feminism for a lazy friday

I was going to post something about how V.S. Naipaul is the latest practitioner of the where-are-you-in-relation-to-where-I-am school of criticism, but I think Jezebel said it just fine. And Amy Poehler said it (as quoted by Tina Fey in Bossypants)—“I don’t care if you like it”—although I think she said it to Jimmy Fallon, technically. The point is 1. women write as well as men, which all non-idiots know. And 2. women aren’t always writing for men, which a surprising number of people don’t know.

It’s also probably true that when men write really good domestic novels they win prizes (like Michael Cunningham before he started writing about aliens; I love that guy), and when women do so, they get a pat on the head and a seat on the midlist.*

It’s Friday, and I’m just as interested in the pizza I plan to make tonight as in literary gender equality. But I am just sort of generally angsty this week, so I will mention some other things that bug me:
1. Christy Turlington, whose face is everywhere. Why must we party like it’s 1994, America?
2. My own head, which I can also not get away from.
3. The book I’m reading, which has a great title but unfortunately isn’t doing much to prove V.S. Naipaul wrong. But I can’t just put it down because that’s how I am. See #2.
4. The parking ticket I got for staying eight minutes after the meter ran out, but which was listed as a street sweeping violation ($10 more—which is a pair of shoes or two movies at the Highland Park 3 in my world).

Here are some things I like:
1. The balsa wood plane AK made me at Craft Night.
2. Trader Joe’s Fair Trade Swiss Dark Chocolate. I am not a chocolate snob. I’ll lick the thin coating off a Cocoa Puff if I have to. But this is the best chocolate out there.
3. Writing dates.
4. Photos of wiener dogs.
5. Poems in video form.

Since my likes outnumber my dislikes, maybe it will be a good weekend.


*I say this as someone who dreams of being a midlist writer. But I keep hearing about how publishing houses are only promoting their J.K. Rowlings, and the midlisters are going to small presses. So I guess this is like dreaming being a brontosaurus, which I also do.