today is the day

[mrspete]

It’s jeans Friday and I’m wearing this cute shirt untucked and when I sit there’s a gap btw the shirt hem and the waist of my non-quite mom jeans.

You can’t wear that to work! said the man I’ve lived with for nearly twenty years.

Why not? I asked. When people come by my desk to ask me dumb questions, I can say, talk to my butt crack, and then keep working. What are they going to do, fire me? I already quit and everyone just ignored me.

Well, at least wear a sweater, he said, then you’ll be fine.

And I realized at that moment that my husband will never ever understand me at all.

[mrspete]

It was suggested by folks I respect that this post may have been a bit too heavy for the Internet, and that I should include “trigger warnings” and such, so I decided to remove it. (If you want to read it anyway, it’s here.)

Instead, please enjoy an Internet-appropriate listicle of the thread of books that saved my life—this time—in the order they found me:

Secrets of the Camera Obscura,  David Knowles

Ghosts, Paul Auster

A Fan’s Notes, Fred Exeley

Sea of Fertility Tetralogy,  Yukio Mishima

There Should Have Been Roses, Jens Jacobsen

City of Quartz: Excavating the Future in Los Angeles, Mike Davis

The Question of Bruno,  Aleksander Hemon

Lolita, Vladimir Nabakov

The Los Angeles River: Its Life, Death, and Possible Rebirth, Blake Gumprecht

Drupal 7 Module Development, Matt Bucher and Matt Farina

Out Stealing Horses,  Per Petterson

Everything Matters! Ron Currie, Jr.

Independent People, Halldór Laxness

And fuck LA, forever.

[mrspete]

And no, things didn’t work out so great for Bjartur of Summerhouses. 

[mrspete]

I just bought a bunch of stuff from Lands’ End. Does that make me a bad feminist? When I started working at the turn of the century, Lands’ End was the only company that offered a good selection of nice clothes plus-sized women could wear to work. Lands’ End helped me build my early tech career by allowing me to show up to work confident and focused-- in something other than tent-like clown clothes. 

“But Land’s End clothes are so BORING” my skinny friends would laugh.  And I wouldn’t say anything, because I was and am totally fine being boring with my clothes.  I had work to do and stuff to build and bands to see and people to love and a kid to raise and hours to volunteer and so much other shit to do. Boring was OK because it meant I didn’t have to spend time shopping or thinking about something that didn’t matter much to me (fashion).

A few years after he sold Lands’ End to Sears (and a few years before An Inconvenient Truth), Gary Comer hired me to build a website that connected a team of scientists working on abrupt climate change.  I loved that project, I loved the science and the scientists, but most of all I loved Gary, and I loved working for him.  He cared more about the people who worked for him than anyone I’ve known. 

Even after he sold the company, he had so much respect for the Lands’ End customer, whom he viewed as smart, educated, no nonsense, practical.  How do we explain global warming to them? How do we make them care?  The Lands’ End customer would always be his ideal user story, because they read, they learn, they vote, they care about nature, they write letters.  They are not swayed by fashion or marketing or populism.

[Total side story: my husband met Gary only once, when we ran into him and his wife at Leo’s Lunchroom.  After a very pleasant exchange with the kindly billionaire (”You got a good woman there,” he said), Jim mockingly gestured toward his clothes, and noted how awesome it was he happened to be dressed head to toe in Lands’ End.  I cracked up so hard, because Jim was ALWAYS dressed in Lands’ End.]

The Comers don’t own Lands’ End anymore.  Sears doesn’t own Lands’ End anymore.  Lands’ End is again a publicly traded company, mostly owned by private equity funds.  It’s not Gary Comer’s Lands’ End, and hasn’t been for many years.

A few months ago, another Wisconsin-based retailer, Penzey’s, sent out a spice catalogue celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act.  I loved it, but a lot of people had a cow, not unlike this week’s cow about Gloria Steinem. But Bill Penzey owns his company, and he can say whatevs and suffer the consequences, just as our local right wing tea merchant can horrify his lefty customers with random 2nd amendment lectures.  I love people expressing their opinions.  I love difference.  I love arguing ideas.  I really love his tea and will keep buying it even if I disagree with him on guns.  (Jim Oberweis and his milk can suck it forever though.)

It’s different for publicly traded companies, especially those led by Europeans who vastly underestimate the antiabortion fervor of the American religious right, and who apparently sell a lot of school uniforms to that audience.  Their primary allegiance is by definition to their shareholders. Their marketing department stepped into our dogshit politics and then tried wiping it off their shoes with velvet gloves, just spreading that shit around instead of making it go away.

Corporations aren’t people.  Consumerism is not our only means of political expression.  There are other ways to protest than with our dollars.

Monday I start a new job in a very nice office, after several years of working remote and wearing hoodies, jeans and sneakers every day. I will be working for my first woman CIO and first woman IT director.   As a working mom, my focus needs to be on doing my best work, leading my new team, building a great product, making sure my kid gets to swim practice and gets his math done, the dog gets walked and I am reasonably presentable.  

I don’t want to think about my clothes.  I want to look sort of cute, professional, and competent.  Not buying good quality cute boring clothes in my size is not going to fix inequality in our country.  

There is so much work to do and we keep getting distracted by this superficial, symbolic bullshit.

[truckstopstruckstop]

BUDDY HOLLY with PHIL & DON EVERLY

[a-disciplined-life]

Four rules for a disciplined life

(Credit to reddit user ryans01).

No zero days. ‘What’s a zero day? A zero day is when you don’t do a single fucking thing towards whatever dream or goal or want or whatever that you got going on. No more zeros. I’m not saying you gotta bust an essay out everyday, that’s not the point. The point I’m trying to make is that you have to make yourself, promise yourself, that the new SYSTEM you live in is a NON-ZERO system. Didn’t do anything all fucking day and it’s 11:58 PM? Write one sentence. One pushup. Read one page of that chapter. One. Because one is non zero.’

Be grateful to the three yous. ‘There’s the past you, the present you, and the future you. If you wanna love someone and have someone love you back, you gotta learn to love yourself, and the 3 you’s are the key. Be GRATEFUL to the past you for the positive things you’ve done. And do favours for the future you like you would for your best bro.’

Forgive yourself. ‘Maybe you got all the know-how, money, ability, strength and talent to do whatever is you wanna do. But lets say you still didn’t do it. Now you’re giving yourself shit for not doing what you need to, to be who you want to. Heads up champion, being disappointed in yourself causes you to be less productive. Tried your best to have a nonzero day yesterday and it failed? So what. I forgive you, previous self. I forgive you. But today? Today is a nonzero masterpiece to the best of my ability for future self. This one’s for you, future homes. Forgiveness man, use it. I forgive you. Say it out loud.’

Exercise and books. ‘Pretty standard advice but when you exercise daily you actually get smarter. When you exercise you get high from endorphins (thanks body). When you exercise you clear your mind. When you exercise you are doing your future self a huge favour. Exercise is a leg on a three legged stool. Feel me? As for books, almost every fucking thing we’ve all ever thought of, or felt, or gone through, or wanted, or wanted to know how to do, or whatever, has been figured out by someone else. Get some books.’ 

[turningtricksbdwozhere-deactiva]

My friend linked this to me on reddit when I was feeling really down and it changed me. Excellent advice!

[mrspete]

I just found this old label on my basement floor. I have no idea where it came from.

[giovannigf]

William Blake

Jerusalem, Plate 47, “From Camberwell to Highgate….” 1804 to 1820

Relief etching printed in orange with pen and black ink, watercolor, and gold on moderately thick, smooth, cream wove paper

Sheet: 13 ½ x 10 3/8 inches (34.3 x 26.4 cm)Plate: 8 3/8 x 6 3/8 inches (21.2 x 16.2 cm)

Source

[tehawesome]

dang, looks like weather.com is going through some shit

[mrspete]

I know you’re hurting, weather.com. I hurt too. Maybe we can still work this out.

Sincerely, Karen.

[gaydrienagreste]

[thisistheglamorous-deactivated2]

Me in about 25 years.

[nevver]

Peanuts

[d0gbl0g]

[thisistheglamorous-deactivated2]

Everyone was lying to me. I DO want to see how the sausage is made.

[mrspete]

Starting to suspect that lefse is not merely a beloved holiday tradition, but perhaps also an ancient eugenics plot designed by great Norwegian grandmothers to keep their menfolk from marrying outside the tribe. “Let’s take 4 dollars worth of mashed potatoes, spend three days of elaborate preparation, then use crazy hard to find tools you could never use for anything else, then make paper thin pancakes. It will take 25years to master the technique, and you can only learn by watching someone else for 15 years first.”

Seriously, there are easier ways to eat butter.

[mrspete]

Seasonal selfreblog.

[mrspete]

This is my third year making the lefse, but the first my beautiful mother in-law won't be able to tell me how much more delicious mine is than hers ever was (a damned lie). Mercedes died last December at 98 and I'm so grateful I knew her. She gave me so much more than her lefse grill and pins.

I'm also done two days before Thanksgiving, which more than anything makes me a Peterson.

[austinkleon]

Sophia Loren making pizza (via)

[mrspete]

And I shall drive my chariot Down your streets and cry ‘Hey, it’s me, I’m dynamite And I don’t know why’ And you shall take me strongly In your arms again And I will not remember That I even felt the pain.

and if you don’t know already I can’t help you.

[hoganhere]

Al Green, sans most everything. So easy so easy so easy. Y’all better sit down for this. #RoyalStudios #MemphisTN 

(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ieCX2-zW9Pg)

[edhewitt]

Fall colors came late this fall (week of October 26 - November 2 2013)

[empathyiseverything]

Stop Googling. Let’s Talk.

Across generations, technology is implicated in this assault on empathy. We’ve gotten used to being connected all the time, but we have found ways around conversation — at least from conversation that is open-ended and spontaneous, in which we play with ideas and allow ourselves to be fully present and vulnerable. But it is in this type of conversation — where we learn to make eye contact, to become aware of another person’s posture and tone, to comfort one another and respectfully challenge one another — that empathy and intimacy flourish. In these conversations, we learn who we are. 

Of course, we can find empathic conversations today, but the trend line is clear. It’s not only that we turn away from talking face to face to chat online. It’s that we don’t allow these conversations to happen in the first place because we keep our phones in the landscape.

(via Stop Googling. Let’s Talk. - The New York Times. Hat tip to Matt Modrowski)