I think very often we have an impulse to become involved at a community or even larger level in bettering the world around us, but we think we have too many obligations already. Maybe even with good intentions, we bow out because we are concerned we could not follow through with the commitment, or we get cowed thinking that we will not have enough time to give.
“The time is always right to do what’s right.” (Address at Oberlin College, October 22, 1964.)
However much time or material goods you have to give, that is the right amount. If it lessens as time goes by, that is okay; if you find down the line you have more to give, then that is right, too. It begins by starting. I know this is something I need to think more about. I know this is something I need to work on: stop talking and start doing, stop worrying about the future and act in the present. In fact, I think I feel a resolution coming on…
E’s third resolution of 2010: The right time is always now.
The time to put in to deed all my plans and dreams, and lay aside my worries and anxieties, is always right now. Right now.
— Sorry for the sparseness and lateness of posts today, dudes, but my grandmother is having a really Bad Day. The human brain can be such a bastard. —
“kitty”. sixteen,5’1″,white,prostitute.
ducking always the touch of must and shall,
whose slippery body is Death’s littlest pal,
skilled in quick softness. Unspontaneous. cute.
the signal perfume of whose unrepute
focusses in the sweet slow animal
bottomless eyes importantly banal,
Kitty. a whore. Sixteen
you corking brute
amused from time to time by clever drolls
fearsomely who do keep their sunday flower.
The babybreasted broad “kitty” twice eight
— beer nothing,the lady’ll have a whiskey-sour —
whose least amazing smile is the most great
common divisor of unequal souls.
“Whose slippery body is death’s littlest pal.” God.
The poem is designed to shock and it is shocking — not so much her age of 16, which was consenting in most states at that time, and there is no harm in a consenting human exploring their own sexuality, but the idea that Kitty is such an old and careful but hopeless hand at the sex trade that it is her sole living and she has abandoned her childhood likely earlier than she would have liked, implying her experiences began at a far more tender age — as well as containing a moral without being overly pedantic about it: my interpretation is that Mr. Cummings finds the youth of this prostitute, Kitty, sad and abhorrent, and is taking to task the entire trade, together with its purveyors, its proponents, and its “banal” and wicked pervasiveness, which can crush the spirit of a child and that can drive the spark and spontaneity out of the eyes of a “cute,” young girl. He is disgusted that a young woman’s agency has been foreclosed to a system that allows her no real freedom. That is my take and I stand by it staunchly. If you take the poem to mean that Mr. Cummings is fine with teen prostitutes, I’m interested to hear your argument.
Girl sold by her family in Thailand. Please only follow this link if you are not the weepy kind. (I am.)
In a lot of Eastern European and developing Asian countries, this problem is so nauseatingly endemic that its only solution is harsh, swift, Actually ENFORCED sanctions from other countries.
For those in more “developed” nations (raise your pinky, okay, cause we are sooo evolved with our computers and cell phones), I think the greatest way to prevent a sad poem like this from becoming the reality for that sullen girl-woman you see with her arms folded in front of the cosmetics display at the grocery while her mother fills the cart with gin and baby formula is to start coaching early and hard in strategies for self-esteem and success the likely victims of the child prostitution trade. I take no such high road as Mr. Cummings about obliquely non-pedantic “you should stop this,” methods: he is far more subtle and poetic than I, obviously. With protection of those vulnerable targets in mind, here is a short and very hastily-assembled list of groups that I think do that. If you have any to add, please, please do.
Organizations for child advocacy
— In the U.S. (all of these non-profits have been rated A or higher by charitywatch.org; do not leave home without it … wish they would start tackling and rating more international non-profits) —
Save the Children. Mainly focused on the United States, but also offers opportunities to better the lives of children in other countries
— In the U.K./Europe —
STOP (Trafficking UK). In support of the Sexual Offences Act of 2003 and the sanctions established against the trafficking of humans, espeically women and children, by the U.N. in Palermo in 2000, STOP (Trafficking UK) is an advocacy group for helping those who have come to the U.K. via the channels of the illegal sex trade — women and children — to find jobs, parents as need be, literacy coaches, counseling, and any other support they need. A new but excellent group.
UN.GIFT (the United Nations Global Initiative to Stop Human Trafficking). “UN.GIFT works with all stakeholders – governments, business, academia, civil society and the media – to support each other’s work, create new partnerships and develop effective tools to fight human trafficking.” UN.GIFT is a great jumping-off point for finding ways to help in your specific country.
— Other efforts abroad to advocate for disadvantaged youth and stem child prostitution —
Pearl S. Buck International: founded by the author of The Good Earth. Through PSBI you can arrange an inter-racial adoption via Welcome House or you may choose to sponsor a child. Special program for children in Asia, where many countries’ lax laws governing prostitution make it a viable and thriving trade, via Opportunity House.
The Global Fund for Children. Well-rated, takes your money and spreads it around well-researched country-based special needs groups.
And of course, UNICEF, the United Nations International Childrens’ Emergency Fund. I don’t want to tell you how to live your life, but it’s what Audrey would want.
Photo credits, top to bottom: Jodie Foster as Iris “Easy” Steensman, Taxi Driver (Martin Scorsese, 1976); Brooke Shields as Violet in Pretty Baby (Lois Malle, 1978); Iris and Travis Bickle dine out in Taxi Driver — Jodie again with Robert De Niro; I credited the center one below the picture itself and I again find it flabbergasting and horrifying; Brooke on the cover of People in May 1978; Jodie again from TD, heartbreakingly young in the green sunglasses — to me this has become an iconic outfit, summing up totally her character and Iris’s backstory and motivations; Brooke again out of costume on set for Pretty Baby, a surprising addition to the so-called “Raider Nation.” I assume the Raiders were still in their brief stationing at Los Angeles at this point.
Giving the people what they want: in which I glance over my blog stats, spot the trends in what brings you party people of the internet sliding on down to my place, and accordingly and with mutual thanks throw you some bone(r?)s.
Farewell and adieu to you fair Irish ladies.
First, a shocker. With mixed emotions I must report that the rack of Miss Megan Mullally is no longer the sheriff of Googlesearchy Town.* The first two editions (1, 2) of “Giving the people what they want” were dominated by amused-but-puzzled nods to the bafflingly large number of searches for the diminuitive Will and Grace star’s cleavage which lead droves of folks to my door. Megan held her own, beating out for many months running distant contenders such as “Drew Barrymore naked,” and “lesbian kiss,” which I would have thought any such phrases would easily eclipse “Megan Mullally’s breasts,” her “boobs,” her “topless” and variations therein and they never did. Until now.
*(By Googlesearchy Town I mean the searches that people enter in google to land on this journal — wordpress keeps track and ranks the most popular for me)
Top searching honors now rest in the tiny but mighty vintage hands of busty, bespectacled aspiring astrologer, the lovely and talented Fran Gerard — Playboy’s Miss March 1967, the self-help loving little looker whose cups runneth over.
The lovely and etc Ms. Gerard. For Science.
With 5,909 searches since her relatively recent appearance on the journal in March, Ms. Gerard beats out Megan at 2,503 since her inaugural boob-airing last September. Well-played, Ms. Gerard!
Sweet, lovely and talented heiress to generations of hot Italian culinary genius, Amber Campisi.
Rising Star Awards must go to three special up and comers. First, the talented family gal Amber Campisi (Miss February 2005); next, beautiful and tragic playmate and poet Marlene Morrow, aka Persephone (Miss April 1974) — whose gripping story has justly been getting attention from a number of outside sites linking in, enough so that her sister Landi was able to find this blog and send us an optimistic update on Marlene’s present condition about which I’m thrilled, check that post’s comments to get the latest — annnnnnnnd Yvonne Craig, BATGIRL!; all of whom are beginning to trend up the stats list with great and deserved speed. I look forward to what the next edition of “Giving the people what they want” will bring!
The very special Marlene Morrow/Marlene Pinckard/Persephone. Please, please read the account of how Paul Zollo found her with notebooks of poetry and an envelope holding her centerfold photo, living on the streets in L.A., and consider following the non-profit links which follow the write-up?
Finally: Quick note to the person who has found this blog by searching google three times in the space of the last two weeks — with “only assholes” in quotes so’s as to make maximal use of boolean exceptors — for the exact phrase “‘only assholes’ fall for me“: In case you ever come back a third time, I’d like to hope you hit this entry.
Vintage hottie Yvonne Craig has suited up!
First, you probably keep landing here because I frequently tag what I consider to be interesting graffiti with the words “only assholes write on walls” a la cult classic Rocky Horror. So I am sorry for the “only assholes” mix-up. But, more importantly, I am genuinely really sorry that you feel like only assholes fall for you and I wish I could make it better. I’m sorry that you’ve felt that way strongly enough to search the phrase three different times recently. I hope the next person you date is not an asshole. I hope that he or she is really nice to you — no, not just nice, because that is mealy-mouthed and hollow. That is a bullshit expression of my actual sentiment and is weak tea compared to the depth of my empathy, here. Okay:
I hope that that next person you date is genuinely amazing to you, like I pray that their very existence makes you believe in a loving God and you see the echo of your love for them in all the shapes of nature, and you don’t just love him or her but admire and value them, and that you curl your toes when you think of him or her even while driving and that they fill you with so much passion and love that you would kill tigers for them without a blink and you stay together until you die in each other’s arms after fantastic geriatric sex.
Scroll to bottom for caption.*
I hope that the grace of his or her presence in your life is like a lightning strike that inspires you forever after always to strive to be a better person, to laugh with surprise at an unexpected joke they make when you are having an argument, to give new ideas a thorough-think-through and peek behind closed doors; I hope in short that he or she deserves every drop of the deep well of love you were created to share and renews your faith in all the anonymous fellow upper primates all over our world with whom we must trek in our stewardship of this nutty mudhole in order to improve our karma and with every go ’round perfect our souls.
ByTim Weber and Sue Noble via environmental graffiti.
Good luck to you.
*Long caption to second to last shot: The dish ran away with the spoon but what can you do? They have opened a comic book store in the City and on rare nights off they like to order dim sum and watch TVLand; the comic shop is honestly not doing so well, their apartment is super-tiny, the bride’s mom won’t take their calls, their used car’s a/c is on the fritz, and they have never been happier.
Photographed by Giasco Bertoli. Ladies’ Gun Club. The term is “Firearms enthusiast.” Never “Gun Nut.”
Forth from the dead dust rattling bones to bones
Join: shaking convuls’d the shivering clay breathes
And all flesh naked stands; Fathers and Friends;
Mothers & Infants; Kings & Warriors;
The Grave is a woman in Blake’s vision. cf: Kali, Shiva, Sekhmet, feral cats who eat their kittens, bathtub ladies from Texas making little angels to be the stars in their hellbound crowns — the Mother/Destroyer, yes? Just like Earth. Just like life.
The Grave shrieks with delight, & shakes
Her hollow womb, & clasps the solid stem;
Her bosom swells with wild desire;
And milk & blood & glandous wine,
In rivers rush & shout & dance,
On mountain, dale and plain.
The SONG of LOS is Ended
(William Blake, excerpt from “The Song of Los.”)
“The Song of Los” is the last of Blake’s so-called Continental Prophesies, where he shared his visions of the future for America, Europe, Africa, and Asia. The excerpt just quoted concludes his prophecy for Asia and Africa.
Golly, good thing Blake was wrong, am I right. Agony and apocalypse, with naked children and flames and howls and shivering clay? In Africa and Asia? What a nut. How off base.
Ugh. Sorry, but as much as I enjoyed putting together DeDe Lind’s post, her comments about the Vietnam War and my subsequent reflections on those words with the ramifications of her centerfold’s popularity has resulted in a chain of thought about the twentieth century and where we’ll go next that has put me in kind of a foul mood. I will try to improve.
This entry was originally posted on November 3, 2009 at 3:57 pm. It’s been slightly altered, but not much.
Gilda Radner. Love. Patron saint. Heroine. Gar. I can’t talk about it.
Gilda as Roseanne Rosannadanna, the colorful news anchor with aggressive speech patterns.
If the name only faintly rings a bell for you, Gilda is the late great funny lady who was the queen of comedy in the early years of SNL. She was the first Not Quite Ready For Primetime player officially cast on the show. Noteworthy character creations that have had lasting cultural impact were Roseanne Rosannadanna and Emily Litella.
With Chevy Chase in her Emily “Nevermind” Litella character, who had comic malapropisms and bad hearing.
This Music Moment comes from her 1979 special “Gilda Live!,” a one-woman Broadway musical and comedy revue. Song starts around :35, because it was the opening number and she gets such a huge standing o that she can’t even calm people down enough to be heard until then.
A rooster says, “Good morning”
With a, “Cock-a-doodle-doo” – “Good morning!”
A horse’s neigh is just his way
Of saying, “How are you?”
A lion growls, “Hello!”
And owls ask “Why?” and “Where?” and “Who?”
May I suggest you get undressed
And show them your wazoo? – Ohhhh,
The animals, the animals,
Let’s talk dirty to the animals.
Fuck you, Mister Bunny.
Eat shit, Mister Bear.
If they don’t love it, they can shove it.
Frankly, I don’t care! – Ohhhhh,
The animals, the animals,
Let’s talk dirty to the animals.
Up yours, Mister Hippo!
Piss off, Mister Fox.
Go tell a chicken, “Suck my dick,” and
Give him chicken pox. – Ohhhhhh,
The animals, the animals,
Let’s talk dirty to the animals
From birds in the treetops
To snakes in the grass – But,
Never tell an alligator, “Bite my…” (No!)
Never tell an alligator, “Bite my…” (Yes!)
Never tell an alligator, “Bite my snatch!”
“I’m not so funny. Gilda was funny. I’m funny on camera sometimes. In life, once in a while. Once in a while. But she was funny.” — Gene Wilder
Official site of Gilda’s Club, a “community meeting place for people living with cancer, their families and friends. There are 22 open clubhouses and nine in development in North America. Gilda’s Club was founded by Joanna Bull, Gilda Radner’s cancer psychotherapist during the time she had cancer; Radner’s husband, Gene Wilder; and broadcaster Joel Siegel. … The organization takes its name from Radner’s comment that cancer gave her ‘membership to an elite club I’d rather not belong to’ ” (the wiki).
You can make financial donations into an earmarked fund so people have a place to stay while their loved ones are getting treated, or you could send blankets and books and toys for kids to play with in the waiting room. Maybe old ipods and stuff, even, actually. Or think about donating time and creativity. Draw a comic book, cross-stitch “I’m sorry your wife is going to be bald for a while” on a tea towel with a sad face; you know, do something Gilda would approve of. Think outside the box!
“It is so hard for us little human beings to accept this deal that we get. It’s really crazy, isn’t it? We get to live, then we have to die. What we put into every moment is all we have.” — Gilda.
You can see that the homeless person who wrote this had written on this spot in the past, and the building’s owners have painted over several times. The most recent repaint is just beneath this message, and instead of saying it is where he or she sleeps, it says “Qui è dove vivo.” What happened to make his or her “living”-place identity more fluid, so that he or she only associates this clearly well-liked spot with sleep now? I suspect it came as a result of being driven away during the day by whomever keeps painting over the writer’s small and painfully human attempt at address-establishment, some workaday person concerned with appearances and light, complaining to friends at a dinner at a restaurant about how he feels badly for the homeless people outside his building, but they drive away customers or reduce the value of the property so what can you do? and everyone clucks sympathetically; some mouthpiece of empty it-sounds-good-to-say-so pandering about the importance of charity who gives to collection at church and feels kind of good about it but is still secretly freaked out by the different and eager to shunt everything “ugly” off into the night where they don’t have to look at it and contemplate such ugly things’ place in their own life and God’s plan; some brainwashed apologetic dick who buys in to the system and has completely fucking forgotten that the whole world is half night.
That got away from me. Sorry. Carità è veleno. Except when it’s not, because I know that’s not true, and not everyone is false or a liar or hypocrite, they’re just struggling with problems so big that even Eleanor Roosevelt’s small group of thoughtful, committed citizens cannot change this thing. It has to come from the top, who would never choose it for themselves, so must be rushed by barbarians at the gate, as has always happened throughout history to the elite (who get conquered by the rough who then form over time their own elite whose own rough rise against them in turn and on and on, so what’s the point of any of it?). Now I sound like an anarchist. Which I’m not. Mainly. Blargh.
The lovely and talented Marlene Morrow was Playboy’s Miss April, 1974.
Photograph by Larry Dale Gordon.
Like fellow 1974 Playmate of the Month and friend Bebe Buell, Ms. Morrow dated Todd Rundgren, and Marlene is related to no less than three different United States presidents: Washington, Monroe, and Madison. But there is much, much more to her gripping and moving story. Let’s start at the very beginning (a very good place to start).
Marlene is also a very interesting person. Born in Billings, Montana, she moved to Osaka, Japan, where her father was a baseball player on a Japanese team. From there, the family moved to L.A., where Marlene grew up. “Believe it or not,” she says, “up until the time I was 13 I wanted to be a missionary.” She gave up that idea and settled on the notion of being a housewife with a load of kids. But that’s been postponed indefinitely, now that her career is spiraling upward.
(“This Year’s Model.” Playboy. April, 1974. )
So groovy. My fave of the shoot.
But for now, Marlene is satisfied with her life in London — visiting pubs and going out with Englishmen, whom she finds vastly different from American men. But does she plan to make London her home? “Someday,” she says, “I’d like to buy a trailer and just travel around the world for a whole year. Is that crazy?”
(Ibid.)
I’M ALWAYS: Dreaming. Still, I wish I wasn’t so serious about life all the time.
WITH MY PLAYMATE FEE: I plan to settle myself in an apartment in Los Angeles and enroll in acting and dance school.
AMBITIONS: To be successful with my modeling and to study acting, and to have a nice home with about four children.
Now that the things she said in her interview at the time are out there and still resonating in your mind, I’m going to get to the main thing of this entry. Marlene Morrow’s real surname was Pinkard.
In a google search for her, I found an article by Italian-american author Joan “Strega,” in whose mother’s Encino shop Marlene worked after moving to L.A. Ms. Strega had done a similar google search and was meditating on her shock and dismay to find recent pictures of Marlene taken in Los Angeles.
It seems that Marlene did stay in L.A., but she did not become a famous model or actress. Nor is she happily married and settled in to a nice house with about four chidlren. Marlene now goes by “Persephone.”
Marlene, aka Persephone, in April 2006.
Persephone is homeless, and currently missing. She lived as recently as four years ago with a few others on the streets of Los Angeles, where she journaled, wrote poetry, and carried with her in a manila envelope a photo of her former centerfold.
The above recent photograph was taken by Paul Zollo, a musician, journalist, and photographer who was strolling around Los Angeles and met Persephone and some of her friends at the corner of Yucca and Cahuenga. Below are highlights from his very moving story of how their encounter went.
“Persephone and Bert.”
At the intersection of Yucca and Cahuenga I saw her – she was sitting on the sidewalk with a guy named Bert Rental. I presumed at first that Persephone & Bert were a couple because they were sitting alone when I first approached them on Yucca near Cahuenga in Hollywood, very close to where I lived for more than 20 years. They both let me know they were homeless, but that wasn’t really an issue.
Persephone was crying, weeping profusely in fact, and explaining that there was a suicide, and she had a grandson she loved, and she had a husband who had disappeared, and “many contracts” that she was ignoring. She didn’t explain what kind of contracts they were.
I asked many times to take her photo, and she said, “No, I’ll GIVE you a photo — a good one — because I look like shit now, because I’ve been CRYING FOR TWO WHOLE WEEKS.” She repeated this like a sad mantra. She started crying intensely, and Bert seemed very uncomfortable with this, and I told her it was cool to cry, and she said, “NO — it’s NOT cool.” And I said all I meant is that it’s okay to cry. And then she wept openly, and then wiped the tears away and laughed with pure joy. And then alternated between laughter and tears.
[She] did show [me] a Playboy centerfold from the Sixties of a blonde woman named Morrow who she said was her. And it did look quite like her, and I believe it was her, and she said that now she dyed her hair dark. I asked her if she knew Hefner, and she looked at me with an expression that said, “How could I not know him?”
[She said] that everything was terrible – she’d been waiting for her husband for days, and he had yet to appear. That she had a grandson she hadn’t seen in too long. Then embraced me with all her heart and told me I was “precious.”
Then she opened a journal of her reflections and poetry, written in a florid script, and asked me to read it aloud, which I did to the best of my ability, as it was hard to make out, but it was about the mythical Persephone, the Goddess of Innocence and the Queen of the Underworld.
I received a message from a fellow flickr-artist [who] had looked her up on the net and discovered a photo of former centerfold Marlene Morrow, at some former centerfold convention or something, taken in 2002. He sent me a link to the photo. I didn’t think there was any chance it could be her.
But then I saw it. And it was haunting. It hit me like cold water in the face first thing in the morning. Because it was her face. Unmistakably.
This is the picture of Marlene at Glamourcon May 5, 2002, to which Mr. Zollo refers.
[I have been] receiving messages from Bebe Buell, who also was a Playboy centerfold – and a good friend of Marlene’s. Together we are hoping to find her. Last I saw she was on the street. If you can help us find her, let me know.
Bebe added more to my tale of Marlene, which follows — Bebe said both she and Marlene dated Todd Rundgren, and that Todd wrote a song about her which is on his “Something/Anything” album, called “Marlene.”
Bebe called and said, “I couldn’t sleep all night after reading your words about Marlene. I am ready to get on a plane to come and find her.”
A final entreaty and heartbreaking epilogue from Mr. Zollo:
I had hoped her life would improve. Sadly, I was wrong. Received a long and sad message from her daughter today telling me Marlene has been attacked on more than one occasion and has lost all her teeth.
Why the world treats some of its children like this is beyond me. She is someone beloved by many. If you know where she is, or have seen her, let us know.
The irreplaceable Ms. Bebe Buell, Miss November 1974, sweet and loving model, actress, and singer in her own right (not to mention mother to equally cramazing and talented Liv Tyler — they are beautiful inside and out), is still seeking to get in touch with Marlene, with whom she was close in the 1970’s. Ms. Buell said that she was told in the early 2000’s that Marlene was looking to talk to her and she lost track of time and did not follow up. She is understandably guilt-stricken about that now and is hoping fervently to find Ms. Pinkard. If you know how to find Persephone/Marlene Pinkard/Marlene Morrow and Ms. Buell has not already heard from you, you may contact her through her website, bebe-buell.com. Please. Contact Mr. Zollo or Ms. Buell any time with any information you have, really.
*(Also, if you follow the link to Ms. Strega’s thoughtful and poignantly articulated story about discovering that Marlene had become Persephone, Ms. Buell’s comment is the first: it includes an email address where she can be reached if you have info about Ms. Pinkard/Persephone. I didn’t want to put it in this entry without her permission.)
If this story has had an impact on you the way it did on me, I’ve hit the charity rating websites pretty hard and come up with a good solid list of some non-profits that you can volunteer with or donate to. Most are national and international so that you can help from no matter where you live, but I made sure to particularly include some charities that may directly affect Marlene’s everyday life, headquartered in LA and environs. All of the charities are top-rated, up-and-up organizations.
Kona was born and raised in Honolulu but has been living in North Carolina for the past year while she attends college. … By the time she turned 16, she had followed her younger brother, La’au, into the surf and soon was challenging ten-foot waves (well, one anyway – and that was enough). “I was always the only girl out there surfing, besides my friend Kili,” she says.
(“Aloha, Kona.” Rowe, Chip. Playboy, February 1996.)
Ms. Carmack used the same trick in college that I did: sitting up front so you can’t fool around. If I wasn’t in the very front row, I started feeling like I could tune out or even skip class, so when I got serious about school, I was front and center in every course. If I hadn’t done that, lord knows how long it would’ve taken me to finish college!
Regardless of the subject, Kona sits in the front row so she doesn’t miss anything. “It’s kind of nerdy, but it works,” says Miss February, a marketing major with a 3.4 GPA. “I also raise my hand a lot. If I don’t understand something, I’m not just going to sit there.”(Ibid.)
One of the most liberating moments of her first year came during English 101, when she wrote a term paper blasting antiporn crusader Catharine MacKinnon. “She argues that Playboy is pornography,” says Kona. “I don’t happen to agree.” She got an A.
Kona excels in the classroom, but she’s no egghead. (Ibid.)
Heaven forbid.
FAVORITE BOY NAMES: Fletcher, Nicholas, Victor, Tristan. (Playmate datasheet)
Nick and Victor are great names, but Fletcher and Tristan, erm, not to step on any toes but … not so much.
My daughter’s father’s sister named one of her two sons Tristan. He is an adorable and bright little boy but, out of all the boy names in the world, I’m not sure it’s the first one with which I would’ve gone. I think my husband once told me his mom wanted to name him Tristan but my father-in-law put his foot down. Isn’t that how the story went, husbandoh? Pretty sure it was “Tristan” or “Dorian” or some shit, you know, something real get-your-ass-kicked-in-school faggoty.
I like how I make guilty amends for possibly insulting dudes named Fletch and Tristan, but cheerily slander homosexuals. I guess it’s because I know that I’m not a bigot. But all apologies just the same to anyone with no sense of humor and anyone who has somehow missed the fact that I rather obviously trend toward batting both left and right and therefore ought be excused from call-outs for gay slurs with the same impunity that permits black people to call each other you-know-what. (Boy, that didn’t even come out very sincere, did it? Jonohs once told me I apologize too much, but it seems when the chips are down and I have to mean it, I’m not much good at mea culpas. Sorry again.)
In a business in which it’s easy to put on an act, Carmack doesn’t have one, leaving her vulnerable and exposed, especially to the question that has to be asked: “So, what about the Playboy thing?”
“Oh you!” she squeals, “The very first question!”
Carmack has no regrets about posing for the magazine’s February 1996 centerfold.
“It got me into the entertainment world and taught me so many lessons. I learned how to survive, how to be tough, how to be professional. I would not be the person I am today without having had that opportunity.”
This picture came from a different Playboy photoshoot and was shot by Chris Peter Paul. Kona was Miss March 1998 in Playboy Germany and 1997’s Playmate of the Year in Japan, so I’m guessing it’s from one of those, or possibly the Year In Review. I included it here because it is cute.
Yet she wishes people would get over it.
“When people meet me, they always say, ‘You’re so nice. You’re not at all like what I imagined.’ So I’m like, ‘Oh, thank you!,’ ” she says, with a huge, grateful grin and her arm extended in a pretend handshake.
(“Kona Gold.” Kam, Nadine. December 19, 2000. Honolulu Star-Bulletin.)
In 2001 Carmack moved to Los Angeles to attend the University of Southern California for cinematography. She graduated in December 2003 with cum laude honors, completing the five-year program in half the time. (“Old Friends — Kona Carmack.” Moniz, Melissa. August 2, 2006. MidWeek Oahu.)
“I really got into it and started producing my own little films.” (Ibid.)
One of those “little films” was a popular and successful documentary about the life of Duke Kahanamoku, aka “The Big Kahuna.”
Born in Waikiki in 1890, Kahanamoku pretty much singlehandedly turned surfing into an international sport, bringing his “papa nui” longboard, built in the style of old school Hawaiian olo boards, to the mainland and to Australia for swimming and surfing exhibitions. He was also a several-times-over Olympic gold medalist in swimming and in water polo.
In Newport Beach, California on June 14, 1925, Kahanamoku rescued eight men from a fishing vessel that capsized in heavy surf while attempting to enter the city’s harbor. Twenty-nine fishermen went into the water and seventeen perished. Using his surfboard, he was able to make quick trips back and forth to shore to increase the number of sailors rescued. Two other surfers saved four more fishermen. Newport’s police chief at the time called Duke’s efforts “the most superhuman surfboard rescue act the world has ever seen.” (the wiki.)
Pretty awesome, eh? Super-interesting man and great life story.
Upon graduating from film school, Carmack started work as a production assistant on the HBO series Deadwood. The next year, Carmack was promoted to executive assistant producer to Greg Fienberg. (“Old Friends.”)
After Deadwood, Kona went on to work as assistant to producer Randy Zisk on one of my favorite television shows of all time, Monk. Super-cool!
Although her home and career for the moment are in Los Angeles, her heart still belongs to Hawaii.
“I miss my family so much, that’s No. 1,” says Carmack. “I also miss surfing – I surf every day when I’m home. And of course I miss the food. I love it at home, I miss everything about it.” (Ibid.)
Carmack definitely plans to move back to Hawaii eventually, mostly to be closer to her mom and family.
“My mom is my best friend, and I’m really proud of her with what she’s been doing all these years for Easter Seals,” says Carmack. “It’s really her passion to help children with disabilities. She’s just wonderful, and she’s my inspiration.” (Ibid.)
The Easter Seals are a nonprofit that provide aid and services to children and adults with autism, special needs, and other disabilities.
The organization that would become Easter Seals was founded by Edgar Allen, an Ohio-businessman who lost his son in a streetcar crash. The lack of adequate medical services available to save his son prompted Allen to sell his business and begin a fund-raising campaign to build a hospital in his hometown of Elyria, Ohio. That hospital continues to operate today as Elyria Memorial Hospital. After the hospital was built, Allen learned that children with disabilities were often hidden from public view. Inspired by this discovery, in 1919 he founded what would become the National Society for Crippled Children, the first organization of its kind. (the wiki.)
Click here to visit their website. My goddaughter’s brother is autistic and though Panda and the Mister are some of the most loving and supportive people you will ever meet, not everyone is as lucky as Nathaniel. So please consider making a donation? — Hey, this could be your big shot at impressing Ms. Carmack!
Dig Leslie Nielsen on the cover. Goddamn, he’s one suave fucker. (Left-field Blue Velvet reference to wind things down. You’re welcome.)
Wanted to take a second to link to Music for Relief’s Download to Donate page, where you can download individual tracks or an entire playlist of songs by a variety of great artists, with your money helping aid relief efforts in Haiti. You have probably already read that an aftershock struck today measuring 6.1 on the Richter scale, which will obviously complicate and prolong rescue efforts and rebuilding in the wake of last week’s quake. If you like music and have some spare change, this is a great, small way to help.
There are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit, and there are differences of administration, but the same Lord. (1 Cor 12:4)
The Man With the Plan.
In partnership with the United Nations Foundation, Habitat for Humanity and Dave Matthews Band’s BAMA Works Haitian relief effort, Music for Relief is working to provide immediate aid with food, water, and emergency medical supplies, and long-term sustainable housing solutions for the people affected by this catastrophic natural disaster.
Musicians on the mix, mastered by supafly bamf Brian Gardner, include Dave Matthews Band, Peter Gabriel, Alanis Morissette, All-American Rejects, and Lupe Fiasco.
There are various gifts, and various offices to perform, but all proceed from one God, one Lord, one Spirit; that is, from the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, the origin of all spiritual blessings.
A group has formed called the Charity Print Auctions Pool on the flickr, and they have a really great and creative idea for raising money to donate to the Red Cross to be used in Haiti relief efforts.
Created by Andy(Shotage) aka Andy Newson on the flickr.
Andrew Newson, the group’s creator, explains:
I created this today, a group dedicated to photographer print sales to raise money for the Haiti Earthquake appeal.
Each photographer donates a print at whatever size they wish and people bid on the image in the comments.
Photograph by Heather Powazek Champ, a flickr employee and gifted photographer. Japanese Tea Garden, San Francisco.
The auction will finish at midnight on Sunday 17 January 2010, unless the photographer specifies otherwise on the image. So who ever has the highest bid in the comments, gets the print.
“Wait a sec …” by photgrapher Ingo Meckmann of Connecticut.
When the bidder wins the print, they will head over to the Red Cross and donate the bid amount. They will also take a screen grab of the payment/donation confirmation screen to send to the photographer. On receipt of that, the photographer will arrange for the print to be made and have it posted to you.
So, go and check out the group and get bidding on the image you want on your wall.
There are some really, really extraordinary photographs in this group, some from professional photographers who have agreed to participate.
I think very often we have an impulse to become involved at a community or even larger level in bettering the world around us, but we think we have too many obligations already. Maybe even with good intentions, we bow out because we are concerned we could not follow through with the commitment, or we get cowed thinking that we will not have enough time to give.
“The time is always right to do what’s right.” (Address at Oberlin College, October 22, 1964.)
However much time or material goods you have to give, that is the right amount. If it lessens as time goes by, that is okay; if you find down the line you have more to give, then that is right, too. It begins by starting. I know this is something I need to think more about. I know this is something I need to work on: stop talking and start doing, stop worrying about the future and act in the present. In fact, I think I feel a resolution coming on…
E’s third resolution of 2010: The right time is always now.
The time to put in to deed all my plans and dreams, and lay aside my worries and anxieties, is always right now. Right now.
First off, thanks to the — as of this writing — over 6,400 people who’ve swung by the site today! Super-cool!* I see you are being linked by a site called pussycalor.com. My thanks again to you for your visits, and a tip of my hat to the fine folks at the site referring you here for the, erm, clever wordplay in their company title (“Pussy Galore” + “hot” en español, I imagine, right? get it? … it’s a decent enough pun; I give it a 60 but I can’t dance to it).
Dawn Richard, Miss May 1957. Photographed by Ed DeLong and David Sutton.
However, now that you’re here, and I’ve got these vintage cheesecake Playboy centerfolds helping me hold your attention, LeVar Burton’s** twitter and I would like to bend your ear a tick on this whole Haiti earthquake and subsequent increased housing and famine catastrophe. This article in the Miami Herald details legit relief organizations through which you can help with time, money, and food donations the displaced and surviving persons affected by yesterday’s devastating earthquake in Haiti, which is unfortunately only going to compound their existing problems as a developing nation.
Miss December 1959, Pat Sheehan. Photographed by Sam Wu.
Those are all fine and worthy causes if you give the list a genuine spin, but I sense that if you have landed here, you are probably impatient to get on with other things, and I empathize to a point with you on the whole “utter-lack-of-attention-span” thing. (Everyone blames MTV but I think it started with cereal box-backs, because I never had cable and I’ve an awful itchy trigger finger in almost every situation) Here is the super-fast-easy way to seal the deal:
Miss January 1957, June Blair. Photographed by Hal Adams.
In America, text the word “HAITI” to the number 90999 to donate $10 to the Red Cross. It will automatically come off your phone bill. How easy is that? $10 is not that much, and this is coming from an extremely broke person. So why don’t you take your hand off your dick (only for a moment, don’t worry — I’m not asking for miracles), fetch up the cell phone you’ve undoubtedly parked in your pocket, and take a second to donate even the low amount of $10 to the Red Cross’s special fund, through which, guaranteed, 100% of your donation goes to Haitian quake relief efforts. The playmates you are gawking at would be super, super impressed. That is why they are all in red: for the Red Cross. (Yes, I have so many playmate pictures saved that I was able to cull out a few scantily red-clad ones for just this entry — and even then I narrowed it to these, my faves.)
Miss March 1957, Sandra Edwards. Photographed by Peter Gowland, a dear patron saint. Right on!
I am not telling you how to live your life, just saying it is a quick and easy way to ease suffering while we comfortably enjoy and count ourselves lucky another carefree, nudie-pic-seeking day. Thanks for your time!
*As I said to the Gentleman earlier today, “I have supported the porn industry for years. It’s about time they returned the favor.”
**You’re darned-tootin’ I follow Geordi La Forge on the twitter. And I did not think it was possible he could be more of a nerd than I always imagined, but he is. He’s seen Avatar, like, five times. I almost stopped following him cause it was all he was on about for weeks. But I forgive him.
There is a calendar out there for everybody. Here are some of the handsome and genuine gents of the very cool Nice Jewish Guys calendar, which I stumbled on via the hilarious blog dealbreaker on the tumblr (Dave Horowitz, one of the hosts, is Mr. November).
The calendar, which includes both Jewish and secular holidays, features 12 “nice Jewish guys”, or, as [calendar creator Adam]Cohen puts it: “guys who are non-threatening, nice to a fault, trustworthy and just very normal-looking”.
According to Mr Cohen, each picture tells a story. “There is the main ‘hero’ picture for each guy and then three smaller ‘action’ ones — these guys are flexing everything they got, which isn’t much but you still have to love them.” (“Adam Cohen creates a calendar.” Krieger, Candace. Nov. 18, 2009. The Jewish Chronicle online edition.)
By no intent of mine, because there’s virtually no way of predicting cutness v. uncutness, but instead by some weird confluence of fateful events outside my control, it’s been years since I’ve been with someone uncircumcised. I’m not officially throwing down for either of the sides of that debate because I guess they both have their merit or whatever, but we can all agree that variety is the spice of life and I guess what I am really saying is that if you stumbled on this by egosurfing, and you are a Nice Jewish Boy, especially one of the ones in the calendar, like, you can drop a line. That would be okay.
Portions of the proceeds from calendar sales go to Mazon: A Jewish Response to Hunger, so when you’re buying for yourself, think about picking up an extra for a friend!
Edit: Thanks to Brian Stampnitsky, hot ginger and Mr. January, for finding this journal, dropping a line, and adding me as an imaginary friendoh on the facebook! Rock on with your Yankee-lovin’ self, and good on you for giving your time to a good cause. Super-cool!
“These Calendar Girls are all wonderful and well, E,” (you are saying), “But what about some rare bloody manmeat up on this plate?”
Oh, my god, hideous oversight, which I will rectify ASAP, starting with pictures from the infamous heathen book of delights, the Calendario Romano, an annual, non-profit, blasphemously magnificent calendar of hot, hot priests in action in the swinging Vatican City.
In my family, we call them Father What-a-Wastes (not to be confused with Sister Mary Knick-Knack).
According to the Calendario’s official site, they have already sold out of their 2010 copies, but stay tuned because they may do a reprint, as the calendars are sold to benefit The Food Chain, a UK-based AIDS charity group. So hopefully they will cook up a way to make batches more.
If you enjoy the sacrelicious hotness, then don’t forget to add Calendario Romano on the facebook. Now say ten Hail Marys and an Our Father, and go take a cold shower, you hellbound sinner.
I feel like I may have got a little down here and there on that last gal, what with my none-too-pleased remarks alluding to what I consider to be her lamentable decades-long trail of desperation, so here’s one of those Playmates who makes me proud to be a Playboy defender.
Gloria Root, the lovely and talented Miss December 1969, is proof that beauty often does come with brains.
Photographed by Pompeo Posar
It is Gloria’s conviction that a major upheaval is both necessary and inevitable in the United States. “We’ve managed to narrow down all the freedoms we take pride in. We’ve created a political aristocracy that we didn’t want, and too many of us are hopelessly trapped in that tired old business of getting an ‘education’ and a job that doesn’t mean anything.” Gloria believes that American society today contains a “hard-core revolutionary middle” that bridges economic, racial and generational gaps — “not just a radical rabble, as the politicians would have us believe.”
“Individuals who have used hallucinogens or pot can experience life in more subtle ways and accept each other more readily than people who haven’t.” And unorthodox costumes, according to Gloria, serve to remind orthodox citizens “that there are other ways to live than what happens to be considered ‘normal’ here and now. If more people cared enough to expand their viewpoints by studying history or anthropology, they’d realize how many different life styles are natural and they’d be more tolerant. Young people aren’t pushing any particular life style — just the freedom to choose. And the youth revolution bridges all boundaries.” (“Revolutionary Discovery,” Playboy, December 1969.)
[Gloria] graduated from Rhode Island School of Design with degrees in fine arts and architecture. She then took a Master’s Degree in City Planning and a Master’s of Architecture at the University of California, Berkeley.
In 1980, she opened her own planning firm, Planning Analysis and Development, in San Francisco. She headed the firm until 1998, when she relocated to New York. While in New York, Root headed the strategic planning services division of Skidmore, Owings and Merrill. She returned to San Francisco in 2002 to a job as a project manager for Auberge Resorts. She later took a senior position with RBF Consulting.
From 1990 to 1998, Root was a board member of San Francisco Urban Planning + Research Association, a public-policy think-tank promoting good government and sustainable urban planning. (the wiki)
Gloria died of cancer in January, 2006.
When not grappling with environmental and growth issues, Gloria was both an avid fan of professional football and an aficionado of the performing and cinematic arts. She was a world traveler, which contributed to her distinctive savoir faire. Long before it became fashionable, Gloria deserved to be called a “foodie” wowing her chums with her culinary delights. Dancer, skier, runner, Gloria was gifted with an exceptional physical grace. Of all her accomplishments, however, the power of Gloria’s mind was the most remarkable. Few possessed her ability to probe and debate current events with such intellectual horsepower and insight. When Gloria’s flame burned, it burned bright. (Obituary in the San Francisco Chronicle.)
I think Gloria Root is a woman who was definitely quite a total package. Beauty, brains, compassion, “different-ness,” and drive. RIP.
“It’s the Muppet Show! With our very special guest star, Twiggy!”
“The Muppet Show,” Season 1, Episode 21: Twiggy, aka Lesley Lawson, nee Lesley Hornby, sings “In My Life,” (Lennon/McCartney, 1965) with a very simple, beautifully arranged wind and string orchestra backing her. Original air date December 19, 1976.
The picture montage that accompanies Twiggy’s lovely cover of this wonderful song is surprisingly moving. She was an icon during a time when beautiful people actually cared about life beyond their own pretty noses: yeah, they were high as kites most of the time, but you know what? They really wanted to make this planet a better place, they dreamed big about equality and freedom, and not just record sales and cheap retail clothing lines and scoring points with the press.
The scenes evoked by the images in the montage and the people featured in them are even better when you consider how much more she could include in such a montage now, having continued to enrich the world with her acting, singing, modeling, and dancing (she has won Golden Globes, released hit albums, performed for charity, toured the world, the works).
Twiggy stayed a genuine Model Citizen, not only remaining active on the fashion, stage, screen, and music scenes, but also in continuing to care for others in word and deed. Visit Breakthrough Breast Cancer if you want to be cool like Twiggy, because if you are reading this and care about looking good, you clearly have some free time to be pretty on the inside, too.
Anyway. This video would be truly perfect, if only I could get rid of the bug in the bottom left (the transparent logo of the Mouse Who Sold the World). But on the bright side, dig her groovy still-mod eyelashes and stovepipe arms in that faboosh red tux, am I right?? Everything old is new again: she could step on stage today and rock that shit, and be perfectly in style.
Gilda. Love. Patron saint. Heroine. Gar. I can’t talk about it. If the name only faintly rings a bell for you, she is the late great funny lady who was the queen of comedy in the early years of SNL. She was the first Not Quite Ready For Primetime player officially cast on the show. Noteworthy character creations that have had lasting cultural impact were Roseanne Rosannadanna and Emily Litella.
Roseanne Rosannadanna
Emily “Nevermind” Litella
This Music Moment comes from her 1979 special “Gilda Live!”. a one-woman Broadway musical and comedy revue. Song starts around :35, because it was the opening number and she gets such a huge standing o that she can’t even calm people down enough to be heard until then.
A rooster says, “Good morning”
With a, “Cock-a-doodle-doo” – “Good morning!”
A horse’s neigh is just his way
Of saying, “How are you?”
A lion growls, “Hello!”
And owls ask “Why?” and “Where?” and “Who?”
May I suggest you get undressed
And show them your wazoo? – Ohhhh,
The animals, the animals,
Let’s talk dirty to the animals.
Fuck you, Mister Bunny.
Eat shit, Mister Bear.
If they don’t love it, they can shove it.
Frankly, I don’t care! – Ohhhhh,
The animals, the animals,
Let’s talk dirty to the animals.
Up yours, Mister Hippo!
Piss off, Mister Fox.
Go tell a chicken, “Suck my dick,” and
Give him chicken pox. – Ohhhhhh,
The animals, the animals,
Let’s talk dirty to the animals
From birds in the treetops
To snakes in the grass – But,
Never tell an alligator, “Bite my…” (No!)
Never tell an alligator, “Bite my…” (Yes!)
Never tell an alligator, “Bite my snatch!”
“I’m not so funny. Gilda was funny. I’m funny on camera sometimes. In life, once in a while. Once in a while. But she was funny.” — Gene Wilder
Official site of Gilda’s Club, a “community meeting place for people living with cancer, their families and friends. There are 22 open clubhouses and nine in development in North America. Gilda’s Club was founded by Joanna Bull, Gilda Radner’s cancer psychotherapist during the time she had cancer; Radner’s husband, Gene Wilder; and broadcaster Joel Siegel. … The organization takes its name from Radner’s comment that cancer gave her ‘membership to an elite club I’d rather not belong to’ ” (the wiki).
You can make financial donations into an earmarked fund so people have a place to stay while their loved ones are getting treated, or you could send blankets and books and toys for kids to play with in the waiting room. Maybe old ipods and stuff, even, actually. Or think about donating time and creativity. Draw a comic book, cross-stitch “I’m sorry your wife is going to be bald for a while” on a tea towel with a sad face; you know, do something Gilda would approve of. Think outside the box!
“It is so hard for us little human beings to accept this deal that we get. It’s really crazy, isn’t it? We get to live, then we have to die. What we put into every moment is all we have.” — Gilda.
The Thought Experiment 
Gifts of the Spirit: Music for Relief
January 20, 2010Wanted to take a second to link to Music for Relief’s Download to Donate page, where you can download individual tracks or an entire playlist of songs by a variety of great artists, with your money helping aid relief efforts in Haiti. You have probably already read that an aftershock struck today measuring 6.1 on the Richter scale, which will obviously complicate and prolong rescue efforts and rebuilding in the wake of last week’s quake. If you like music and have some spare change, this is a great, small way to help.
Logo by Casey Ryder.
The Man With the Plan.
Musicians on the mix, mastered by supafly bamf Brian Gardner, include Dave Matthews Band, Peter Gabriel, Alanis Morissette, All-American Rejects, and Lupe Fiasco.
Beautiful inside and out.
Tags:1 Cor, 501c3, Alanis Morissette, All-American Rejects, BAMA works, bible quotes, biblical quotes, charity, Corinthians, Dave Matthews Band, earthquake, Gifts of the spirit, giving, Haiti, Letter to the Corinthians, Linkin Park, Lupe Fiasco, Matthew Henry, Matthew Henry Concise Commentary on the Bible, Music For Relief, non profit, Peter Gabriel, quake, relief, St. Paul
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