Found this over on Julia Allison’s blog (huge fan of hers, as I’ve mentioned before):
And I liked it. That’s all.
[Posted by Mallory]
Category Archives: random
no pink or blue for pop.
A couple in Sweden have decided to raise their child genderless, or in my opinion, screw up their perfectly healthy child. The couple won’t answer any gender questions pertaining to their two-year-old son or daughter, who the media is calling “Pop.”
The idea behind the genderless upbringing is that the child won’t grow up with preconceived notions of gender and won’t be pigeon-holed into acting like a boy or a girl.
I’m sorry, but there is NOTHING WRONG with having a gender. The parents are creating gender issues where there probably weren’t any in the first place.
As a parent, why would you want to do anything that might encourage this type of identity crisis and bring about certain ridicule from peers on your own child? Isn’t adolescence difficult enough already? The parents claim that Pop will be able to choose his/her own gender whenever he/she feels it is the right time. Pop, for your own sake, I hope it’s soon.
Read for yourself over at The Local.
[Posted by Shannon]
Filed under babies, definitely not politics, family, health, news, pop culture, rando, random, thoughts, weird
let the lady show some leg!
People want a White House that isn’t stuffy and a president they can have a beer with, yet when the first lady dresses like a normal woman on vacation, the media screams “totes inappropes, Meesh!” Or something to that effect.
As you probably already heard, some people are hassling my girl Michelle for wearing shorts and showing her stems as she stepped off Air Force One. They call her shorts “short shorts” and “disrespectful” and BLAH BLAH BLAH. This issue really resonates with your Six Words bloggers, as both of us have been blessed with long femurs.
These are the shorts in question:
Ummm… they look fine to me. These are “short shorts”:
Not the same, are they?
Our lovely and stylish First Lady is model height. She’s 5’11. She’s going to have some lengthy gams. So really, her shorts aren’t that short, her legs are just really long. So lay off, you raging heightists!
Aren’t there bigger and better things to worry about anyway? You know, like making sure the Republicans stop lying about health care reform. Just a thought.
[Posted by Kathleen]
Filed under blogging, celebrities, crushes, family, fashion, news, politics, pop culture, random, thoughts
study proves gamer stereotypes are true.
This just in from the Department of Things that are Unsurprising: A new survey shows that the average U.S. gamer is overweight, 35 years old and depressed.
This study was conducted by the CDC in the Seattle-Tacoma area. CDC’s Dr. James B. Weaver said,
“Health risk factors, specifically a higher BMI and a larger number of poor mental-health days, differentiated adult video-game players from non-gamers,” he said. “Video game players also reported lower extraversion [sic], consistent with research on adolescents that linked video-game playing to a sedentary lifestyle and overweight status.”
Image from vortexgames.com
Does anyone else find this to be really disturbing?
Last weekend I was in Indianapolis for a wedding, which fell on the same weekend as Gen Con Indy– a gaming convention. Walking around, our high heels and party dresses were a stark contrast to the sea of gamer costumes: elves, pirates, warrior princesses. Not to go all Carrie from Sex and the City on you, but I couldn’t help but wonder–besides the costumes, what is it about gamers that really sets them apart from the rest of us?
While we non-gamers are surely not to blame for the natural chemical imbalances that lead to depression, what is our role in ostracizing gamers from mainstream society?
Perhaps we lack the imaginative spark they manage to hold on to, and we mock them for it. That being said, there must be another outlet for imagination and creativity besides a video game.
We all understand what it’s like to feel comfortable in a community of like-minded people. (My comfort zone is other political wonks and campaigners who, to some, may seem like weirdos. Unlike gamers, however, we tend to be painfully extroverted. It takes a certain kind of person to actually like knocking on doors and talking to strangers.) And if the study had said the average gamers were mostly happy and healthy, I would say “live and let live” and then make a crack about how they probably still live in their parents’ basement.
But that isn’t the case. We now have data pinpointing a distinct community of people who are depressed and unhealthy. Now we just need to figure out what to do and how to reach them.
[Posted by Kathleen]
Filed under adventures, blogging, health, news, pop culture, random, technology, thoughts, Uncategorized, weird
youtube clip of today: wedding film.
Again, with the warm-and-fuzzies! I can’t stop! The lovely Miss Potter sent this video along, and I don’t think it needs much of an introduction, except to say that it goes along this set of photos:
What a LOVELY wedding. (Lovely is the warm-and-fuzzy word of the week.) And could this couple BE any cuter?! She makes me want to chop off my hair and dye it platinum blonde, and he makes me actually sort of almost like seersucker. Needless to say, around about 2:15 in that video, the tears began a-flowin’. An enormous kudos to photographer/videographer Josh Goleman. You done good, Josh. You done good.
[Posted by Mallory]
mysterious letters: a lovely (creepy?) project.
People, I don’t know what’s come over me, but I can’t stop posting about warm-and-fuzzy stuff. Yesterday I had a slow day at work and organized the shit out of my Google Reader, adding tons and tons of blogs, mostly courtesy of the lovely and tiny Susnan. It was via one of these blogs (thanks, design*sponge!) that I stumbled upon the Mysterious Letters project. The people who started the project, Lenka Clayton and Michael Crowe, explain it as such:
In April 2009, we sent a personal, handwritten letter to each of the 467 households in the small Irish village of Cushendall. We hoped these unsolicited letters would prompt neighbourly discussion, spreading across the town, promoting community curiosity.
Lenka and Michael saw this as an art project, and that’s it. Pretty simple. Here are a few sample letters that they sent to the people of Cushendall:
And my favorite:
Perhaps it’s all the warm-and-fuzziness taking over, but I thought this project was nothing but adorable. This clip from a local news program (worth watching if only for the accents, eee!) shows that locals had a different reaction to the mysterious letters. In fact, most of them were at best confused and at worst creeped out and concerned for their safety. I see their point, though I do love the idea in theory. As the anchors say at the end of the clip, Lenka and Michael plan to expand their project and eventually write these letters to everyone in the world. A bit ambitious, maybe, but I’ll be looking out for mine!
What do you think, dear readers? Lovely or creepy? What would you do if you got an unsolicited handwritten letter from a stranger?
[Posted by Mallory]
Filed under adventures, random, the arts
yum yum, it’s national cupcake day!
I don't know why I picked this picture. I actually HATE cats.
Leave it to Six Words to know that today is National Cupcake Day!
As a DC resident, I love a good yuppy, over-priced cupcake from a store that only makes cupcakes (Georgetown Cupcake, cough cough). I could write an ode to the cupcake, but it would probably end up with me talking about my thighs and then leaving work early to go to the gym a cupcake store. Instead, I’m going to let the masters at one of my favorite blogs, Cake Wrecks, do their magic. Click below for some hilarious pictures.
http://cakewrecks.blogspot.com/2009/08/national-cupcake-day.html
I hope you celebrate this very important day!
[Posted by Kathleen]
Filed under blogging, food, news, pop culture, random
dancing with the crooked, lying politician.
I should have written about this yesterday, but I didn’t. So that’s that. When I first heard about it, I thought it was a joke. Former Congressman and Majority Leader Tom Delay is going to join the cast of “Dancing with the Stars”. Perhaps the title should be changed to “Dancing with the Fallen Stars”.
Do you all remember Tom “The Hammer” Delay? I’m a huge fan. No, really, I am. Do I disagree with pretty much all of his positions on the issues? You betcha. But I’m really a fan because he gave us one of the most classic and hilarious high profile mugshots EVER. Smile, Hammer!
Stop... Hammer time!
That smile really just lights up a room, doesn’t it? He looks thrilled.
In case you were wondering, he earned the nickname “The Hammer” because he was particularly fierce as the Majority Whip (the person who gets the party to all vote the same way) for the Republicans in 1995. He became the Majority Leader for the House of Reps in 2003. Then, all this stuff started happening. Perhaps there was a little violation of campaign finance laws, perhaps a little perjury. You know, no big deal. Well, actually, he was indicted, but it still hasn’t come to trial yet. Perhaps that will be part of his dramatic DWTS storyline?
So “The Hammer” will grace us with his dancing skillllllz. He says he and his wife love to dance, and his daughter is a professional dancer. When he was in Congress, Tommy was known for his outspoken opposition to the National Endowment for the Arts. Just throwing that out there.
He will be joined by a bunch of other regular people who were once famous. According to People:
The complete cast for Dancing Season Nine
Mya, singer
Melissa Joan Hart, actress
Michael Irvin, former Dallas Cowboy
Ashley Hamilton, actor, comedian, singer-songwriter
Aaron Carter, singer
Kathy Ireland, former supermodel-turned-businesswoman
Debi Mazar, actress
Natalie Coughlin, U.S. Olympic swimmer
Louie Vito, snowboarder
Chuck Liddell, ultimate fighting champ
Donny Osmond, singer
Tom DeLay, former Republican congressman
Macy Gray, singer
Joanna Krupa, model and actress
Mark Dacascos, Iron Chef personality
Kelly Osbourne, reality star
AARON CARTER?! I’m watching this every week. That is a completely serious statement. And just because I can, I’m going to leave you with the a video of my other favorite dancing Hammer:
[Posted by Kathleen]
don’t let people happen to you.
If you don’t already read www.leloveimage.blogspot.com, you must start immediately. It’s all happy lovey photos and text. I’m a single person and I STILL love it, so everyone can love it, and everyone should love it. Love love love-ity love love. This text was posted the other day (can’t find the original source):
Another favorite:
Don’t you feel happier now? Good. Great. Happy Friday!
[Posted by Mallory]
today is a google holiday, hooray!
Man, two Google Holidays in one week! I can hardly believe our luck. I think this means I am going to win the lottery tomorrow. (I did buy a ticket. If I get the $213 million, I’ll send you each a $20. You’re welcome.)
Today’s Google Holiday: Hans Christian Ørsted’s birthday. (Um, YAY?) Basically he began the study of electromagnetism, which means we can thank him for the fact that there’s light when we flick a light switch. Thanks, Hans!
What I was Googling: tube TV
And really…if anyone knows what a tube TV is, please let me know. Google kind of failed me on that one.
[Posted by Mallory]
six words to change the world. 