[vodpod id=Groupvideo.1533818&w=425&h=350&fv=%26rel%3D0%26border%3D0%26]

>Jordan

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Call for Submissions

Working Title: Spilling Over: A Fat, Queer Anthology
Contact: spillingover@gmail.com
Submission Deadline: December 1, 2008

Despite the attention given by queer studies to the materiality of bodies and the cultural and social inscriptions that designate them, still a dearth of both scholarship and literature exists around intersections of gender, sexuality, and fatness.  As fat studies begins to emerge as a viable academic location of inquiry, questions surface as to how fat bodies, deemed “excessive” in their trespasses of size and space, create even more complex subject positions when compounded by queer desires. This proposed anthology seeks contributions addressing junctions of “fat” and “queer” in pieces that consider the representations and resistances of non-normative corporeality and also writings considering the theoretical conceptions of these intricate subjectivities. Spilling Over will reflect the notions of excess, boundaries, and containment implied by the labels “fat” and “queer” both singularly and collectively.  In the form of scholarly writing and creative non-fiction pieces, essay submissions might consider (but are not limited to):

•    theorizing the concept of “excess” as it pertains to fatness and queerness
•    fat and queer identities; personal narratives; reclaiming “fat” and “queer”
•    notions of (in)visibility, hypervisibility, and passing and/or privilege
•    intersections of race, class, gender, sexuality, ethnicity, (dis)ability, age, and religion
•    the economics of the obesity “epidemic” and the diet industry
•    fat, queer art and performance; performativity
•    pleasure, sex-positivity, eroticizing non-normative bodies
•    acceptance movements, political activism, resistance
•    the engagement of feminism with fatness
•    global, transnational, transcultural constructions of fat, queer bodies and lives
•    critical reflections of fatness and queerness in media, literature, film, music, and visual arts
•    the rhetoric of fat oppression, fatphobia, homophobia, transphobia, bigotry, responding to and/or addressing hate speech

By December 1, 2008, please send your 2,000 – 6,000 word submission, along with your complete contact information and a 50-100 word biography, to spillingover@gmail.com with the subject line of “Spilling Over – Submission.”  Submissions must be received in 12 point Times New Roman font and sent in via Word documents (PDFs will not be accepted).  Pieces will be reviewed and decisions made by April 2009. Please note that accepted submissions will be approved on a tentative basis, pending editorial board approval once the anthology has secured a publisher.

Questions can be directed to me at spillingover@gmail.com or visit the MySpace page at www.myspace.com/spillingoveranthology

Please distribute widely.

OH MY TOUR DE NERDFIGHTING FOR THE WIN!!! 

IF YOU DONT LIKE CAPS I SUGGEST YOU STOP READING NOW

CUZ I AM SO JAZZED THAT IM GOING TO GO CRAZY!!!!

THE DAY STARTED OUT NORMAL BUT CRAP HOLD ON!!!

 OK SORRY I HAD TO EMAIL SOMEONE! 

OK BUT THEN I WENT HOME AND I WAS LIKE WHAT TO DO HMM.. . .

SO I WENT ONTO YOUTUBE TO CHECK UP ON THE VLOGBROTHERS 

AND THERE WAS A NEW VIDEO SO I WAS LIKE COOL

SO I WATCHED THE VIDEO AND AT 3 MINUTES AND 29 SECONDS 

JOHN GREEN IMMITATING MARGO IN PAPER TOWNS SAID. . . .

THEY ARE COMING TO WESTPORT CT FOR THE TOUR DE NERDFIGHTING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

NERDFIGHTERS HOOOHAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

SO I STARTED TELLING ALL THE NERDFIGHTERS CUZ I WAS SO EXCITED AND THEN I WAS

LIKE DAR COURTNEYS NOT ONLINE SO I HAD TO CALL HER!

MIND YOU I WAS HAVING TROUBLE NOT SCREAMING AT THIS POINT 

AND SO ME AND COURTNEY ARE ALL EXCITED AND THEN SHE TELLS ME THAT THERE IS A

LIVE BROADCAST OF THE VLOGBROTHERS ON BLOGTV!!!

SO I RACED OVER AND QUICKLY LOGGED INTO THE MAIN ROOM AND IT WAS AWESOME!

JOHN WAS TALKING ABOUT PAPER TOWNS AND ALL THE USUAL COOL STUFF!

AND LIKE EVERYBODY I WAS ASKING QUESTIONS AND MAKING COMMENTS 

BUT THEN THE MOST AWESOME THING HAPPENED. . . HE ANSWERED ONE OF MY

QUESTIONS!!!    I FORGET WHICH ONE BUT ILL REMEMBER SOON!!! 

THEN COURTNEY ASKED A Q AND HE ANSWERED HER!!! 

AND EVEN SAID AWW DONT WORRY MOOO!!!!!!!!<--- HER USERNAME

AND IF THINGS WERENT GOOD ENOUGH HE ANSWERED 2 COUNT UM 2!!!

MORE OF MY Q'S!!!

OH I REMEMBERED THE FIRST ONE IT WAS:

WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE FICTIONAL CHARACTER!?!?

HE WAS LIKE IN THE MIDDLE OF ANSWERING WHEN HE GOT DESTRACTED BUT STILL!!!!

THE THIRD Q WHICH  COURTNEY MADE ME ASK WAS WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE KIND OF CHEESE? 

AND HE SAID NICHOLAS SOMETHING-OR-OTHER I DONT REMEMBER I WAS SCREAMING 

WITH HAPPINESS AND LAUGHING AT THE SAME TIME!

AND THE SECOND Q HE ANSWERED WAS:

WHAT ARE THE PICTURES BEHIND YOU?

(THERE WERE PICTURES BUT THEY WERE KINDA BLURRY SO I DIDNT KNOW)

AND HE ANSWERED AGAIN!!!! 

BUT AGAIN I WAS SO EXCITED I DIDNT HEAR THE ANSWER IT STARTED WITH A C I THINK 

IT MIGHT HAVE BEEN CAPE CODE. . .IDK 

I'LL BE LESS OF A FANGIRL NEXT TIME BUT RIGHT NOW THIS HAS MADE MY DAY, WEEK,

MONTH, POSSIB. YEAR IF WE CANT GO TO THE TDN IN WESTPORT!!!!

WELL DFTBA AND NERDFIGHTERS FTW!!!!!!!!!

ANYBODY LEAVE A COMMENT IF YOU ARE A NERDFIGHTER OR NIT AND/OR GOING TO 

THE TOUR DE NERDFIGHTING!!!

BYE!

theCresswellFamily.net is winning Google search for "best family ever." We noticed these keywords were leading strangers to our family photo blog at theCresswellFamily.net, and saw that we somehow come up first out of 16 or 17 million pages.  Quite by accident, but cool anyway.

Sarah.  Saaaarahhh!

How awesome is this picture?  But is it as awesome as this:

Did you catch Palin's speech?  Wow.  Wow again.  That was one of the best speeches I've ever heard.  For a quick review click here.

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Vanish!

I feel less stressed about things since I have not been driving, it never occurred to me that driving can be stressful. Depending on the day and how I feel, I can be a very passionate driver. But here, since I don't drive, I can be calm and collective all day.

Whats more, round-trip to and from Seoul is under 2000won or $2. Cheap. I love it. I told myself I'd look into a city with public transportation when I get back into the States, which narrows my choice of cities to a handful.

If I am feeling lazy or it is raining (which it rains here a lot more than I am use to), I take local buses to the shopping center close by. It's not the greatest deal, 900won one way but I can live with that. Funny how a round trip on a bus to local areas cost me about the same as it does to take the subway into Seoul.

Walking, I do a lot of walking. I bought walking shoes before I came here for such occasions. My feet are happy for that. Even though I still have my beer belly, I feel I've dropped a few pounds from the food and the walking everywhere combination.

Not trying to come off as a hippie or jumping on the 'going green' bandwagon but public transportation is really cool. I wish more cities in the U.S.A. had public transportation. Even some of the bigger cities I've been to that had public transportation lacked enough buses and rail to make an impact. And sure, maybe this "energy crisis" we're experiencing will open more public transportation options to cities that lack or do not have public transportation, but only time will tell.

This woman is totally saving my butt and I have not enough Bulgarian words to thank her.  Last week, we were at the cafe and I expressed my concern over the variety of Bulgarian documents I would be required to write for the Ministry of Education (it sounds way scarier than I think it is...I have a hard time taking it seriously, anyway.  Maybe I don't know better.) throughout the school year.  "Spokoino, Andrea, I will help you," she told me.

The first major issue of concern were the razpredlenies for my classes.  Basically, what you have to do is write a schedule of what you will be teaching at every single class throughout the year, when the tests are, etc.  If I was in an American school, I would chalk it up to irritating busy work that would suck away my week, because that is essentially what it is.  Only in Bulgarian.

My counterpart, proving to be ever more useful as the days go by, gave me most of the students' books and only two of the teachers' books which contain models of said razpredlenies then proceeded to go sit on her favorite bench and chain-smoke all the livelong day.  Thanks, hon.  You are great.

So yesterday, Kamelia sat down with me and attempted to explain how I go about putting these things together, how many hours there are per year for grades that have English 3, 3.5, and 4 hours a week and how many days I should allocate for units as a result, when I have to have tests, etc.  Then she assured me that we would work together on getting them done and that she had a program on her flash drive that she would bring.

Today I go to the computer lab with her and we sit down to work on the 3rd grade razpredlenie.  She opens the file and...she has completed the first 37 hours of the 3rd grade razpredlenie for me in Bulgarian AND in English!

Might I add that she does not speak any English, teaches Math, and is in no way obliged to help me whatsoever.  I have no clue how she put the English in there or how long it took her (I know how long it takes me to type in Bulgarian!).  I seriously almost wept with joy and gratitude.

No words can express how screwed I would be without this wonderful woman.

And, to boot, she took more of my books home with her in order to type the Bulgarian out for me.  I owe her my firstborn child or at least a dozen cookies.

Oh, and when I said earlier that I had most of the students' books, that is because my school is currently not in possession of the eighth grade text book, which is......dum dum dum: VENTURE!  Yes!  (Hence, the "Put your hand in my monster claw" reference.)  This textbook is a joke.  Once I receive it, I cannot wait to regale all of you with various quotes from its stellar lessons.  Maybe I will start a regular, "Venture Quote of the Day," section on my blog.

AND in other REALLY FREAKING AWESOME news: my BFF is coming na gosti for Christmas!!!!!

I need way more exclamation points to truly express how happy and excited I am.

That is right people, in only slightly more than three months, Amy and I will be getting ourselves into all sorts of trouble, Balkan style.  This whole plan only started forming a few short days ago when we talked on the phone.  I constantly tell people they need to come see me and usually get a rather vague response like, "Yeah, that'd be fun!  I'll see if I have money."  So when it looked like things were taking shape for her to come my way, I could not contain my excitement.  I woke up this morning, stumbled into the kitchen to make coffee and check my email and IT WAS REAL.  She has plane tickets and everything.  I am starting a countdown.

I cannot think of a better way to spend the holidays than with someone I have been having adventures/wreaking havoc with since we were five.  I hope she likes it here or, at the very least, gets a kick out of this sometimes absurd place I am now trying to call home.  I am so pumped.

AHH and i have found this extremely EXTREMELY close resemblence between stevie ray vaughan and john mayer. the prolonged guitar riffs, the guitar wailing, the husky growling voice, even down to the enunciation of words! mmmmm sexy stuff. anyway that shouldn't be a big surprise, seeing that jm was inspired by srv all through his career. seriously, i can understand why so many guys don't like john mayer that much; he is way too sexy for his own good, especially the cleft on his chin. oh my oh my oh my oh my. NO seriously, what am i saying!! yes i do admit sometimes his music gets on my nerves (especially his lives, what with all that cajoling with the females in the audience) and the "oily-ness" of his songs. okay i shall explain; if listening to jack johnson is like eating ice kachang, and stevie r. v. is like indian curry, then john mayer is like spaghetti and meatballs. it's delicious to eat, but extremely messy and sinful. haha. meatballs, meatballs. can you tell that i'm pretty hungry right now. man when was the last time i had any pasta :( 

anyway artistes i'm currently diggin'

1. Stevie Ray Vaughan (!!)
2. N.E.R.D. (!!!)
3. Daft Punk (!!!!!!) yay can't wait for their discography to finish

haha, you would wonder how one person can like N.E.R.D. AND Stevie R.V. at the same time, but that's me! :O also, the comparing-artistes-to-food thing might be insulting to some, but it's really quite amusing. if daft punk is a fizzy lemony cocktail then N.E.R.D. would be some whisky+soda concoction. cos both their music is totally WOAH!crack and a lot of people are dissing them, like "i can't believe anyone listens to this trash" kind of thing, which i think is rather harsh. i mean it's quite listenable and funky even though it's very trippy and psychedelic! and as much as it sounds strange, i actually find listening to this type of song helpful to my mugging. try it! it helps :)

my oh me oh my, do i sound drunk or what. AHH i swear it's the coffee. i've drunk too much today.

Here's a friend of mine from Cincinnati, Abbydid (also known as Abby Langdon) who was just featured at Plushteam and who will be part of Chicago's Renegade Craft Fair in a little over two weeks. Her Wibbly-Woo stuffed toys are adorable, and I posted at Shelterrific awhile back about her weird and wonderful Three Sisters set of dolls. Beyond her obvious artistic talent, Abby and her family are just wonderful people -- the kind who are gorgeous enough that you first meet them with all kinds of horrible stereotypes in your head like, "They are bound to be conceited" and then find out they could not be warmer, sweeter, or nicer. Writing about them is really making me miss them. So go to Chicago and give them a hug for me!

The waiting is killing me at the moment.  I'm tired and need to go to bed.  I think I will.

Maybe it's because it reminded me of the $75 I paid for a ticket to their Psycho Circus 3D tour.  It was about as 3D as this clip.  They pointed at the screen a lot, but not once was I concerned that they might touch me.  Thank God.

Not to get too political on a blog about fun, but when I think about the upcoming election this song comes to mind.  I don't want to disclose my political views but I will say a-holes like Diddy are not helping Obama's cause.  I really really hate Diddy.

Diddy, don't you know you never go full retard. Seriously though when was the last time this guy was relevant.  I'm guessing it was when South Park made fun of him 4 years ago.

Not bad.  I also think she's hot.

And if you are someone who is confused about the message of my previous post conflicting with posting this, I'll clear things up:  These videos are ball-bouncingly funny.

The picture is a hint.

but it didn't happen this way this time. he fell, and his brothers/sisters picked him up. He dusted himself off, but fell again. The grass was thick, wet, entangling, not very friendly. and so he looks up at the clear blue sky and sees the birds and the clouds, knowing there's a rainbow up there somewhere he pushes up with all of them watching, expecting a heroic feat to shatter all their fears and dreams and hopes. But he just pushes on, like the brown soldier he is. Not because he has to, but because it is him. To not push on is to defy his identity, and fall back and meld with the forest, to cease existing. That cannot be accepted.

And so there is blood on the floor, where he spat the remnants of the scabbing of his heart. Fresh red, because it will never heal in time. But at least it stopped hurting.

What would you do, dude. What would you do.

This life is too awesome.