no parking on the dancefloor

A lovely little time-lapse video of the bridge going up and down.

I used to live on Hawthorne and 19th - across the bridge, and worked in the lower right hand corner.

I really do love pork, but not this kind.

A reasonable (meaning no holds barred on any candidate) deconstruction of pork-barrel spending from my one of my favorites, Matt Taibbi:

The thing that's really vile about earmarks is how cheaply we all get sold out. Two million of your taxpayer bucks in exchange for a $5,000 donation? Greenlighting a billion-dollar Pentagon boondoggle for a couple of free flights? Hey, if you're going to sell us out, at least fucking bargain. But it's not their money, and they never do.

barack obama: the final throes!

"That's why Giblets is so certain this final crippling blow to the Obama candidacy will be the finalest and most crippling of them all...Giblets doesn't need to wait for "polls" or "data" or "actual facts" when he has the sound judgment of real authentic heartland folk like Chris Matthews and George Will and Hillary Clinton!"

liquor land, originally uploaded by miz_ginevra.

It's not a Disney ride for drunks, and it's closing to make room for a CVS.

"This is a double-edged sword," said Dumas Lafontant, director of the Lower Roxbury Coalition. "It's never good when liquor stores outnumber supermarkets, and we welcome giving residents more access to medicine and other goods. On the other hand, we don't welcome a major corporation replacing a locally owned business."

Horace Renge, 56, an unemployed man with a big, toothless smile, comes by the store nearly every day to earn a few dollars fetching coffee for the Petrillos or sweeping the place. His picture is on one of the store's cash registers...

"David Mays has even more to lose. The president of Tow Happy earns about $2,800 a week towing cars from Liquor Land's lot, where people visiting the hospital often park illegally. "There's no way I'll replace this income," he said, after nearly towing the car of a reporter who had been at the store.

Petrillo and her daughter Christina, who are on a first-name basis with many customers, say their business is about more than money.

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Liquor Land is across from the hospital which houses the gym I go to, and bookends a bunch of public housing. It makes me sad to lose a local business that's been around for longer than my dad's been alive.

nerdily, I like the Vegas-y typepace.

(Not to place you as the scion of t-shirt marketing, but, hey! you kind've are.)

I'm offering to you a proposal to innovate another size: the extra medium.

See, some of us girls are shaped differently. Some of us do not cut the willowy silhouette you model after. Some of us are larger in some places and smaller in the others. Quoth the Sir of Mix-a-Lot: "little in the middle but she got much back."

Extra Small? Check. Extra Large? Check. Wither the Extra Medium?

Look, I'm the median of women's sizing. This means that I wear a size 6 in some brands, a size 12 in others, and everything in between. I'm not saying the fashion industry is going to suddenly wise up and give us realistic, modern, proportional sizing for women of all shapes. I'd just like another option to choose from in all the madness.

Extra medium, to my mind, wouldn't be a size between medium and large, but more of a "chick" shape. You know, enough for awesome logo t-shirts to fit across various expanses of boobage without stretching out the letters, long enough to fit over pants without plumber's crack, and a waist that nips in a bit to give it a shape.

Theory gets this, and so does BCBG, but spending $50 on a shirt isn't really my (ha!) style. I'd like a wider range of options for cute, stylish logo t-shirts, like the ones I get from Mule Design:

extra medium.

I won't go off on a tear about the fashion industry. It's an industry, as ridiculous and creative as a corporate practice  can be. As an industry, fashionistas of all stripes struggle with eating disorders at the front of the house, slave labor at the back of house; sexism, racism, and homophobia just to name a few. I'm not here to critique that. Go on with your bad selves.

I'd still like to propose the extra-medium: it sounds good, it fits well, it's a helluva good marketing practice.

Loves and x-large kisses!
Ginevra

I bought a little chicken from my local butcher, which prides itself on local, grass-fed meats, which are without fail expensive and delicious. They also have the best eggs I've ever eaten. A bold sign outside declares "New England Can Feed Itself", and despite the freezing temperatures and how tired I am of turnips and kale, I almost believe them.

Given this fierce local/organic approach to their wares, I should have expected what happened. When I got home with a little chicken marked - get this - "Buddhist Style". And indeed, little chicken looks heart-meltingly serene: its little feet were tucked underneath it in a perfect lotus pose, and its head, still very much attached, bent prayerfully to one side. Hello, little chicken! (Typically, they ask me if I want it butchered, but I think they forgot and I assumed.)

I'm not quite sure what to do with it. Do I confess that I am a sissy and take it the mile walk back to the butcher, and make them lop off its extremities? Or man up (as it were) and butcher the thing myself? It brings back memories of my dad saying the reason he never eats chicken is watching his mother kill one by catching it and breaking its neck. My husband certainly doesn't want to play Barber of Tremont Street.

I'm not sure if this will turn me back into a vegetarian, or teach me to finally Get Over It, that my delicious roast bird ones had a face and feet. The rest of the world would surely sigh in impatience that I would even be thinking twice about this.

I think I'll call her Marie Antoinette. The beheading is scheduled for 5pm this evening.

all in a pretty row