Category: Opinion

Multislacking Day

On By SarahIn Fun & Entertainment, Internet, Opinion2 Comments

It is the Day After Thanksgiving, a national holiday in and of itself, a day that celebrates one of America’s favorite passtimes: Slacking. Today, I am taking the celebration to a new level: I have embraced the art of multislacking.

Yesterday, G and cooked our asses off in the kitchen for our traditional feast. Today we’re enjoying leftovers and laziness. I am entertaining myself finding random websites while G and I watch re-runs of Cold Case and Scrubs. I got sucked into the surfing vortex that is wont to happen when I find one interesting website that leads to another and another and another. That is how I found out about the definition of multislacking, according to the Urban Dictionary. I also learned about the Word of the Year Contest sponsored by the American Dialect Society. I nominated the word “bromance.”

Yes, I’ve been finding a little of everything today, as evidenced by my bookmarking on Ma.gnolia.

Today is the day that slackers and multislackers can enjoy this pass time and feel virtuous. Today is also, as most everyone knows, Black Friday, the beginning of the Christmas holiday shopping season and biggest shopping day of the year. It is also International Buy Nothing Day. I have done my part in observing this day buy not only buying nothing, but also doing nothing.

Honestly, G and I seem to go in spurts where we are really busy, going all the time until we drop and can’t do any more. And we’re anticipating another busy time coming up after this weekend, both of us going back to work to demanding jobs, the crazy vortex of the holiday season that no matter what I do I cannot help but get sucked in. So, yes, I’m not kidding myself that couch surfing is really some sort of social or political activism and is doing anyone besides me any good. And I do hope and strive to achieve a better work/life balance than this blog would reflect (that was one of my great hopes for returning to the Midwest, after all).

I promote and try to live out the values of International Buy Nothing Day. My family has agreed, at the suggestion of my niece, that we don’t have a gift exchange this year, but rather make a donation to our favorite charities. And I do believe that getting sucked into the vortex of the Internet is healthier for me than getting sucked into the vortex that is the consumer craziness.

This year I am resolved to achieve the work life balance that I so long for, practice healthy amounts of work, regular yoga practice, church, creative outlet. And yes, occasional multislacking. It’s all about balance and moderation.

I Really Do Hate Cilantro

On By SarahIn Food & Cooking, Fun & Entertainment, Internet, Opinion1 Comment

It happens just about every day. Each time I check my blog stats, I can see what search engine terms people are using to find my site (or more precisely how folks stumble upon my site with Google or whatever). Almost every day folks find my site by looking for the combined terms “cilantro” and “soap”. I’m not sure what these random strangers are hoping to find, but I guess they are finding a kindred spirit, a fellow cilantro hater, when they find my posting about the evil weed. I posted this entry seven months ago (April of 2007), and since then I have been getting hits on that posting just about every day.

Clearly I am not alone.

My entire family agrees with me that cilantro tastes like Palmolive, which offers me some comfort. I know a few people (not related to me) who share my taste, but often I feel alone in my abhorrence of the stuff. G and I now live near “Little Saigon” in Chicago, which has many Vietnamese restaurants that we are just beginning to explore. I really love pho and the fantastic sandwiches and pancakes that this regional cuisine is known for, but I cannot let my guard down about the cilantro. I really love to eat this food, but the evil weed just ruins it for me. My beloved loves itf, so we either order separately or ask for it on the side, which usually suffices. But once in a while we order a dish whose description mentions nothing about cilantro, and it is permeated with it.

I know, I know, it is hardly the end of the world, and there are certainly precautions I can take. Most restaurants will accommodate my tastes. But how would you like it if you were really hungry and just waiting with rapt anticipation for an absolutely savory bowl of deliciousness only to find that it has been generously seasoned with soap flakes?

Yech.

My observations about my blog stats are entirely unscientific, but I can see that I am not isolated. There are many others out there like me. In fact, there is a web-based social networking site dedicated to those of us to detest cilantro. Of course I had to join the community. My problem is that I love all of the foods I can think of that often contain cilantro. I love to eat, and I’m very adventurous about it. I’m not picky. I just happen to feel very strongly about this one thing.

Really, cilantro is a total buzz kill. For those of you out there who are looking for affirmation, you have found it. You are not alone!

Reeling Film Festival

On By SarahIn Art & Culture, Community, OpinionLeave a comment

My spouse and I just moved to Chicago from the Bay Area, and we thought what better way to get acquainted with the lgbt community than to go to the Reeling Film Festival. We were really excited to check out the offerings, go stand on line and meet random people attending the films. We have attended the Frameline Festival in San Francisco for years, and it is an incredible community event. Great people watching, chance encounters with old friends and random strangers. We had no allusions that this would be as big or as well-attended as the SF festival, but I figured that it would be a smaller perhaps rootsier festival. I guess for that reason I expected it to be an even more important community event for the lgbt community.

So, G and I purchased tickets to several screenings. We’re a fan of the shorts because they are often really interesting and impossible to see anywhere else. We knew they wouldn’t be the most well-attended, but I figured someone would be there besides us. Not so. I would guess there were fewer than 25 people in the audience at the first three screenings we attended. Granted, they were all on school nights, but I was really disappointed that more people didn’t make an effort to get out and see these films. I guess I was expecting a little more enthusiasm from the crowds. I was expecting a little more of a crowd, for starters.

Perhaps this is due to the poor organization of the event. At each venue, none of the volunteers seemed to know what they were doing. It makes me wonder about the community outreach and marketing. We found out about it through Internet research, and there was a publication at the Whole Foods on Halstead. I also heard about on Public Radio here, so it seems that word is definitely out about it.

The films themselves have been pretty good, a mix of course. Some less good than others, but definitely worth making an effort to see. Nothing knocked my socks off, though Red Without Blue was certainly exceptional. This documentary about identical twins, one of whom goes through the transformation of becoming a woman, took me through the gamut of emotions. Her entire family goes through a transformation along side her and comes full circle back to acceptance and love. Truly an amazing story. I also loved Worst Case Scenario: Butch Edition, the super 8 short about etiquette for butch dykes to help them navigate through the dicey situation of holding doors open for femmes and their mothers.

Some of the films were miscategorized. Among the documentary shorts was Tokens, a film about a Mormon woman in the process of coming out. While this film was about the real-life experience of the filmmaker, it was more of an artistic expression rather than an actual documentary. Also, in Funny Lingus, lesbian comedy shorts there was Rub my Chub, which should have been among the documentaries. There were funny moments in this movie, but the women in this film are activists, and the film itself is about a serious subject. It seemed to me to be disrespectful to include this film with the comedy films.

The one sold-out film that we saw was Itty Bitty Titty Committee. Finally, a crowd. We had the experience we were looking for! We ran into someone we know (amazing!), and we chatted with random strangers. We checked out the crowd, making observations to each other about how the edgy “alternative” folks look the same everywhere; tattoos, pink or green hair, pierced lips and eyebrows. We looked for doppelgangers of ourselves and our friends.

The movie itself was a little bit of a disappointment. Its a coming of age story about young lesbians becoming radical activists, embracing the concepts of feminist theory, and acting on them by committing act of infoterrorism a la Act Up and the Guerrilla Girls. It had it’s funny moments, and it is refreshing to see an intellectual and political comedy. Good effort over all, but I really hated the ending. No spoilers here just in case, but let me know if you’d like to know why I hated it so much.

The biggest disappointment was the lack of turn out and excitement in the community for this event. I’m not sure if this is any indication of what the lgbt community in Chicago is like, and perhaps I am jaded coming from California where one can take for granted that queers are everywhere. G and I stopped going to the Pride Parade there because it was so commercial. I’m withholding judgment for future queer events, holding out hope that next year there will be more enthusiasm, interest and dialog in the community about the festival. Perhaps next year we’ll feel more connected to the community. That will probably help, too.

Out of Touch

On By SarahIn Fun & Entertainment, OpinionLeave a comment

Moving across the country and starting a new job is one of those life events that makes one self-absorbed and out of touch. For a good two to three weeks I haven’t really paid attention to the news. I have occasionally turned on the radio, the TV, downloaded podcasts, and read news headlines on the Internet. Emails from my family updated me on the fires in Southern California so I know that my cousin was evacuated and is okay (we don’t know about her home yet, though). I was a little embarrassed that I found out about the Red Sox winning the World Series a couple of days after the fact. I learned from Peter Sagal on Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me that Barak Obama and Dick Cheney are distant relatives.

When I watching the Daily Show the other night, Jon Stewart covered the media coverage of Gov. Shwarzenegger’s praise for the emergency response to the fires, I got really mad.

I am saddened by the news of the fires, and my heart goes out to those who are now left homeless.

But I am also sickened by the backslapping politicians congratulating each other on the gourmet salads, yoga classes, and massage that are being offered to firestorm victims. I mean, sure, yah, it’s great and all, and if I were a victim of one of those fires I would want a massage, too.

But I can’t help but think of the victims of Hurricane Katrina who after two years, as the Southern California fires burn, are barely surviving in FEMA trailers, who were not treated to fresh water just after the disaster, much less to a yoga class or a massage.

Jon Stewart’s comment to the over-abundance of food donations for the fire victims as compared to the provisions for Katrina victims was something like “The lesson here is don’t go through a natural disaster if you’re poor.”

The hypocrisy is infuriating and depressing.

I think I prefer to go back to unpacking and preparing to start my new job tomorrow.

Blog Action Day (October 15, 2007)

On By SarahIn Internet, Opinion, Politics1 Comment

Okay, so really Blog Action Day has come and gone, and I really wanted to participate. So, I am going to anyway with a post-dated entry. I’m sure my friends and family will indulge me because they all know that on October 15 I was in transit, moving my entire life, me, my partner, and my cat, from Oakland, California to Chicago. Let’s just say that the days preceding and just following that date were a little busy for me.

So, this year, Blog Action Day was about the environment. G and I are actively trying to live more sustainably, embracing habits of eating mostly organic, buying products locally grown and made, recycling, trying to walk more and drive less, and using environmentally friendly cleaning products.

Being in the midst of one of my biggest life changes, moving 2,000 miles to another city, I can say that some of these values were set aside, put on hold, if you will, and some might say chucked out the window because it is either inconvenient or expensive.

This move has put me in touch with just how privileged I am. Movers packed our stuff, loaded it onto a big truck, and as I write this, someone is driving our things across the country to our new home, and more movers will come to carry it all up three flights of stairs. Professional house cleaners came to scour our apartment once it was empty. The day before we left, Gillian and I went to have pedicures.

No matter what, moving is stressful. I was able to hire people to do a lot of the physical labor for me, and I still feel tired. I have done a good deal of heavy lifting to get us here, but nothing like Dan who could carry three heavy boxes at a time down our stairs and out to the truck. I am incredibly grateful, and I fully recognize my privilege.

And even so, I was not able to do everything in an environmentally friendly way because G and I could not afford it. We didn’t want to keep our hide-a-bed sofa, and when attempts to give it away were unsuccessful, we paid some haulers to take it away. The “environmentally friendly” haulers (as they marketed themselves) charged $50 more than the regular haulers that we hired. And they turned out to be a gay couple that we really liked who recycled all of their hauls in an environmentally sound way, anyway.

It’s interesting to me that the “green” hauling company feels that they can charge more for offering the same service that is marketed in a different way. The “green” house cleaners would have cost hundreds of dollars more than the cleaning ladies from our neighborhood, who I’m pretty sure don’t use environmentally friendly cleaning products.

I believe in the “green tax,” paying more for products that are made sustainably and that do not harm the environment. I will patronize local businesses over big chains to support the local economy instead of large corporations. I will pay more for organically grown produce. I have the ability to pay more, and because I want to do my part and be a good citizen, I will. But it is a privilege to be able to do so.

Living green should not be a luxury. It is a responsibility. If we’re going to live in a capitalist economy, and if the captains of industry are really interested in doing good for the environment, then they need to find a way to make green accessible to all. Some say that demand from the middle class will create green trends at all class levels.

While I’m suspicious of WalMart’s new “organic” line of food, I have to ask the question, isn’t this the way things should be going? Sure, WalMart is capitalizing on the whole green/organic movement, but this is also a company that caters to the working class with its low prices. Believe me, I’m no fan of WalMart, but isn’t this kind of marketing the right idea? Shouldn’t the green movement want to reach the working class in any way possible? Can’t the green movement find a way to capitalize on WalMart’s efforts to promote green living?

As we settle into our new home, G and I will clean the coils of our refrigerator with green cleaning products, replace old bulbs with CFL bulbs, educate ourselves about the green movement here in Chicago, support local businesses with sustainable practices, and otherwise continue to pay the green tax here. We will be mindful of the things we accumulate, acquiring things that will contribute to our quality of life, recycling and regifting things that we no longer need or use. We probably won’t shop at WalMart, but I won’t look down my nose at anyone who does. We probably will shop at Whole Foods, which won’t make me feel more virtuous.

I do whatever I can in my daily life to leave a lighter footprint, and I will continue to write and talk about ways that green living should be a responsibility for everyone, not a choice only for those who can afford it. This is the only way that living green will make a real difference.