If you watched the VP debate last night you heard a lot about Sarah Palin’s BFF, Joe Six Pack. But who is he? What does he like? What does he do?

We don’t know Joe Six Pack personally (though we have hooked up with his cousin, Mark Quarter Barrel…who could not keep it up), but we imagine he’d be something like this:

Description:
5′11, brown hair, brown eyes, some sort of facial hair, big hands and a tattoo of some sort (possibly his kids’ initials) on his upper arm. No actual six pack to be seen behind the slight beer belly hanging over the top of his ill-fitting denim. Read More »

Is Palin a “Muscular Feminist“?

Find out who is googling you

Oh no, Angie depressed?

Famous people say VOTE

Oh great.  Now I can pee my pants in fear for a 5th time

I would not, thanks

Aw, Scarlett and Ryan are little Hollywood hippies!

Dear God, plug your ears now…

What have they done to Clive Owen?!

Fabulous bags on the cheap? Sign us up!

J. Simpson getting married for the second time?

Homer accidentally votes for McCain

Jolie-Pitt family comes to NY (most likely filling a plane on their own):

After reading an article in The New York Times regarding the inequality of gender roles in the work place, I got to thinking. After having some corporate (and not so corporate…hellloo retail?!) jobs, I can see where Ms. Seligson (the author of the NYT article) comes from when she airs her frustration about the fact that women have progressed so much in the college and educational world, but when we get to the workforce, it seems like we take a few steps backwards.

From my personal experience, here’s how it goes: men are respected off the bat, women (especially young, attractive ones), need to earn it after due course at a company. Men also aren’t afraid to go after what they want; the article states that when men want a raise, they simply ask for it, but with women, we lack the courage and words to get what we want. Why is this?

I have had both male and female bosses and I will say this: women are threatened by other women. Many women, rather than lending a hand to a female colleague, go behind her back and undermine not only her authority, but her professional aptitude and capability. I had a female boss who once told me I only get dressed up for work because I feel like I need to prove something to everyone. Puh-lease woman. I dress nice because I dress nice — in and out of work (Fast forward to me quitting on the spot and telling said boss how unprofessional she was…talk about wanting to knock me down instead of help me rise!  Surprise, surprise, the woman is no longer with that company).

Girl against girl is the nature of the game and, while I feel like I am one of those individuals who is set apart from the social norm, I’m sure I fall victim to some of these behaviors.  But my biggest question is: WHY?! Read More »

We’ve all been there: the noisy hallmate, the rude hallmate, the one that leaves the bathroom messy or is playing loud music during exam week. But this past year all the forces of evil converged on one hall and ended up giving me the truly infernal hallmate experience. Read on, and pray you never have as bad luck as I did!

Things didn’t seem to be getting off on a good foot when I discovered myself and my boyfriend, also on the same hall, were completely surrounded by freshmen. We were juniors, with a buttload of junior independent work to get done in the course of the year, and we didn’t have as much patience for freshmen shenanigans as in the past. But still, we vowed to be good sports. The freshmen started things off with a bang by constantly converging in the hall right in front of my door to chatter loudly about inane subjects. On weekend nights, the music coming out of their rooms shook the floors, no matter how many times we asked them to turn it down.

The girls decided to label me as a spoil-sport because of this polite request, and insisted on giving me dirty looks in the bathroom. They continually stole the chalk from my chalkboard, left dirty dishes in the sink of the kitchen, and had atrocious hygiene when it came to disposing of sanitary items. That, however, was only the beginning. Read More »

While at a bar last weekend, a guy casually asked me what I did for work. When I told him I was a writer, he wanted to know what kinds of things I wrote. “I mostly do technology writing,” I started to tell him. “What?!” he laughed. “You’re too pretty to be interested in technology.” I almost slapped him, but instead just said, “What’s that supposed to mean?” He didn’t have an answer for me, so I just walked away. And yes, I was a bit insulted.

Why is it not acceptable for girls to be interested in technology? Unless you’re an ugly girl with no social life and no social skills, of course. I guess it could be because there just aren’t a lot of women who work in technology jobs, such as IT, science, and engineering. But why aren’t there? Read More »

[Click Here to read Part 1 of this series]

To the claim that romance novels are anti-feminist, well, it’s hard to argue this point. Not because romance novels are, in fact, anti-feminist. In fact, I would consider many of them to be extremely pro-female. No, it’s difficult because so many people have their minds set on what is considered under the umbrella of “feminist” and what isn’t, and those opinions are usually formed through one’s own life experiences.

So I will only say that I find a book like Jenny Crusie’s Bet Me more feminist, than, say, (Pitchforks at the ready?) Kate Chopin’s The Awakening. I applaud Chopin and, indeed, I even empathize greatly with her heroine, who is trying to establish herself as a woman as opposed to a mother or a wife amidst all that patriarchy. But I enjoy literature in which women are rewarded or at least not denigrated for their bold and brave decisions. Isn’t it more feminist appreciate a happy woman than to accept that the only way that she can be free is to die? I recall poor Anna Karenina, who threw herself under a g*ddamn train. What kind of a message is that?

It’s also patently untrue that all heroines featured in romance novels are unrealistically perfect looking with no problems (thus perpetuating unhealthy self-images in readers) . I would go as far as to say that most of the main female characters do have flaws in appearance or nature. The heroine in Bet Me is overweight and has low self esteem but her love interest sees her weight and interest in food as a good thing. She doesn’t have to lose weight to be loved, she is accepted for who she is. The novels in which women are loved instantly on sight because of their heart-stopping beauty or unerring kindness and generosity of spirit are almost always the least interesting ones, just like in real life. Read More »

What’s better than a southern punk rock sounding band comprised of tattooed boys who have some serious chips on their shoulders? A southern punk rock sounding band comprised of tattooed boys with serious chips on their shoulders who are FROM ENGLAND.

Most people call them Gallows, but after spending a couple months on Warped Tour alongside them this past summer; I call them The UK’s Answer To The Shitty American Hottopic-esque Bands Polluting The Minds Of Today’s Teens, instead.

They’re angry. But they’re honest. They don’t prepackage themselves with the sorta fashion you’d expect out of a festival like Warped Tour these days. In fact, Gallows pretty much don’t give a f*$k about anything. Read More »

The other night, while eating dinner with a friend at one of the 4874 Thai restaurants in my neighborhood, we got into a discussion about being single.

“I’ve decided that deep down, no girl really wants to be alone,” my friend announced as she cut into her spring rolls. “Even if she says she doesn’t want a boyfriend, if the right guy stepped into her life, she’d take him.”

“What about So-And-So?” I asked, naming another mutual friend. “She kept saying how happy she was without a guy, and how she was too busy anyway. She seemed fine.”

“Didn’t you hear? Last month she landed a dude.” My friend handed me half of her spring roll, using the other half to point in my direction. “She bumped into this guy at a party and two weeks later she was updating her Facebook status to read So-And-So is totally in love.”

“Ew. Really?” Inwardly, I was jealous. When was the last time I had updated my Facebook status to say I was totally in love? Never, I realized, since the last time I was in love, Facebook hadn’t even been invented.

“Really.” My friend declared. “Us women all need to face the fact that being single just isn’t our natural stasis.” Read More »

I must have been out of town when this memo was passed around, so perhaps someone can clue me in. When did “feminist” become a four letter word?

I noticed this first earlier this summer, while reading “The Feminine Mystique” by Betty Friedan. My book began to cower in fear any time I attempted to take it out of my purse to do some reading public. While people can openly read Harry Potter books and trashy romance novels, my book was met with hostility.

“Why are you reading that trash?” my cousin scowled.

“What are you, becoming some kind of feminist?” a friend of mine asked, while I did some pool-side reading.

I thought to myself, if I had been reading a book about civil rights and the end of slavery, I wouldn’t get a second glance. But a book about feminism, one that applies to over half of our population, apparently offends people. Read More »