I am officially annoyed by all this Rapture business. I don’t know if it’s the advertising budget (there are ads in the subway!) or the way the Internet can’t stop talking about it, but I find the whole thing creepy. Not because I think the Rapture is going to happen tomorrow, but because of how destructive this mess has the potential to be. My family has its own, less disruptive, religious weirdnesses best not gotten into here, and let me tell you, I feel for these kids. I am also discomforted by the degree that people joking around about this Rapture mess tend to think the end of the world might be fun. I used to think that too, then 9/11 happened. I’d love for this whole non-event to pass without further mention.
In happier news, Part 3 of that series on the male voices on Glee is up. This article series remains completely awesome, and there’s a lot of other great pop-culture content on that blog. You should go frolic with it.
On a less amusing, but fairly interesting, note on the gender and pop-culture front, a major bookstore chain has asked a magazine to put a “decency bag” on issues of its magazine featuring a shirtless male model who happens to look too much like a woman for the chain’s comfort. However, the chain(s) involved now say this rumour was always false, while further reporting seems to indicate that the polybag request was reverse after the original article ran.
This seems as good a time as any to tell you about my shopping adventures in the Macy’s boys department yesterday. I bought some hideous shoes, some great shirts, and a couple of ties. I also used the dressing room there for the first time. I got weird looks, but was able to try on a pair of seersucker trousers that were totally rocking my world. Alas, the fit was terrible, and I mention it only because wow, apparently I’ll do a lot for seersucker.
I also managed to get my hair cut, which was about 80% successful. My bangs are a little too short and “straight across the back of my neck” and my girl sideburns were not executed on correctly, but the first will grow out and I am probably coordinated enough to fix the rest myself. All in all, less stressful than these things usually are.
After going to the Paley Center end of season party for American Idol and Glee Tuesday night (pop-culture fans in NY and LA should totally join the Paley Center, their programming is awesome and wide-ranging), I’m off to Boston on Wednesday morning at fuck o’clock (a time so early that, when you look at your clock, all you can say is fuck) for a conference, and then it’s on to Pittsburgh for a friend’s wedding. I’ll be meeting up with Patty (who is in Ohio visiting with her family) there, and then we’ll be heading back to New York the next day. Originally I was totally going to wear a dress to the wedding, but now I’ve been having quite a bit of male sartorial inspiration of late, so now I’m all torn, and probably will remain so in a way that means having to bring too much luggage with me for these various adventures.
Letters from Titan 
The article about the kids made me so sad. I try hard to be very hands off about religious belief because that’s so very complicated, but Jesus riding a raptor, that is fucked up.
You know, you are not the only lady shopping in the boys department. We’ve had an ongoing thing with a client at work about what they want to do with reviews written by petite women shopping in the boys section.
The gender thing about the magazine cover is terrifying for so many reasons. I mean, nobody’s going to put me on the cover of a magazine anyway, and I know they’re all about ridiculous standards of beauty at any rate, but to actually consider that different=obscene, when different=not-standard-covergirl/boy… wow, that should make EVERYONE feel threatened.
*gasp* just saw that it was Borders and not, say, Wal-Mart. I… *speechless*
That is a lovely dress. Where is it from?
Have fun at the wedding.
Thanks for the article about the magazine. Borders? Really, Borders. Damn because I go there. (It’s the only bookstore left anywhere near my side of town. All the others have closed up.)
Speaking of seersucker…
I’m sorry those trousers fit poorly, good seersucker trousers are a scarce find these days. No chance of going with a size or two larger and tailoring to fit, huh?
Check out the Toronto Star for some very interesting, and disturbing, articles about a Toronto couple who made the decision to keep the gender of their third child private in order to support the child discovering for her/himself which gender fit best. In today’s edition, the mother has written a very thoughtful response to the ensuing media hoopla. It seems there are few issues that bring out the ire in people than gender diffusion. I can’t bring myself to read all the comments made in response to the Star’s articles on this story because of the bile and ignorance expressed there. I look forward (hopefully in my lifetime) when we will be able to achieve fluidity in our thinking about gender. In the meantime, we do love our binary classification systems, don’t we? They make life easier for some, and impossible for those who don’t happen to “fit”.