nathansqueak

[nathansqueak]

my problem is that I can't watch a movie or TV show without pointing out the crochet, and I can't look at a pretty landscape picture without pointing out the unhealthy forest growth

[nathansqueak]

[nathansqueak]

ever since the election i have been almost exclusively watching To Wong Foo: Thanks For Everything, Julie Newmar and the 2008 three part TV miniseries rendition of The Color of Magic/Light Fantastic

and this plays a major role in my keeping my cool

[nathansqueak]

That day I woke up crying

Inspired by this article, which caught in my throat for a good while.

[nathansqueak]

looking into the smoot hawley tariffs of 1930, skipping to the bottom and seeing that it got rolled back TWO YEARS LATER

[nathansqueak]

when the Alvin and the chipmunks movie came out I was like 11 years old and I remember thinking Dave was such a chode, like why is he such a dick to these little critters who just need his help?? they're literally children stop making them work for the roof over their head??

and now rewatching the film as a 28 year old im like OH they're DEMONS?? they're tiny little nightmares specifically sent to torture him? a rubber room with rats?? what the hell????

[nathansqueak]

some guy was like "dude imagine, a boy band, but CHIPMUNKS"

and some other guy was like *hits blunt* "that's fuckin genius what the fuck"

[nathansqueak]

body changes on hrt are so bizarre because how am I gaining weight at the same time that I'm losing weight and my pants are falling off but my shirts are too tight and I am so horny and I just want to be sexy but instead I get Lumpy Awkward Puberty Part 2

and my voice is dropping so fast but my face is still round and soft and baby so I look like

but i sound like the "i told you we needed more glitter" meme

[nathansqueak]

Claiming you shouldn't be fat is one of the biggest lies they'll try to sell you

[nathansqueak]

there are ring necked doves that have taken to living in our backyard and they are so cute and sweet and pretty. they hang out on the railing by the bowl of seeds, or they hang out over on the fence near our window, and they preen themselves and each other and they look at us

it is the most amazing thing! and funny and cute! when you're watching a bird and they start watching you back! they start craning their heads around to get a better look at you and their heads bob a little bit. they're just hanging out, our little dove friends. how lucky we are

[nathansqueak]

This Week in U.S. Censorship News (Posted Nov. 14, 2024)

Shreveport Times: Increase of book bans across the U.S. in 2023-2024; Which books are being banned? (Nov. 8, 2024)

K-12 Dive: School book bans triple in 2023-34 (Nov. 11, 2024)

AP: Florida education officials report hundreds of books pulled from school libraries (Nov. 12, 2024)

The Conversation: Most US book bans target children's literature featuring diverse characters and authors of color (Nov. 12, 2024)

Clarksville Now: List of almost 400 banned books sent out as 'resource' to CMCSS school libraries, but not mandated (Nov. 13, 2024)

Arkansas Times: Conway School Board returns to book banning (Nov. 13, 2024)

Alabama: 'These issues are not going away': Alabama anti-censorship group urges action in library culture war (Nov. 13, 2024)

Tallahassee Democrat: Hundreds of books pulled from Florida schools listed in new DOE release. Here are the titles (Nov. 13, 2024)

Electric Lit: A Year of Giving Away Banned Books in Florida (Nov. 13, 2024)

KVUE: Austin gears up for annual Texas Book Festival as book bans sweep the state (Nov. 13, 2024)

KCRG: Iowa State Board of Education finalizing rules for book ban law (Nov. 13, 2024)

Axios Des Moines: Iowa, among the nation's top book-ban states, set to finalize school rules (Nov. 13, 2024)

WNEM: Michigan Library Association backs proposed bills about book banning procedure (Nov. 13, 2024)

Inforum: Book ban proposal sparks heated debate at Sargent Central Schools (Nov. 13, 2024)

Pipe Dream: On banning books, burning bridges (Nov. 13, 2024)

The Transfeminine Review: The Trans Literature Preservation Project: A Practical Guide to Resisting Censorship (Nov. 13, 2024)

TIME: The Woman Whose Crusade Gave Today's Book-Banning Moms a Blueprint (Nov. 13, 2024)

Literary Hub: Maggie Tokuda-Hall on Project 2025's Plans For Book Bans (Nov. 14, 2024)

The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Award-winning author, plaintiff in Volusia lawsuit talks Florida book banning, censorship (Nov. 14, 2024)

[nathansqueak]

Yall wanna hear a kinda funny, kinda sad story about my grandmother and hetero-normativity?

Ok, so... when my grandmother was in her 50s (I was an infant), she met a woman at the Unitarian Church. And, as can happen when you meet your soul mate, this event made it impossible for her to deny parts of herself that she had fiercely hidden her whole life.

All the drama- their affair being found out, the divorce with my grandfather, the court battle over who got the house, happened while I was a baby. Even in my earliest memories, it's just Mama Jo and Oma, and my grandfather lived elsewhere (first his own apartment, then a nursing home, then with us.)

But here's the thing- no one ever explained any of this to me. No one ever sat down and was like "hey, Rosie, so do you know what a lesbian is?" It was the 90s. It was Texas. I think my mom was still kinda processing all this, and just assumed that like... I was gonna figure it out. Don't mention it, let it just be normal. Like I think my mom thought that if she explained the situation, she would be making it weird? I dunno.

But like. In the 90s, in all the movies I had seen and books I had read, do you know how many same sex couples I had seen? Like. 0. Do you know how many "platonic best friend/roommates" I had seen? A lot. I had no context, is what I'm saying.

I literally thought this was a Golden Girls, roommates, besties situation until I was like...I dunno, 11? 12?

It was actually their parrot, an African Grey named Spike, imitating my grandmothers voice saying "Johanna, honey, it's getting late", that triggered the MIND BLOWN moment as I realized that *there's only one master bedroom and it only has 1 waterbed* when all the pieces finally clicked.

Anyway. I think it's a real important thing for kids to know queer people exist, for a lot of reasons, but also because kids can be clueless and it's embarrassing to have your grandmother be outted by a parrot because everyone just thought you'd figure it out on your own.

Anyway, here is my grandma and her wife, my Oma, after they moved to Albuquerque to be artsy gay cowboys and live their best life. They helped run a "Lesbian Dude Ranch" out there (basically just with funding and financial support. As Oma has explained "traditionally, most lesbians don't have a lot of money" so they wrote the checks and let the younger ladies actually run the ranch.)

[nathansqueak]

How Can Cupid Be So Cruel.

[nathansqueak]

we are at the point of hiding toilet paper, laundry detergent, and now paper towels from our roommates because they're wasteful and inconsiderate and are constantly using up the things we buy and not replacing them until we leave the box empty and they eventually HAVE to buy more

it started with the toilet paper. my partner and I both have issues with hemorrhoids and thus bought more expensive toilet paper as it's usually softer and is less likely to tear up our assholes. we can't afford to buy the fancy toilet paper for the whole house.

next it was the laundry detergent. my partner and I had just bought a full container of tide pods when we put together that it was likely the detergent that was giving us both weird skin itching/rashes and had to switch to gain pods. we told our roommates to keep using the tide pods, that we got the gain pods for us for skin sensitivity issues. cool no problem. I used the gain pods one time and when I went back the container was already almost empty. checked the tide container thinking they got confused. nope, that one was empty too. now I'm confused because how the fuck did they go through that much detergent that fast?? anyway we left two gain pods in that container as a decoy and bought a new container for our room.

its only typing this out that I'm realizing how much we spend in this house.

anyway we realized the paper towels are also going extremely fast so now I guess we have to hide those too. we bought a pack of six rolls like two weeks ago. I think we only used two of them ourselves.

it's a ridiculous sort of consumption without any awareness. how are they using this much?? where is it all going???

one time I bought some simple green cleaner and only got a couple uses out of it and now when I occasionally traverse into their bedroom looking for dirty dishes I see its empty bottle staring up at me from the corner of their floor, whispering "father why? how could you let them take me? you could have reused my bottle but now I am garbage. father why have you abandoned me"

need better roommates.

[nathansqueak]

"gavin newsom could never win presidency, his own constituents don't even like him, he's WIDELY unpopular in his own state"

sure, sure. that's why we keep voting him into higher and higher positions in state government. because we don't like him

[nathansqueak]

thinking about that one wordless calvin and hobbes sunday strip thats just calvins dad ditching his work to go play in the snow... its going to make me cry

[nathansqueak]