Adios, Amigo

Yesterday, Mr. Man had an assignment (have I mentioned that Mr. Man is a schoolboy?) to write a bunch of aphorisms. In the midst of digesting the fact that Lambda Legal, a self-described LBGT legal defense fund, has ads running on Perez Hilton (who I've finally decided is too ignorant and transphobic to read anymore--read on), he decided to write some about the unspoken "lessons" one can learn about our culture from visiting Perez's site. Here's how our our gchat went:

Mr. Man: ow lambda legal is advertising on perez

me: omg

fucking idiots

!!!

???

that's cuh-razy

right?

3:26 PM Mr. Man: ya- it's crazy- but not too surpising

me: ya

no it's kinda smart

but not really

Mr. Man: there go the raises for thier employees....

me: pretty fucked up

no shit

not to mention who they're endorsing by their presence, and who they're targeting

3:30 PM Mr. Man: i am writing aphorisms inspired by perez hilton

me: haha yay

3:34 PMMr. Man: Things that could be learned from reading perezhilton.com

1. The young are the powerful, because they are beautiful, but the old can have power too if they get plastic surgery and/or have money.
2. Some women who are not transgender look like transgender people, and this is shameful.
3. A worthwhile cause is only worthwhile if it is endorsed by a celebrity.
4. What the rich and famous do is more important and meaningful than what everyone else does.
5. Everything is secondary to visual beauty.
6. Celebrity pop culture is nothing more than sensationalized mundanity.
7. Sarcasm is the best way to both make fun of and idolize people at the same time.
8. People who used to be celebrities, but aren't really any more are both funny and pathetic.
9. Appropriation of a radical queer style is okay if you are gay man, even if you are pretty mainstream, aside from your gay-ness.
10. Subscribing to strict gender roles is important is you want to be a celebrity- it's okay to be gay, but not too gay.

In one of my very first posts, I mentioned Perez Hilton and how I hated to love him but couldn't help it because he shared my love for Beth Ditto. Even back then, Mr. Man (the rascal who got me hooked on celebrity news, darn him) and I had noticed a disturbing habit Perez had of making fun of trannies, but we kind of just cringed and shook our heads in that "I'm disappointed but not really surprised" way, the way we did when that dumbass Dave Letterman (who I've always loved more than Conan or Leno) disappointed me so much a few weeks ago. Sometimes I'd post comments about how fucked up it was that PH would be such a hypocrite, not because he's gay, but because sometimes he champions the rights of trannies (or pretends to), most recently in response to Letterman's insensitive and trans-phobic remarks.

I should acknowledge that it's pretty fucking ridiculous that we visit this site at all. The whole celebrity thing is ridiculous, and although I like to tell myself that I need to know this stuff for work, or to better understand the mainstream, but I would have to admit that part of me enjoys it, in spite of being totally disgusted. It's like Diet Coke.

It's not just the trans stuff, either--Perez makes fun of people like Tina, the young girl who PH made famous for videos of herself dancing to pop music in her bedroom, who did appear to be homophobic, but is just a kid (who seems to have a learning disability of some kind). And he definitely tends to humiliate women much more than he does men...which is not so surprising, as that's kind of what people do in our culture.

PH often compares femme bio-women with MTF trannies, to insinuate that the bio-women are not femme enough, and therefore ugly. Nice. Sometimes, these bio-women are "villains," like Paul McCartney's now-ex, Heather Mills.

Today, he compared Ms. Mills to "Jeremy the out of control trannie," a homeless transwoman who recently crashed her car into a lingerie store who'd denied her application for a job. To get to those facts, I had to click through to the page where that expanded version (the post that lives on the main page is two pics with a teaser) lives, which is also the comment page. I tried not to read them, because Hilton's readers generally seem to be a shallow, xenophobic bunch, and they say some pretty offensive shit. Of course, today was no different, although there are a few people who chimed in to chide PH for his transphobic bullshit. He'd added his own commentary to the newspaper article he'd lifted, saying how no homeless person he knows has a car. I bet he knows a ton of homeless people. What a fucking idiot.

And that did it. Enough is enough. I'm through with you, Perez. I'll find some other mindless entertainment to rest my brain on when I need a break from being a productive person in the world. In fact, you can go fuck yourself Perez Hilton, and continue to be a hater and exploit the insecurities and prejudices of your (generally speaking--not us!) immature readers. It's not your fatness or your gayness that makes you ugly--it's the shit that comes out of your mouth.

Flushing away but still more shit

As of Monday, a full 5 days after we alerted our douchebag landlord to our toilet woes (and a full 48 hrs longer than he had, legally, to fix it) we were back in business, bathroom-wise. But the shitstorm that has plagued us since we moved here has yet to abate--that douchebag (perhaps I should just start referring to him as the DBLL) got so stressed and pissed about all the money he's spent over the last few months fixing up his house that he's passing that stress on to us, in the form of trying to evict our roommate, Miss D.

We told him she'd moved in and he was fine with it, but after they happened upon each other for the first time in the alleyway (right after she got fired from her shitty job) he decided to use the fact that we hadn't submitted that information in writing to fuck with us. In fact, he pretty much threatened to kick us all out. Yay for crazy DBLLs!

We're giving it a few days to blow over, and then we're going to send him a diplomatic email and make our case for Miss D staying. Of course, the larger issue is whether we should stay--who knows when that crazy fuck is going to hassle us again?

In other poopy news, Belle (aka Devil Dog) had an upset stomach yesterday and took a huge runny dump on the stairs, which I wouldn't mention except that after I'd walked her down those stairs (thinking "what is that smell?") with her, somehow managing neither to see or step in it, even though it was huge and right in the middle of the step. It wasn't until Miss D joined us downstairs and mentioned it that I realized how lucky I'd somehow been.

(what kind of pollyanna am I, reporting how happy I am not to have stepped in dog shit, even though I did have to scrub it out of the carpet? Silver lining, folks)

Anyhoo, in more pleasant-smelling news, I'm writing this post from Little Morocco, the hooka bar/restaurant down the street from our (current) domain. Mr. Man and I noticed they had falafel a few weeks ago, which was very exciting for us, since most of the restaurants in our hood are pizza joints. He came first, alone, for takeout, but both of us enjoyed the same first experience here--the super friendly, proud owner gave us a tour to the upstairs, which has kind of an Eastern, rumpus-room flavor--it's all satin-y and pillow-y and hooka-y. Right now, I'm up here alone, digesting what was a delicious falafel, enjoying the faint aroma of flavored tobacco, taking advantage of the free WiFi and as usual, pretending to be working. In the back of my mind, I'm having fantasies about harem girls and boys. Ahhh. Unfortunately, the connection's a little slow. Can't have everything.

By the way, I'm sure my gorgeous and clever readers noticed the new widget I've placed (all by myself, y'all) at the bottom of my sidebar. I've just started reading Hightower's new book and I'm so excited, because as a radical queer femme, I've often fought with myself internally over my love for old cowboys, so many of whom are red-necky and sexist and homophobic. Jim Hightower, though, has that cowboy sensibility but takes a much more informed political stance--but he's still got that cute old cowboy vibe, you know? Anyhoo, I thought it'd be fun to watch the time run out on that dumbfuck president of ours together. Enjoy!

"That's not good."

Pardon my undying (even in the face of incredible un-funnyness) love for the pun. Mr. Man and I had an insanely shitty day today. Literally.

It started first thing this morning with the toilet backing up on Mr. Man. Yuck!

Then, I took the dog out to poop and there was a hole in the bag and I didn't see it before I stuck my thumb in dog doo. Dammit!

Then, I got to hang out and watch our douche bag of a landlord plunge the toilet. He was all dressed up (in black slacks, a black mock turtleneck and dark green sports coat) and he didn't even take his jacket off to plunge so that made it kind of funny but it doesn't make up for the fact that he's a douche and anyway, it didn't work.

I should mention that the kitchen sink is draining slow and the pipe outside, that all of our wastewater clearly flows out (it's directly below and outside of the bathroom) was leaking, and Mr. Man had called our douchebag landlord and told him about it, and he didn't believe him (and blew me off when I brought it up, plunger in hand, today).

Anyway, he called a plumber and took off, and when the guy (who was a cute kid, actually, and btw Mr. Man, I forgot to tell you that he loved Bitsy) finally showed up, he looked around and when I told him about the pipe outside, he of course wanted to check it out, so after showing him our poop-filled toilet, I led him through our embarrassingly messy boudoir, and sent him out the window and down the fire escape, which is the only route to the backyard (yay row houses!)

I sat in the windowsill and smoked a cigarette and watched him. He started knocking off some of the insulation that is wrapped around the bottom 6 ft or so of the ancient pipe, and when he did, almost immediately, the pipe sprung leaks that shot straight out from it, and the poor guy had to run for fucking cover.

"That's not good."

"No shit." (again, I apologize)

So, tomorow'll be another shitty morning with the landlord and because he thought the kid's estimate was too high (easy to think when you're not the one having to get creative about finding places to poo) another plumber. We're thinking that now that we got ourselves a Hummer, we oughta just spring for one of those fancy condos (wink).

Know what else is shitty? Madonna's new video. I haven't listened to or followed Madonna in a long time, but I was excited about this video because she was supposedly going to "save the world in 4 minutes." Save the world my ass--what is that shit.

omg I almost forgot to mention the last poop story of the day--what a crazy shitty day--you kind of have to laugh and wonder what the fuck the universe is trying to tell you. I met Mr. Man this evening at the opening night of the Transmodern Festival, and in the middle of some experimental theatre that frankly went on a little way too long, one of the characters was a turd. Seriously. WTF?