Heya! Just checking that posting still works :)
Category Archives: fluff
Hm, maybe I should post more often
The 2nd-most-recent post on the blog is from February and mentions that I’d gotten my silver Translator badge that week. I got my gold Translator badge* last week. Maybe I should post more?
Harriet Brown has been writing more about weight and health of late. The most recent, in Slate, is worth reading (though the comments are NOT supportive and can be easily skipped).
Harriet also tackled 4 lies at Psychology Today:
- Americans keep getting fatter and fatter – nearly half with will be obese by 2030
- Being fat takes years off your life
- Being fat makes you sick
- Diets make you thinner – and healthier
Meanwhile, at Everyday Feminism, Liz Boltz Ranfeld asks what would happen if fat people were allowed to be happy?
My native Seattle is getting more inequal; the rich’s income is going up more than in other US cities. The median income is up to $100K here now too. I think it’s good that franchises didn’t win their injunction against raising the minimum wage.
Oh, and the Sounders season started :)
Major League Soccer (Football to the rest of the world) has scarves. It’s a Football thing. This is my 2015 season ticket and Alliance member scarf.
*I realize that last may make no sense if you don’t know about Ingress, but in sum, I did a lot of game-playing to go from silver to gold.
I confess – I laughed
I live in Seattle, which means The Stranger is a local institution. From The Stranger‘s “regrets” of the previous year — a mishmash of errors they made and regret, errors and non-errors they don’t regret, and various other sarcastic local commentary — comes this sarcastic and possibly blasphemous gem:
Jesus Christ, our Lord and savior, regrets that former Mars Hill pastor Mark Driscoll was such a fucking pussy that he couldn’t even keep his church from falling to shit this year. What kind of man can’t hold down a job?
This is blasphemous in that Jesus himself didn’t necessarily hold down a job. “Itinerant preacher” doesn’t usually come with a boss, paycheck, or a W2. The Jesus that welcomed women would probably not use “pussy” as a putdown. But the god that Mark Driscoll preached definitely would use that slam, and would definitely be contemptuous of a preacher getting kicked out of the church he cofounded and ran.
So yeah. I laughed.
Ingress
If you saw my recent tumblr posts you may have thought I’m playing Ingress. I am. Ingress is many things: an augmented reality game, Google Maps gamified, a walking game, a reason to get outside the house.
The game centers around “portals”. Portals can be gathering places, libraries, churches, unique businesses, or artworks — and, as a result of some business tie-ins, Zipcar stations & Jamba Juice stores are portals too. Players can suggest portals. The company that made the game, Niantic, is part of Google, and I’m sure that Google Maps is making use of this information.
[T]he other morning I spent about an hour playing in Washington Square Park. The park has loads of portals so I figured it would be a good place to try to focus on taking over some enemy ones.
Turns out that even in a place with a dozen or so portals within two blocks, it is difficult to play without being constantly on the move. After a portal is hacked it has a cool down period before it can be hacked again. […] Hacking an enemy portal makes you lose energy, which you replenish by collecting more. To do that, you have to walk around. The energy shows up as little white dots on the map. It’s plentiful, but you have to physically go get it by walking around with the game open on your phone.
I find the game fun. I get in-game goodies by hacking portals defined around the area, and I can claim portals using those goodies. I can also attack “enemy” portals.
There can be a lot of walking, yes, but the speed can be your own, as can the number of breaks you take. By default, you can hack each portal every 5 minutes with a max of 4 times in 4 hours. For me, this can mean I hack a portal and move on. On the other hand, when I had 2 portals in range from a shady bench this afternoon, it went like:
- Hack 1st portal
- Hack 2nd portal
- Add goodies to the portals (to make it give out better gear, or better shielded, or able to be hacked more frequently – whatever)
- Read twitter
- Hack portals again
- Repeat steps 4 and 5 twice
- Move on to more portals
Obviously your mileage may vary. It’s summer in Seattle. I currently favor playing in areas with lots of benches, shade, and occasional water fountains or coffee shops to get drinks. I also play quite a bit while riding to and from work (I ride with a friend who prefers to drive) or on the bus.
“[M]y favorite way to use Ingress is as tourist guidebook. Beyond that vampire grave in Rhode Island, Ingress also led me to a home on the Upper West Side where Babe Ruth once lived and to the site of Thomas Paine’s death in Greenwich Village. ”
— NY Times
Ingress has led me to better explore parks and streets that I thought I knew. I’ve discovered the local library has more artwork than I thought, along with the local churches and the local senior center.
Ingress is an experience. The whole point is to go out and find some portals, then, once you’ve established your presence, take a look at the real world. Enjoy some artwork, explore a museum. Get inspired. Interact with people. Make new friends, even. After all. You’re fighting for the fate of human creativity and thought, here. May as well make use of that wonderful mind of yours and share it with others.
Need a laugh?
This video from The Doubleclicks gave me one today.
Growing up isn’t fast
In fact it’s so slow you don’t see it happen
I turned around one day to find
That I worked a job & I had to file taxes
But I still like fun
And I still like games
And I still want to know all the dinosaur’s names
Dinosaurs were just really really big chickens
Growing up is just becoming a really big kid
It Came From The Search Terms
Seat belt extender, attached
Once again, a post inspired by search terms used to reach my site.
how much does a woman who wears a 5x weigh
This probably depends on the woman’s height, amount of muscle, and how many limbs have been replaced with cybernetics. Really, some of those are heavy.
what are the rules about having to buy an extra airline seat?
Depends on the airline – and you’ll probably want to call to book 2 seats. Related posts are Day in the Life: Buying Plane Tickets and Flying While 400lbs.
alaska airlines seat size
Check out http://www.seatguru.com/
“do all overweight people”
seat belt extenders walmart
No idea. I got mine from the dealer and Amazon.com.
im a 400 pound man is there a tool to help wipe bottom
If you’re reading this, I hope you look at the options at Amplestuff, Oversize Solutions, or Amazon.com.
will i be too fat for the rides at disney world
I generally wasn’t, but it depends on your size & the ride. :)
Back from Norwescon!
As mentioned on Twitter, I was at Norwescon this weekend! One of the most delightful parts was the interview session with special guest Seanan McGuire, who is also Mira Grant. I don’t have that to share with you, but I do have this from her book tour last fall for her book Parasite
Minute 7 – how having a genetically engineered tapeworm could affect weight loss.
Minute 9:45 – could write a very socially-shaming book along the lines of “now that my PCOS doesn’t prevent me from losing weight, you actually think I deserve decent medical care?”
Minute 11:50 – poop transfers & your personal biome
Minute 25 – on bacteria & how antibiotics are overused
Minute 29 – on how drugs are mislegislated and miscontrolled
Minute 39:55 – on morning person encountering a night person
Minute 42 – “Do you honestly think it’s better to be dead than autistic?”
Watch and enjoy ;)
It Came From The Search Terms
When you go to a page by searching Google (or whatev) it very nicely let your sites know what you searched on. WordPress aggregates this for its users. Some of them are fun.
how do morbidly obese people get dressed
Once you manage to buy the clothes it’s not all that different….
how some will look if they weighed 400 lbs at 6 foot 2 inches
Depends on the person, but see the photographic height/weight chart.
what it’s loke to be fat
The interesting thing about that one was that it wasn’t just a 1-time misspelling — 7 hits with that one phrase.
Music Monday
You have probably heard “Stairway to Heaven”….
Stairway To Heaven performed by Heart with Jason Bonham
But have you heard “Railway to Hogwarts“?
Saturday Ramblings
1am is still Saturday if you haven’t gone to bed yet, right?
Note to self: The expensive twice-daily asthma med works best if the evening dose is 12 hours after the morning dose, not 18 or 20. You carry it with you. Set an alarm on your phone & use it. Don’t just turn it off.
Kath posted about a current fat acceptance tag on twitter, if you haven’t seen it already. Also the HAES blog has a piece on activist burnout.
I started watching the first season of Mad Men on Netflix. Is it weird that I’m describing it as “a grown-up Bewitched”?
Music Monday
Kathy Mar (image from Last.fm)
Kathy Mar has been making folk and filk music longer than a lot of people have been around. She was a professional folksinger and street performer in Denver before she discovered filk, the music of science fiction & fantasy fandom. She’s gone on to record several filk albums and won awards in filk music.
And yes, she is a woman of size.
One of her songs from 1988 is still as timely as it was then.
We are surrounded by technology a flood that’s rising still
And we are praying we’ll survive it or we’re sure we never will
And all our speed and skill and reach will soon be taking us to space
It’s a great day in the morning for our funny human race
But we’re frightened of our future and we’re scared to move along
So we scream that our technology is dangerous and wrong
Back-to-nature cannot save us but the stars could be our crown
If we can drink up this river before we drown
Last.fm has a great version of “Drink Up The River” and other songs of Kathy’s.
A more recent image of Kathy (via Wikipedia).
It Came From the Search Terms
how does 400 pound have sex
400 pound what? If you mean £400 I’m not sure.
blogs about being obese
Hi!
what to do super morbidly obese
What do you want to do?
what size is 6x plus
Oh dear, plus size sizing is NOT for the weak. For example, I wear 5x at Making It Big, except when I wear a size 4x or a size 6x. I recently joined Gwynnie Bee, in part, to try more clothes from vendors I’ve been unsure about committing myself too (and I’ve discovered I can rock a 30/32 IGIGI dress, which may be an EXPENSIVE thing to learn). Oh, and how did I learn about Gwynnie Bee? From Marianne Kirby, which brings us back to how plus sizes make no sense.
yoga pants bbw
You know all those stretch knit elastic-waist pants that everyone sells for fatties?
what sizes does lane bryant carry
14-28.
4x – 9x clothing for women
Already answered – be sure to check out the comments & also this list of resources.
what size do you need a seatbelt extender
Depends on the person and the seatbelt. Check out these posts.
swimwear for morbidly obese
For women, this post. For men, Casual Male.
what is the largest scrub size you can buy
Plus Woman sells clothing from 1x to 10x, including scrubs. They make a lot of things to order so you can pick fabric and so on.
Happy New Year
Happy New Year, Happy New Year,
May we all have a vision
Now and then of a world
Where every neighbor is a friend
Happy New Year, Happy New Year
Try Some New Music
Several indie artists put together a sampler of music — over 70 tracks — to try.
Some of it is music I’ve loved for years.
“Firebird’s Child”
“Light Heart”
“Salad of Doom”
“Tam Lin”
“The Cthulhu Colada Song”
“The Holly & The Ivy”
“Two Guys Kissin’ Ruined My Life”
“WinterTide”
“Witches’ Rune”
Others are new to me, or new interpretations.
“Close Your Eyes”
“Do Virgins Taste Better Medley”
“How Was The Show Last Night”
“Jedi Drinking Song”
“Mingulay Boat Song”
“XLibris”
There are links to all the performers’ websites as well.
Love Song for Internet Trolls
From The Doubleclicks:
It is snarky and silly and fun.
I love you, even though you’re a commenter from hell
the predictable way you don’t know how to spell
and you’re hateful
disgusting, ungrateful
like you don’t understand, other people have feelingsI feel like you don’t even know
if you don’t enjoy a youtube video
you can stop it. you don’t have to watch it.
your ignorance is just amazing.it seems like you’ve never heard
that if media doesn’t speak your words
you can make something new, express your view
it’s a delight how you’re so darn LAZYthe internet makes you feel so empowered
you almost forget you’re a stupid coward
Sick
You know that stage of being sick where you feel fine, really, as long as you don’t actually try to DO a anything?
Yeah.
Tonight I tried to make pumpkin bread & forgot to put the pumpkin in. So it’s spice bread.
Anyway. I guess it’s a good thing I didn’t try to drive or go to work today.
Halloween
The company I’ve worked at for the last three years has parties for Halloween & trick-or-treating in the office. I’ve sometimes felt strange, in past years, to be the fat lady handing out candy. (No cultural baggage there…!)
This is the second company I’ve worked at to do the full-on trick-or-treating. Some years at the old company I stamped kids’ hands with bats and cats, but I gave my rubber stamps away in an uncluttering binge. So I stopped by the party store on the way home Tuesday.
I’m giving out small toys this year. It’ll be different, and the kids might like the variety. Besides, leftover kazoos might be fun.
