A Sappy Scene [just don’t read the parenthetical statements]

So… Road Trip!! Our first with our cuddly little, sweet-smelling [when she hasn’t spit up and has a clean diaper] baby. We’re so excited [also terrified].

It was so much fun [except that two hours into it, Baby A had had ENOUGH]. Li’l A and I were singing “Ten Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed” to the baby [to distract her]. Big A was all big Daddy-O and driving us home and trying to listen [to Nas on the stereo at whisper-volume]. After the ninth monkey fell out of bed [for the fourth time], Big A sang along [except he sang: Jesus CHRIST! Is she retarded? The doctor said NO MORE MONKEYS jumping on the bed!!].

We fell about laughing like maniacs [we were on the cusp of a communal nervous meltdown]!!!

_

(Action replay) Hipsters re-jump the couch

There’s yet another proclamation of the death of the hipster in the current issue of The New Yorker. Hari Kunzru’s story, “Raj, Bohemian” is so unempathetic and superficial that it’s so ironic, so meta… Man! You know?

There’s a veritable parade of transplants, trust-fund babies, and all the minimalist, alt, indie, eclectic creeds. It doesn’t help that all of this list has rapidly become assimilated by the mainstream and, actually, is already so infiltrated by it, that it’s positively putrid with ennui. [Can you tell I’ve been reading Zizek again?]

There is, obv, no Kunzru hate for hipsters. But his disdain [zing] actually cuts more. That may be somewhat deserved by the post-hipster, perennially unhappy sellout Misshapen species. But what about the fuzzy, farm-share ascetics and Etsy aesthetic types we actually know? I thought it was a good read but a flawed story. Or vice versa. May be *you* can tell.

_

SNORKELING

Everyday for breakfast
She had spoonfuls of sky
Nothing close or nearby
Ever seemed same again.

So in another land,
In some softly alien sea
They consent to band
In lithe experimental ties

With elongated limbs,
And buckled lungs,
Talking of walking water
Minus primness or miracle

Finding the sea suddenly
Small as a lapping pet,
Animated in assault,
Circling them for treats.

Then too soon, in ten or so days,
Their rules and goodbyes unsaid,
They fly; the red of an airline blanket
Flowers, in her lap, like a miscarriage.

_

Life with vagina

If you’re female and have ever wondered what your letters of wreck recommendation looked like, take at look at this article:

Letters written for female applicants were found to differ systematically from those written for male applicants in the extremes of length, in the percentages lacking in basic features, in the percentages with doubt raisers (an extended category of negative language, often associated with apparent commendation), and in frequency of mention of status terms. Further, the most common semantically grouped possessive phrases referring to female and male applicants (‘her teaching,’ ‘his research’) reinforce gender schema that tend to portray women as teachers and students, and men as researchers and professionals.

GULP!

And if you ever wondered how you’d fare if you ran for high office—president say--read this:

For decades, researchers have been probing bias -- how it arises, how it changes, how it fades away. Their work suggests that bias plays a more powerful role in shaping opinions than most people are aware of. And they suggest that the American mind treats race and gender quite differently. Race can evoke more visceral, negative associations, the studies show, but attitudes toward women are more inflexible and -- to judge by the current dynamics of the presidential race -- ultimately more limiting.

Gendered minority certainly runs deep :/.

_

Hanif Kureishi: White departments, ethnic doors

Alastair McKay (I know him. How? When? Where?) interviews a voluble Hanif Kureishi in The Sunday Herald. Interesting all over, especially this bit about the start of multiculturalism in 1980's England.

They thought because you were writing about Asians that the only people who would watch it would be other Asians. The TV companies then began to have ethnic departments, which I refused to go in.

"I said: I'm not going in the ethnic door, it's like apartheid to me. I'm staying in the white department, f*** you. I'm not going in that door with the Pakis.'"

The publication of Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children in 1981 was a turning point: "One of our blokes had done it. Salman Rushdie was living in Britain, he was a British-Asian writer. That was a big moment."

Uhh. Funny how that bit about Rushdie crept in :).

_

Sahasranamam

NuNu LaLa,
Nu-nu Noodles,
Nooner, Noonster, Noony
NoonIE (Boonie),

Uppity, Appuchi,
Ammachi, Chapuchi,
Chippie, Chweeky, Chinaari,
Chinna Kukka, Chinnamma,
Chinna Rani, Rajakutty

Kung-Fu Cash Money,
Slobber monkey,
Amma bujji,
Aacha paapa,
Amma Kanna,

Stinky Pants,
Squeaky Butt,
Spittles and Giggles,
Your Tiny-ness,
You Big, Rowdy Mess

(If only you got
As much respect
As you get love.)


_

*Sahasranama: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sahasranama 

COEXIST

Yellow plate,

Black beans

On brown rice,

And browned

Whitefish.

And just to

Confuse

You--

Green peppers

And tomatoes...

_