Casey Johnston

[About Ilona Maher's run on season 33 of "Dancing with the Stars"]

The world of dance can be gatekeepy and preoccupied with aesthetics and gender norms—not all of it, but like most of the world, a lot of it. Ilona has always taken great delight in spitting in the face of these kinds of expectations in general, and she was not about to be cowed by any institution.

I'm always fascinated when dance intersects with strength and muscularity in women, precisely because the vast majority of people presume someone who is strong and muscular can't and won't be graceful at all. They think of being "muscle-bound," with the muscles preventing swift or fluid movement or having a good sense of rhythm or timing. Ilona is an extremely talented athlete in addition to being strong, but her physicality defies even the conventions of most team sports—stereotypically, the bigger you are, the slower you are, the more "likely" you are to play the role of defensive brick wall than nimble striker.

This is why I love to see the Ilonas of the world come through and defy conventional thinking about what bodies can do based on the stereotypes we assign to certain aesthetics. She's a beautiful dancer, which is especially saying something for someone whose job is not dancing. More to the point, she embraces all of her gifts wholeheartedly, flipping her partner bodily through the air and balancing him on her shoulders.

This is not to say that someone like Ilona only matters because they can dance, or whatever. But to the extent we are not often treated by very-very-mainstream media to the art of a woman like Ilona asserting her physicality, it's a reminder of how narrow that lane can sometimes be, and what we miss by allowing mainstream media to be the arbiters of visibility. In conclusion: She fucking rocks, what a gift to humanity.

-from Casey's newsletter, She's a Beast, 12/5/2024.

Tommy Vietor

It's gonna fucking suck for four years.

—"Pod Save America," November 6, 2024.

WONKETTE

Wait, What? What The Fuck? Is This Happening? MY GOD.

Eight years ago, about this time of night, I screamed and caterwauled and God DAMNED America. How could people look at that stupid, grunting rapist and say fuck yeah, sign me up? And then those years were so horrible, so much worse than we could imagine, so many years shaved off all our lives by our skyrocketing stress and blood pressure, and that’s before he killed a million Americans by letting his son-in-law pit states against each other for ventilators in the pandemic.

 

You do not subscribe to Wonkette for our political prognostications, because as I have explained — until quite recently, when I apparently lied to my own face and brain and shushed your worries and told you NO, WE HAD THIS — I am quite terrible at it. Our job is watching, and cataloging, and calling bullshit, and having long memories and institutional knowledge, not predicting the future.

But I watched this FUCKING MORON babble and shit himself, while the supermodel badass tough smart lady ran a flawless, magnificent campaign, and I knew you were worrying about nothing. Oh you, so silly, your dumb little fears! I knew we had this. I knew it was a BLOWOUT. Maybe with TEXAS.

And never for a moment did I think that after we’d lived through this, we’d affirmatively sign up to do it again. 

 https://www.wonkette.com/p/wait-what-what-the-fuck-is-this-happening?hide_intro_popup=true

Pajiba (Dustin Rowles)

There are a few things we need in life: food, shelter, love, and, occasionally, the satisfying spectacle of seeing bad people get what's coming to them.

https://www.pajiba.com/news/aaron-rodgers-career-is-unraveling-and-watching-it-is-pure-satisfaction.php?utm_source=mostviewed&utm_medium=mostviewed&utm_campaign=Most%20Viewed&utm_content=in

Gerrard Winstanley

Was the earth made to preserve a few covetous, proud men, to live at ease, and for them to bag and barn up the treasures of the earth from others, that they might beg or starve in a fruitful Land, or was it made to preserve all her children?

(The New Law of Righteousness, 1649)

Marlene Cimons

After a long struggle with infertility and miscarriage, Katie Tonkiss chose to have two small hearts tattooed on the inside of her right wrist. The hearts are more than decorative — they symbolize her bond with the two children she and her husband ultimately adopted. They also represent a way of reclaiming control over her body.

"I felt that this was something I could choose to do after such a long time of having no real choice," says Tonkiss, 40, a senior lecturer in sociology at Aston University in England. "It was an expression of celebrating after a lot of self-blame and frustration."

Tattoos' popularity among women reflects changing attitudes about a practice that once was male-dominated. Today, many women are choosing tattoos as important signifiers of empowerment, identity and personal values, experts say. Frequently, they use body art to honor something or someone or to cope with trauma.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2024/10/16/women-tattoos-body-art-autonomy/

Rainbow Rowell

Shiloh would rather not live in an IKEA showroom. She liked old things and bright colors. She liked having too many throw pillows and too many coffee mugs. She liked rugs. And macramé wall hangings. She liked everything to be a little too much.

Slow Dance (2024), p. 151.

Hugrún Jóhannsdóttir

Inside, sweaters are shelved depending on whether the yarn is dyed or "sheep-colored." Lindis gravitated to the yarn section, where I found her petting a skein of handspun longingly. "I get it," Ms. Jóhannsdóttir said. "There's a kind of witchcraft to textiles."

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/16/travel/iceland-knitting.html

Catherine Rampell

Doug Emhoff has been called many things in recent years: Second Gentleman. "Goofy dad." "Crappy Jew." But perhaps his most appropriate title: Progressive Sex Symbol.

Move over, Ryan Gosling. The modern female fantasy is embodied by the man who might soon become our first First Gentleman. Emhoff appears to be a genuine mensch with an impressive career. He's smitten with his wife and supports her ambitions, as is obvious from his convention speech and their sweet interactions on the campaign trail. But most important for this sexy sobriquet: Emhoff is secure enough with his own masculinity to sometimes prioritize his wife's ambitions over his own.

What. A. Hunk.

...

As Emhoff once told a South Korean newspaper: "Lifting women up so that they can carry out important roles is a very manly thing."

...

What do women want? To be valued and supported as much as they deserve, both privately and in public. On that score, Emhoff looks like a dreamboat.

--Rampell, Catherine. "Doug Emhoff, modern-day sex symbol," The Washington Post, August 23, 2024, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/08/23/emhoff-harris-sex-symbol/.

Glynnis MacNicol

Amazingly, it took me some time to realize the reason I loved Phryne [Fisher of Miss Fisher's Mysteries] and continually returned to her, was not just the exquisite clothes, or the perfect Louise Brooks hair, or the fact that no matter how many times I watched an episode I could never remember the plot and so it always somehow seemed new. It was because she was a grown-up. She was not getting married. She was not having children ("I don't understand the appeal," she likes to say). Her power was not in her potential to be matched up. Her power was her. Full stop. It was so satisfying. 

I think often about how the best stories we have about women outside of marriage and motherhood are almost always about women detectives. Their lives alone, literally and figuratively, are not enough to support what we understand as narrative, and so the most basic, most recognizable narrative is attached to them: whodunnit. In this extremely formalized structure, they are allowed to float along, being messy, or complicated, or elderly, or fashionable. We understand their purpose. Phryne’s real purpose, of course, is to live well, and love well, and do exactly what she pleases. 

 I'm Mostly Here to Enjoy Myself (2024), p. 145-6.

Jon Lovett

Republicans are fucking weird. I love this direction. If there's one thing this country hates, it's weird shit. We like Taylor Swift, generic sports bars, wooden signs in the kitchen that say EAT, mid-century modern Pinterest boards, and weddings that look like all the other weddings. One day, we'll break out of that. But for now, Republicans are fucking weird.

—on the direction of Kamala Harris's campaign, one week after she became the de facto nominee for president. Podcast "What A Weekday," July 30, 2024. 

Glynnis MacNicol

I do think that enjoyment is built into the French system as a right. Whereas in America it has to be earned. And not just earned financially, but earned through labor, through hard work. There's this sense in America you must do something to deserve pleasure, as opposed to you deserve it because you live on planet earth.

https://bonjour.lindseytramuta.com/p/paris-as-a-playground-of-pleasure

Glynnis MacNicol

I couldn't shake the feeling that the years ahead, if they were to be lived in a way that didn't leave me feeling like I was standing in a corner watching the action but never living it, would require me to transform into a person I could not yet recognize and was not totally convinced even existed.

No One Tells You This (2018)

NEH

Him: Why are you laughing?

Me: I'm just laughing at us. I don't want to get old, but I can see how it's going to be. I have to laugh. 

Him: Well, the good news is you're stuck with me. My quirks are only going to get quirkier, so buckle up. 

Heidi Waldorf, MD

About skincare products and supplements in particular. 

But [Heidi] Waldorf hits the bull’s-eye: “Realistic expectations are key. From a long-term and cost-benefit perspective, a gentle non-soap cleanser, moisturizer, prescription retinoid, and sunscreen, with or without an over-the-counter, science-based anti-aging topical cosmeceutical (for example, peptides or antioxidants), will do more for you than a supplement and for less money.”

https://www.thecut.com/article/will-hyaluronic-acid-supplements-help-my-skin.html

Editor's comment: Most skincare products are bullshit. Stick with the basics and drink lots of water. As for the retinoid, my dermatologist recommends Differin gel, available OTC - no prescription needed. I use it every other day so a little tube lasts for quite a long time.