Shorter Mitch Albom: Get Off My Lawn... And Back In The Kitchen

This  (which I found here) makes me feel better about really disliking Mitch Albom without ever having read a single one of his books.

(The husband loved Tuesdays With Morrie, and I contemplated giving it a shot, until I read some of the guy's opinion pieces, and… gack.  It was this kind of stuff. Loooots of this kind of stuff.)

I have a few thoughts, only the first of which is how sad I am that Mitch Albom would probably never like my Brazilian wax post, then.  I use the word "vagina."  Maybe if I go change it to "your v-word" he'll read it!

I read a comment on the Twitter with which I heartily agree, and which I feel sums up the entire problem with this piece (if we don't treat the get-off-my-lawn premise as a problem but rather as a mentality of its own).

The comment was something to the effect of, "Never complained about the whole male-run porn industry thing, didja?"  Certainly the numbers of porn viewers are untold leaps and bounds beyond the readers of Shades of Grey.

I'd add that I've never seen Mitch Albom write up a critically lauded film wherein male characters use vulgar words for vagina.  Because no movies like that exist, I'm sure.  Definitely, definitely sure.

And it's a little ~telling~ that Mitch takes issue with Girls, and yet I don't recall a similar rant from him when Game of Thrones premiered last year.  Let's compare:

Girls
- Shows breasts
- Shows penis (1 so far, I think)
- Shows vigorous sex (including with not-peak-of-attractive bodies)
- Uses foul language
- Lady creator
- Lady show runner
- Lady writers
- Touchy issues other than depiction of/conversation about sex: abortion, STI's, sexual harassment

Game of Thrones
- Shows breasts
- Shows penises (2 come to mind, but it might be 3?)
- Shows vigorous sex (including woman-on-woman prostitution)
- Uses foul language
- Dude creators (books and show)
- Dude show runners
- Dude writer (books); Dude and lady writers (show) (well, a lady writer is credited once for "teleplay," and another lady writer is credited twice for "written by"... out of 20 episodes)
- Touchy issues other than depiction of/conversation about sex: limbs sawed off and intestines hanging out, a four-stroke beheading.  Also some burnt children's bodies, children being shoved out of windows, children being stabbed through the throat.  Also people burning alive.  Incest (forgetting the depiction of, it's a moving force in the storyline).

I think you see where I'm going with this.  (Note: I love Game of Thrones and really don't love Girls.  Just so we're clear.)

I can't wrap this up without also referencing Albom's apparent problem with the movie Hysteria.  If you think a movie about the invention of the vibrator has nothing to do with the majorly stunted agency of women at that time in history, then you, sir or madam, have some reading up to do.

Recovery Relapse (Yes, Really)

It is possible - just possible - that April and May were total shit.  I am admitting to nothing outright, but let's just say that it's possible and leave it at that.

Put another way, sometimes I feel like the only person on earth who can attend a wedding rehearsal dinner involving pizza and a birthday party involving cake, and come away losing weight both times.

Despite being in really excellent care right now, and despite really, honest-to-god trying, I have actually gotten to my lowest weight since at least June 2003.  Lose.  Lose, lose, lose.  Loser.  I feel like one literally and colloquially.

I've been keeping a food log with my therapist, and it does give me a fair amount of insight into, "Okay, that really is NOT enough food to maintain this weight," as well as, "Wow, I sure do eat a lot of apples and bananas."

I am just so angry with myself that I want to cry.  I've always been an angry crier.

I can't blame myself totally (not in the sense that I blame other people for my own actions) because April and May were... Wow, you guys, they were epic, and their epic nature was not of my making or under my control. 

The rest of June and July are going to be tough, but better.  I hope.  I pray.  (I don't pray, literally.  I... concentrate.)

It is my intent to blog more frequently, but the blog might turn into a spate of navel-gazing for a little while (ha, I mean, more than usual) in tandem with some "homework" for my treatment.  You've been warned.

For now I'll leave you with a flower.  It's blooming at my East River park right now, and it is a singularly comforting shade of yellow.