I asked, you answered, then I aswered.
randomliberal/Robert: What…is the air-speed velocity of an unladen swallow?
Are we talking an African swallow or a European swallow?
“Although a definitive answer would of course require further measurements, published species-wide averages of wing length and body mass, initial Strouhal estimates based on those averages and cross-species comparisons, the Lund wind tunnel study of birds flying at a range of speeds, and revised Strouhal numbers based on that study all lead me to estimate that the average cruising airspeed velocity of an unladen European Swallow is roughly 11 meters per second, or 24 miles an hour.”
Roni: What color should I dye my hair?
Don’t. Your hair is gorgeous, the kind of thing us whitey chicks die for.
Chris Clarke: What do you hear right now?
Honestly? I’m listening to Danzig. Bring the shame.
Heliologue: You have a single-use time machine, and, assuming the laws of quantum physics don’t apply and the grandfather paradox is a non-issue, what is the one thing you would change/observe firsthand/&c.?
If I have to choose, I’d choose Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” during the 1963 March on Washington. We need more leaders. Everything else I would want to see firsthand would be so damned depressing I couldn’t handle it.
Shankar Gupta: All-time favorite movie?
I don’t like movies all that much so it’s difficult to pick an all-time favorite. As a kid, my favorite movie was “Empire of the Sun.” This may account for my bad taste in film. Most recently my favorite movies have been “Whale Rider,” “The Ice Storm,” “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” and “Before Night Falls,” in other words, serious movies with complicated characters that make me sob. I may hate them but I still get emotionally sucked in.
media girl: How do you like brunette? I was thinking of doing the same, but I’m hesitant.
I like it! I had to pick a color that wouldn’t amplify the pink in my skin. I scoured all the boxes for non-olive-skinned models with brown hair and got one solitary color, Havana Brown.
The cool thing is that I get less unsolicited advice, though I’ve now been informed that the Bettie Page/dominatrix thing might be a stronger effect. I hope not. In other hair-related news, I’m growing my bangs out a bit. My cowlick tends to make the left side stick straight out of my forehead.
Baubo: What do you consider to be ‘radical’ feminism?
Judging by most public reaction to feminist thought it appears that weilding the label is in itself radical. I think most feminists get labelled radical from the outside when so steeped in feminist language that the layperson is lost in the loaded language and gets an entirely different effect than the one intended. That said, I think feminists like Dworkin and MacKinnon, who had many valuable things to say, had metaphors and euphemisms so entrenched in self-referencing feminist discourse that they are lost on non-academic and/or obsessive-compulsive feminists too. On occasion I reread “The Whole Woman” by Germaine Greer, the book that introduced me to hardline(-ish) feminism, and realize I took far different meanings from the text than I do now that I am older and more versed in the theory. I tend to read these texts with a more critical eye, knowing that this is in part the reason why feminism has had such a hard time becoming an accepted tool to work against systematic oppression.
What is usually considered “radical” feminism is the feminism that is often accused of waging war between men and women. My feminism is more tempered than that, believing that men and women suffer under patriarchal systems and that superficial power based on earnings, gender, color, religion, and social status have little real value to them. This is, in some circles, considered quite radical. I obviously don’t think so.
norbizness: When John Cusack is holding up the boombox to serenade Ione Skye with a Peter Gabriel song in Say Anything, isn’t there a part of you that wishes that the speakers were only loosely connected, and the middle part of the boombox slips out and bonks him on the head?
I’ve never seen it. But yes.
Kyle Hasselbacher: How long is the answer to this question?
It depends. It might be very short or very long depending on the question. Judging from your short question, I imagine the answer would be shortish as well.
mac: What are the nicest and meanest things you’ve ever been told?
Meanest, being told I was ruining my life by becoming a mother to Ethan. That statement filled me with a simultaneous doubt and anger that I’ve never been quite able to shake, primarily the notion that I may have “ruined” Ethan by refusing to be anything other than a mother to him. The sweet irony is that the man who told me that is now a single dad. I hope he remembers that.
Nicest, I don’t know. I’m not good at receiving compliments. The highest compliments to me are the ones with a simple adjective during a time of self-doubt. Timing and intent. I can remember the first time someone referred to me as articulate. Another time elegant (laughable, if you ask me). I’d rather be complimented on my intellect than my looks. If one is to compliment me on my looks, I prefer an even evaluation of the whole. I’d like not to be reduced to my parts, but go right ahead and compliment me on my outfit. I’m vain, too, you know! I still can’t take them even though I remember them forever.
In fact, I remember more of the banal statements that people make than the ones intended to be full of meaning. I think we reveal more about ourselves when we’re being unmindful.
Thomas: Parenting excluded, what are you proudest of in your own life?
Parenting excluded, I know that most of the things I will be proudest of are in the future. I’m proud of this blog and the community that you guys give me, being somewhat socially isolated. I’m proud of my garden this year, and my little family, cats included. Like with compliments, I feel pride for the smaller things.
Manogirl: If you could move anywhere, where would you go – supposing that the whole world is open to you?
For good? Hell, I haven’t thought that far yet. Not much of a self-dreamer here. I honestly love the Midwest and imagine a home base here for me for a long while, even if I move to another city or state. In the meantime, I’d like to do some serious travel. Should I move out of the Midwest, I’d like some coastline.
OTTami: Do pedicures tickle? I’ve never had one.
Yes, and I’m not ticklish whatsoever.
Rosepixie: What is your favorite book and why?
Hard question! I don’t know that I’ve read a book I didn’t like. I could list for days. That said, I am still in love with Jeanette Winterson’s “Written On the Body,” which I read it for class on gender lit with Dr. B. several years ago. It is a high-concept novel about love, loss, and gender constructs. In the beginning the genderless (or -full) narrator laments that love can never be explained without the use of cliche, then Winterson manages to create a loss-of-love story that does exactly that. She relies on anatomy textbooks, of all things, to illustrate the depth of physical and emotional love. Beautiful, wonderful, thought-provoking book.
jam: is there anything better than fresh dark garden dirt squishing between the toes?
Cheese.
Sydney: Would you describe yourself as an idealist or a realist and why?
A cynical idealist. Sometimes I don’t know why, the cynic in me. Somewhere deep inside I believe that humanity isn’t down the toilet yet, that we have real potential as a whole. We do! But the realist in me realizes that most people on this planet are preoccupied with other things: making it through the day, surviving war and famine, navigating terrible relationships, operating under oppressive regimes, and in America, too involved in hedonistic consumer-based culture, to work toward something better for all people, not just a select few and not just for our selfish selves. I’m torn between caring too much and not caring at all. Really.
Adrienne: Have you ever shot a gun?
Oh, lord no. Guns scare the shit out of me. I once had a friend who had a spring-loaded glock. I wouldn’t touch it until he took it apart for me. He instructed me on how to put it back together and once I did, I realized I was holding a damn gun and dropped it.
Yet, I was raised around guns. My father had at least half a dozen around the house and was a champion skeet shooter (no puns please).
ScottW714: What is the meaning of life?
To seek meaning in life.
Sina: What’s your favorite wine?
Wine! Ever since I started dating the French chef, I’ve been sampling a lot of wine. I was intimiated at first — liquor is liquor and beer is beer, but wine is in a whole other category. Because we’re both broke we drink cheap reds that run around $10 a bottle, $15 at the most. I like Lindemann’s Shiraz and the Castle Rock Pinot Noir. Both are decent table wines that you can drink easily. I’m much pickier about whites because I really dislike sweet wines. They smell like cheap perfume. Nonetheless my pseudo-roommate always makes me drink whites. The reds do turn my teeth pink.
On occasion the boyfriend have a wine contest and pick out a bottle apiece based on its packaging and taste test. I always win (because I say so). The last winning wine that I picked out was Red Knot, and it was quite good.
Ron O.: How do you like your PB & Js? Open-faced or closed? Toasted or not? Other variations?
Ethan and I are quite fond of PB and honey on wheat bread. If not, we go Elvis-style without the bacon fat.
Lisa: I wanted to ask favorite books, but Rosepixie beat me to it. So what would be the perfect way for you to spend the day?
At this point I desperately want a vacation. I want to get in my car and drive somewhere, anywhere. Make it a long drive, all day in the summer, with great music and bad radio. And NPR. When I get there, with a lover or friends or whomever, I don’t want to know anyone there except my travelmate. I want a beach and wine and all sorts of artisan cheeses, and to lay around in the sun like a cat or a whale and get terribly sunburned. Then I want a dress that actually fits me (damned hips) and to go out and do something frivolous. At the end of the day, I want to know I can do it all again the next day.
Stephanie: Are you planning on or would you like to have any more children in the future?
Oh, that question. Some days yes, some days no. Considering my chances of getting HELLP syndrome in my future pregnancies, my logical side says hell no. Get me around a small baby and I get killer womb lust. It will be many years before I have another child, if I can with good health.
louise: JAM–I remember when I was a kid YEARS ago when we went to our grandparents farm in Arkansas and….this is the truth…chicken poop squished between our toes. However, it was not a cool feeling like mud or dirt or soft rain water!!
Mom, that’s not a question.