Yeah, Baby, I Like It Like That...

I second Cindy's profuse thanks to 10 % Productions for their underwear models.

Who Woulda Thunk It?

When one thinks cute and cuddly, one does not generally picture nasty, unhealthy microorganisms. Yet, these giant microbe stuffed animals (or bacteria or fungi or whatever the individual case may be) are adorable! My favorite, of course, is the bookworm.

Byzantine Splendor

These are the famous mosaics of the Empress Theodora (top) and the Emperor Justinian (bottom). They're in the Church of San Vitale in Ravenna, Italy. Aren't they exquisite? I have a fascination with the Byzantine Empire and its history. Lots of colorful and interesting characters, Theodora and Justinian high among them. Someday, I plan to journey to Ravenna and see these mosaics myself. Till then, I'll just enjoy the pictures.

Hierarchies

We all need to have someone to look down on from time to time. Bloggers and geeks are no different. In fact, it may be more of a need for us because we're so often looked down upon by society at large. Therefore, it's comforting to know that, no matter how much of a dork you are or how lame your blog is, you'll always have the furries and the crazy cat bloggers to feel superior to.

My Hero

No one does hilarious invective like the Faggoty-Ass Faggot. Watch as he skewers the HRC for its ineffectiveness and commercialization! Marvel as he blasts Queer As Folk! Wonder as he cheers the segregation of the waxed!

This One's For Cindy (aka the Unsinkable Cindy Best, aka The Notorious CAB)

What Everyone Should Know About Blog Depression.

(Via Gawker)

I Don't Get It

You know those junk emails that have web addresses in them that the evil junk email people want you to click so they can get your info ("phishing" or whatever) and put spyware and viruses and other crap on your computer to steal your identity and like take all your money and ruin your whole entire life and also make your computer explode? You do? Well then can you help me figure out what this www.youkillbugsgoodman.com address even means??? Is it supposed to make me feel all manly and macho and hetero so I'll click thinking I'll see boobies but instead have my life destroyed? 'Cause if that's it, it ain't workin', sugar!

It's All About Me

Kyanka at Something Awful, like any red-blooded American, has an innate sense of entitlement. Hilarity ensues as he chides his dependents for not giving him anything in return for his care and attention (besides bodily fluids, apparently). It's a great read; check it out.

It also contains, like, the best line ever: "I'm such a terrible gardener that I can't even successfully grow tired at night."

You Want Me To Put WHAT In WHERE?!?!?

Joe. My. God. gets kinky. There sure are some weird people out there.

Defending Jon Stewart

On Monday, Jon Stewart interviewed Senator Rick Santorum. I didn't watch it because I had no interest in listening to an idiotic homophobe like Rick Santorum, but a lot of people are up in arms, claiming that Jon "softballed" the interview and didn't go after Rick enough.

Dudes, chill! Jon can't do everything! He tries to have a civilized conversation with his guests and, as some voices of reason have pointed out, he can't chew out every public figure he disagrees with or he'll only be able to get mindless celebrities and ideological cohorts of his to come on the show and that wouldn't be so good. Yeah, he called Tucker Carlson a dick, but that doesn't mean he should do it every night; at that point, he'd degenerate into nothing more than another smug, not-funny liberal "comic" (we already have Al Franken and Janeane Garofolo, and that's more than enough). Yet some people seem to feel downright betrayed, saying he's "too nice" and "too liberal" (i.e. trying to be nice to everyone and reasonable and openminded, a position that just makes my mind boggle) and that he "sold out" gay people or something.

Guys, I love Jon Stewart. I adore The Daily Show. But I think some have put far too many expectations on it. It's only one show and can only do so much. If you want more public evisceration of the right, try building a Democratic Party with a backbone and an original thought, okay? The Daily Show cannot be the entirety of the liberal/progressive movement and it shouldn't have to try to be.

Update: Apparently, by missing the first ten seconds or so of yesterday's The Daily Show, as I did, I missed Jon's witty and charming acknowledgement of the controversy over his Santorum interview. Now, everyone's back on the bandwagon. God, people are fickle!

Sad

At first blush, a man being killed during S&M sounds kinda macabrely funny and/or another excuse for prudes to say that sex-is-dirty-especially-with-handcuffs-so-DON'T-DO-IT-KIDS
-or-you'll-DIE-and-go-to-HELL, but if you read the story, it's really very sad. He worked hard for his success and was killed for it. That's just wrong.

I Am Noah Webster's Bitch

I'm an Anglophile through and through, but when it comes to spelling, I'm as American as the Liberty Bell. (Except when it comes to spelling judgement with an "e". "Judgment" just ain't right, y'all!) Cheers!

(Via Bookslut)

The Wife of Bath Is A Playa, Yo!

Sensei George of Bookninja links to a story about a hip-hop version of The Canterbury Tales.

I have to say, I'm a bit skeptical. I'm no rap hater, but I'm always a bit leary of these "let's take a classic and make it hip for the kids!" kind of thing. It's often ill-advised and a little condescending to the "youth" who would be just fine with the original, if you given the chance. Remember that "Hip-Hopera" version of Carmen MTV did with Beyonce? No? Good, I blocked it out, too.

It'd be really cool, though, if the artist used Middle English for the rapping. A Middle English rap would be cool! It'd open up a whole new treasure of rhymes, because, though recognizably a form of what we think of as English (unlike the weird-to-us-today Old English), Middle English was pronounced quite differently than Modern English. It all has to do with "The Great Vowel Shift" that took place right before Shakespeare's time.

This shift in pronunciation, BTW, is the reason for English's weird spelling/speaking split; a lot of the words today that are spelled nothing like they're pronounced were perfectly phonetic in Middle English. Unfortunately, spelling began to settle down and be codified just as the pronunciations they were based on totally changed. If spelling codification had waited a few decades, we'd probably have a much more phonetic language.

Bring It On, Bitch!

Okay, we all know I'm a huge-ass nerd, but even I think this writing video game thing is a little lame. I'm not much of a video gamer, but even I know that the whole fun of it is to blow shit up, not write a term paper!

(Via Bookslut)

Oh, I'm Not Bitter!

I'm not bitter at all that some people get an amazing dinner and a night of sweaty sex, followed by a whole day of fourgy action, for their first gay dating experience. Oh, no, not at all!

As Usual, I'm Ahead Of The Curve

Gay.Fleshbot read the same Slate article about the "disappearance" of the jockstrap that I wrote about yesterday. They come to more or less the same conclusion as I did as to why they're disappearing in the straight world: the gays have grabbed them all!

College

Just clicking around, I came across this post at a blog entitled Maverick Philosopher. The proprietor, one William F. Vallicella, Ph.D, makes an important distinction between "education" and "credentials" that I think is often uncontemplated.

The story he tells of his "overeducated" friend rings very true to me. I wish our society could grapple with the fact that some people are meant to go to college and some people aren't. One group is not superior to the other; they're just different. But the roadmap of the middle-class American life now includes a college education, so all kinds of people with no business or interest in going to college do.

I myself am not one much for "grunting and sweating and schlepping heavy loads," but instead enjoy the "effete and not quite real" life of the mind. I doubt I'll ever have a "real" job. But so many people I encountered in college gained nothing by it except for the piece of paper. A "real" job would have made them much happier and been more productive for them than four not-exactly-wasted-but-inconsequential, years.

Rockin' The Jocks

According to this Slate article, guys just aren't into jockstraps like they used to be. All I, as a jockstrap fetishist, have to say is that that may be true for the straight boys, but we 'mos know a good, sexy piece of underwear when we see it! There's nothing like those few strips of cloth and elastic; they plump the package, frame the ass, and leave things open for fun! *fans self* It's getting a little hot in here...

Nude Descending a Staircase No. 2
Marcel Duchamp

A Plea To Protestors

Can we please come up with a chant a little less corny than "Hey, hey! Ho, ho! [So-and-so] has got to go!"??? Hippies, Christ freaks, and assorted other marchers/picketers: please, be a little original once in a while!

Visual Stimulation

Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?
Paul Gauguin

The Oath of the Horatii

Jacques-Louis David

Holy Blue Christ!

People, is nothing sacred? Leave the Smurfs as they are, Hollywood; none of this CGI-remake crap!!! Smurfette will cut you, bitches!

(BTW, what does it say about me that I always found Papa Smurf incredibly hot? Yeah, that's what I thought...)

(Via Defamer)

Brilliant!

Word nerd that I am, it's not surprising that I think My Favorite Word is a cool site. Anyone can send in their favorite word, with a short description of why they like that word so much. The best entries will be included in a forthcoming book. Cool, huh?

Camp Humpalottamen

Michael Lucas, the enfant terrible of gay porn (yes, I know I add that moniker every damn time I talk about him, but it just fits so well), is currently shooting a movie on notorious Fire Island. This blog post about getting ready to shoot the movie is very funny. The mental picture of Michael Lucas as a "camp director" who "instead of making sure [the porn "campers"] scrub behind their ears, ...run[s] after them with an enema" just tickles my funny bone.

Obit

James Doohan, aka Scotty from the original Star Trek, died early on Wednesday from pneumonia and Alzheimer's. He led a very interesting life outside of Star Trek, though, as the fine obituary at SciFiDaily attests. He was part of the Canadian contingent that landed on Normandy, for instance. Anyway, it's very sad and my heart goes out to his family.

Testing... Testing...

Test your art literacy. I got a 7 out of 8. Unfortunately, they don't tell you what questions you got wrong, but I'm sure mine was the one about modern sculpture. I know nothing about modern sculpture.

You can also test your knowledge of Greek mythology if you'd like.

(Via That Rabbit Girl)

Moby Sucks

BWAHAHAHAHAHA! Moby really does suck; even his love of dogs is a pretense.

(Via Gawker)

Books, Books, Books

I made a trip to the bookstore yesterday. For my summer reading program, I did indeed go with Boethius' The Consolation of Philosophy, but also picked up a copy of Marcus Aurelius' Meditations. I did look at The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire and decided to read it, but all the copies I saw were really beat up, so I decided to wait and try and find a better copy at one of the other bookstores I haunt.

And, yes, I must confess: I bought a copy of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. I just finished it a few minutes before writing this post, actually. I won't bore you all with a review (I don't want to spoil anyone and others can review it much more adroitly than I), but I will say that Rowling is amazingly adept at accurately portraying teenage social life and emotions, and that the ending is very, very affecting. Her editor really needs to put a stop to the comma splices, though; I've noticed them in all the other Harry Potters I've read and it's a very jarring and irritating stylistic erratum.

Daily Harry Potter Post: The Aftermath, or "We Shot Our Loads, Now Pass The Cigarettes"

Bookninja brings us in-depth coverage of You Know What. First, a bookseller on the front lines describes the midnight madness. Then, George & Co. get their linkin' on by electronically pointing to stories, features, more stories, reviews, more features, commentaries, and essays.

Gawker adds that the NYT says (follow that?) that about seven million copies of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince were sold on the first day, for a take of $117 million dollars in 24 hours. Me, I think I'll wait for the Gawker version, Harry Potter and the Mulatto.

Harry's ass must be, like, totally gross after all that fucking! But Harry is, like, such a whore, so he probably liked all the pounding! I hear JK's a hard pimp to work for, though; she'll choke a bitch!

Hotties Against Poverty

If I'd thought of Live 8, not as a meaningless celebrity "Aren't we wonderful? We care about BLACK PEOPLE!" wankfest, but more a chance to ogle sweaty young men without their shirts, I might have gone!

Tan line? Duuuude, what tan line?

Yeah, you know you want it!

How y'all doin'?

Ciao, bello!

How you dooin'?

(More pics at Cute Guys from Live 8)

Summer Reading Update

About a week back, I patted myself on the back for my summer reading program. Last week, though, for some reason, I was in a rare "I don't feel like reading" mood, so little progress was made. The past few days, however, I've made some strides. I finished The Praise of Folly (witty, but not as funny as I'd hoped) and H.G. Wells' The Time Machine (very short; very Victorian, very modern, and very futuristic, all at once). I'm still plowing through The Varieties of Religious Experience. It's a fascinating book and William James' prose is quite absorbing, but it's very dense reading; I have to be in a very specific mood to deal with it.

I think the next classic I'll tackle is Boethius' The Consolation of Philosophy. Or maybe I'll go with Gibbons' The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Or maybe both. I won't decide until I go to the bookstore and see what's what.

Like

I have trouble not liking people. I'm a nice guy in general and want everyone in the world to be loved and cherished. The thought of all the lonely people out there makes me sad, so I try to like everyone I meet. The world has enough hate and apathy.
More selfishly, when I find myself not liking someone, I always hear a voice in my head that says, "When you don't like someone, it's because they reflect something about yourself that you don't like and don't want to admit to." Therefore, I'm often charitable and polite, almost to a fault, to people who really don't deserve it, just so I can pretend that I have no flaws that others reflect. Eventually, of course, I give in to the hate, but it still makes me paranoid about what that says about me. I really care what other people think of me, so if I don't like someone because they have a characteristic I subconsciously think I have, that means that other people don't like me because of that characteristic. And I want everyone to like me! Because that's what it's all about. Right?

Happy Harry Day!

To those who went to the midnight parties and already have your copies of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, kudos and huzzah! To those who are going later this weekend, good luck. To bookstore employees: may God have mercy on your soul. To all readers: enjoy!

Red or White? Riesling or Burgundy?

It may come as a shock to some, but I really don't like to whine. I try to live by what I call the Leaden Rule (so-called because it's the inverse of the Golden Rule): "Don't do what you don't want other people to do." And as I don't much like whining in others, I try not to do it myself.

But I can't help but give into some whining. I'm just really upset about not being able to find a man. I fully accept a lot of responsibility for this, since I'm not going out there and meeting people. But why does no one online seem to be at all interested in me??? Why do I log in to online meat markets to find nothing but empty inboxes or messages from guys a thousand miles away (a phenomenon I never understood; why bother writing me when we'll never meet?)? Why do nearly all of my messages get ignored? Am I that disgusting and unattractive? I don't have any illusions that I'm God's gift to fags, but I like to think I'm half-decent in the looks department. And what about my wit and charm? Doesn't that count for anything? (What am I saying? Of course it doesn't!)

Am I too being picky? Are my expectations of the Internet too high? I mean, I want a versatile or top man in my general area who is clean, disease-free, and has his own place. All the guys who look good seem to be bottoms, PNP fanatics, and want to meet at my place. ("Hey, Mom, Bob and I are going to my room to have sex!" Yeah...) Is an older, intelligent, articulate, well-off, slightly hairy, muscular leather Daddy with a well-stocked playroom, a nice house, and lots of creativity too much to ask for?

Seriously, it's all very disheartening. I'm horny and I'm lonely.

Awwwwwwwwwwwwww!

I hate Moby (you know what I think of those damn hippy, PC, artiste types), but I just have to show his ugly mug because that bulldog is just. too. damn. CUTE! I melt into a big pile of goo just looking at him/her! *sigh* I miss my Dusty...




(Via Towleroad)

Daily Harry Potter Post: Pontifical Edition

Well, it's nice to know that what the current pope was worrying about when he was just a cardinal: you guessed it, our boy Harry!!! As Jon Stewart just put it on "The Daily Show," if anyone would know about the "subtle seductions" of children, it's the Catholic Church!

(Via Bookninja)

Among the Primitives

An anthropology professor went undercover as a student to see how the proverbial other half lives. She's written a book about it and, I for one, would be most interested to read it. I was a commuter, so my college experience was different from those who lived on campus, but I'm very, very curious to see what a professor finds and thinks about student life. Judging by the article, she seems to have come away with a newfound understanding and respect of her students.

Some in the comments section of the article have taken issue with the ethics of this ethnographical study. I don't really see a problem, because she got permission from people where necessary and she's kept everything very anonymous. It doesn't look like she was out to embarrass or expose anyone, either. I'm neither an anthropologist nor an ethicist, though, so I may be totally wrong.

But then I think of what Cindy (aka the Unsinkable Cindy Best; aka the Notorious C.A.B.) says about anthropologists: "They make stuff up!" It makes me a little cautious about believing her and her findings, even though it all seems pretty legit. Damn you, Cindy, for tearing away my innocence!!! *LOL*

(Via Inside Higher Ed)

Daily Harry Potter Post: Crazy Haters and Crazy Lovers, Together At Last!

As I blogged about earlier in the week, some people hate Harry Potter. Some, though, want it to see it win literary prizes. If we're not careful, it's gonnna get all East Coast/West Coast by the time the next one comes out!

(Via Bookninja)

P.S. I realize that for someone who says he's not a freaky Harry Potter fan, I sure blog about it a lot. True. But there just seem to be so many weird stories and bloggable incidents connected to it that I can't resist! Plus, with the buzz ahead of Saturday's release of the next installment so loud a bee's nest sounds like a Zen garden by comparison, everyone else seems to be talking about it. Why not me? I'm not above peer pressure.

A Trio of Bagatelles

This is both too f'n cute and almost too f'n gay.
_______________________________

Zack Parsons of Something Awful gives what is, more or less, my own position on pornography in the face of those who disapprove of it.

People who think porn will turn you into a ravening sexual predator are in denial about the fact that 95% of men have watched pornography. I would go so far as to say that pornography is a healthy part of sexual development for most men. It may not present the most accurate depiction of the women [or men] they will encounter in the real world, but finding a Penthouse [or Inches] out in the woods has provided many an epiphany for hormone crazed pubescent boys wondering what all those strange feelings were.

There’s bad porn, there’s bad people involved in porn, and bad people sometimes watch porn. I don’t think any of these things equate to porn being evil. If they did then we’d get rid of TV because of “Average Joe” and that fat people weight loss show on VH1 or get rid of music because some serial killer liked Britney Spears.

________________________________

I'm with Gawker on this "Carnival of New Jersey Bloggers" thing. As the Gawker editors say, "We’ve [...] never thought of it as a particularly coherent state: the top part thinks of itself as adjunct New Yorkers, the bottom part as adjunct Philadelphians, and neither wants to have anything to do with the folks in the middle."

New Links

Just added a few new links (see the sidebar to the left).

Under Links I added World Wide Words and Astronomy Picture of the Day, two sites I've been visiting for quite some time, but, for some reason, just didn't put up here.

Under Blogs I added Learning Curves and second order approximations. I just found these a few days ago. They're both professor blog (profblogs, anyone?). The former is written by a math professor in the South (she's pseudonymous and vague about the particulars of where she is, but it seems to be the Carolinas somewhere) who's really into knitting, home repair, and "noethrian rings." I can't understand most of her math or knitting talk, but she's a very funny and compelling writer. Second order approximations is the blog of a physicist. I can't tell you too much about him, yet, because I've only just started in on the archives, but he's also funny and interesting. He uses ellipses a bit too much, but for one of those scientist fellows, he writes well.

UPDATE: I've gotten through a lot of second order approximations and the ellipses have faded away quite a bit. He's even funnier than I'd originally thought, too! Gotta love the biting sarcasm. Oh, and he actually got a grant to write a play, so that explains the writing skills. (Haven't gotten to the part where we see how the play turns out, though.)

Homo-verse

The universe is just too queer to understand. I always thought Reality was a little flamey.