cathartist

derekring.blogspot.com/2009/06/enough-someone-has-to-say-it.html

i made a comment

Worcester artists UNITE!

Worcester dyslexics UNTIE!

Worcester procrastinators  . . . . .meh

If you do not know who Dan Savage is, do not read his blog or listen to his podcast I am sorry for you. But luckily after reading this excerpt you might be a convert and an addict like me.

According to Wikipedia; "Dan Savage is an author, media pundit, journalist and newspaper editor.Savage is known for penning the internationally syndicated relationship and sex advice column Savage Love. Its tone is frank in its discussion of sexuality, often humorous, and frequently hostile to social conservatives."

This little piece here is why i wholeheartedly love this man and wish there were a million more people living in America just like him. I'll let the words speak for themselves.


(I hate to disagree, Dan, but you missed the mark when you wrote this: “When we marry, we’re signing up to fuck someone at least semi-regularly for decades. Not interested in fucking? Don’t marry.”

Dan, people marry for many, many reasons. Sex is only one of them, and sometimes it isn’t even high on the list—or on the list at all. Family, friendship, stability, love, someone to grow old with, and on and on. Your surprisingly narrow description of what marriage means needs some rethinking.

Thanks for your work,
Cacilda Jethá, MD
blogs.psychologytoday.com/blog/lust-in-paradise

I’m willing to concede that I left an important subordinate clause out of the sentence that riled you, Cacilda: “When we marry, we’re signing up to fuck someone at least semi-regularly for decades, among other things…”

Marriage can be about all the things you list, Cacilda, but so long as sexual exclusivity is presumed to be a part of marriage—a defining part, according to the right-wingers—spouses have a right to expect sexual activity within their marriages. People who are interested in marriage but not sex—people whose lists only include family, friendship, stability, love, someone to grow old with, and on and on, but not sex—need to inform their prospective spouses of their disinterest in sex before marrying, not after.

As I’ve said a million times before: If you don’t think that sex is what marriage is all about, mostly about, or even partly about, if sex is something you can live without, that’s grand. But you need to marry someone who feels the same way or inform your betrothed of your disinterest well in advance. And if you lose interest in sex after you marry but want your partner to stick around for the family and stability and friendship and the rest of it, I’ll let you in on a little secret: The spouse is likelier to stick around for that crap if you give the spouse permission to get his or her sexual needs met elsewhere.

It never ceases to amaze me how many people who aren’t interested in sex—who consider sex to be trivial and unimportant—nevertheless deny their frustrated partners permission to do this trivial, unimportant thing with others.)


If you like that one then definitely check out this post too: www.avclub.com/articles/savage-love-february-11-2009,23658/

Dan Savage you're my hero.




 

Sadly due to poor planning and no warning most of us will not be attending webcomics weekend this Sunday.
http://www.webcomicsweekend.com/
scroll down to the post for March 5th.
Apparently they instituted preregistration without actually letting anyone know in advance, So even though the show is free to get in the preregs are already at capacity and they cannot allow anyone else access.
I sent a nice but irked email to the promoter explaining my ire bout the situation, but what can you really do, so i guess the Sunday is freed up for me now.
Sorry for the bad news to anyone who was thinking of attending

http://www.webcomicsweekend.com/?action=page&url=official-guest-list

March 20-22 Easthampton, MA

see some your favorite Webcomic Artists live and in person.
Girls with Slingshots
Cyanide and Happiness
PVP
and MANY MORE!!!

Who wants to make the road trip with me?
(madsahara doesn't have to travel as far as the rest of us)

who's with me?

Arisia bound after 6:30 pm tonight. Get to see my Vermont peeps, the Teseracte Rocky crew and maybe a face or two from Cali as well. This years party theme is Big Top Skank and it should be memorable. If you all are lucky you might get some interesting pics.

So after waking up at an ungodly hour this AM (7:52) I sluggishly bounded out the door of Kellys apt so i could go home and try and find clean clothes. My washing machine is on the fritz and i cannot call my landlady to fix it till i do all my dishes since she is a neat freak, and will take my head off for having dirty dishes in the sink and lecture me for an hour on mice and bugs.
But i digress.
So I head off in my car and my radio dial is set to 93.7 MIKE FM. I am not ashamed that i listen to this station you can actually hear some really fun music combination's from time to time . . .
like today. So what pops up but the unmistakable drum beat to Twisted Sister's "Were not Gonna Take it" So of course I crank the dial and growl along to this timeless 80's rebellion classic. What a great way to start the morning. (If anyone is unaware of 93.7's play list, it's totally random like an I POD shuffle all the time.) So what comes on directly after TS? That's right, Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch "Good Vibrations" Not one but two musical guilty pleasures in a row first thing in the AM. Chad is a happy boy.

For any and all who do not yet know today is my 32nd b-day and to celebrate, myself and a few (15-20) friends are hitting up Jose Murphy's in Worcester for 10 cent tacos tonight. They have great alternatives for non taco fans and for any veggie friendly fans there is always the standby cheese quesadilla. We will be congregating around 6:30 - 7pmish there will be much food and some drinking as well. Stage two will commence at Kelly's for cake and if anyone is up for round three i was thinking of some pool but thats totally up in the air at this point. I know most people live far away and its a weekday so thats why i don't expect people to come from afar but i thought i would post it here anyway just in case any last minute stragglers had not yet heard.

To all my friends who i have not seen in awhile i miss you terribly and as soon as i get a car . . .(oh yeah most of you don't know about that. My car died about a month back and has been turned into scrap metal and i am in the market for a used car as we speak/ type)
so as soon as i get a car i am making a more concentrated effort to go see my peeps.
ok enough jibber jabber for now
hopefully see you all tonight

I have a friend who skates for Providence roller derby and i have not gone to see her once all season long because i have been so busy. Well I am remedying that tomorrow night and i want you all to join me cause roller derby is frickin awesome!
So to all my Worcester peeps and even those beyond if anyone is free I implore you to shoot down with Kelly and I for a great nights of bumps, bruises and hot women in short skirts on wheels!

So my car is going to cost 2700 dollars to replace the motor since the initial diagnosis of timing chains was deemed more critical. It looks like i am in the market for a good used car. If anyone knows anyone selling, send the info my way please. In a perfect world i will find a car i can fit in comfortably with relatively low mileage. I have always driven domestic sedans but i think i may have to migrate to a japanese car like a toyota, nissan, etc. Right now my most important factor in choosing a car is dependability.
I really liked my Intrepid and am gonna miss it, its a good car. . .or was. There is still the possibility that i am getting flim flammed by this garage so i am going to have the car towed to my uncles garage in Natick and see if its at all salvagable. The problem is that the more time i wait for another diagnosis there longer i am without a car.
Kelly has been a trooper letting me borrow her car and giving me rides and i have learned the bus isn't as bad as i thought it would be. But it can't last forever and plus my second job is late night and in Boylston so i have to find another way to get to the warehouse.
On another note if anyone knows of someone selling a good bike i would be up for taking a look at that as well, it beats walking.

So as some of you may know through Kelly or thru our taco excursion last night. My car is in bad shape. The timing chains on my car's motor are shot and they are apparently an integral part of the functionality of the car. Though i have have never heard of them b4, Andrew was nice enough to elaborate for me (he's listens to A LOT of Car Talk, just ask him about the dead dog)
The chains connect the pistons to the camshaft and when they break they basically bend all the valves in the engine. So this is something that needs to be dealt with pronto!
I was quoted at $1500 base and could go up from there, the mechanic is getting a more exact quote for me today, i am just hoping it doesn't go over 2 grand. My other options were laid out for me as totally replacing the motor itself or just upgrading to a new car, the motor would be around $2500 and the new car well lets just say that Chad almost had a heart attack thinking about that cost (and yes Chad is speaking about himself in the third person)
The deciding factor was the fact that my car has 125,000 + miles on it which isn't as bad as I thought, if we we're talking closer to 200,000 i may have actually bit the bullet and started searching for a new or used car with lots of headroom.
So this is how it is laid out now, i am on foot for awhile and am going to have to research the city's bus lines to get around for the next few days. So if anyone sees me walking the streets of Worcester i am not too proud to ask for a ride.

So friends from Vermont are visiting tonight and we are going to see NIN!
Not sure if i am a big enuff NIN fan to buy tix for them since i probably only know enough songs to count on one hand. I guess then its good that i am going for FREE!!!

Sorry that was me gloating.

So i will try to keep this from being overtly melodramatic but i cannot make any promises, every once in awhile i get this woe is me feeling and i need to vent about it. And i tend to ramble so i apologize in advance for this lengthy diatribe.
So as many of you know Kelly (my gf) has been away for the last few days. I initially thought it would be cool to have a few days to myself maybe hang out with the guys and do non relationship stuff, and it would have been.
See the main reason for this post is that i spend a good amount of my free time alone due to the major fact that i cannot seem to muster up enough confidence to actually call my friends out of the blue and ask what they are doing. Sounds silly, i know. But cold calling people, even my friends always feels intrusive to me like i am a telemarketer calling during dinner. I am much more of an internet person whether it be IM, Myspace, email, or yes even LJ. Social networking sites and instant messaging are great ways to communicate but usually only for lonely people since people who have lives aren't sitting at home waiting to see which one of their friends pops up with the "online now" tag. Hence the main reason why cellphones were invented in the first place was to be able to communicate with people outside of their homes. But i have this subconscious fear that i am always interrupting their oh so busy lives.
Consequntly for the last 25 hours i have basically been vegging in front of my computer waiting to see if any of my friends were around. I drove to Providence last night to get a bite to eat at my favorite hot dog joint. It would have been cool to have some company but i cannot imagine that conversation going well. "Hi (place name here) i know its 9:30 at night on a Saturday but do you want to drive 40 mins. out of the way to Providence to go get a hot dog with me?" I guess i have a hangup about seeming unbelievably uncool. Maybe its a product of being picked on so much growing up, who knows. Anywho i feel like this post in of itself is just a sad attempt of garnering pity and that disgusts me. I'd like to think i am an outgoing individual, i have fun at parties and can talk to almost anyone face to face, but that damn initial phone call is where things get difficult. . . .
thanks for listening

Put pen to paper and beer to lips, tonite at the 1st ever Worcester Pub Scrawl. Whether you draw, write, knit, sculpt, whittle, dance, or sashay come on down and bounce ideas off other like minded creatives types wile getting sauced in the process.




Come on down tonite, even if you think you don't have any artistic talent. Everyone can wax poetic when half in the bag!

I will be leaving Thurs night after work and driving to Philadelphia to attend/ work the Wizard World Convention going on this weekend. I will hardly get any sleep, work long hours and eat crappy food . . .it's gonna be GREAT!
I will be at the Toon Tumblers booth selling top notch glassware. Hoist a pint emblazoned with your favorite superhero/ cartoon character. www.toontumblers.com
I doubt i know anyone on here who will attending or who lives in that area but if so gimmee a call and maybe we can hang out.

I took the brunt of the suck for the rest of you. I have braved the flames of bad movie hell and come out the other side a stronger individual. But i implore you
as a friend and as a fan if you value your money, your time and your love of cinema;

DO NOT SEE INDIANA JONES AND THE KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL!!!

Considered yourself forewarned.

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull tonight at Blackstone Valley Cinemas midnight showings.
My crew is meeting up at 1030 at the bar inside the theater to get a tad liquored up just in case the movie is not very good. At that point we will decide which showing to see.  If anyone is geeky or crazy enough to join us gimme a call or just surprise us, the more the merrier.

So as many of you may or may not know I LOVE PLAYING POOL!!
I had been in a league with my co-worker George for a while but found that league play lost its luster early on.  I want to be able to go out and shoot around for fun and not worry that i am losing money on a game.  I still like to play and try to hit London Billiards in Worcester at least once a week if i can try.  They have a deal on Mon and Tues nights that with a purchase of a two drink minimum you can play for free.  Now i am not usually a big drinker when shooting pool, but two beers is a better deal that paying for two hours of pool.  Any way, the reason behind this blog is that i am always looking for people to play with.  I just don't have many friends in the area who are as interested in the game as I am.  So if anyone is free either monday or tuesday night on a semi regular basis and wants to shoot around for cheap let me know.
thanks

Saw the flick today at cinema 320, it was fab. Sent out a (*gasp*) Myspace message a few hours b4 hand and texted a bunch of friends last minute but no one showed. So it was just me the gf and her bro. I would use their LJ names but this is all too new to me to figure that crap out.
Anywho, Persepolis was a really great film that i had been anticipating for quite some time. I had never read the source material but being that it IS a graphic novel and i work at a comic book store (www.thatse.com) i was telling everyone i knew about it. The art style of the book transformed quite well into animation and carried a good deal of mood with the minimalistic simple B&W line work.  I learned much of Iranian culture and history that i never truly knew and may have never cared to research in any traditional sense.  The story covered a range of emotion and had an inspirational tone that made you cherish the things most people take for granted in life but also made you strive to make the world a better place around you. There was a realism to the characters that made you emote with them on a personal level that even some of the more enjoyable animated features i have seen in the past have not done. Even though the movie dealt with war, loss and change there was a good chunk of genuine humor that grounded the story and made it an enjoyable film overall.
Being that was a autobiographical in nature made the ending of the movie a tad weaker with no actual culmination but perhaps left it open ended for a sequel someday down the road after more volumes of the comic are completed . . .
On the cathartist pink fedora scale i give it 4 pink fedoras out of 5

    When I moved to Worcester roughly 5 years ago one of the things I loved most about the city was its diversity of cultures and businesses.  Growing up in the burbs we didn’t have much variety in culture and especially in food culture, i.e. restaurants.  We had your staples of fast food, pizza and Chinese take out.  As silly as this might sound due to the lack of diversity in food choices I took my love of certain types of foods to heart and every time I have moved somewhere new I always seek out these comfort foods in that specific community.  Of course my tastes fall far outside the range of pizza and Chinese but they are childhood fav’s so they stick with me even today.
    So when I moved to Worcester I quickly .located my fav Pizza and Chinese places.  Originally pizza was Niko’s on Grafton St. now it’s Pop’s Pizza in Tatnuck Sq. but that’s a whole other long story for another blog.  My favorite Chinese place was Ping’s Garden.
Both pizza and Chinese food are two styles of take out that are easily and often duplicated and you can find both of them almost anywhere you look in the US. The problem with this is quantity wins out over quality many times.  I have had some very bad pizza and some very bad Chinese food in Worcester and in my opinion I have also had some of the best. It’s all a matter of trying different places and seeing what works for you.  Of course many people views vary and people are extremely decisive and defend their choice vehemently.  I really think it harkens back to childhood. These are comfort foods and when you grow up eating certain things these feelings stick with you your whole life.
    Which brings me to my point; Ping’s recently closed for awhile and opened under new management.  The new management did the unthinkable.  They turned a nice Chinese restaurant with a fun (if not aged) décor, small buffet, and good all around menu into a Super Buffet.  Now for those of you not hip to the Chinese food lingo, a Super Buffet is an even more fast food version of Chinese food.  It is an all you can eat trough style buffet restaurant.  Heck calling it a restaurant is a mockery in of itself.  The staff is adorned in silly looking bright fuchsia shirts that one Worcester troglodyte mistook completely when he commented, “Wow they are wearing those kimono things!”  The food itself is bland, the décor is uninspired and the wait staff literally stands there and watches you eat like a hawk.  All they do is refill your water and wait to swoop in when you have cleared your plate.  I swear the woman gave me my check, walked five feet away and stared at me till I got up and paid the bill.  The whole experience offended me, and excuse the pun but it left a sour taste in my mouth. They definitely lost a loyal customer in me.
    Now I am left for naught because I have to once again search for a new Chinese restaurant in Worcester. I try to avoid Nancy Chang’s if I can. A lot of people I know swear by it but I think its one of the more pretentious restaurants in Worcester and the food really isn’t all its cracked up to be.  I have heard good things about Red Lantern on Shrewsbury St, but the mere fact that’s its on Shrewsbury St makes me wary that it’s more about the image than the food.  But I will hold of final judgment till I try it.
    But sorry for the soliloquy folks I just needed to vent if anyone else knows of any good places let me know. thanks