Being Amber Rhea

Oh, and one more thing…

Athens World named Of Montreal as artist/entertainer of the year. I concur. Heartily.

Goodbye, 2005; you were good to me

Well, 2005 is almost over, so I’d better put up some kind of obligatory end-of-year post. Uh… 2005 had its ups and downs, as every year does; but on the whole it was a pretty goddamn awesome year. I kind of feel like it flew by, though. That must be a sign of old age.

Three years ago, I felt like my entire world was falling apart. For those of you who don’t know, I rang in 2003 having just found out that day that my husband wanted to be a woman. (And I didn’t even tell the blogosphere about it until this year.)

And that’s all I have to say about that. Look how things can change in three years.

Here’s how the GDBF and I are ringing in the new year. You know you’re jealous.

Actually, at midnight we’ll be fucking in the new year, but for now, ringing shall suffice.

Unrelated: I bought a Glamour magazine today because my hero, Dooce, is in it.

You get what you pay for

Ever feel like this whole country is becoming a cheap, plastic imitation of what it once was? Yelladog has a good post about those craaaazy union workers.

Look, you pay people in the public sector crap wages in exchange for good pensions and decent benefits. That’s the trade-off. Going back on that deal as these folks approach retirement is dishonorable and cheap. If they strike and they are fired for striking, then replaced with scab labor, well, you get what you pay for. Do you really want some guy who the temp agency provided driving your train?

Go read it.

How things change in 50 years

Holy crap. (They had streetcars in 1953, ya know.)

Down to the wire

My essay, in its current state, has 2,607 words. The call for papers stated a desired length of 3,000-6,000 words, but I’m not comfortable rambling much further. So I say, let the editing begin. I’ll probably produce a few hundred more words in the process, anyway.

I’m very antsy in the pantsy about this.

Top 10 Posts of 2005

Here it is, folks: the 10 Most Popular Posts of 2005 (based on number of comments). Actually, it’s 13 posts, because there were a couple of ties. Feel free to resurrect any old threads and totally fuck up the numbering herein.

1. The Issue of Personal Choice (100) – The only thread to enter the triple digits. Jen won a free abortion for posting the 100th comment.
2. Wow! Representation! (75) – This one has been getting me an awful lot of comment spam.
3. Tie for #3:
   • Chapter 5: Stopping Short (53) – One of the notorious Every Young Man’s Battle reviews.
   • Audience Participation (53) – Shameless solicitation for bio page content.
4. Target, don’t do me like that (47) – A late-comer pushes its way up to fourth place! Impressive.
5. Detox (46) – Joseph, you were right; one of my juice fast posts did make it in.
6. Saturday Night Surprise (44) – It started as a rant about Georgia Power trying to screw me and [d]evolved into a debate over human rights and economic libertarianism.
7. Attack of the Ferocious Libido!!1! (37) – Wherein the radical suggestion that sexual compatibility is important in a relationship causes quite a stir, and we meet a new reader who actually employs the wife-as-cow metaphor!
8. Quote Site of the Day (36) – Fun with the Bob Jones University dress code.
9. Three-way tie for #9:
   • Top 10 reasons that I am not a [stereotypical] girl (34) – Lists are always popular (Gawd, I am sooo self-referential!)
   • Hello (34) – This one was written by Rusty as his first post of the Great Blorgy of 2005.
   • Let’s Beat This Analogy ‘Til It’s Dead (34) – What happens when Christian fundamentalism meets common sense? Commentage ensues!
10. Self-Affirmation, Dammit (31) – A pep talk turns into a ridiculous back-and-forth with a porn photographer, and then back into a pep talk.

Dude. You’ve arrived.

Props to Dacia for being chosen as #3 on Fleshbot’s Top Ten Hotties of 2005. (Course, I think she should be #1, but whatever.) I find it concurrently awesome and amusing, especially since most of the time we spend together involves sitting on our asses, napping, or eating chocolate pudding while watching Mr. Show DVDs. Take your porn stereotypes and blow ‘em out your ass!

Any patriarchy apologists wanna come out and play?

So you’ll have something to read while I try to think of more “top 10″ or “best of” lists to make, here are a couple of good posts I’ve read today:

• Alenda Lux: Another Rant
  

  You, as a woman, are not really any good to society, you see, until you’ve reproduced. This is the subliminal message that women get, and it starts with the goddamned people that are not even related to you who assume that you will immediately begin spawning in the first ten minutes after you say, “I do.” The other thing I just love is how one’s childbearing status is just anyone at all’s business. No, it’s not, you freaks. It’s not a “harmless question,” because if it was, no one would be mortified to bring their co-worker, daughter-in-law, niece, or granddaughter to tears when they have to tell you that they’ve just had an ectopic pregnancy, hysterectomy, or that PID has rendered them infertile, or that they’re just fucking sick of people wanting to know whether or not they’re fucking at all.

• I Blame the Patriarchy: I Dislike Lucy
  

  One of the worst things about having chosen a career in patriarchy-blaming is that I can no longer stand “I Love Lucy.” Every so often I try, because it’s Lucille Ball for chrissake, the extent of whose awesome genius cannot, I don’t even need to tell you, be overstated. But it only takes about two minutes for me to start fantasizing about Lucy breaking Ricky Ricardo’s eye socket with a bat.

Enjoy.

Update on my living situation

So, I went to the leasing office yesterday to talk to them about their flagrant attempt to screw me over. I repeatedly stated that I liked living there and did not want to move, and pointed out that in two years I have never been late on my rent or had any complaints against me (unlike some residents who don’t clean up after their dogs or throw cigarette butts into the bushes and start a fire). I was informed that the new rental rates were “set by the corporate office,” and that they in the leasing office have “no authority” to lower the price unless it’s an increase of $150 or more. I was also informed that my increase was the lowest of any, as if that was supposed to make me jump for joy. I asked, “So there’s nothing anyone here can do?” The leasing agent shook her head in response. “Well, then I’m going to have to move,” I replied. “Well… uh, I could get [the property manager] to put in a request with corporate,” she stuttered. “Check back on the 3rd.”

I told her to go for it, and that I would be back next week; but I’m not holding my breath. So barring a miracle, it looks like I’ll be moving at the end of March. Dammit. Well, at least my goddamn boyfriend has a truck.

Categorizing blogs, and other games

[This post is a slightly-edited outtake from my Big Bad Essay. It's actually been sitting around on its ass for a couple of weeks, and I finally decided to kick it out of my Word doc and onto the internets.]

I kind of hated breaking my “Blogs Not of Georgia” links into categories (screen shot, in case you’re reading this sometime in the future after another layout change), but I had to do it, because there were just so many that it was getting difficult to look at without some separation. I made a “Geeky” category and a “Sexy” category, but it gnawed at me so much that I added this disclaimer: “No implication meant that ‘geeky’ and ’sexy’ are mutually exclusive.”

The blogs that I placed in each category were placed there based on the primary or most frequent topic of their blogs. But not all blogs are so easily categorized – hence the catch-all “Just a damn good read” category.

Trying to define and group the non-Georgia* blogs to which I link got me thinking about my blog, and how it would be categorized – and I had a tough time coming up with an answer.

• Is it a web development blog? While I write about web dev stuff from time to time, my blog certainly is no 456 Berea St. or molly.com.
• Is it a feminist blog? Maybe, if only because I’m a feminist and this is my blog – but I don’t spend all day chronicling the inequities of the patriarchy.
• Is it a political blog? Please. One or two “Here’s why Republicans suck” posts per month do not a political blog make. There’s a reason I wasn’t approved for the Georgia BlogWire.
• Is it an Atlanta blog? Again, perhaps by default since I live in Atlanta. I also have an online photo album filled with Atlanta pictures, and write about local issues from time to time – but I’m no decaturguy.
• Is it a sex blog? Not by a longshot; although, some might say it is, simply because I write about sex more often than other bloggers they read – which is to say, the other bloggers never mention it.

That last one in particular got me thinking. I get interesting reactions when I post about sex – and I don’t even do it that often. Perhaps that’s part of the reason for the type of response I get. But, what are some other possible explanations? My theory is, there are several factors at work here. Shall we enumerate them? We shall.

• I write about lots of different topics. People may be caught off-guard when they encounter a sex post immediately after a CSS post.
• Like it or not, the fact is that even in the 21st century, it’s still a lot less acceptable (and hence less common) for a girl to speak bluntly about sex than it is for a guy to do so. Which brings us to…
• I write unashamedly about my love for and appreciation of The Good Fucking. Hell, I use the word “fuck.”
• I love me some cock but there are people who think I’m a lesbian because I have short hair and don’t wear make-up. Add to that the fact that (commence own-horn-tooting) I’m smart and nerdy and have two college degrees under my belt and fancy myself as a bit of a wordsmith… In short, I don’t fit the stereotypes (which are stupid anyway, but I digress).

Several sex blogs are part of my ever-increasing collection of almost-daily reads. There’s a reason these blogs are labeled “sex blogs” and mine isn’t. But then again, is it fair to pigeonhole them either? I know Dacia got some flak from some of her readers when her writing started to shift away from recaps of sexual encounters and more toward ruminations about sex as a social and cultural phenomenon. I think both types of writing are worthwhile, and I don’t think Dacia (or anyone) should feel constrained to write about only one or the other. The argument could even be made that the body of work she produces is more valuable because it incorporates both approaches (and everything else along the spectrum). The diversity results in a more well-rounded, and hence more realistic, picture.

I’m not saying that it’s always bad to categorize one’s writing. Plenty of bloggers – some of the most successful ones, in fact – made the decision to write about a specific topic or subject area, and their writing certainly hasn’t suffered for it. Sometimes, having a specific “category” or “type” can be a good thing – it keeps your writing on track, spurs you to think more deeply about specific subjects, and may result in more insightful writing than if you were “free” to write about anything. On the other hand, it can also be restrictive; case in point, the GDBF saying, “I can’t write about [whatever] because this is supposed to be a political blog.” It’s never good to feel constrained by something that was intended as a means of expressing your ideas and creativity.

Most of my favorite blogs to read are ones where the person writes about whatever they want, whether it be what they did that day or some sort of political commentary. That’s not a hard-and-fast rule, though, because some of my favorite blogs fit easily into a pre-defined category. But even those blogs don’t feel so impersonal, because the person occasionally writes about other, semi-related topics, or injects a personal note from time to time. I like this because it gives me an idea of the person behind the writing – and however inaccurate that idea may be, it’s better than reading something written by someone you know nothing about.

Getting back to sex – why, then, would readers be especially shocked or displeased when a “non-sex” blogger writes about sex, or a “sex blogger” writes about – gasp! – some other topic? I would word my answer differently for each question, but either way it’s really the same answer. In the first case: “Sex is a part of life – but a part that many people don’t want to deal with in an upfront manner.” And in the second case: “There’s more to life than sex – believe it or not, bloggers who write mostly about sex are regular people who actually do other things in their day-to-day lives.” These are just two different ways of saying that many people mistakenly impose a non-existant duality on others (and themselves) when it comes to issues of sex. Sexuality is viewed as something separate from the rest of who you are – which means that when you spend most of your time writing about the aspects of your life that encompass “the rest,” it can throw people off balance to see a post about sex, casually thrown in with no warning. Likewise, if you write mostly about sex, people unfairly detach this from the rest of who you are and see you (through your writing) only as a function of your sexuality, rather than a whole person of whom sexuality is but one part.

Dismantling this imposed duality is no easy task, and a lot of people (understandably) don’t want to put up with all the hubbub from ignorant readers, so they stick to writing one way or the other. Blogs that seamlessly incorporate both are few and far between. Obviously I think this is a good thing and should happen more often, and I say hats off to the bloggers who are moving forward with it. (Joseph accomplishes it particularly well.) But still, we need more.

It is important that people not feel prohibited from writing about sex on a personal level, and that there be bloggers who combine normal, everyday minutiae with stories of The Good Fucking, because sex is something that, as I already mentioned, is typically seen as separate from the rest of who you are. And so many people have an attitude of shame or guilt about sex, that it’s important to get it out in the open as something that’s natural, normal, awesome, and most definitely not something to be ashamed of.

So, uh, back to the original point, inasmuch as I had one… how would you categorize my blog?

* Ed. note: You might ask why I categorized blogs based on location in the first place. Why, because it’s easy, of course!