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BeExcellent (39)
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Your favorite movies featuring a cat
Should have been so much better
WB is getting what it deserved, but fans are not
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When I was sixteen my best friend insisted I try a little piece of fried peanut butter and banana sandwich. That mouthful of sweet fried sin was the most delicious thing I ate that whole year. This recipe looks similar:
http://www.tartqueenskitchen.com/2015/01/08/elvis-presleys-peanut-butter-banana-sandwich/
Which reminds me: a coworker keeps telling me I need to watch Bubba Ho-Tep. Maybe I'll just cook up one of these ridiculous heart attack sandwiches and finally get that film crossed of my To Watch list this week.
The poem? It's about imagining alternate realities where you didn't lose a cherished loved one.
If you were asking about the Murakami book, it's about (as near as I can tell) a reality slightly shifted from our own. And honestly, I think I'm failing this book as a reader. I just can't seem to sink into it. I give myself a D- for effort because others seem to love it. I'm determined to finish it, but uuuurgh. I have literally been reading it for months with little joy.
The Fireman is a post-apocalyptic book not entirely dissimilar in premise to Joe's dad's The Stand. I typically enjoy Joe's writing, so I'm not sure how I failed so utterly to enjoy this novel.
Okay, I sound like a bad reader. Maybe I am. The last book I loved unconditionally was Carey's The Girl With All The Gifts. (And the movie was horrid. Oh, how I wish I'd never set eyes upon it.) I'm looking forward to reading Danielewski's House Of Leaves next, but I can't quite give myself permission to abandon 1Q84. You know, there's really no way around it. I really am a bad reader right now.
Ohhh, thank you for sharing this. I'm glad so many of the cast think fondly enough of the series that they're happy to be at cons.
I hope Tom Braidwood's illness was only temporary. Frohike was my favorite of TLG, though I do adore them all. Glad to hear "Langley" is still working.
You're making me want to indulge in an XF marathon. Maybe I will.
No. The current state of things isn't fair and acceptable. There are dozens of unjust rules typical workers put up with in order to stay employed. And it's not just--or even mostly--sexual politics. I've seen changes regarding breaks, sick leave, yearly evaluations, and limiting free speech during non-work hours at my workplace in the last half decade that are asinine and counter to basic decency. The changes inconvenience supervisors and workers alike and make the organization less agile, but state law commands it.
Back to sexual politics. It's a mess. We've created an atmosphere in which even people of abiding goodwill feel defensive and hostile about the state of things. I think most sane people of both sexes would realistically agree on 95% of issues if they could actually discuss them. But the people who have championed many of the regulations we're operating under are *not* part of the calm group of souls with mutual goodwill, so we have a system that almost assumes antagonism and creates defensiveness by default.
Man, I have no solution. Of course I don't want anyone to lose their job over unwanted flirting at work. (Thankfully, I've never seen that happen.) If *I* were in charge, I'd trust consenting, sane adults to work that particular issue out on their own and only come to HR if they couldn't find a solution.
I'm curious what you would do in this situation: a developmentally quirky guy works closely with a woman with a sensitive personality. He flirts with her though she's told him to stop repeatedly. It drives her nuts. He flirts with other women workers and it doesn't bother them because they understand he's slow/different. What would you do? For the record, I don't have a good answer, but I sure wouldn't let him go.
Roy Batty in Blade Runner
Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs (but not in Hannibal)
Jareth in Labyrinth
Valentine in Kingsmen: The Secret Service
Boris Grishenko in GoldenEye
Jerry in Fargo
And if you consider Eli a bad guy in Let The Right One In, her too.
Okay, you just gave me the best laugh. And I needed one. Thanks again, db.
Hmmm... if you're suggesting that the original poster is not actually a Russian gentleman, but is just adopting a persona temporarily and mocking the current state of American sexual politics.... yup. You're probably 100% right.
Hehe. My bad. I need to be a little less credulous. Thanks db. There are a lot of Russian immigrants in my area and they struggle with our norms. I was feeling really sorry for him because I honestly think America's fairly miserable for the majority of Russian immigrants. I was tempted to tell him "You'll probably hate this place and you probably shouldn't come here," but I feared that would just sound hateful and rude.
I feel bad for everyone, male and female alike, who has to deal with current American sexual politics.
Okay, got my sister's responses to your questions:
"Most Americans are very nice. Most women would be impressed and humbled to be given your seat. Calling a woman beautiful can be perfectly acceptable if you are in a social setting. In the workplace it could be considered inappropriate."
(I prompted her to explain a bit more because, in my experience, it's [b]not[/b] culturally okay in America for a man to approach a woman with a compliment on her beauty unless it's in a context where people are specifically looking for a dating partner or where long-standing tradition dictates the occasion makes it acceptable to approach someone you're romantically interested in. And she agreed....)
So she added: "It is common in social settings of dating age people. It's a way for a man to show he has interest in a woman. Not in random public places. Only ok in socializing situations like you said."
Man, I don't want you accidentally tripping on American customs if you come here, so I feel like I have to explain more than my sister did: in general, you can't compliment a romantically-attached woman on her beauty *at all* unless you are either under the age of 10 or so elderly that there's no chance it could be mistaken for flirtation. And unless you are disarmingly charming, you can't compliment a woman you don't know unless it's at a bar, party, or wedding. Then again, my uncle met his (gorgeous) wife by approaching her at a food court at a mall. If you're wealthy, fit, and a great socializer like he is, you can break the rules and have no problem.
You can get fired from a job for complimenting a woman (or a man, for that matter) if it's unwelcome, but this is different from it being an offense where you could get arrested and put in jail. And I think most companies have a policy where a compliment can happen *once* without it being a problem, but if the complimentee tells you it's unwelcome and you do it again, that's when you can lose your job.
About the fast food: yes, Americans love fast food way too much.
And yes, capitalism is a dogmatic belief for most Americans. At heart, both Republicans and Democrats seem to believe the free market will save us all. Greed is rebranded as ambition and is perceived as a positive trait. There are a few subcultures that reject it.
I don't think any mentally-well woman would take offense at being offered a seat on public transportation. It's perfectly legal to offer someone else your seat.
I've shared your questions with my sister and will post her reply when I get it. Unfortunately, complimenting women's beauty *is* a risk zone in American culture and I suspect her answer would be more helpful to you than mine.
I'd actually consider watching the resumed X-Files if TLG were there. They imbued classic XF with such a spirit of fun, geeky goodwill, I can't imagine enjoying the XF universe without them.
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