Bastet

I think the late, great Bella Abzug said it well; the quote has been garbled like a game of telephone, so I don't know exactly which phrasing she actually used among the many variations floating around out there, but the point was this (dismissing the lie that things were equal in the workplace now that women were scattered throughout more of it, so shut up about it already): It's not equality for a female Einstein to get a job as an assistant professor; when a female schlemiel gets promoted as quickly as a male schlemiel, then we're dealing with an equal playing field.

Yes to writing a check, no to mailing - I pay it through the Citibank ATM.

Well, women are routinely underpaid and under-promoted, dismissed, diminished, and harassed, so I think it stinks. I'm a civil rights lawyer, focused on women's rights, so the male colleagues I collaborate with are progressive, enlightened souls. They're better than most of their brethren, sure, but male privilege is still too often unexamined - and too often met with reflexive denial and defensiveness when pointed out. The workplace is like any other sector within a patriarchal society - a sexist cesspool, operating as it was designed and continually empowered to. There are tiny pockets - individual departments, maybe companies, never industries - where there's true equality, but in general women face all manner of discriminatory employment practices on the regular (not to mention sexist work environments that do not constitute a legal violation). I litigate these cases all the time, and it ain't getting much better out there no matter how many individual victories we manage to achieve despite the burden of proof and how insidious the combination of systemic sexism and subconscious bias is.

Yeah, if it had said "poisonous" as the synonym, "toxic" would have been the correct response, but with "poison", it's "toxin". Or so I thought when this question was raised, but, looking up "toxic", it's listed in multiple dictionaries as also being a noun, usually used as a plural (so, a synonym for "poisons"). They might have had to accept it.

I think a missed DD and a TS are quite different things. Between knowledge gaps and brain farts, a contestant missing a DD that one or two of the others would have come up with had they been the one to land on it is unremarkable. But all three contestants not coming up with something is notable. It's why I think I've only been surprised by a missed DD once or twice ever, while a number of TS have truly shocked me. No big surprises for me tonight, but I wasn't expecting 1920s to go unanswered; it's not often $200 clues are TS. Romance is not my genre, so I dreaded Rom-Drams, and indeed it turned out I'd only seen one film (Dirty Dancing), but I only missed two clues. I had a good first round; other than that, I just missed one each in stuck (flypaper stumped me, too) and X (I knew I'd heard the hair growth ingredient stated in commercials, but couldn't remember that it was minoxidil). But I didn't run anything in DJ. I almost ran albums, but joined the contestants in being stumped by the Lady Gaga title. I also got all but one in mountains. Of course I bombed faiths, but not as bad as I feared; I got two, including correctly guessing on the Buddha TS. Modern art was another "oh no" category, in which I also missed three. I missed another three in words, which ticked me off as I typically sail through vocabulary categories. In plants I missed two, so I barely cracked 50% for the round, but I'm okay with that in DJ. I didn't get FJ, though. I was trying to think of an object that was in the title of one of his works or what one of his stories was about, and came up with nothing that fit; when the correct answer was revealed, I read the clue again and thought, "Oh, yeah, those words clearly point to the thing used for capital punishment in his day." But that thought process did not happen other than in hindsight. "Jurisprudence, call her Pru?" was funny quick thinking by Clark in response to Ken's follow-up interview question about a legal-themed name for a baby. (But, yeah, would not recommend having one as a 2L, especially with a due date during finals.)

Tom is right about all the advantages long-running champs have*, and I wouldn't care if they imposed a limit again, but I'm not calling for it and I don't think it will happen. Ratings go up when there's a contestant on a hot streak, so no producer is going to preclude that opportunity. *The only disadvantage they have is getting tired; using your brain that way for extended periods days in a row is tiring. The CA bar exam is three days - three hours in the morning, lunch, then three hours in the afternoon for three days in a row. When I got home that third night, I pretty much passed out.

Oh, see, I hated that out of the blue prayer at the end. I kind of like the liquor store scene for, as you said, showing her she wasn't that crazy lady in the internet memes to everyone. But her hanging around with him afterward was just a waste of film to me.

Oh, I can't believe I left Bull Durham off my list. I love it as a baseball movie and I love Annie, and I also really like the relationship in that one. It's one of the few films in which I can stand Kevin Costner. Working Girl I like, but not the relationship between Tess and whatever Harrison Ford's name is. He's another actor I generally do not enjoy, and this is one of the roles in which he very much does not do it for me.

It's the pizza scene where she really pisses me off. That's her home, so of course she had every right to invite her father-in-law in when he turned up, but she should have told Lloyd so he could avoid coming home while his dad was there if he wanted. And once she let him be ambushed by the dad's presence, she should have respected his wishes when he wanted the guy to leave.

Yeah, I use that when I make crab cakes. I just think those crab nachos had too much going on, like they'd probably taste good, but I'd think it was a waste of crab.

Even though I'd loved the song long before that, Maddie and David's long-awaited consummation became my primary association; even though the relationship was written in a profoundly shitty way after that (thus leading to the erroneous "Moonlighting Curse", as if having the main characters hook up, not fucking with every single aspect of them as characters and as a couple afterward, was the problem), which pisses me off to this day, I still smile every time I hear the opening beats of that song not just out of general joy, but specifically in memory of that scene.

The Flex-Seal guy being way more qualified than the pillow guy made me laugh, low-hanging fruit though it may be. But this was another ho-hum episode. I missed the first five minutes, so I missed the set-up for Mark's problem. "Is this your first day here, who's happy?" about him not wanting to struggle like the rest of them and Darlene being reluctant to pull him from the magnet school were nice moments of a story that wasn't properly told. I loved "You were right, Mom, I did say that ('If you hate me, then I'm doing my job') to my kids one day", though. But "How many times in high school did you give me all your weed?" is bullshit; we learned in the original series Darlene rejected pot immediately because it dulled her hatred. "You are not old, you are crazy" and "I don't want to be active, I just want to sit and go to hell" were funny moments between Jackie and Neville, and they're clearly trying to salvage this relationship for the long haul despite the creepy way it began, but I'm still on the fence. At least we know where Harris has been staying (that looked like a different trailer, but I didn't pay proper attention the first time, and that's an obvious unforced error I hope the show wouldn't make). But, overall - meh.

Oh, that enraged me! I have a longstanding, somewhat strange interest in plane crashes (I love flying [as a passenger; I'm not a pilot], so it's not out of fear, I just find the patterns in what causes the rare crashes interesting), so I know more than the average bear about the NTSB. These are some of the sharpest investigators in the world, and their work - despite no regulatory authority - has forced changes that have transformed aviation again and again and saved countless lives. I knew the major details of that particular investigation; the report cleared Sullenberger and Skiles of any missteps (significant, with human error being at least one cause, if not the primary cause, in the majority of plane crashes), and in fact commended their decision making and airmanship in saving the lives of all on board. To tune into that film one night when it was on cable and find this completely fabricated story pissed me off on the investigators' behalf. Only half, not all, their if you headed for the nearest airport immediately after the engine loss flight simulations resulted in a successful airport landing, and the one that factored in (by no outside prompting, but of their own volition [since these teams include, you know, experts], so already in place at the time of the depicted hearing) the inevitable real-world delay in response time due to evaluation of an unexpected situation showed an unequivocal inability to reach an airport, thus the unequivocal exoneration and praise in their report. And I side-eyed Capt. Sullenberger for promoting the film so enthusiastically and, while acknowledging that's not at all how the investigation happened, defending the "dramatic license" falsehood as an acceptable representation of how he felt by the scrutiny. It's lazy storytelling. Everyone in the audience knew it had a happy ending; how do you make a whole movie about a six-minute flight in which everyone lives? You invent a villain, when there wasn't one in reality; to create drama beyond the time covering the engine loss, ditching, and water rescue, the filmmakers made an entirely false second half out of the NTSB investigation. The problem is, that second half of a true story trotting down the fictional path meant their villain was an actual organization comprised of actual people who conducted a by the book investigation and stated the truth. And Eastwood is all about making the federal government a villain, so he did no fact checking on the script that deviated so broadly from Sullenberger's memoir on which it was based.

I'm at about 70% gift bags and 30% wrapping. I think gift bags, being reusable, are a more responsible choice, but I think wrapping - incorporating some decorative items in place of bows we've been re-using in my family most of my life - shows an effort I don't want to eliminate entirely. So where something is by its natural shape or included packaging something that easily lends itself to wrapping, I make the presentation special, and the rest I toss in a gift bag with some color-coordinated tissue paper.

I know nothing about them beyond what I read here, but based on what has been posted of their relationship with Lenny Kravitz, they seem prime candidates for not just civility, but a good post-divorce relationship.

The Newfoundland TS surprised me a bit, as did no one guessing rat or figuring out parks. I was really surprised by the Queen Elizabeth II TS; when I get a royalty clue correct (granted, I said Queen Elizabeth, but would presumably been prompted to BMS, at which point I'd have remembered the II), I figure it's widely known or, as in this case, fairly easy to figure out - even if you don't know the lineage to trace it based on g-g-gf (as I don't), it could only be Elizabeth II or Anne* - a living (as of 2019) woman in the British royal family by blood - and at only $400, I figured it was Elizabeth. (*Right? Or does my knowing so little mean I think it's simpler than it is?) I never would have predicted the Edith Wharton TS, either; all they had to answer was who wrote The House of Mirth, and I figure one of any three J! contestants can usually do that. Maybe I'm just cranky, but I had more "Really?" reactions to TS tonight than I typically do. After last night's disappointing performance, I was on fire tonight. I got everything in the first round. In DJ, I only ran sitcoms and one letter different, but other than science - in which I missed three (it should have been two, but I couldn't get Heisenberg's name from my brain to my mouth) - I did very well, missing two in royals, and one each in the other two. FJ was an instaget (based on the second S at the end bringing him immediately to mind, and then the other details in the clue seeming to fit perfectly [the year and choosing a new last name screamed slavery] and make me confident in my guess), so it was a great game for me all around.

I love how perfect everyone's reactions to Sharon getting hit by the killer boyfriend in "Heart Failure" are - Provenza checks on her, knowing Julio will tackle the suspect (which Julio does, but, this being season five Julio who's learned how to control himself, he does it lawfully). Andy and Amy take off out of Electronics, while Buzz jumps up to block Rusty from joining them, which he of course had attempted to do. And then, in the interrogation room, Andy stands down with a simple "No" from Sharon. (Can you imagine how pissed she'd have been at him if she'd taken a hit so they had something to hold the guy on, and he messed that up by beating up a cuffed suspect?) It's all exactly what each character would do. It's also a perfect touch that afterward, when Sharon is talking to Andrea, Rusty stares at the red spot on her face the entire time. And I love that Rusty's "Wow, my mom is a badass" is followed by a cut to Sharon whimpering "Ow". Punches never hurt on TV (or mess up anyone's hand), so I like the acknowledgment that you don't just shrug off getting hit in the face.

So would I. I don't think I'd ever love wrapping gifts, like I did when I was a kid, but if I had a tricked-out gift wrapping room, I wouldn't hate it like I do now.

I love both those songs so much! She had a terrific voice.

That was the only thing I knew about him prior to his death, since I'd never seen any of the shows/movies he was in - I never watched his stand-up, but I read countless times over the years how his comedy was the antithesis of the Full House character that had become the public's perception of him. That seems to be the case. I read through one of those articles compiling celebrity reactions to his death, and so many of those close to him noted he ended every conversation - even via text - with "I love you" and gave great hugs. And Jodie Sweetin described him as "someone who would also call and profusely apologize for at LEAST 15 minutes if he thought he MAY have perhaps said something he shouldn’t have or thought maybe he took a joke too far".

Yeah, if even her own mom isn't annoyed by it, I'm certainly not going to be. She's playing dinosaur at home one morning. The horror?

This was simultaneously amusing and depressing. I didn't find it quite blistering enough, it felt a bit rushed and had abrupt tonal shifts, Timothee Chalamet's character added precisely nothing, and I thought DiCaprio's performance of Prof. Mindy's big redemption moment on The Daily Rip wasn't what it should have been, but I'm still glad I watched it. The post-credits bit with Jason as the last man on Earth, still living his social media life ("don't forget to like and subscribe") and not knowing his mom forgot him, was a nice touch. I think my favorite was the sequence showing what everyone was doing as the world came to an end, especially that Patriot News was still proclaiming some bizarre side show (topless somethings) as what everyone is talking about and Ron Perlman shooting at the comet, declaring "You'll never take me alive". There were a lot of great little touches, too, like the disclaimer at the end of Mindy's FEMA-BASH ad for the hotline. It just didn't really come together for me, the total result being a solid "okay".

Most of mine have paid no attention, but Bandit loved to watch horses (good thing he lived with my parents; I hate most westerns, but they'd watch some). And Mitsie (speaking of your Mitsi; great name!), one of the cats I grew up with, would dash behind the TV (back when it was a free-standing large piece of furniture) trying to figure out where race cars had gone when they drove out of frame. We didn't watch car racing, but one time it came on after a sport we did watch and we weren't in the room to change the channel; she was so hilarious looking for those cars, we continued to occasionally tune it in for her. (And then when we'd turn it off, we'd give her a toy to chase and destroy, to distract her with having caught something after all those elusive cars.)

I'm still struggling terribly with Bandit's death (as are my parents, of course, living in that empty house, and with the memory of seeing him in the street); it's just so different. With our sick cats who we'd been able to have euthanized once the disease won, we'd done all we could, the time had come, and the death was peaceful. This death wasn't inevitable, though; if we could hop in a time machine and change the slightest little thing by seconds, a perfectly healthy cat would still be cuddling and talking for probably five years. Instead he lay alone and dying in the street. It's torture, and not one of us feels the slightest bit better than we did nearly a month ago. But I know I'm lucky to have Riley, and I also take joy in the astounding cuteness of the other cats in my life. Here are my niece and nephew; the little goober on the left is the infamous Trouble, and in her ongoing attempts to distract him throughout the day so she and her husband can get some work done, my friend set up Bird TV in another room. Another nephew didn't care, but these two were into it (for a while, at least):

I don't have many bills on hand at any given time - I put almost all charges on my credit card, and then write one check each month for the total amount - so keeping the bills I do have in denomination order (a few ones in front, then a five and/or a ten if I have any, then a twenty or two) in my wallet makes it easy to flip through and find what I want. I agree that differentiation (like with coins) would make things even easier; the U.S. pretty much stands alone in having all bills the same size and color.