a show like kid nation a distraction, a simulation of what passes as 'normal' childhood these days in the face of child poverty and such? this post is far too cerebral. it was intended as a meditation on my favourite reality television shows. so before i list them with accompanying witty commentary, i will just say that reality television is my favourite because it upends the notion of the real by rubbing in your face the constructions (simulations? fantasies? de/i/llusions?) of everyday life.

* big brother - the quintessential reality show for the consummate addict. one day i will 1) stop claiming that this is the summer that i will resist it and, 2) stop being too cheap to pay for the live feed.

* the real world - this show NEVER gets old. how could it? egomaniacal americans in their late teens and early twenties in close quarters. please. this shit is genius.

* america's next top model - pick what is not to like about this show: beautiful women, drama, clothes, make-up, and did i mention drama?

* everything on mtv - mtv is the mother of all reality shows. those of us obsessed with anything from the hills to a shot a love with tila tequila should petition to give this channel a medal. or a nobel peace prize. or SOMETHING!

* beauty and the geek - two of my favourite things.

* daytime talk shows - from oprah to rachael ray - it's gold people. gold. (don't judge me dammit!).

* the food network - reality food shows - what can i say? i'm in heaven, i'm in heaven...

jacks out.

coming out of the graduate school closet: off of the beach and onto the internets

2007-11-27T14:59:00.000-08:00

i have been effectively blogging for over a month now (such a huge commitment i've made to the internets, i must say) and recently realized that i haven't actually said what it is that i am studying that makes this blog necessary in its: a) capacity to familiarize me with the exciting world of web 2.0 and, b) to offer me a place of solace, of peace, of genuine procrastinate-y goodness. drum-roll: i study online dating. now at parties, this makes me unbelievably popular. similar to my master's work when i did an "intensive" two month stint on a nude beach and got: 1) the best tan of my life, and 2) a master's degree out of the ethnographic account of it i gave in my thesis, this project is of widespread interest because of the amount that is not known about such an everyday activity. like nude beaches, online dating sites are places people might have stumbled upon or clandestinely ventured into for a "sneak a peak." but the folks i am interested in are the ones who stay and bask a while in what can become a lifestyle. online dating, as i am compelled to understand and research it, can become a lifestyle as well - or more pointedly, can alter the course of one's lifestyle if indulged in seriously. and i gotta say folks - people are serious about online dating. and why shouldn't they be. it is a wonder that popular culture references online dating as though it is for the desperate, defective, or depraved. my research, perhaps unsurprisingly, demonstrates that online daters are really just people that are committed, diligent individuals trying to meet people in a city that is infamous for its inhospitality to singles. online dating of course has a sexy side, a fetish side, a dissenting side, and a niche market side but what interests me most are those people simply and unabashedly looking for love. i mean theoretically i am interested in all of the online daters many-faceted motivations, expectations, and struggles to (be)come and show who they "really are." i have always been fascinated, since i was a child, with difference and what difference means in a world of the similar. online dating in some ways demands to be seen as a "different" way to meet people. but what is more fascinating is what that difference means to the lives of online daters and the ways that they understand themselves in the world. not only can you life, location, and love-life change, but your understandings of yourself and the effect you have on the other can also change. not that i am suggesting that engaging in online dating necessarily evokes change and wonderment at oneself. but it does offer a opportunity to reflect, on oneself and one's desires and thus a fertile valley of publicly accessible and vastly engaging accounts of the self. we must make ourselves intelligible in this world if we are to attract (an)other(s). being compelled to seriously look for those others in a forum such as online dating is interesting in its difference but also in its sameness. to oneself intelligible, one sometimes has to put themselves into boxes that don't quite fit, shade in areas of alien importance, and deign to answer those requests, behests, of those just not quite "right." i will have more to say about areas of the intelligible but for now i enjoy having intriguing dinner party talk and a memory of a summer on a hot canadian beach.

not-so-random-thoughts

2007-11-20T15:17:00.000-08:00

there is a trend that bloggers i admire sometimes subscribe to and i have decided to take the plunge and braindump about the random (and no so) thoughts (that the everest survivor i read about in maclean's eloquently equates with bats zipping in and out at dusk), by considering what i consider to be some not-so-random-thoughts albeit written and presented as unconsidered randomness of the most randomly random. yeah. sometimes it feels good to talk shit. here goes:

* shockingly, a four-year phd seems impossible. or that is what everyone who has their phd tells me. who knew?

* the old adage that says that life happens when you are making other plans was impressively de-corny-fied by my lovely friend M who has deep insight into not only human behaviour but jacks anxiety as well. i believe she said something, characteristically simple-but-always-shockingly-profound about how life is surprising and ultimately the surprises are always good because they result from (and in) choices that you make/have made. she is an old sage dressed in cute pixie skin i tells you.

* i am not always as funny as i think i am. again: who knew?

* housewifedom, not matter how diametrically opposed to what i am doing (and really, how different is it? i once met a guy at a party who asked me what i did and, during my long graduate student pause, offered that there is no shame to being a housewife to which i promptly replied, "i'm basically a housewife who reads a lot." see how i think that i'm funny?), will not save me or deliver me from my dissertation. no matter how many bonbons i eat. seriously.

* i think britney spear's new songs are danceable. and this makes me a fundamentally bad person.

* everyone deserves a warm-weather destination vacation fully paid by their work or the government

* i have no idea what actually goes on at american thanksgiving (nor how it is different from american christmas) (nor how american and canadian christmas differs) (nor why the fact that austrians apparently have a baby jesus that flies to and fro on christmas eve (?) kinda scares the crap outta me).

* i am puzzled as to why my brain refuses any kind of systematic inquiry. like math, coding, making lists (and actually checking them), writing in an agenda, playing risk, strategizing of any kind, really, making plans over a week away, and editing. the word editing seriously makes me shiver. i won't mention it again. just for my own safety.

That, my friends, was an attempt at brain-dumping randomness. which is actually impossible for me because even randomness requires some kind of systematicity which i have only badly approximated here. i know you want to read a blog that is better at random thoughts. well here it is: here . so there.

posthuman paralysis

2007-11-14T16:29:00.000-08:00

on friday i am going to preview ideas for my dissertation. tell the story. convince inquiring minds. i hope. currently i am grappling with some of the most exciting and interconnected ideas EVER. my supervisor tells me it's gut-work. the story you know because it exists in the data. was not preexistent, of course. but emergent. it is like i already know the story. it's there. staring at me. but it is the connections. always the connections. i know they will come. i have faith. the faith. swears. the most exciting moment so far is in understanding how individuals construct themselves in the pursuit of their desires. desire is an interesting thing. it seems like it must also exist in togetherness but it seems to often exist alone. alone in your mind. in front of the screen. a screen. any screen. it is something that we wear. inside out and outside in. we construct ourselves around the pursuit of what we want to make manifest. we construct the things that are in our power to change, alter, augment, in the hopes of sometime, someday being fulfilled from the outside in. a few days ago i began a post marking the day of remembrance with a meditation on ambivalence. it was an ambivalence about death. the ultimate loss of that which we have made manifest through our desires. our lived desires. our hopes to be one that has been, will always be, accepted in our excesses, our estrangement, our identity. identity is such a narrow and slippery slope. it walks the plank between oblivion and boundary-ied box. it fixes one in place while promising possibilities of plurality. the ironic relationship between identity and desire is what puzzles me now. what paralyzes me. what makes us all always. already. posthuman.

disarming good

2007-11-08T13:36:00.000-08:00

with all the hoopla about positive thinking in the realm of new-agey BS, i thought i'd give it a shot. can't hurt. can it? as a disclaimer i should say that while i don't believe in the innateness of human characteristics, i might just have been born a cynic. asking the universe for what you want, creating your own reality, being positive all seem like things people do if a) they are unhappy; and/or b) they are dirty hippies (just wanted to say dirty hippies. hehe.). but my softer, more "open" side compels me to think, to know, to believe in the old adage that you catch more bees or flies or whatever with honey than with vingear. i have no idea why one might want to catch bees, so flies is probably the ticket (although aren't you just trying to kill them in this watery/honey-filled grave you are constructing? this is like the moment you find out that fairy tales are actually the scariest horror stories ever told. bees. flies. imminent death. a tragedy i tells ya). anyhoo. i recently wondered what the worst thing that can happen out of being positive is. and, of course, it's nothing. so i tried it on for size and it isn't too bad. for one, the annoying bus lady that talks too loud to her friend about the intimate details of her life was actually a gift to me yesterday as we stood still on the granville street bridge for a really. long. time. her story was interesting and made her multi-dimensional. like an actual person you know. a friend. keeping you company on the bus. then there are the actual friends in your life that support you. are kind to you. respect you. and yet you never see it. it is like you are blind to kindness until it smacks you in the face. by bringing you tea, coming to your talk (that they have heard over and over and over), giving you fabulous ideas. kindness and good stuff abounds but perhaps we are closed off to it. afraid of the unknown that is good. positive. disarming. we struggle against what we are, what we do, who we know, what to be. but for nothing. we all have our struggles. our unease. our unfinished projects of the self. but even knowing that is positive. good. refreshing. like honey water. maybe mixed with vingear for some bite.

critical skating: the only way to roll

2007-11-04T15:28:00.000-08:00

when i was three i started figure skating. i skated my ass off after school, before school, DURING school until i was about 13. ten years of trying to be elizabeth manley (an obscure canadian skating reference - congrats to all those who got it) , to be good, to be noticed. one thing i always prided myself on, and my parents encouraged, was that i never cried if i failed a test, lost a competition, fell down. what i remember, and perhaps this is selective memory, is always being encouraged by others with kind words and other forms of wood and plastic trophy-like praise. i was my harshest critic. i was the one that berated me for not doing my figure-eights perfectly, for not landing a jump, for falling in the annual skating show. i wanted skating to be fun and i knew when i was young i was good at it. i wasn't allowed to "just" do the fun parts, like making up routines and dancing with the partner i received to compete with as a result of being picked from the ice-rink stands as his perfect skating companion. no. i had to do it all. i had to go through the levels as quickly and as precisely as one can at such a young age with no real thoughts of where these circles were leading. when i was 12 or 13ish (my memory already fails me), i quit. just like that. such a big part of my life, gone. i had had to make the decision whether to pursue it as a future and begin lessons with another former olympian or hang out with my friends. be a kid. have fun. maybe i exaggerate. i don't know what would have become of my skating. surely not the olympics or anything close. but perhaps something. but i'll never know. and i'm okay with that. most of the time. but my skating past reminds me of my present. my striving toward a goal. only this time, i know what it means. i know it means a future. a job. (part of) my life. and i've come to wonder why we, to borrow a beautiful phrase from a loved one, wear our goals, our lives, our work like a burden. why we, when we have everything feel like we have nothing. not enough. like we need more. why we feel less encouraged. under-appreciated. criticized. especially without out wood and plastic reminders of our successes. our achievements. our lives. these days i try not to see things as either/ors. i try to remember that i do everything because it suits me. because it is me. and i am doing everything i've always wanted. and wearing it like a burden can only amount to crying over skating.

i'm an impressionable bricoleur (blush)

2007-11-02T15:10:00.001-07:00

i used to think that if you were going to do anything, you had to do it right. so i used to not do anything. cause you can't do everything right all the time. or even most of the time(?). i used to think you had to do the whole thing if you were going to do anything. i used to do everything in that sense because it was possible in my mind. obsessive thoughts about how to do everything right all the time and the whole thing all at once. but does anyone do everything all the time? i profane of fakery. faking "it." faking that you have it all together when you have nothing but fear. the people that do this all the time make me nervous. they make me think that somehow, some way, grasping for every/any-thing is a reasonable pursuit. i think it might rub off. onto me. into me. of course, the best advice is to always "be yourself." i think being oneself is possibly the most liberating thing there is. but it takes work. work like that of those "faking it." except in the reverse, the work it takes is to open oneself up. to criticism, praise, ambivalence. it's exhausting. to be oneself. more than not being? hard to say. they both take performance. but Turkle makes me wonder. about our relationships with ourselves as mediated by objects-to-think-with (in her case, this object is the computer). it is interesting (and of course not new) to think about the world around us as mediating our understandings ourselves. and others. and the objects themselves. while i don't completely buy Turkle's vision of our intimate relationship with computers (because it gets into AI and social-psychological explanations that focus too much on the individual and not on the tripartite or networked relationship human-computer-human, that is, relationships between people that are mediated by technology), i do like her notion that she borrows from Levi-Strauss about the bricoleur. the bricoleur takes extant information and re-situates/constitutes it to make the world intelligible. thus we have bricolage - the process by which problem are solved or knowledge is constructed/acquired not from top-down design but by arranging and rearranging a set of well-known materials. we are all bricoleurs. we all negotiate our surroundings that separate, alone and bare, would be less intelligible. we would be less intelligible but for the bricks we cobble together about ourselves. whether they are weak and crumbling or strong and Inca-like. maybe that is the point. as bricoleurs of our selves we cobble together what we have. what we are given. and what we are refused.

i heart halloween

2007-10-31T10:06:00.000-07:00

i have been thinking a lot lately about the significance of halloween, mainly because it has been taking over my life for the past week and a half. in recent years i have discovered that i LOVE halloween. it is such a silly thing. it's not like i'm goth (or ever was), like death, or enjoy hanging out in cemeteries (even though i did take a ambulating tour of mountainview cemetery lately and it was pretty freakin' cool). i've decided, as much as one can, that the significance for halloween for me is the transformative effect it has on - wait for it - everyone. i know, i know - ohhhhhh - everyone gets to be someone/thing else - isn't that liberatory (reminiscent of Turkle's Life on the Screen which i am currently reading). but seriously, there is something cool about the transformative effects of change, no? while the internet may be a hasty receptacle to pour all of society's hopes and dreams for liberatory change, empowerment, and utopian je ne sais quoi, this tendency does beg some interesting questions about the human desire for transformation, growth, change and something "other." we could chalk it up to consumerism, as we could everything, including my precious halloween, or we could think of it as an exercise in the technological imaginary a la de Lauretis. the combination of anxiety and desire around technology (and other transformation objects, effects, and affects) is a compelling and powerful, if not heady, experience. someone recently told me that they think people like scary movies in order to feel something, to feel alive. to be scared into your own humanity is a interesting proposition. to remind ourselves that we are alive, have the capacity for change, and the desire to seek it out makes every other day (other than halloween, that is) seem lacking. my tenuous halloween-as-a-metaphor-for-technologies-of-the-internet thing might be lacking as well in that both produce fear, anxiety, and a certain amount of pleasure but one happens only once a year and the other pervades our everyday, every minute, every second. maybe the desire for transformation and change does as well but we are "programmed" to ignore it, push it down, hide it in the recesses of our mind until we are allowed, enabled to set our difference out into the night of all hallow's eve - the simultaneous celebration of life and death. do we not seek to say something about ourselves, whether blogging or dressing up as something clever? is it not all about us on some level. the work on the self. the identification with the other to become more, different, better. anyhoo. monster mash just came on. must go do the twist. another imperative on halloween.

on hate

2007-10-28T14:02:00.001-07:00

i know what you are thinking. hate is such a strong word. therefore we need some clarity in this endeavour. i don't actually HATE this blog but i'll let you in on a little secret: i hated my last blog. it was painful and "professional" and horrible. i needed to get rid of it. so i dumped it for this sweet new glossy one. all pretty and easy to use. so hate is a misnomer. so there. on my last blog i felt compelled to be confessional, professional, and...well, that was just boring. but this is a whole new story. as someone who has always loved to write and who now studies new media technologies, i decided that i NEEDED a blog. what makes me so needful of a blog? i guess the advice of another recently morphed phd student come doctor who recommended a blog for procrastination purposes (find her fabulous blog here). and a conference where another phd student tracks the pedagogical importance of blogging for other phd students (find her personal blog here - it links to her phd research blog). so i'm putting a lot of eggs in this basket. i am hoping for catharsis for sure. so maybe hate isn't really a misnomer. i hate the compulsion to narcissistically write about oneself. but hate stills sounds so harsh. i also hate the compulsion i feel to outline the uses and abuses of my blogging. like an outline for an essay, i feel i need a plan. i have been watching way too much of the Showtime series Dexter and feel that this prefatory blog entry is inspired by the painful articulation of his innermost thoughts which acts as the narration of the show. maybe that is what this blog will be: a narration of my writing-up "process." a friend recently encouraged me to join his ten-year plan for the (un)completion of his phd process. wittily, he explained that people immediately stop listening as soon as you tell them that you are writing your dissertation. he has been effectively hedging people off and doing his phd swimmingly for ten years now. as envious of his procrastination as i am, i still want to be finished in a year. so while the time starts ticking, the hate stops here. until, of course, i begin to hate my dissertation which is TOTALLY gonna happen. fer sure. it's coming. wait for it...