Still reading: Shirley
Once upon a time there was Sara Moulton and she was afraid of mixers and I loved her. She was calm and soothing, and said reassuring things like, "I'm sure you'll do this better in your own home." There was a brittleness about Sara that was also appealing, like in the episode where they brought in some of her "friends" to liven up the show, though clearly these were people who had only just met each other and Sara in the green room minutes before taping. Sara looks uncomfortable around people. She reminds me of me sometimes.
Today I watched a 12-year-old named Dave Lieberman vibrate his way through 17 different dishes he needed to make in 30 minutes. Dave, who probably hasn't even finished puberty yet, lives in a loft in Manhattan with a huge kitchen and what looks like southern lighting. Because the universe is fair that way. He bounces like he has to pee and has difficulty enunciating words and sentences. He also styles his hair with that weird yeti-peak the gays are so fond of -- though I have no idea if Young Goodman Dave is a homersassy or not. I mean, yeah: girlfriend's Clay Aiken gay; but, like all male Food Network stars, he's oddly sexless (see also: Brown, Alton; Flay, Bobby; Chiarello, Michael and speaking of which, if they force Michael Chiarello to host one. more. poker party where he serves delicately cut finger sandwiches and couscous...). Dave Liberman's pretty, don't get me wrong, especially if NAMBLA's your bag (and really: why not?) and you're pretty good with the Sony Playstation ("We hear the talk, the innuendo/but we're busy upstairs playing his Nintendo." -- Andrea Martin. It's just odd, if not entirely impossible, to imagine Dave Lieberman in any sort of sexual situation. For one thing, the boy has ADHD and would probably grow bored before the sex itself could even start. "Hey! Is that string?"
I watch cooking shows to be soothed. To watch impossible things happen in places called "kitchens." One of my favorite quotes about cooking comes from Rita Rudner: "I read cookbooks like science fiction. I get to the end and think, 'Well, that's never going to happen.'" Anymore, though, the shows are too frantic. With only 30 minutes and 300 ingredients, it's always a race to the end and I'm tense with worry over if the chef is going to make it or not. Gone, it seems, are the days where a chef would walk you through one dish, or maybe a dish and a dessert. Instead, it's some culinary Longest Mile to test the endurance of both the viewer and the personality.
The whole reason you're even reading my thoughts on the Food Network is because I've had this entry in my queue for about a week now, and I just don't have the interest in finishing it. But I did spend some time writing and figured why the heck not?
But anyway. Shirley.
I love this book. A lot. And I feel I owe my girl Shirley an apology for calling her a whore. Shirley? I spoke rashly and in anger. I mean, I think it's a little squicky to be all up in Robert Moore's grill after Caroline told you how much she loves him -- but ultimately it's Robert Moore who's the whore in this book.
Robert Moore is that guy, you know? That guy who you and your friend Shirley both like, and it's kinda weird that you both like him but you have this feeling in your heart that he really likes you a little more and you guys hang out on weekends at the mall and stuff checking out the t-shirts at Hot Topic and sharing a cookie from Mrs. Fields that you paid for (though, really, Robert Moore always seems to get more bites out of the Lemon Cooler cookie than anyone else). And sometimes you think, "Totally. He's totally into me and he's the sweetest guy ever because look how kind he is to Shirley; but when we were sharing a milkshake at a booth in Johnny Rockets -- a milkshake that I had to pay for because Robert was drawing anarchy signs all over his duct-tape-covered wallet and he left it on top of his Dungeon Master's manual in his mom's basement -- he totally touched my foot under the table and then when that song with that Amy chick from that angsty band -- you know, the girl who dresses like a tired ballerina with a habit of secret cutting? When that song came on he so gave me a look and yeah, his breath is kinda stinky 'cause he smokes Kools he steals from his mom's purse (if only the guys at the comic book shop hadn't totally railroaded him out of a job, he'd be able to buy his own cigarettes) but still: we're totally doing it once we ditch Shirley." But then sometimes you think, "No. He did not just touch her earlobe while looking at Shirley's dragon-holding-a-hematite-ball earrings -- earrings I bought her back when we were going to be Best. Friends. Forever. So what, forever's just an ass-slap away? Because I totally saw that."
Robert Moore is divisive, playing Shirley and Caroline against each other, giving false hopes to both while totally being more into his textile mill than is healthy. To update the novel to modern times, turn the mill into a Chevy Impala and turn Robert Moore into this guy named Josh I once had a crush on but who totally shined me on and you'd have it. Thanks for opening up that wound again, Charlotte.
What makes Shirley such a fascinating character is her fluid gender identity. Once upon a time, Shirley was a man's name and yeah, I know. You'll just have to deal. Anyway, Shirley uses that to her advantage often, slipping casually into the "man's" role when necessary and even identifying and being identified as such. She's in a unique position in the novel; she owns the property that Robert Moore's textile mill sits on and I'm pretty sure it's unentailed, which means Shirley gets to do with it what she pleases. And since she's unmarried, she gets to call all the shots. Shirley is refreshingly bold for a female character from the mid-19th century; this allows us to wallow a bit longer with Caroline, the other female lead. I'm sure more than one college-level thesis has been written on the homoerotic subtext between Shirley and Caroline (which: meh. I mean, I guess if you've got to write a paper you've got to write a paper but I'm sort of over Queer Theory and think it and Camille Paglia need to take a long nap).
Shirley also has some pretty progressive theology going on -- not just for the time, but for any time. When Caroline and Shirley are told that women are lesser than men because of Adam's primacy over Eve (I wanted "primogenitacy" or "-icy" or whatever to be a word), Caroline responds by saying that she's not interested in believing that since she's not sure the translation can be trusted. She even uses the popular "time and place" argument, suggesting that Paul's admonishment to women in the church was directed to a specific church at a specific time in a specific place rather than something applicable through all time. I have a feeling that it would be pretty cool to sit and talk to Caroline about theology while Shirley did things like chopped wood, gave us spending money, and killed bugs.
In "Mike Writes a Book" news -- I haven't been. I wrote what I thought was a first chapter, was told that it was more like a middle chapter, and haven't done much of anything with it since. I'll need to tinkle or get off the potty soon, since we're meeting again this Tuesday.
Today I watched a 12-year-old named Dave Lieberman vibrate his way through 17 different dishes he needed to make in 30 minutes. Dave, who probably hasn't even finished puberty yet, lives in a loft in Manhattan with a huge kitchen and what looks like southern lighting. Because the universe is fair that way. He bounces like he has to pee and has difficulty enunciating words and sentences. He also styles his hair with that weird yeti-peak the gays are so fond of -- though I have no idea if Young Goodman Dave is a homersassy or not. I mean, yeah: girlfriend's Clay Aiken gay; but, like all male Food Network stars, he's oddly sexless (see also: Brown, Alton; Flay, Bobby; Chiarello, Michael and speaking of which, if they force Michael Chiarello to host one. more. poker party where he serves delicately cut finger sandwiches and couscous...). Dave Liberman's pretty, don't get me wrong, especially if NAMBLA's your bag (and really: why not?) and you're pretty good with the Sony Playstation ("We hear the talk, the innuendo/but we're busy upstairs playing his Nintendo." -- Andrea Martin. It's just odd, if not entirely impossible, to imagine Dave Lieberman in any sort of sexual situation. For one thing, the boy has ADHD and would probably grow bored before the sex itself could even start. "Hey! Is that string?"
I watch cooking shows to be soothed. To watch impossible things happen in places called "kitchens." One of my favorite quotes about cooking comes from Rita Rudner: "I read cookbooks like science fiction. I get to the end and think, 'Well, that's never going to happen.'" Anymore, though, the shows are too frantic. With only 30 minutes and 300 ingredients, it's always a race to the end and I'm tense with worry over if the chef is going to make it or not. Gone, it seems, are the days where a chef would walk you through one dish, or maybe a dish and a dessert. Instead, it's some culinary Longest Mile to test the endurance of both the viewer and the personality.
The whole reason you're even reading my thoughts on the Food Network is because I've had this entry in my queue for about a week now, and I just don't have the interest in finishing it. But I did spend some time writing and figured why the heck not?
But anyway. Shirley.
I love this book. A lot. And I feel I owe my girl Shirley an apology for calling her a whore. Shirley? I spoke rashly and in anger. I mean, I think it's a little squicky to be all up in Robert Moore's grill after Caroline told you how much she loves him -- but ultimately it's Robert Moore who's the whore in this book.
Robert Moore is that guy, you know? That guy who you and your friend Shirley both like, and it's kinda weird that you both like him but you have this feeling in your heart that he really likes you a little more and you guys hang out on weekends at the mall and stuff checking out the t-shirts at Hot Topic and sharing a cookie from Mrs. Fields that you paid for (though, really, Robert Moore always seems to get more bites out of the Lemon Cooler cookie than anyone else). And sometimes you think, "Totally. He's totally into me and he's the sweetest guy ever because look how kind he is to Shirley; but when we were sharing a milkshake at a booth in Johnny Rockets -- a milkshake that I had to pay for because Robert was drawing anarchy signs all over his duct-tape-covered wallet and he left it on top of his Dungeon Master's manual in his mom's basement -- he totally touched my foot under the table and then when that song with that Amy chick from that angsty band -- you know, the girl who dresses like a tired ballerina with a habit of secret cutting? When that song came on he so gave me a look and yeah, his breath is kinda stinky 'cause he smokes Kools he steals from his mom's purse (if only the guys at the comic book shop hadn't totally railroaded him out of a job, he'd be able to buy his own cigarettes) but still: we're totally doing it once we ditch Shirley." But then sometimes you think, "No. He did not just touch her earlobe while looking at Shirley's dragon-holding-a-hematite-ball earrings -- earrings I bought her back when we were going to be Best. Friends. Forever. So what, forever's just an ass-slap away? Because I totally saw that."
Robert Moore is divisive, playing Shirley and Caroline against each other, giving false hopes to both while totally being more into his textile mill than is healthy. To update the novel to modern times, turn the mill into a Chevy Impala and turn Robert Moore into this guy named Josh I once had a crush on but who totally shined me on and you'd have it. Thanks for opening up that wound again, Charlotte.
What makes Shirley such a fascinating character is her fluid gender identity. Once upon a time, Shirley was a man's name and yeah, I know. You'll just have to deal. Anyway, Shirley uses that to her advantage often, slipping casually into the "man's" role when necessary and even identifying and being identified as such. She's in a unique position in the novel; she owns the property that Robert Moore's textile mill sits on and I'm pretty sure it's unentailed, which means Shirley gets to do with it what she pleases. And since she's unmarried, she gets to call all the shots. Shirley is refreshingly bold for a female character from the mid-19th century; this allows us to wallow a bit longer with Caroline, the other female lead. I'm sure more than one college-level thesis has been written on the homoerotic subtext between Shirley and Caroline (which: meh. I mean, I guess if you've got to write a paper you've got to write a paper but I'm sort of over Queer Theory and think it and Camille Paglia need to take a long nap).
Shirley also has some pretty progressive theology going on -- not just for the time, but for any time. When Caroline and Shirley are told that women are lesser than men because of Adam's primacy over Eve (I wanted "primogenitacy" or "-icy" or whatever to be a word), Caroline responds by saying that she's not interested in believing that since she's not sure the translation can be trusted. She even uses the popular "time and place" argument, suggesting that Paul's admonishment to women in the church was directed to a specific church at a specific time in a specific place rather than something applicable through all time. I have a feeling that it would be pretty cool to sit and talk to Caroline about theology while Shirley did things like chopped wood, gave us spending money, and killed bugs.
In "Mike Writes a Book" news -- I haven't been. I wrote what I thought was a first chapter, was told that it was more like a middle chapter, and haven't done much of anything with it since. I'll need to tinkle or get off the potty soon, since we're meeting again this Tuesday.
posted by Mike at 9:57 AM
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