On the Vulnerability of Children: The Tiger’s Bad Tumble

On Wednesday, my six-year-old son, the Tiger, “lost a battle with gravity,” as my friend who witnessed the situation described it. He fell from the monkey bars on the school playground, to the great detriment of his left elbow. You could see that there was an actual bend in his arm just above the elbow. [...]

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Medicare for All, after All?

A few weeks ago I floated the proposal – which I swiped from Cenk Uyger – of using reconciliation to pass meaningful health care by vastly expanding Medicare. Now it seems that Ezra Klein is warming up to the idea: My preference is that House Democrats pass the Senate bill and then run their fixes [...]

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Caturday: Got Your Goat Edition

Okay, I have to fess up: there are no cats whatsoever in this clip. It’s goats all the way. I found this clip recently while helping my younger son, the Tiger, with a school assignment on the “Three Billy Goats Gruff,” and it just tickled me.

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Blog for Choice Day: “Choice” as a Feminist Idol

In a couple of my previous posts on Mary Daly, I mentioned that her secularized notion of “idolatry” – which she saw in first-wave feminists’ singleminded focus on suffrage – can be applied to modern-day feminism as well. Today, on the 37th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, I’d like to dwell on how “choice” has [...]

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Perverting Star Wars for Good: Minimizing Mastectomies

While I’m stewing a couple of longer posts, here’s a medical breakthrough. And for once, I don’t have anything critical to say about it. I’m all gee-whiz-isn’t-science-awesome! Science Daily announces that a team headed by Dr. William Dooley of the University of Oklahoma has developed a technique to radically shrink large breast tumors. The study [...]

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One Good Thing …

… about the Senate Democrats losing their filibuster-proof 60-vote majority? At least Joe Lieberman won’t be able to kick us around any more.

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Tuesday Recipe: Little Raspberry Tarts

These are a variation on the pecan tassies that I make at Christmas. The raspberry/almond combo might even be better than the original. Tart dough: 1/2 cup butter, softened 1 3-ounce package cream cheese, softened 1 cup all-purpose flour Filling (see below) In a small mixer bowl, beat together butter and cream cheese. Stir in [...]

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Daly’s Misandry: “Idolatry” in Second-Wave Feminism

Shortly after Mary Daly died, I speculated that the notion of “idolatry” might be useful for secular feminists, but I didn’t develop the idea much further. In Beyond God the Father,  Daly suggests that in the past, feminists positioned suffrage as a kind of secular idol, and she warns against the “new wave” of feminism [...]

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Caturday: The LOLbible, Illuminated

The Ceiling Cat’s Twitter alerted me to this fabulous take on the LOLcat Bible. LolCat Bible Illuminated Manuscript from jonandrewdavis on Flicker. Since it’s not licensed under Creative Commons, I’m posting it with the hope that he’ll consider it fair use – and that people will visit the rest of this set on Flickr, “Divine [...]

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Against Trafficking, of Whatever Flavor

I winced when I saw this Columbus Dispatch headline – Call to toughen “slavery” law – but the article surprised me. In a good way. An Ohio legislator, Teresa Fedor, is about to introduce a law that would make human trafficking a stand-alone crime and not just an adjunct to other crimes. She’s supported in [...]

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I’m Incapable of Remembering My Own Blogoversary

It was yesterday. Two years. Huh. So I guess that makes today my first anniversary of forgetting my blogoversary. Because I spaced on it last year, too, amid snow days and work stress. It’s never too late to raise a glass, right? Festive kitteh from ICHC? Here’s to 753 posts … the patience of my [...]

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Real Faux Lies: Palin Is Coming to Fox

We need a word for “Schadenfreude-in-advance.” That’s how I feel upon hearing (via litbrit at Cogimatus) that Sarah Palin is slated to join Fox News. Oh, the joys of fractured syntax! The invention of historical facts on the fly! Howard Kurtz reports at the WaPo: Palin, who resigned as governor of Alaska last summer, will [...]

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Caturday: Mean Kitty!

We here at Kittywampus are ashamed to be so late to this party. “Mean Kitty” already has 28 million views! I am such an old fart. Such a square! I’m so square that I still use the word square! Anyway, on the off chance that you’re equally square, here’s “Mean Kitty.” Enjoy! Surely that’s a [...]

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Snow Days: Divine Blessing or Curse?

We here at Kittywampus have a long tradition of kvelling about snow days. Foolishly, we thought that when our offspring entered public school, we would be able to pursue our paid work from 9 to 3:30 with only the occasional blip for ridiculous holidays like Columbus Day (the kids get it off, the uni doesn’t). [...]

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Frankenstein, Necrophilia, and The Final Solution: How Transphobic Was Mary Daly, Really?

Historiann is wondering if there’s solid evidence that Mary Daly actually was transphobic. After a food-fight erupted in comments on Shakesville’s post, “RIP Mary Daly,” Historiann asks: Did any of the very opinionated commenters [at Shakesville] who were so very concerned about Daly’s transphobia offer quotations, or, you know, any actual evidence of her grave sins [...]

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Recuperating a Truly Liberatory Theology from Mary Daly

You may have already heard that Mary Daly, theologian and radical feminist, died on January 3 after a couple of years of poor health. And if you did, you might have recalled how she excluded men from her university classes. Or maybe you thought back to her playful use of language, which becomes downright baffling [...]

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On Barf: Why Parenthood Differs from “Having Kids in My Life”

Every once in a while, I hear childfree-by-choice people emphasize that they’re not anti-child; they just enrich the lives of kids by being actively involved with nieces and nephews, or they teach, or they volunteer for Big Brothers/Big Sisters. All of that is essential to keeping the lives of parents and kids afloat, and I’m [...]

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Not a Joke: Persistent Arousal Syndrome

K at Feminists with Female Sexual Dysfunction draws our attention to something that might sound like a joke, at first blush, but is miserable to actually live with: persistent arousal syndrome. It’s been mocked in the media as “restless vagina syndrome,” which trivializes it by equating it with restless leg syndrome(which in turn is only [...]

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Happy Blue New Year

Surely I can’t be the only one feeling a little melancholy at the start of a new year? Rationally seen, I’m actually on a good trajectory. Last year was a doozie for me, with the onset of a mysterious ailment on Inauguration Day that continues to disrupt my life. I still don’t have a name [...]

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