Category Archives: The Slattern Speaks
The naked rampage is back on campus
You cannot petition the lord with prayer, and it really pisses Dr. Calculus off.
When I was back there at the University of Maine, for some reason, Jim Morison was still remarkably popular among the undergrads, despite the fact that he had already been dead for almost a decade. See?
Yeah, that’s me with my late boyfriend.
Photo property of WS Winslow and Spencah.
To this day, I still have flashbacks of being awakened in the wee hours by the exhortations of Jim and company as they blasted from the refrigerator-size speakers that took up more space than the beds in one of the more notorious rooms down the hall. Apparently volume was crucial to a successful trip, as was repetition, because even now, I can recall the words to that song. To the letter.
The triumph of the willy.
Courtesy The Chive.
Now, with the psychedelic experience often come unusual compulsions, such as the need to undress in public, or at the very least in the company of several of your closest friends and/or acquaintances. Or so I have heard. Of course the streaking craze of the early Seventies had been largely consigned to memory by the time I began my long, hazy journey through academia, though like all exhibitionistic indulgences, it has enjoyed periodic resurgences and upticks in activity ever since.
But as I say, back in the day, it wasn’t widely practiced, other than by a couple of incorrigible undergraduate nudists on campus, more often than not after a long evening of consuming grain alcohol mixed with Kool Aid that was served by the tumbler from a garbage can. Understandable of course. As such, I did spy the occasional exposed member or naked cheek of a weekend evening; however, the practice of stripping down in public was exclusively the domain of the student rather than the faculty.
And so it was with some interest and no little surprise that I happened upon the story of the Michigan State math professor who melted down to such an extent — in the classroom — that he felt compelled to strip completely naked and utterly nude in the middle of a calculus lecture. Now I’m no math whiz, but I’d have to say that if anything could make me lose my grip on reality, not to mention my underthings, it would be having to teach an advanced mathematics class. So I sympathize. Or is it empathize? I can never remember. Anyways…take a look.
Thank heaven for soft focus. Photo courtesy WILX Lansing. Click the screen shot for the full frontal story.
What I love about this article is the reference to keeping your socks on by the student in the classroom. If you’ll recall, one of my state’s most colorful scandals involved the charming Eliot Spitzer, aka the “Luv Guv,” who was found to have availed himself of the services of a bevy of sex workers, and subsequently lost his dream job. Like the mad calculus professor, he too preferred to keep his socks on, though if the press accounts are to believed, he lobbied his escorts heavily for unprotected sex. Now that’s a thrill seeker.
Here’s what I don’t get. It wasn’t until Professor Crazy stripped naked that the students became fearful. Correct me if I’m wrong, but it seems unlikely he could conceal a weapon once he was down to his birthday suit. Who knows, maybe there was a shiv in his sock or a telltale scab on the nether regions that posed an infection risk? Unlikely, you must admit. So why then, would a group of healthy twenty year-olds fear one paunchy un-armed math professor? The photo is a bit grainy, but he’s clearly no Arnold Schwartzenneger.
In fact, a quick scroll through the Facebook would indicate that the youth of today are far less inhibited about being caught naked on film than any previous generation. One might conclude, therefore, that this professor’s little trip to Crazy Town should have been no more traumatic than a night in the frat house for his students. Perhaps it wasn’t the nudity, but the existential crisis that got them all in a lather. Maybe it was the notion that not only can you NOT petition the lord with prayer, but He doesn’t actually exist at all that put them in a tizzy. Or maybe it was just the calculus. Would have done it for me.
Remembering
This morning I logged on to my computer intending to file yet another pithy entry about the trials and travails of life on the domestic front lines, but my plans changed when I read Bharat’s lovely post marking the eleventh anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist bombings. I was living in New York at that time – I still am – and for me, like so many of my friends and neighbors, it is a rare week when it doesn’t occupy my thoughts, or at the very least cross my mind.
Bharat writes that on that day we were all victims, and he has a point, but that’s not the whole story. So if you’ll forgive a temporary darkening in tone, I’d like to add my own thoughts.
When the first plane hit the Trade Center Tower, I had just dropped my daughter off at school; it was the beginning of second grade for her. It was a glorious day, warm and clear with a bright blue sky, and as I walked back home I looked up at what I thought were a flock of homing pigeons. We live in an Italian neighborhood, and there are still a few people who keep pigeon coops on their roofs and fly their birds in big swooping flocks that sort of glimmer when the sun hits their wings just so. It’s an Old World hobby, like playing bocce or making wine in the cellar. After a moment I realized it wasn’t birds – the movements were too chaotic and random – so I stopped. I was passing the pharmacy, and a man standing outside told me a plane had hit one of the Trade Center buildings. At that moment I realized it wasn’t birds in the sky, but papers, thousands of pieces of paper that had floated across the East River and were fluttering above my Brooklyn neighborhood. And so I ran.
The Bridge to Hell
What’s the worst pop song ever?
So last night Mr. Slattern and I were having a rollicking game of Scrabble while working our way through a bottle or two of something or other. Since I was knocking the slop out of him (for a change), we decided to lighten the mood (his anyway) by adding a bit of music to the evening’s festivities. Not wanting to interrupt the flow of things, we just picked a random satellite channel and got on with the smackdown contest.
Courtesy fleetowner.com
The name of the station was, I believe, “The Bridge.” I tell you this out of the goodness of my heart and to save you a world of hurt. Should someone you love, or you yourself, ever stumble upon this house of musical horror, turn around and return to the preceding station, or any other you can find, even if it’s the one with the all-Grateful Dead format, because let me tell you that spending the next few minutes with Jerry’s kids will be infinitely less painful than being subjected to the playlist of The Bridge, whose format is described on its website as follows:
Cross The Bridge to the softer side of rock. Stress-free music from Jackson Browne, Bonnie Raitt, Van Morrison and Elton John. Nothing too hard, just great mellow rock.
Here’s how I’d describe it: A trip to hell featuring extended layovers in a string of audio re-education camps with entertainment provided by a mopey, poetry-writing high-school girl circa 1975. Listening to this station is about as pleasant as spending the second full day of your summer diet hungover and trying on woolen underwear at the Barney’s warehouse sale — with Barry Manilow singing Copacabana on an endless loop on the sound system.
Anyways, being rather absorbed in the game, we weren’t really paying close attention to the music, so when we heard the opening lurch of The Wreck of the Edmond Fitzgerald we chuckled because Gordon Lightfoot in general, and this song in particular, have both become running jokes in our house. Listening to this stinker always makes me feel a bit queas-Y, like I’m barreling along with the God forsaken crew when the gales of November come ear-LY. Just thinking about this song makes me seasick. And always I ask myself the same question, Does anyone know where the love of God goes when this song turns the minutes to hou-ERS?
I find this performance particularly irritating because Gord sings it in Canadian instead of the regular English he used on the record. Maybe his jaw’s tired from all that emoting, or it could be he’s just too lazy to open up his mouth. Hard to know. Harder still to care.
“Ah know you’re in there, Vicki Lawrence!”
Via Huffington Post.
Too lazy to get up and reset the radio, we were both hoping this song would be the musical equivalent of a long overdue belch that clears the line and makes way for a cleaner, purer flow of sound. How wrong we were; what followed was one or another of Billy Joel’s nasty mid-career hits, all of which are putrid, but none more so than Piano Man. This was not the selection chosen by The Bridge; however, we changed the station immediately anyway, sensing a trend that could only lead to something far worse, along the lines of Billy Don’t Be a Hero or Brandy You’re a Fine Girl. Just the mention of one of those songs will create an immediate, soul destroying earworm that can last days, or even weeks. Many good people have cracked under less pressure than that. You remember what happened to Britney, who, I have it on good authority, was heard listening to The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia over and over right before she took a golf umbrella to that car.
The game ended and as we repaired to the living room for a nightcap, a lively debate about the worst pop song ever committed to vinyl soon began: Piano Man or The Wreck of the Edmond Fitzgerald? Mr. Slattern, who is actually musical and therefore entitled to an opinion, takes the position that Billy Joel is the worse offender. He feels the faux Irishness, pretensions to crappy poetry (“a real estate novelist”) and limerick-y midline rhymes (“They sit at the BAR and put bread in my JAR”) make this song the worst one ever written. Further, he maintains, the instrumentation is insane and makes the cheesy lyrics and overwrought delivery indescribably worse, with a harmonica and an accordion locked in a fight to the death in the arrangement. Then of course there’s the wholly undeserved, smug, self-aggrandizing message (“Man, what are YOU doing here?”).
Listen, if you can bear it.
Now there are those who would not agree with Mr. Slattern that Piano Man is the worst song ever written. They might point to other notable entries in the oeuvre of the pride of Long Island, and they might be right. Look:
Courtesy Fighting the Youth
In truth, I can’t find much to argue with here, but I still have to give the edge to old Gordon Lightfoot in the worst song sweepstakes. Of course, now I’m in the lowest level of music hell. Not only am I hungover and sleep deprived after staying up all night watching bad music videos on YouTube, but I’ve now got the lyrics to Piano Man running through my brain to the tune of The Wreck of the Edmond Fitz-GERALD. Both are in waltz time, you see. And really, what is a pop song doing in three-quarter time anyway? It doesn’t make sense.
Any opinions out there this fine Labor Day weekend? Which song do you think is worse? Got any write-in candidates? I’m all agog.
Mother knows best
Life advice from the trenches
Picture courtesy of Tanqueray London Dry
I just deposited my one and only shining light of a daughter at college this week, and it’s got me thinking – about many things, but mostly about the passage of wisdom from one generation to the next and the ceaseless march of time (and the boot prints it’s left on my face). It’s also got me trying to properly balance a cocktail of psycho-pharmaceuticals with a raging hormonal imbalance while swimming in a veritable river of dirty martinis, but that’s a tale for another day.
It seems like only yesterday I was a student myself, though it was actually so long ago you could measure the time in geologic eras, or at the very least dog years. As is invariably the case with the long dead past, it now seems like a much simpler time: the scourge of AIDS had yet to destroy promiscuity (though herpes had taken a lot of the spontaneity out of it); you didn’t need an advanced degree in molecular mixology to make a gin and tonic; an ounce of weed could be financed with a simple ATM withdrawal (I am told) rather than requiring a leveraged trust fund payout or a significant shift in the futures market; and Eddie Murphy was actually funny.
‘Amember?
These days, however, our best and brightest enter the hallowed halls of higher education only to contend with the complexities of speech codes, the ins and outs of political correctness, exacting recycling rules and a steady stream of “chem-free mixers.” I don’t know whether the last is a soft drink or a no fun allowed social event, though really what difference does it make? In any case, I think it’s safe to assume that navigating the transition to adulthood is a bit more challenging than it once was, what with one thing and another.
Anyhoo, the Little Slattern has flown the coop, fledged the nest, made like a banana and split, and she is now off at school making memories, thundering toward being a grown up and acquiring vast oceans of very expensive, almost entirely useless knowledge. (Tell me, can you recall the difference between the en soi and the pour soi, calculate anything with a logarithm, or explain a single concept related to Economics beyond the law of supply and demand? Neither can I.)
Unfortunately, I now realize that I failed to pass along to her most of the practical knowledge and critical life lessons I have accumulated these past NUMBER REDACTED PER THE AUTHOR years. You know the kinds of things I’m talking about: family recipes, pearls of wisdom, stories of youthful hijinks, tips on fashion, reminders about the importance of good grooming and having a skilled trial attorney on retainer. It wasn’t for lack of trying on my part; rather, it was largely because as soon as I started to tell my daughter a story or relate an edifying anecdote she promptly left the room. And since she prefers not to read my blog for reasons that are abundantly clear to anyone who hangs around for a post or two, I’ll just have to share my motherly advice with you. Here goes:
via clothes on film
Your underwear should be concealed by your clothing.
What’s that? Obviously, you say? Oh, I beg to differ. Ever since the Material Girl first flashed her big black bra, life on the streets of our cities and towns has been a nonstop lingerie peep show. These days, you’re more likely to see a whale tail on the checkout line at H&M than on the Discovery Channel, and brightly colored brassieres under white t-shirts have ceased to be mortifying fashion faux pas and become instead “fashion statements.”
I thought I’d seen it all until I took a walk through the Public Gardens in Boston recently and encountered this innovative take on “daywear.”
“Oops! I’ve got to stop dressing in the dark!”
Now how in the name of all that’s holy this poor gal concluded that this was any way to leave the house I cannot say. Perhaps her mother forgot to tell her that a bra is not a blouse, or maybe she’s blind and accidentally put on her boyfriend’s jock strap instead of a tank top while dressing that morning. I don’t know, it could be she somehow got her outfit on sideways. It doesn’t really matter how this fashion equivalent of a crime against humanity found it’s way to the public view. What matters is that it never happens again. Ever.
So ladies, please take my advice and leave something – anything really – to the imagination. Give your friends and neighbors something to wonder about. Maintain an air mystery as to what’s happening under your dress, because unless you’re Giselle Bundchen, the reality is often a tad disappointing.
Apparently the little kitty sphincter acts like a suction cup. Who knew?
Just because you can, it doesn’t follow that you should.
This has so many applications, it’s hard to know which to choose. OK, let’s just say, hypothetically, that you have excellent balance and posture and that your house cat likes to ride on your head and will calmly do so, even when taken out on busy city streets. Does this mean you should drag said cat outside on a cold winter day and parade around — oh I don’t know — lower Manhattan, for example, with it perched on your head? I think you know the answer. I think we all do.
Your teeth are not tools.
Do not use them to open bottles. Except in emergencies.
“Your father and I did not spend thousands of dollars on orthodontia, extractions and headgear to straighten out that congenital underbite just so that you could chip every tooth in your head with some drunken shenanigans.”
That was not an emergency.
This is.
Thank heaven for screw top bottles. And toga parties.
* * * * *
Photos of Cat Head and Bra Girl are both property of WS Winslow.
Kitchen Slattern 
The Guiltiest Pleasure
Sep 25
Posted by WSW
Reality TV scratches my id.
Who needs natural raspberry flavors?
via http://flickrhivemind.net
As even the occasional visitor to my well-appointed little lockdown ward knows by now, I indulge a fair few guilty pleasures. Some might even say I have more vices than virtues, though I think it just seems that way because I so often air my dirty laundry for your amusement, which is a compulsion of a different sort, but perhaps that’s a subject for another day. Among my filthy little secrets are insatiable appetites for swearing and the now-verboten Hostess Zinger (the sticky red coating over the Twinkie is pure bliss); my collection of Fleetwood Mac records; the admission that I like Grace Jones’s cover of La Vie en Rose better than the Little Sparrow’s original; and of course the fact that I have watched that dreadful 90s turkey Practical Magic about a hundred times. (I just love that scene where they all get trashed on midnight Margaritas and sing The Lime in the Coconut.)
Up until recently however, none of my little treats or crutches could really be classified as shameful (well maybe the Grace Jones business, but I’ll bet there’s at least one person on the planet who agrees with me on that score). I viewed them as the standard foibles of a reasonably functional member of the modern world. As guilty pleasures go, I reasoned, mine were all fairly tame. Now, however, I find I have finally given myself cause for concern, and that’s going some from a woman who whole heartedly exhorts others to serve ham salad finger rolls at parties.
Since I know the suspense is killing you, I’ll fess up. It’s reality TV. Though not a huge fan of the genre generally, I do follow Project Runway and Top Chef, and even occasionally look in on the Real Housewives. (New Jersey and Atlanta only — I can’t tell one California bleach job from the next, and the New Yorkers are all too familiar.) As a rule, I prefer the competitive formats to the biographical ones. I mean really, Kim Kardashian has marital problems and mother issues. Well who doesn’t? Eating bugs for money, modeling for morons or camping for cash? Who cares? No, my newest guilty pleasure takes reality TV well beyond the usual limits of both decorum and decency, into the territory I think of as Surreality TV, which is why, I suppose, it appeals to me. That’s right, you guessed it, I have developed a (borderline) obsession with Mob Wives of Chicago. Really, I just cannot get enough of this show. Look!
First of all, is it me, or do they all look like a bunch of cranked up trannies who just knocked over the make-up counter at Macy’s? Allegedly. The extensions, the Vegas makeup, the boob jobs and the sparkles all telegraph drag show to me. And who doesn’t love a man in a tiara? Whenever I’m watching the show, I’m also half expecting one of them to burst into “Son of a Preacher Man.”
I know it’s horrifying, and yet I cannot stop watching, so intense is the fascination. And before you go all violence-desensitizes-us-and-destroys-society on me, let me just say that it’s not like I’m watching Showtime for lord’s sake. This is on VH1, the regular cable channel that brings you a thousand hours of 80s music videos every week. Which, come to think of it, is a pretty good indication that this show is in the right place in terms of its overall intellectual level.
Nora: “I’m gonna resume my father.”
Renée: “I think it’s exhume.”
Almost as tricky as spelling HUMILIATION.
I especially love the hapless therapist who clearly wants to run from the room and looks like she’d probably rather be counseling a rabid civet than a woman who routinely gets into extension-yanking, bitch-slapping, knock-down, drag-out fights with her “friends.” I may be wrong, but I’d be willing to wager Dr. Thing pops a little vitamin V before Christina’s sessions. I know I would.
Dr. Thing: “How are you planning to work that out?”
Christina: “With a BLEEP shovel.”
Sometimes, the wives are very funny — on purpose — as when Pia the stripper comments on Nora’s obsession with digging up her father’s body to prove that it is actually he (“The German,” who died in stir) and not some hapless hobo that the feds sent to the cemetery. Pia, who is clearly practical-minded, says, “It’s not like the man dug himself up and went to 7-11 and got a sandwich and a Coke.” No argument there.
Now, I know what you’re thinking. What is the possible appeal of something this grotesque? I’d say that there’s such a sideshow feeling to it that it is entirely irresistible, especially to those of us who grew up in more emotionally-restrained environments. Take me, for example. As the product of a New England culture that looks upon anything more than a handshake as an intimate act, I find these women mesmerizing. Among my people, the only time anyone gets whacked is when Bitsy agrees to Binky’s request that she wear a saddle over her flannel nightgown on a Saturday night, but these ladies threaten to kill one another on a daily basis. With shovels.
What can I say, it gives my id a workout. And everybody knows how important a limber id is. If you don’t believe me, just ask Big Ang.
Big Ang via Reality Nation.
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Posted in Commentary, The Slattern Speaks
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Tags: Big Ang, Drag Queens, Fleetwood Mac, Grace Jones, Guilty pleasures, Humor, Mob Wives Chicago, Project Runway, Real Housewives