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Thursday, July 31, 2003
( 11:52 PM ) The Rat YELLOWSTONE LAKE AS A METAPHOR FOR MY LIFE. From this. "We're thinking this structure could be a precursor to an hydrothermal explosive event," Morgan said last week. "But we don't think this is a volcano." If the bulge should explode, "we think it would create a large crater." But such an explosion, smaller versions of which created Indian Pond, Duck Lake and Mary Bay itself, would probably heat up the water temporarily, create high waves, spew poison gasses and other materials into the lake for a time, and leave a rimmed underwater crater. Or it could do nothing. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:52 PM ( 11:52 PM ) The Rat DON'T YOU THINK this looks like a publicity still for a new reality show? # Posted by The Rat @ 11:52 PM ( 11:52 PM ) The Rat THEY CHANGED THEIR MINDS about that SMS thing. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:52 PM ( 11:52 PM ) The Rat DID STALIN HAVE wayyy too much time on his hands? # Posted by The Rat @ 11:52 PM ( 11:52 PM ) The Rat AND HERE, another news item from neighboring Long Beach, a.k.a. "Iowa by the Sea." # Posted by The Rat @ 11:52 PM ( 11:52 PM ) The Rat ORANGE COUNTY wasn't like this when I lived there. Or maybe it was... how would I know? I was a bleeding-heart liberal. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:52 PM ( 11:52 PM ) The Rat Before I met my husband, I'd never fallen in love, though I'd stepped in it a few times. —Rita Rudner # Posted by The Rat @ 11:52 PM Wednesday, July 30, 2003 ( 10:54 AM ) The Rat DIVORCE VIA SMS APPROVED BY MALAYSIAN COURT. Malaysian prime minister Mahathir bin Mohamad, who has positioned his country to take advantage of the hi-tech information revolution, said on Tuesday he did not like the idea of divorce by the popular short message service (SMS). "I think that if people want to divorce their wife, they should resort to a much more personal approach than that. "We hope of course that instead of sending messages, you should look at the beautiful wife that you're going to divorce... maybe she would cry a bit and you would change your mind," he added. # Posted by The Rat @ 10:54 AM ( 10:54 AM ) The Rat NESSIE A MYTH? The Rat declines to believe this report. # Posted by The Rat @ 10:54 AM ( 10:54 AM ) The Rat OOOOH. # Posted by The Rat @ 10:54 AM ( 10:54 AM ) The Rat "Unfortunately, we only have 15 minutes to look at the Impressionists." —overheard last Friday at the Met (but would also make a good New Yorker cartoon caption) # Posted by The Rat @ 10:54 AM ( 10:54 AM ) The Rat GO OUTSIDE ON AUGUST 27. # Posted by The Rat @ 10:54 AM Tuesday, July 29, 2003 ( 11:25 AM ) The Rat THE LAST DAY OR SO ALONE brings, among others, the following search requests: ignore horny spiders "life would be perfect if" [Don't even get me started. —ed.] mermaids and mermen porn # Posted by The Rat @ 11:25 AM ( 11:24 AM ) The Rat AIDS CASES ON THE RISE. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:24 AM ( 11:23 AM ) The Rat ANOTHER EXAMPLE of someone who should have read this Monty Python sketch. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:23 AM ( 11:22 AM ) The Rat YET ANOTHER SIGN of Bob Hope's coolness: He outlived Vincent Canby, the man who wrote his Times obituary, the Post reports. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:22 AM ( 11:21 AM ) The Rat Hope's own wit was as sharp, if not sharper, than that of his writers. When a writer with a stuttering affliction explained he missed a meeting because he was at the hospital while his wife had twins, Hope said, "Twins, huh. Apparently you don't just stutter when you talk." —Doug Gamble on NRO today # Posted by The Rat @ 11:21 AM Monday, July 28, 2003 ( 12:34 PM ) The Rat MAGGIE GALLAGHER and Stanley Kurtz on gay marriage, in The Weekly Standard. The Ontario court views marriage as a kind of Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval that government stamps on certain registered intimacies because, well, for no particular reason the court can articulate except that society likes to recognize expressions of love and commitment. In this view, endorsement of gay marriage is a no-brainer, for nothing really important rides on whether anyone gets married or stays married. Marriage is merely individual expressive conduct, and there is no obvious reason why some individuals' expression of gay love should hurt other individuals' expressions of non-gay love. There is, however, a different view—indeed, a view that is radically opposed to this: Marriage is the fundamental, cross-cultural institution for bridging the male-female divide so that children have loving, committed mothers and fathers. Marriage is inherently normative: It is about holding out a certain kind of relationship as a social ideal, especially when there are children involved. Marriage is not simply an artifact of law; neither is it a mere delivery mechanism for a set of legal benefits that might as well be shared more broadly. The laws of marriage do not create marriage, but in societies ruled by law they help trace the boundaries and sustain the public meanings of marriage. In other words, while individuals freely choose to enter marriage, society upholds the marriage option, formalizes its definition, and surrounds it with norms and reinforcements, so we can raise boys and girls who aspire to become the kind of men and women who can make successful marriages. Without this shared, public aspect, perpetuated generation after generation, marriage becomes what its critics say it is: a mere contract, a vessel with no particular content, one of a menu of sexual lifestyles, of no fundamental importance to anyone outside a given relationship. The marriage idea is that children need mothers and fathers, that societies need babies, and that adults have an obligation to shape their sexual behavior so as to give their children stable families in which to grow up. # Posted by The Rat @ 12:34 PM ( 11:59 AM ) The Rat AS IF HIGH SCHOOL WEREN'T ALREADY GAY ENOUGH: New York is opening the first public high school for GLBT students. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:59 AM ( 11:58 AM ) The Rat BOB HOPE has died. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:58 AM ( 11:57 AM ) The Rat THE RAT isn't sure what this list is, but it's funny. Includes the following: [...] maladaptive, malpractice, manner-means-object, mannerism, mano a mano, manque, manqué, marginal, Marxism, masquerade, mass, mass entertainment, material, matinee idol, maturity, maudlin, maven (may’-ven, Yinglish), mawkish, MCANA, means, medieval, mediaeval, mediocre, mediocrity, megalomania, megillah (m’gill’-a, Yinglish), melee (maylay), mellifluous, mellow, melodious, melodramatic, memorabilia, Mencken, H.L (Henry Louis Mencken, 1880-1956, critic, ed., n-fictwri, philologist), mentor, mentsh (mench, Yinglish) , meshugaas, mishegaas, mishegoss (Yinglish), meshugge (m’-shu’-geh, Yinglish), mesmeric, mesmerize, metamorphoses, Mill, John Stuart (1806-73, Brit. econ., philos.), mimic, mind’s eye, mind-blowing, mind-boggling, mindset, mind-set, minimalism, National Book Awards [...] # Posted by The Rat @ 11:57 AM ( 11:56 AM ) The Rat THIS EXHIBITION is the coolest thing ever. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:56 AM ( 11:53 AM ) The Rat "SKIN." # Posted by The Rat @ 11:53 AM ( 11:52 AM ) The Rat [L]ove, even in its humblest beginnings, is a striking example of how little reality means to us... —The Fugitive # Posted by The Rat @ 11:52 AM Friday, July 25, 2003 ( 12:06 PM ) The Rat TAKE YOUR ZEITGEIST AND SHOVE IT. Bobos in Paradise author David Brooks has been given a column at Bobo Central; the Hussein brothers' bodies were evidently retouched for filming; Jayson Blair has assignments to write for Esquire and Jane. These stories—and the rest of today's media crop—are why we're all much better off reading about the approaching plastic duck armada. # Posted by The Rat @ 12:06 PM ( 12:05 PM ) The Rat HOWARD ROSENBERG on Jessica Lynch, Kobe's accuser, and the media. # Posted by The Rat @ 12:05 PM ( 12:04 PM ) The Rat HEPBURN PUSHES HILLARY TO NO. 2. # Posted by The Rat @ 12:04 PM ( 12:03 PM ) The Rat Days in the past cover up little by little those that preceded them and are themselves buried beneath those that follow them. But each past day has remained deposited in us, as in a vast library where, even of the oldest books, there is a copy which doubtless nobody will ever ask to see. —The Fugitive # Posted by The Rat @ 12:03 PM Thursday, July 24, 2003 ( 1:10 PM ) The Rat THE USELESS PAGES. Worth a few yuks. Don't miss the current Useless Site of the Week, "How Much Is Inside?" # Posted by The Rat @ 1:10 PM ( 1:10 PM ) The Rat CHECK OUT this week's Onion horoscopes. # Posted by The Rat @ 1:10 PM ( 1:10 PM ) The Rat A man is only as old as the woman he feels. —Groucho Marx # Posted by The Rat @ 1:10 PM Wednesday, July 23, 2003 ( 2:49 PM ) The Rat SPANISH MAYOR ENACTS CURFEW ON MEN. The Mayor of a southern Spanish town has declared Thursday's "ladies' night" and says he will fine any man found strolling about town in the evening. A spokeswoman for recently elected Andalusian regional party Mayor Javier Checa says the curfew is an attempt to encourage the men to stay at home and do the chores... A five euro ($8.70) fine would be slapped on any man found out and about. # Posted by The Rat @ 2:49 PM ( 2:48 PM ) The Rat RECENT SEARCH REQUESTS. nasty rat Salvador Dali, penis motive fey wasp [this has to be one of my all-time favorites —ed.] horny people # Posted by The Rat @ 2:48 PM ( 2:47 PM ) The Rat WHEN EDITORS ATTACK. # Posted by The Rat @ 2:47 PM ( 2:46 PM ) The Rat "You know the whole 'Prince of Darkness' thing?" —overheard in the office # Posted by The Rat @ 2:46 PM Tuesday, July 22, 2003 ( 3:20 PM ) The Rat BRUNO BOZZETTO'S "EUROPE AND ITALY." Heh. # Posted by The Rat @ 3:20 PM ( 2:20 PM ) The Rat TONGUE TRANSPLANT. # Posted by The Rat @ 2:20 PM ( 2:19 PM ) The Rat FIRE on the Eiffel Tower. # Posted by The Rat @ 2:19 PM ( 1:42 PM ) The Rat "Yes, and I did it out of pure spite! My only goal is confusion!" —overheard at the office, mid-production # Posted by The Rat @ 1:42 PM Monday, July 21, 2003 ( 3:16 PM ) The Rat "HOT CHICK ANGST." # Posted by The Rat @ 3:16 PM ( 2:21 PM ) The Rat LETTERMAN'S TOP 10 EXCUSES OF THE BASEBALL PLAYER WHO BEAT UP THE SAUSAGE. # Posted by The Rat @ 2:21 PM ( 11:58 AM ) The Rat SHADOW OF A DOUBT is showing tonight at Bryant Park. Free. (Also check out Cat on a Hot Tin Roof in a week.) # Posted by The Rat @ 11:58 AM ( 11:57 AM ) The Rat AMAZON PLAN WOULD ALLOW TEXT-SEARCHING. Executives at Amazon.com are negotiating with several of the largest book publishers about an ambitious and expensive plan to assemble a searchable online archive with the texts of tens of thousands of books of nonfiction, according to several publishing executives involved... Together with little-publicized additions to Amazon's Web site, like listings of restaurants and movie showings, the plan appears to be part of a strategy to compete with online search services like Google and Yahoo for consumers' time and attention. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:57 AM ( 11:56 AM ) The Rat GUARDIAN CONSIDERS U.S. VERSION. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:56 AM ( 11:55 AM ) The Rat BBC ADMITS DEAD SCIENTIST WAS SOURCE. The BBC has confirmed that a British government scientist who committed suicide was the source for a story accusing Prime Minister Tony Blair's office of doctoring intelligence on Iraq to strengthen its case for war. The British Broadcasting Corp.'s news director, Richard Sambrook, said yesterday the "primary source" for the story that triggered a political maelstrom was David Kelly. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:55 AM ( 11:54 AM ) The Rat Coworker 1. Idi Amin is dying. Coworker 2. Was it something he ate? —overheard at meeting # Posted by The Rat @ 11:54 AM Friday, July 18, 2003 ( 11:07 AM ) The Rat PRIEST ACCUSED OF DENYING DYING MAN LAST RITES. Yikes. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:07 AM ( 11:06 AM ) The Rat HAVING A BAD DAY? Remember, at least you're not this guy. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:06 AM ( 11:05 AM ) The Rat NEW DONKEY KONG HIGH SCORE. Scary. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:05 AM ( 11:04 AM ) The Rat CONSOLATION for English-speakers trying to learn difficult foreign languages, via Eve. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:04 AM ( 11:03 AM ) The Rat EEP! # Posted by The Rat @ 11:03 AM ( 11:02 AM ) The Rat "BAMBI HUNTS" A HOAX? # Posted by The Rat @ 11:02 AM ( 10:55 AM ) The Rat WHAT IS IT ABOUT D.C. INTERNS?! # Posted by The Rat @ 10:55 AM ( 10:54 AM ) The Rat RECENT SEARCH REQUESTS. pet rat choking "fire fetish" Rat poems how to get rid of rat in the attic fast norwegian naked rat tattooed german women Free Enlarged Boobs vagina overlook pictures Rat rescue centers rat saying fuck you Nasty Rat Porn rat wave gaffe pictures vagina Things that commitmentphobic guys say I'm a rat and I like it # Posted by The Rat @ 10:54 AM ( 10:53 AM ) The Rat THE RAT WANTS one of these, for the same reason you should always aim to hang out a lot with people much fatter than you. # Posted by The Rat @ 10:53 AM ( 10:52 AM ) The Rat Never sign a valentine with your own name. —Dickens # Posted by The Rat @ 10:52 AM Tuesday, July 15, 2003 ( 4:05 PM ) The Rat MAGGIE GALLAGHER on the stakes of the same-sex marriage debate. # Posted by The Rat @ 4:05 PM ( 1:56 PM ) The Rat GOGOL'S NOSE FOUND! # Posted by The Rat @ 1:56 PM ( 1:54 PM ) The Rat JOHN LOTT will be speaking on his new book, The Bias Against Guns: Why Almost Everything You've Heard About Gun Control Is Wrong, this Thursday from 7 to 8 at the Women's National Republican Club, 3 West 51st St. # Posted by The Rat @ 1:54 PM ( 1:53 PM ) The Rat GREAT HEADLINE, via the Post. # Posted by The Rat @ 1:53 PM ( 1:52 PM ) The Rat In physical suffering, at least we do not have to choose our pain ourselves. The malady determines it and imposes it on us. But in jealousy we have, so to speak, to try out sufferings of every shape and size, before we arrive at the one which seems to fit... —The Fugitive # Posted by The Rat @ 1:52 PM Thursday, July 10, 2003 ( 12:15 PM ) The Rat IT'S PROUST'S BIRTHDAY! Celebrate by discovering that all of your friends are gay and/or sleeping together. # Posted by The Rat @ 12:15 PM ( 12:14 PM ) The Rat CELL-PHONE COMPANY offers mosquito-repellent option. # Posted by The Rat @ 12:14 PM ( 12:12 PM ) The Rat J-LO "TOO LOW-CLASS" FOR VOGUE? Give me a break. I mean, I love Vogue, but it's not like they haven't had trashy people on their covers. # Posted by The Rat @ 12:12 PM ( 12:11 PM ) The Rat Of the state of mind which, in that far-off year, had been tantamount to a long-drawn-out torture for me, nothing survived. For in this world of ours where everything withers, everything perishes, there is a thing that decays, that crumbles into dust even more completely, leaving behind still fewer traces of itself, than beauty: namely grief. —Time Regained # Posted by The Rat @ 12:11 PM Wednesday, July 09, 2003 ( 1:16 PM ) The Rat NIFTY LITTLE ESSAY by Joyce Carol Oates, about Marilyn Monroe and the Strand, that I keep forgetting to link. # Posted by The Rat @ 1:16 PM ( 1:15 PM ) The Rat HEH. # Posted by The Rat @ 1:15 PM ( 1:14 PM ) The Rat ONLY 16 TABOO WORDS LEFT. But I'm sure we can come up with more! # Posted by The Rat @ 1:14 PM ( 1:13 PM ) The Rat IF YOU HAVEN'T YET, sign up for the National Do Not Call Registry. # Posted by The Rat @ 1:13 PM ( 1:12 PM ) The Rat THIS ONE'S for all of you out there who've been thinking for years: "Gee, my life would be perfect if I just had some anus-bleaching cream." # Posted by The Rat @ 1:12 PM ( 1:11 PM ) The Rat HOW MANY OF US can't help wondering whether, if this were to happen to us, our mother's first words to us afterwards would still be: "So, when are you going to get a real job??" # Posted by The Rat @ 1:11 PM ( 1:10 PM ) The Rat EUROPEANS ARE SO CUTE WHEN THEY'RE MAD! # Posted by The Rat @ 1:10 PM ( 1:08 PM ) The Rat "Remember, you're fighting for this woman's honor... which is probably more than she ever did." —Duck Soup # Posted by The Rat @ 1:08 PM Tuesday, July 08, 2003 ( 5:54 PM ) The Rat THIS WEEK'S ONION, or what I've read of it so far, is inspired. (Check out the horoscopes too.) Woman Masturbates To Concept Of Commitment PORTAGE, MI—Soaking in her bathtub Tuesday, area resident Linda Marston, 32, pleasured herself over the thought of a long-term committed relationship. "Mmmm... oh, yeah, baby... I want to settle down with you forever," moaned the never-married Marston, as she gently massaged her clitoris with two fingers. "Oh, God, yes... two kids, maybe three... and a house in the country. Big swingset in the backyard." Several hours later, Marston masturbated again to the idea of loving someone unconditionally through good times and bad. # Posted by The Rat @ 5:54 PM ( 5:53 PM ) The Rat "Oh, to be seventy again!" —Georges Clemenceau, on seeing a pretty girl on the Champs-Elysées on his eightieth birthday # Posted by The Rat @ 5:53 PM Monday, July 07, 2003 ( 12:05 PM ) The Rat A LINK to those nifty Louise Bourgeois spiders that were on view in Rockefeller Center a few summers ago and that Eve and I walked through, pretending we were Liza and Stavrogin (that was no dream!). The same site also links to photos of the spiders in Russia and the U.K.; this summer they are evidently in Japan. # Posted by The Rat @ 12:05 PM ( 12:02 PM ) The Rat IF YOU'VE NEVER BEEN TO ORANGE COUNTY, you can find out pretty well what it's like just by reading this essay. (Note: Even if you couldn't care less about Orange County you should read that essay—it's really good, and will save you the trouble of reading a whole novel by another, way-less-cool guy.) However, stuff like this, this, and this justifies a lot. So do streets with names like Avocado, Fuschia, and Heil. (The Rat's preschool, which alas no longer exists, was on Reagan St.) # Posted by The Rat @ 12:02 PM ( 11:27 AM ) The Rat SO, in the grand tradition of her travels to London and Paris (i.e., counting just places I've been while employed), the Rat also wishes she were still in California. (Would you believe I like New York??) Oh well, at least I'm not this guy. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:27 AM ( 11:26 AM ) The Rat DON'T CONFUSE an octopus with a squid! You'll get some people really really mad. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:26 AM ( 11:20 AM ) The Rat INTERESTING PIECE on gender and writing style. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:20 AM ( 11:19 AM ) The Rat CONVERSIONS GALORE. Handy page. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:19 AM ( 11:18 AM ) The Rat One says the name to oneself, and since one remains silent it is as though one were inscribing it inside oneself, as though it were leaving its trace on one's brain, which must end up, like a wall on which somebody has amused himself scribbling, by being entirely covered with the name, written a thousand times over, of the woman one loves. One rewrites it all the time in one's mind when one is happy, and even more when one is unhappy. —The Fugitive # Posted by The Rat @ 11:18 AM Saturday, July 05, 2003 ( 2:50 PM ) The Rat RECENT SEARCH REQUESTS. erotic mice wasp sting fetish Penis exhibitionists organizations therat porn Strom Thurmond's girlfriends what does a dream with a rat mean boobs emoticon instant messenger nude Kuwait whittier horny girl [I suspect there is more than one horny girl in Whittier. —ed.] rat cohabitation # Posted by The Rat @ 2:50 PM ( 2:49 PM ) The Rat [T]he physical blow which such a parting administers to the heart, and which, because of that terrible capacity for registering things with which the body is endowed, makes the pain somehow contemporaneous with all the epochs in our life in which we have suffered... —The Fugitive # Posted by The Rat @ 2:49 PM Friday, July 04, 2003 ( 3:04 PM ) The Rat FINALLY, AN ARGUMENT FOR THE EURO! # Posted by The Rat @ 3:04 PM ( 2:26 PM ) The Rat MIXED-SEX HUMAN EMBRYO CREATED. At least I know a few people it could date... In experiments using donated embryos, scientists from the Centers for Human Reproduction in New York and Chicago investigated whether healthy cells from one embryo could be implanted into a second defective embryo. They found that, in some cases, the introduced cells do proliferate and spread throughout the chimaeric embryo. Their hope is that having even a small proportion of cells from a healthy embryo might prevent certain genetic diseases from arising. The "merged" embryos were never intended to develop into children, and were destroyed after a few days. # Posted by The Rat @ 2:26 PM ( 1:13 AM ) The Rat THIS STORY puts me in mind of that Fawlty Towers line: "Ohh... you're German! I thought there was something wrong with you!" # Posted by The Rat @ 1:13 AM ( 1:12 AM ) The Rat I, who was acquainted with many Albertines in one person, seemed now to see many more again reposing by my side. Her eyebrows, arched as I had never noticed them, encircled the globes of her eyelids like a halcyon's downy nest. Races, atavisms, vices reposed upon her face. Whenever she moved her head, she created a different woman, often one whose existence I had never suspected. I seemed to possess not one but countless girls. Her breathing, as it became gradually deeper, made her breast rise and fall in regular rhythm, and above it her folded hands and her pearls, displaced in a different way by the same movement, like boats and mooring chains set swaying by the movement of the tide. Then, feeling that the tide of her sleep was full, that I should not run aground on reefs of consciousness covered now by the high water of profound slumber, I would climb deliberately and noiselessly on to the bed, lie down by her side, clasp her noiselessly on to the bed, lie down by her side, clasp her waist in one arm, and place my lips upon her cheek and my free hand on her heart and then on every part of her body in turn, so that it too was raised, like the pearls, by her breathing; I myself was gently rocked by its regular motion: I had embarked upon the tide of Albertine's sleep. —The Captive # Posted by The Rat @ 1:12 AM Thursday, July 03, 2003 ( 8:55 PM ) The Rat BAPTISTS... # Posted by The Rat @ 8:55 PM ( 8:55 PM ) The Rat The whole world is about three drinks behind. —Humphrey Bogart # Posted by The Rat @ 8:55 PM Wednesday, July 02, 2003 ( 5:10 PM ) The Rat PRO-LIFE WOMEN SHIFT TO MAJORITY. # Posted by The Rat @ 5:10 PM ( 11:02 AM ) The Rat FUN GROUCHO ANECDOTE. # Posted by The Rat @ 11:02 AM ( 11:01 AM ) The Rat The most famous nickname in the Anglo-Saxon world is probably Jack the Ripper. Whether he was a lone killer or, as the most recent evidence has it, a team of three men covering up a government scandal, it is doubtful if the crimes would have become so legendary without the catchy name. Whoever coined it had an English ear. Besides describing accurately the anatomical horrors involved, it is also a summing up of Cockney life, evoking the smell of fog, the feel of slimy Whitechapel cobblestones underfoot, and the noise of the raucous drunken singing from the music halls. When the French dramatized the murders they came up with Jacques L'Eventreur, which simply doesn't have it. It sounds very fey and very French, a murderer out of a traveling puppet show. I don't know what the Germans call him but I can imagine. Undoubtedly they have thrown together one of their famous compounds that translates Jack Who-the-Throats-of-Women-Who-Their-Bodies-to-Men-Sell-Cuts. —Wasp, Where Is Thy Sting? # Posted by The Rat @ 11:01 AM Tuesday, July 01, 2003 ( 2:57 PM ) The Rat FROGS, via Eve. # Posted by The Rat @ 2:57 PM ( 2:56 PM ) The Rat LITERARY BAR JOKES. # Posted by The Rat @ 2:56 PM ( 12:32 PM ) The Rat A realist about adolescent male sexuality, [the Wasp mother] is extremely tactful about inevitabilities like masturbation and nocturnal emissions. Both Mrs. Jonesborough and Mrs. Bailey change the sheets and say nothing. Mrs. Bailey deplores masturbation while Mrs. Jonesborough does not, yet both accept it. They also ignore it. To the Wasp way of thinking, the most dreadful scene in Portnoy's Complaint is the one in which Sophie bangs on the bathroom door, demanding, "Alex? What are you doing in there?" As my own mother put it, "What in the hell did she think he was doing?" When the Wasp son locks himself in the bathroom, his mother will pretend he is not really there. For that matter, she will pretend that she doesn't have a son, that he doesn't have a penis, or that masturbation hasn't been invented yet. If worse comes to worst, she will even pretend that she doesn't have a bathroom. —Wasp, Where Is Thy Sting? # Posted by The Rat @ 12:32 PM |
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