Rebranding Pestilence

War, Famine, Pestilence, and Death.  Someone had to be the least cool of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.  War and Death had a iron grip on coolness when it came to mythical horsemen,  That left Famine and Pestilence.  Pestilence, however, tried a Hollywood- or Washington-type solution to his dilemma: hiring a publicist to refurbish the old image. 

Doralee Pilsudski took on this client, believing that this represented a major public relations challenge to demonstrate her awesomeness in putting lipstick on a pig.  But, she wondered, how do you emphasize the lighter and brighter side of disease?  Well, she had some ideas!

First, she needed to revamp the image of Mr. Pestilence.  Unfortunately, Albrecht Durer's famous engraving was most often seen in popular representations.  Accordingly, she prescribed some cosmetic surgery and some boot camp sessions at the gym.  After Mr. P. bulked out, was tanned, and got a contemporary hair styling, he looked somewhat like Channing Tatum!  Hmm.  Next, she recommended a sartorial change in terms of power suits instead of dressing like a character from a less successful Kevin Costner movie like Waterworld or The Postman.

Doralee then advised him to ditch his mangy horse, and take up driving a Ferrari to emphasize the fact that he is successful.  Mr. P. demurred; exclaiming that he was a horseman!  She countered that he still was, in a way: the horsepower under the hood!

Then she offered some quasi-Darwinian takes on the inevitability and desirability of diseases: they thin down the herd and reduce the number of the weakest links.  She stopped, however, at commissioning a television comedy featuring microbes and viruses as characters.  Even with the lousy fare on network television, they were not THAT desperate next.  

Furthermore, she pointed out that Mr. P. needed exposure in typical gossip magazines.  She arranged his acquaintance with several habitués of those publications who were famous for being famous.  The fact that they were also willing to wear clothing that hinted at their physical assets did not hurt, either.  Symbiosis occurs in nature, but especially in Hollywood!

In order to better serve Mr. Pestilence, Doralee asked him about his long-term plans so that she could better dovetail his expectations with the image improvement.  To no surprise, Mr. Pestilence expressed a hope of running for Congress and possibly the Presidency some day!  Finally, it all came together.  Doralee did a great job in re-imaging Pestilence knowing that he had a political future in mind! 

The Best Song/Music Video of 2014

It has to be Taylor Swift's "Shake It Off."  No other one comes close.

Taylor seriously and totally rocks!  No two ways about it!  This song is empowering and fun.

I stay up too late

Got nothing in my brain

That's what people say

That's what people say

I go on too many dates

But I can't make them stay

At least that's what people say

That's what people say

But I keep cruising

Can't stop, won't stop moving

It's like I got this music

In my mind, saying it's gonna be alright

Cause the players gonna play, play, play

And the haters gonna hate, hate, hate

Baby I'm just gonna shake, shake, shake

Shake it off

Heartbreakers gonna break, break, break

And the fakers gonna fake, fake, fake

Baby I'm just gonna shake, shake, shake

Shake it off, Shake it off

Celebratory Gunfire

For some cosmic reason, in some parts of the Ninth Ward in New Orleans, in Puerto Rico, as well as in some parts of the Mideast, some people think that a basic law of physics is repealed in New Year's Eve: Apparently, the simple principle that states that "what goes up must come down" does not apply on that date.

This is the only thing that can explain the practice of celebratory gunfire.  Actually, some people get hurt or killed from this now and then.

Seriously, shooting a gun into the air can have bad consequences. A falling bullet can travel at a velocity sufficient to penetrate human skin.  Shooting into the air simply to celebrate is something only a moron would do.

On the Mississippi River levee in places such as Gramercy and Lutcher (north of New Orleans) the celebrants have Christmas Eve bonfires.  This is more safe and sane; and beautiful to behold!

The War on Pink

Agatha is one of those people who are strongly motivated to improve society in quaint, sometimes unproductive ways.  For example, she went full bore into the antivax movement, and she can be called upon to participate in any demonstration that is opposed to the current order of things.  She would not mind being a spokesperson if called upon.  However, due either to good luck or the Good Fairy of News Reporters, they have avoided a harangue worthy of Fidel Castro by choosing someone else instead.  She definitely can be said to have the courage of her opinions!

Anyway, I met her and in the second sentence she told me what is on her mind: the frequency of pink toys and clothing for girls!  I did a whoa!  Glad I was not wearing a Hello Kitty tee or clothing in the Pink line from V.S., otherwise I would get an earful, having been identified as among the uninformed, if not a oppressor.  Still, like a moth drawn to a light, I wanted to understand why she saw pink as a problem. 

I was soon appraised of her reasons.  According to Agatha, dressing girls in pink and giving them pink toys sends them a message that they should strive to be cute and ornamental, rather than assertive and effective.  In other words, they grow up to be life-sized Barbies with this artificial gendering!

Well, that can be a problem.  Barbie is the ultimate material girl; and Ken is as interesting as breakfast at McDonald's.  (Brother Mike used to undress my Barbie and dress her in Ken's duds to piss me off.)

I asked her what she was planning to do in response to her qualms about pink.  She trotted out several things:
1) Never buy pink clothes or toys for daughters and forbid them for wearing or playing with pink things.  Avoid pastel shades altogether.
2) Engage in consciousness raising with others over the dangers of pink.
3) Forbid any semblances of the princess role or look.

4) Boycott the Pink Pony Pub in Gulf Shores.  So I go, "But Aggie, you live 200 miles away from that coastal pub!"
5) Join Pink Stinks or other anti-pink groups.
      http://www.pinkstinks.co.uk/
6) Create banners: Pink is represses girls and women, Pink is for guys too.
7) Burn CDs of that album by The Band, Music from Big Pink.
8) Picket for cotton candy to come in colors besides pink.
9) Drink only red or white wines, no rosés!
10)  Wear only red lipstick or none at all: no pink!
11) Boycott pink grapefruit.
12) Eschew pink lemonade and Cosmopolitans.
13) Eat steak that's well done, not rare or medium rare.
14) Never play music by Pink.

I asked, just playing the devil's advocate, whether forbidding girls from wearing pink does also restrict them artificially.  She seemed confused by the idea.  That's the problem with people who are single-minded: they miss the big picture.  Also, could she be underachieving when it comes to indignation?  In the cosmic scheme of things, pink shouldn't be really a biggie.

St. Johns County Knows Buttocks

Although I have been up to my wazoo in work, and got a wee bit behind on things, still I have nothing to moon about since I came up with some cheeky topic on which to write.  But what could be more American than to take an appreciative look behind outward appearances?  Perhaps we owe this renewed interest due to the intercession of Kim K. with her callipygous assets?.  But talking about the rear view in legal terms offered a challenge that vexed scholars for a long time.  Just so we don't have to butt our heads against a wall, how much display is okay, or not?  Touché!

Fortunately, back in 1992, St. Johns County (St. Augustine, Florida) passed an anti-obscenity law regulating how much feminine flesh could be displayed on stage or on the beach.  Evidently, they needed to spell it out in no uncertain terms, lest they be legally in arrears.  I find it so precious and funny how they split hairs with regard to the buttocks.    

Breast -- "A portion of the human mammary gland (commonly known as the female breast) including the nipple and the areola (the darker colored area of the breast surrounding the nipple) and an outside area of such gland wherein such outside area is (i) reasonably compact and contiguous to the areola and (ii) contains at least the nipple and the areola and 1/4 of the outside surface of such gland."

Buttocks -- "The area at the rear of the human body which lies between two imaginary lines running parallel to the ground when a person is standing, the first or top of such line drawn at the top of the cleavage of the nates (i.e., the prominence formed by the muscles running from the back of the hip to the back of the leg) and the second or bottom line drawn at the lowest visible point of the curvature of the fleshy protuberance, whichever is lower, and between two imaginary lines on each side of the body, which lines are perpendicular to the ground and to the horizontal lines described above, and which perpendicular lines are drawn through the point at which each nate meets the outer side of each leg."

In other words, a bikini that provides full coverage in the rear.  I wonder if males are equivalently restricted.  A few years ago I offered my opinion on swimsuit equality:

http://evil-pop-tart.blogspot.com/2010/06/lets-have-swimsuit-equality.html

I suppose the local police would be unduly burdened with determining precisely what percentage of each breast is properly covered and whether the buttocks are properly out of view, according to this law.  Would the police form a special Bikini Control Squad?

Unfortunately, St. Johns County did not define Elbows in their law.  Therefore, we cannot be certain that they know their tushes from their elbows there!




Probably illegal in St. Johns County.

Merry Christmas!

May this Christmas and other Holidays 

be joyful and peaceful for you.

Encountering a Pit Bull

As a teen, I was briefly employed as a dog groomer in a pet store.  Now I knew very little about trimming dogs' coats, so I was relegated to the easy jobs on breeds not requiring much finesse.  Obviously, no poodles or Chinese cresteds or Yorkies. Cayoodles* are seldom clipped or manicured.

Usually I wound up bathing the dogs; and this usually resulted in an impromptu doggy bath for me as well!  Oh well, when I rode the bus, I was not usually crowded by other passengers!

One day, the worst possible case happened.  A distressed owner brought in his large, drooling, uncomfortable, miserable pit bull named Thor to get a bath after getting sprayed by a skunk!  The scariest breed there was, and with a scary name as well!  And I was supposed to de-stink this fellow?  And, for God's sake, how did he come across a skunk in New Orleans?  Actually, a surprising number of wild animals have become semiurbanized opportunists.  But no Louisiana brown bears or alligators, as far as I know.

Actually, Thor shied away from me, expecting some other enormity on top of the skunk chemical warfare.  I gave him a dog treat to buddy up to him.  He sniffed at it, and accepted it after some thought.  I made sure the water was warm; immersing a pooch in cold water spoils the mood.  However, I started before the bath to massage him with a combination of hydrogen peroxide and baking soda.  (I used gloves with the H2O2.)  He seemed to like the soft sponge.  Naturally, even a short-haired dog shakes off water when wet; and I got the stink removal stuff and some stink all over me.  Darn!   For some reason I put my arms around Thor's neck to better grasp the situation, and he took it as a hug.  That worked.  So I kept on with it, and he settled back and enjoyed the rub down and the following bath with doggie shampoo!  Contrary to the stories, there is no reason to bathe the dog in tomato juice; make the dog gazpacho instead.  Any way, I became his best friend when he realized that he reeked less!  (Or maybe the two of us smelled similarly!)  The story went on: I had to ride the bus going home, and I sat in the back. 

One day Thor and his owner came into the pet store.  As I was in the store itself, and not in the grooming parlor, he jerked his owner's leash and came to visit with me.  Thor was a sweetie!

*A New Orleans expression for mixed breed, garden variety dogs (mutts).

Such a winning smile.