#24 on a list of 99 reasons why baseball is so much better than football. Actually, #24 reads in its entirety: "Marianne Moore loved Christy Mathewson. No woman of quality has ever preferred football to baseball." Oh, good lord. "Woman of quality." Marianne Moore. Christy Mathewson.
I got to that page via Peter Hoh, who said I should check out #19 on the list. Okay:
Pro football players have breasts. Many NFLers are so freakishly overdeveloped, due to steroids, that they look like circus geeks. Baseball players seem like normal fit folks. Fans should be thankful they don't have to look at NFL teams in bathing suits.
Great. Moobs. Let's take a closer look at those moobs. That list was written back in 1987, and it's my observation that a lot of those football players have very attractively V-shaped bodies. The ones who are tubby are tubby for a reason. What explains the tubbiness of baseball players?
And the fact is we don't have to see either football or baseball players in bathing suits. We see them in their uniforms — their costumes. And the football costumes are glorious and sexy, while the baseball uniforms these days look like children's pajamas.
***
I like to call the uniforms "costumes," because spectator sports are entertainment and because I'm looking for the traces of the feminine within the manly... and because it drives the guys crazy and I'm all about driving the guys crazy.
AllenS: Jenn Sterger (the woman) was hired because of some sexy pictures of her in Sports Illustrated mag, that Brent Musberger thought would be a good matchup for the male dominated football sports sceen. Jenn and Brent are just as much at fault here. I'm thinking of sending the woman a picture of my penis also. Could I borrow the fish bowl lens?...
Meade: It's a fish eye lens. Fish eye. It's for taking shots of massive objects or scenes which a normal lens can't take all in. A fish bowl lens would be for taking shots of tiny things. Like Brett Favre's... ability to make good judgments.
AllenS: Ok, ok. Can I borrow the lens that makes stuff look bigger?
But, in fact, the fisheye works really well to make something look large if you get the camera lens right up at it. Lots of other stuff is including in the picture, arrayed all around and looking comparatively small. Frankly — and this is not an offer to AllenS — it would be really interesting to take pictures of naked men and get the extreme closeup on the genitalia with a well-composed and interesting background. I went looking through my old posts with the "fisheye" tag to find some that prove my point.
The second picture here of the fisheye dog makes this point very well. Get right up to the nose. The scenery in the background isn't as interesting as I'd want for my proposed compositions, but you can see how tiny Meade looks in the background (when in fact he was quite close by). Here's another photograph that illustrates the point, albeit with the female body:
That's from the Khmer Dynasty room at the Metropolitan Museum in NYC. Here's the effect of the lens looking at the room from the other side:
Here's some male and female nudity, to be fair:
That's the Museum of Natural History — not Brett and Jenn. You may recognize that couple from the movie "Election" — which is a great cautionary tale about the inadvisability of cheating on... many things (including your spouse).
And then — searching through the fisheye pictures — I found something that was extremely important to me: the purple tree, which had this.
[P]eople don't always vote on logical reasons. Emotion drives voters particularly when they have reason to be angry and frustrated. If you lost your job or lost your house or lost your 401k, you had every reason to be angry and frustrated and when you are, you have a tendency to blame the people who are in office...
... and — via me — UW polisci professor Charles Franklin:
I'm not endorsing the American voter... They're pretty damn stupid.
Taranto — being much nicer to Franklin than Rush Limbaugh was — includes the self-defense Franklin wrote in the comments to my blog:
... [V]oters embraced Ron Johnson before they knew much about him. . . . The race wasn't about specific details of Johnson vs Feingold, it was a rejection of Democrats more or less regardless of what voters knew about the GOP candidate... [D]espite not knowing the details of Johnson's policy positions, the voters did NOT make a mistake in choosing Johnson as the more conservative candidate and certain to be more favorable to cutting government....
Taranto finds this incoherent: "In other words, the electorate was smart. So why did Franklin call them stupid?"
***
By the way, I love Taranto's Best of the Web. This, from the same link, had me in hysterics:
Police in Idaho have arrested a woman who impersonated a plastic surgeon so she could carry out breast exams to random strangers....
The victims said they believed [Kristina] Ross because she used medical vocabulary.
She said Ross even gave them a phone number to an actual plastic surgeon's office in order for them to make follow-up appointments.
Ross is charged with a felony — "practising medicine without a licence." Oh, blech, it's the Daily Mail. Why do I keep reading that lurid trash! The charge is practicing medicine without a license. Oh, what bullshit. She wasn't practicing medicine. She was lying to ladies in a bar.
The Daily Mail also makes a big deal out of the fact that Ross's "gender category" is "male to female."
That all makes sense to me. Except the part about ice!
I ran across that by accident after searching — unsuccessfully — for the old Clairol ad with the tagline "If I have only one life, let me live it as a blonde." While it made being blonde seem awfully important, I always thought it was bizarre to remind us that we're all going to die. How much compensation for that calamity could we get out of blondeness?
Another commercial from the same era tried to encourage us to use the product (Schlitz) with: "You only go 'round once, and you've gotta grab for all the gusto you can."
Wow. They really rub it in with the sharks that ate the guys in the shipwreck. Must drink beer! I guess it takes a heavier hand to use death as leverage against guys.
Anyway, what's this post about? Freedom, commerce, death as an incentive to live, an icy brew and... for the adventurous: icy breasts!
I love the Simpson "tit" flap. Even as the "Ground Zero Mosque" saved us from having to talk about the economy, that giant udder with 310 million tits has saved us from further discussion of that damned mosque. This is good, from Jacob Sullum:
The mention of outraged feminists suggests that Simpson stands accused of sexist vulgarity. I have to admit that I was shocked the first time I saw my mother use tit in a Scrabble game, but I was about 12 at the time, and she explained that the word is a perfectly acceptable variation of teat. Webster's New Universal Unabridged Dictionary backs her up, saying tit is deemed "vulgar" only when it refers to a woman's breast. The New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary likewise lists "teat" as the first definition for tit, although it notes that the usage is "now obscure" except in certain dialects (such as Alan Simpson's, evidently). So even by the arbitrary standards that make certain words unacceptable in polite company, in family newspapers, and on broadcast television between 6 a.m. and 10 p.m (though that last rule may be a thing of of the past), Simpson need not apologize for his use of tit.
Shit, Piss, Fuck, Cunt, Cocksucker, Motherfucker, and Tits, wow. Tits doesn't even belong on the list, you know. It's such a friendly sounding word. It sounds like a nickname. 'Hey, Tits, come here. Tits, meet Toots, Toots, Tits, Tits, Toots.' It sounds like a snack doesn't it? Yes, I know, it is, right. But I don't mean the sexist snack, I mean, New Nabisco Tits. The new Cheese Tits, and Corn Tits and Pizza Tits, Sesame Tits Onion Tits, Tater Tits, Yeah. Betcha can't eat just one. That's true I usually switch off. But I mean that word does not belong on the list.
Or this — not about "tits," but conceptually more apt:
[C]ocksucker is a compound word and neither half of that is really dirty. The word - the half suckercock is a half-way dirty word, 50% dirty - dirty half the time, depending on what you mean by it. Uh, remember when you first heard it, like in 6th grade, you used to giggle. And the cock crowed three times, heh, the cock - three times. It's in the Bible, cock in the Bible. ... Now the word twat is an interesting word. Twat! Yeh, right in the twat. Twat is an interesting word because it's the only one I know of, the only slang word applying to the, a part of the sexual anatomy that doesn't have another meaning to it. Like, ah, snatch, box and pussy all have other meanings, man. Even in a Walt Disney movie, you can say, We're going to snatch that pussy and put him in a box and bring him on the airplane.
AND: Could someone digitally alter this scene and replace Woody Allen with Alan Simpson?
Though it's been more than nine months since she went under the knife, [Heidi] Montag says she is still in severe pain and her body has not acclimated to the over-the-top breast augmentation.
"I have major anxiety about it," she confides. "I was taking painkillers but they weren't working, so I stopped. It hurt either way,"
In addition to the physical pain, the busty blond reality star's new assets have prevented her from properly hugging her four dogs or wearing anything that isn't a custom-made design.
"I'm obsessed with fitness but it's impossible to work out with these boobs," Montag says. "It's heartbreaking. I can't live an everyday life."
Yet, on the plus side, there is all the publicity and reality show material entailed in this "realization" and subsequent additional surgery — and surgery is her only real basis for fame.
With the passing of her confidant Dr. Ryan, Montag fears that she will be stuck living in her cartoon-like figure forever.
"I feel trapped in my own body," she confesses. "There's just no fixing it. Dr. Ryan knows the work he did, he knows everything."
Because how could another doctor ever locate those implants?
... Montag was quick to squash the rumors....
Oh! The imagery!
Find a doctor to (find and) remove your implants, and find the decency to remove your "downgraded" self from the public stage.
It's a standard expression. Simpson came up with a brilliantly memorable variation to describe social security: "a milk cow with 310 million tits." Then he let himself get pushed back by people who spewed faux outrage to keep anyone from using the powerful phrase ever again.
And by the way, shouldn't the word Simpson used be spelled "teat"? The "tit" pronunciation of "teat" is seared in my memory, because once, years ago, I read the phrase "colder than a witch's teat" and pronounced it "teet." Apparently, at least in some sectors — possibly including Wyoming — you sound like a fool if you say "teet." It's "tit." "Tit" for "teat."
Discuss!
IN THE COMMENTS: Charlie Martin said:
You're correct about the pronunciation. /tit/ is the common pronunciation for most country folks and is listed as the preferred pronunciation in some dictionaries, and is the technical term in dairy farming for the place where the milk comes outta.
/teet/ is the preferred pronunciation for the sort of little old ladies that say the table has "limbs" and city folks who think what the milk comes outta is a cardboard box.
Anne B. said:
I'm pretty sure Mencken used it first, or at least used it earlier. "A milch cow with 125,000,000 teats" was his description of the second FDR administration.
Why did Simpson retreat? He could have made his critics look dumb and elitist by pointing out a literary reference they didn't get and a country-style pronunciation they weren't in touch with.
CORRECTIONS: I made 2 little corrections: adding a "d" to "pronounce" is paragraph 2 and deleting the stray word "embarrassed" after "look" in the last paragraph. I don't always note superficial tidying up like that, but I'm doing it this time because I just have the feeling that Althouse-haters are quoting the "embarrassed" mistake and saying I should be "embarrassed." I'm not trying to hide that I'm capable of typing and editing mishaps, only trying to make things as readable as possible.
ADDED: Simpson's comment was made by email, so he chose the spelling "tit."
Nice takedown by Jack Shafer. (But isn't the correct spelling "bogosity"? Try saying it. I know the adjective is "bogus," but people don't say "bogusity." They might say "bogusness," but not "bogusity.")
Anyway, the problem is something that's common to journalism about trends (including that ridiculous Daily Caller piece about blog payola). A headline declaring a trend gets readers' attention, but then you need a lot of examples of the things that constitute the trend. The writer has some things that look like a trend, but he's got to beef up the article with more examples or it's not a trend. But he's itching to get to trend!!!! so he includes things that don't really fit, and then the whole thing looks stupid.
It's really annoying for the reader, because the trend!!!! declaration worked, and you've already read it and rewarded the website with traffic before you realize it's not quite a trend. What can you do? Resolve not to read trend pieces anymore? But then you still see the headline and it makes the impression that there is a trend!!!! and now you're been deprived of the evidence that there isn't a trend.
Now, I'm reading the comments at the Shafer piece and see that some of his readers are pouncing on the "bogusity/bogosity" spelling issue. I'm glad to see that others share my priorities. There's also this from one "nerdnam":
Well, what's her name's plastic surgeon just died after driving off a cliff immediately after twittering a picture of his dog at the beach. The dog survived, luckily. So I see a trend here.
Oh?! "Heidi Montag Mourns Death of Her Plastic Surgeon." Oh, lord, look at the expression on her face! Isn't it ironic? You plastic-surgerize — what's the verb for "surgery"? — somebody's face and then you die and her face is incapable of looking convincingly sad. Her gigantic breasts don't look sad either, but they make it into the People Magazine photograph, and because they stand as monuments to your work, that's not ironic at all.
Hmm. That People article no longer contains the information about tweeting that is referred to here:
According to People, Dr. Frank Ryan's jeep Wrangler careened off of the Pacific Coast Highway on Monday....
People later reported that Ryan's former girlfriend confirmed that his accident was caused by texting and driving. He had posted a Twitter message about hiking with his dog just before the accident. The dog survived the crash.
One more dubiously technology-related death. Maybe confirmations from former girlfriends don't cut it anymore.
There's so much talk of Mel's "racist rant." I listened. Although he most certainly says the n-word and says it in a line that suggests contempt for black men, the rant is all about the woman's purportedly fake breasts. The hatred is squarely aimed at the (white) woman.
"Nooo, I have not had implants," said Palin. "I think a report like that is about as real and truthful that Todd and I are divorcing or that I bought a place in the Hamptons or that Trig is not my own child.
"And we still put up with that garbage, too."
Speculation was rampant after photos of the former Alaskan governor at the Belmont Stakes showed her looking a little more buxom than usual.
"'Boobgate' is all over the Internet, because there are a lot of bored, idle bloggers and reporters with nothing else to talk about," Palin said in the interview.
Come on, Sarah, don't put down bloggers generally. And don't put down talking about breasts generally. I reject the idea that breasts belong at the bottom of the list of things to talk about. Breasts are important. They mean something. Let's not minimize their significance in our culture. They are the subject of many journals, books, and movies. I have taken my knocks for talking about the meaning of breasts in politics (though, of course, the knockers were my political opponents, motivated to squelch what was a criticism of Bill Clinton, whose attraction to Lewinskis was well-known ). So I will talk about breasts, and it's not at all for lack of better raw material. Breasts are big! Let's talk about them!
Now, speaking of breasts and bloggers, what amuses me — aside from the endless obsession with Sarah Palin, specifically, and with the physical aspects of female politicians, generally — is the low level of knowledge of breasts on the part of the Boobgate bloggers. They didn't seem to realize that different bras and different kinds of shirts and jackets affect the way breasts look. A woman can draw attention to her breasts or downplay them. In professional settings and for political appearances, women tend to wear jackets. Even when jackets are fitted through the midsection, they flatten and disguise the curve of the chest. That's the point: to blunt the point.
By contrast, the contour of the breasts is accentuated by a knit top — especially if it's thin, clingy, and light-colored, like the one Sarah Palin wore to the Belmont Stakes. And when a woman wears such a shirt, it's particularly easy to perceive the existence of nipples. Everyone knows they are in there, but reasonably modest women — like Sarah Palin — try to avoid the nipple protrusion of the sort you can see in this photo of that woman who's suing her ex-employer for objecting to the way she dressed for work. The way to do that — and I laugh at people who write about breasts but don't know this! — is to wear a bra with a reasonably thick layer of foam padding.
I feel sorry for the bloggers who know so little about breasts that when they saw that Palin photograph, their first explanation was surgery. Before you think scalpel, think Occam's razor: the simplest explanation is most likely. Palin was wearing a t-shirt and a t-shirt bra. Now, go, get a life, and some real experience of your own in this fleshly world, you blogger losers.
ADDED: Thanks to Crack Emcee (in the comments) for pointing out my typo: "a reasonably think layer of foam padding." Corrected.
Reporting some non-celebrity's say-so about an incident that occurred in bed with her boyfriend. The only evidence that anything happened is the woman's own chatty gossip about herself. This item is tracking as ABC's "most popular" story, however — ahead of "Steven Seagal Sued for Sexual Assault." Journalism as page views. Great work, ABC. Brilliant of you to figure out that giant breasts will attract eyeballs.
So all we passengers need to do is keep an eye out for other passengers aiming hypodermic needles at their big breasts (or asses), and everything will be just fine. Unless you care that the authorities saw you naked. Better get used to it! This is war.
Snowflake expert Kenneth G Libbrecht said the photos did not meet modern standards because of the "crude equipment" Bentley used.
"But he did it so well that hardly anybody bothered to photograph snowflakes for almost 100 years," Mr Libbrecht added....
Bentley, who was known as The Snowflake Man, wrote in 1925: "Under the microscope, I found that snowflakes were miracles of beauty and it seemed a shame that this beauty should not be seen and appreciated by others.
"Every crystal was a masterpiece of design, and no one design was ever repeated. When a snowflake melted, that design was forever lost."
After catching innumerable snowflakes and preserving them forever, he "caught pneumonia in a blizzard" and died.
IN THE COMMENTS: Bob_R said: "It's like Hugh Hefner being killed by being crushed by a million breasts."
