The Awl http://www.theawl.com/ Be Less Stupid Fri, 27 Jan 2012 16:30:25 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.2 How To Bring A Bike On The New York City Subway http://www.theawl.com/2012/01/how-to-bring-a-bike-on-the-new-york-city-subway http://www.theawl.com/2012/01/how-to-bring-a-bike-on-the-new-york-city-subway#comments Fri, 27 Jan 2012 16:30:25 +0000 Jay Casey http://www.theawl.com/2012/01/how-to-bring-a-bike-on-the-new-york-city-subway 1. Don't.

2. If you have to ride the subway, everyone else comes before you. It's known as yielding.

3. Is it rush hour? Don't bring your bike on the subway.

4. "But I just have to ride the train during rush hour!" Then only outbound in the morning, and inbound in the evening. Otherwise, you're an incorrigible imp. And you'll probably get a ticket.

5. At the turnstile, signal the MTA attendant in the booth by waving your arms wildly and gesturing to the gate (is there no booth at the entrance? Go the hell back upstairs and enter at a booth station entrance), swipe your Metrocard, spin the turnstile arm, walk over to the emergency entrance (if you didn't muck it up, the booth attendant will have unlocked it), walk through.

6. Don't ever, ever, ever carry your bike over a turnstile.

7. Stairs? You go last. (And now you must carry your bike.)

8. On the platform, make room. Plan to enter at either end of the train car.

9. Once on the train, don't sit down.

10. Don't lean your bike anywhere.

11. Don't lock your bike to a pole.

12. Don't straddle the frame.

13. Don't ride it.

14. Use the same attention you reserve for riding around buses and garbage trucks. Because, instead of dealing with wheels that will crush your skull, you have a train full of people who want to stab you until your intestines are a puddle on the subway car floor.

15. Hold the bar, hold your bike. In the event of sudden movement or (God forbid) an accident, you've just introduced a metal projectile to the train car.

16. Stand by the doors, you need to exit first. Last on, first off. Find a clear area on the platform. Wait a minute or two (or whenever the platform/stairs look empty, you weakest of the species), then make your next move.

17. In a city full of opinions, there's only one person whose judgment matters in this situation: Police. Listen up, or look forward to your marmalade p.b. & j. sandwich in The Tombs.



Jay Casey will be the first one to stab you. You can learn more about the MTA's rules and guidelines for bicycles here! You should try it! Photo by Pete Jelliffe.

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]]> 1. Don't.

2. If you have to ride the subway, everyone else comes before you. It's known as yielding.

3. Is it rush hour? Don't bring your bike on the subway.

4. "But I just have to ride the train during rush hour!" Then only outbound in the morning, and inbound in the evening. Otherwise, you're an incorrigible imp. And you'll probably get a ticket.

5. At the turnstile, signal the MTA attendant in the booth by waving your arms wildly and gesturing to the gate (is there no booth at the entrance? Go the hell back upstairs and enter at a booth station entrance), swipe your Metrocard, spin the turnstile arm, walk over to the emergency entrance (if you didn't muck it up, the booth attendant will have unlocked it), walk through.

6. Don't ever, ever, ever carry your bike over a turnstile.

7. Stairs? You go last. (And now you must carry your bike.)

8. On the platform, make room. Plan to enter at either end of the train car.

9. Once on the train, don't sit down.

10. Don't lean your bike anywhere.

11. Don't lock your bike to a pole.

12. Don't straddle the frame.

13. Don't ride it.

14. Use the same attention you reserve for riding around buses and garbage trucks. Because, instead of dealing with wheels that will crush your skull, you have a train full of people who want to stab you until your intestines are a puddle on the subway car floor.

15. Hold the bar, hold your bike. In the event of sudden movement or (God forbid) an accident, you've just introduced a metal projectile to the train car.

16. Stand by the doors, you need to exit first. Last on, first off. Find a clear area on the platform. Wait a minute or two (or whenever the platform/stairs look empty, you weakest of the species), then make your next move.

17. In a city full of opinions, there's only one person whose judgment matters in this situation: Police. Listen up, or look forward to your marmalade p.b. & j. sandwich in The Tombs.



Jay Casey will be the first one to stab you. You can learn more about the MTA's rules and guidelines for bicycles here! You should try it! Photo by Pete Jelliffe.

---

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53 comments

]]> http://www.theawl.com/2012/01/how-to-bring-a-bike-on-the-new-york-city-subway/feed 53 Don't Say That, Say This! http://www.theawl.com/2011/12/dont-say-that-say-this http://www.theawl.com/2011/12/dont-say-that-say-this#comments Thu, 08 Dec 2011 13:00:59 +0000 Sarah Miller http://www.theawl.com/2011/12/dont-say-that-say-this Coming across a guide of "18 Common Phrases to Avoid In Conversation," I was struck by the rightness of the article's aim: Some things should indeed never be said. But the alternate conversational choices offered by the magazine seemed a bit passive aggressive to me —for example, "Is everything OK?" as a substitute for "You look tired." Naturally, I felt it was my duty to come up with some satisfactory alternatives.

Don’t say: “I could never wear that.”
Why: It can be misunderstood as a criticism. (“I could never wear that because it’s so ugly.”)
Instead: Suppose you meet up with a girlfriend at a party and her outfit is just a tad more revealing than what you might choose for yourself. You could say, “Hey, let’s play a game where we point out every single person in the room who looks like a common streetwalker.” When you’ve gone through everyone, shrug and say, “Well, that’s almost everyone!” Let her struggle for as long as she's willing to find anyone else present who might vaguely resemble a common streetwalker until it is very clear that absolutely no one does. With zero impoliteness on your end, she will be forced to either identify you as the person in question (as if) or to point a (long overdue and deserving) finger at herself.

However, if you want to say “I could never wear that” because the “outfit” in question would make you look like a giant lesbian, and the person you’re talking to does not mind looking like a giant lesbian, either because she is one or she just doesn't mind, you can just bite your lip and say, kind of offhand, “Hey, what did you think about that documentary about the women who actually wore bras under their giant plaid shirts? Wasn’t that really good? Didn’t you think those women were really brave?

Don’t say: “You look tired.”
Why: It implies she doesn’t look good.
Instead: Say, “Gee, you look like you were getting ass-reamed all night by a family of giant squid.” She is more likely to be flattered that you might regard her as a person every single squid in an entire family could agree on finding sexually attractive than to think she looks like a person who needs some sleep, a shower or, in lieu of these, some Touche Éclat. You know, from Yves St. Laurent, with the neato little push dispenser, which, after, getting banged by sea animals all night, or whatever, miraculously makes you look ready to go again. (Touche Éclat, $40.)

Don’t say: “Are you pregnant?”
Why: You ask, she’s not, and you feel totally embarrassed for essentially pointing out that she’s overweight.
Instead say: “Have you ever thought about what really happens after a man’s erect penis or a dripping turkey baster propels a roiling load of jizz into a woman’s vagina and her cervix laps it up like a Bernese Mountain Dog?” And if she pats her belly and says with smug self-regard, “No, because I don’t have to,” then you know she’s pregnant. And if she doesn’t say that, well, she’s just some fat lady who thinks you’re an asshole—and she can just get in line.

Don’t say: “Do you plan on breast-feeding?”
Why: The issue can be controversial, and she may not want to discuss her decision publicly.
Instead say: Don’t say anything. Simply have handy in your purse a folder full of very graphic photos of children suffering from painful ear infections, allergies, strep and e coli infections, diabetes, juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, childhood cancers, meningitis, Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS), Crohn's Disease, ulcerative colitis, insulin dependent diabetes and any other disease listed on the La Leche website as being the almost sure fate for children of parents who dare to feed their children formula instead of breast milk. Trip and spill contents of purse in such a way that photos array themselves in front of the woman in question; when she exclaims, “Oh my God, these photos are horrible! What are they of?” simply say, “Why, I don’t know, I was merely carrying some photos for a friend of mine who is extremely active in La Leche League, an advocacy group that educates the public about the health benefits of breast feeding. These must be photos of the sorts of diseases children can get when, as helpless infants, they are not provided with the special nutrients and antibodies that are present in human breast milk.” But there’s no need to go any further than that. Remember, people must be empowered to make their own decisions, in private.

Don’t say: “You look good for your age.”
Why: Anything with a caveat like this is rude. It's saying, "You look great—compared with other old people. It's amazing you have all your own teeth."
Instead say: Actually, go ahead and say “you look good for your age.” Especially say it if you are considerably younger than the person in question. If you’re pretty, well, even better. Make a goddamn habit out of it, because once a person—for simplicity's sake, let's say a woman person—has reached a certain age—let’s say 42—just about the most pleasurable part of her life comes from witnessing the flighty disregard women less advanced in age have for their own mortality. Sure, it’s sad to get old, but what’s not sad is how funny it is that women ten years younger do not yet understand that their own cherubic little faces and taut bodies will also undergo a process that will take them to leather, then ash, and then dust. What’s also not sad it how if they do have some fuzzy sense that this fate awaits, they will be very shocked when it happens in what feels like the amount of time it should take to purchase a bottle of water, a Luna Bar and a copy of In Style at Hudson News before flying to Turks and Caicos with their fiancé, who they don’t yet know wishes they were a tranny. Saying “you look good for your age” to a woman who is fully aware that what she looks like is merely some increasingly meaningless increment of No Longer Young might seem like cruelty. But anyone who knows how much she is going to enjoy reporting the incident to her hag friends and cackling over the clueless little tramp who said it can see it for the act of generosity it is.

Don’t say: “This might sound stupid, but…”
Why: Never undermine your ideas by prefacing your remarks with wishy-washy language.
Instead: Say, “This would sound stupid if everything else everyone said before wasn’t way stupider.” See how much more confidence is packed into that statement?



Sarah Miller is the author of Inside the Mind of Gideon Rayburn and The Other Girl, which are for teens but adults can read on the beach. She lives in Nevada City, CA.

Illustration by lineartestpilot, via Shutterstock.

---

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28 comments

]]> Coming across a guide of "18 Common Phrases to Avoid In Conversation," I was struck by the rightness of the article's aim: Some things should indeed never be said. But the alternate conversational choices offered by the magazine seemed a bit passive aggressive to me —for example, "Is everything OK?" as a substitute for "You look tired." Naturally, I felt it was my duty to come up with some satisfactory alternatives.

Don’t say: “I could never wear that.”
Why: It can be misunderstood as a criticism. (“I could never wear that because it’s so ugly.”)
Instead: Suppose you meet up with a girlfriend at a party and her outfit is just a tad more revealing than what you might choose for yourself. You could say, “Hey, let’s play a game where we point out every single person in the room who looks like a common streetwalker.” When you’ve gone through everyone, shrug and say, “Well, that’s almost everyone!” Let her struggle for as long as she's willing to find anyone else present who might vaguely resemble a common streetwalker until it is very clear that absolutely no one does. With zero impoliteness on your end, she will be forced to either identify you as the person in question (as if) or to point a (long overdue and deserving) finger at herself.

However, if you want to say “I could never wear that” because the “outfit” in question would make you look like a giant lesbian, and the person you’re talking to does not mind looking like a giant lesbian, either because she is one or she just doesn't mind, you can just bite your lip and say, kind of offhand, “Hey, what did you think about that documentary about the women who actually wore bras under their giant plaid shirts? Wasn’t that really good? Didn’t you think those women were really brave?

Don’t say: “You look tired.”
Why: It implies she doesn’t look good.
Instead: Say, “Gee, you look like you were getting ass-reamed all night by a family of giant squid.” She is more likely to be flattered that you might regard her as a person every single squid in an entire family could agree on finding sexually attractive than to think she looks like a person who needs some sleep, a shower or, in lieu of these, some Touche Éclat. You know, from Yves St. Laurent, with the neato little push dispenser, which, after, getting banged by sea animals all night, or whatever, miraculously makes you look ready to go again. (Touche Éclat, $40.)

Don’t say: “Are you pregnant?”
Why: You ask, she’s not, and you feel totally embarrassed for essentially pointing out that she’s overweight.
Instead say: “Have you ever thought about what really happens after a man’s erect penis or a dripping turkey baster propels a roiling load of jizz into a woman’s vagina and her cervix laps it up like a Bernese Mountain Dog?” And if she pats her belly and says with smug self-regard, “No, because I don’t have to,” then you know she’s pregnant. And if she doesn’t say that, well, she’s just some fat lady who thinks you’re an asshole—and she can just get in line.

Don’t say: “Do you plan on breast-feeding?”
Why: The issue can be controversial, and she may not want to discuss her decision publicly.
Instead say: Don’t say anything. Simply have handy in your purse a folder full of very graphic photos of children suffering from painful ear infections, allergies, strep and e coli infections, diabetes, juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, childhood cancers, meningitis, Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS), Crohn's Disease, ulcerative colitis, insulin dependent diabetes and any other disease listed on the La Leche website as being the almost sure fate for children of parents who dare to feed their children formula instead of breast milk. Trip and spill contents of purse in such a way that photos array themselves in front of the woman in question; when she exclaims, “Oh my God, these photos are horrible! What are they of?” simply say, “Why, I don’t know, I was merely carrying some photos for a friend of mine who is extremely active in La Leche League, an advocacy group that educates the public about the health benefits of breast feeding. These must be photos of the sorts of diseases children can get when, as helpless infants, they are not provided with the special nutrients and antibodies that are present in human breast milk.” But there’s no need to go any further than that. Remember, people must be empowered to make their own decisions, in private.

Don’t say: “You look good for your age.”
Why: Anything with a caveat like this is rude. It's saying, "You look great—compared with other old people. It's amazing you have all your own teeth."
Instead say: Actually, go ahead and say “you look good for your age.” Especially say it if you are considerably younger than the person in question. If you’re pretty, well, even better. Make a goddamn habit out of it, because once a person—for simplicity's sake, let's say a woman person—has reached a certain age—let’s say 42—just about the most pleasurable part of her life comes from witnessing the flighty disregard women less advanced in age have for their own mortality. Sure, it’s sad to get old, but what’s not sad is how funny it is that women ten years younger do not yet understand that their own cherubic little faces and taut bodies will also undergo a process that will take them to leather, then ash, and then dust. What’s also not sad it how if they do have some fuzzy sense that this fate awaits, they will be very shocked when it happens in what feels like the amount of time it should take to purchase a bottle of water, a Luna Bar and a copy of In Style at Hudson News before flying to Turks and Caicos with their fiancé, who they don’t yet know wishes they were a tranny. Saying “you look good for your age” to a woman who is fully aware that what she looks like is merely some increasingly meaningless increment of No Longer Young might seem like cruelty. But anyone who knows how much she is going to enjoy reporting the incident to her hag friends and cackling over the clueless little tramp who said it can see it for the act of generosity it is.

Don’t say: “This might sound stupid, but…”
Why: Never undermine your ideas by prefacing your remarks with wishy-washy language.
Instead: Say, “This would sound stupid if everything else everyone said before wasn’t way stupider.” See how much more confidence is packed into that statement?



Sarah Miller is the author of Inside the Mind of Gideon Rayburn and The Other Girl, which are for teens but adults can read on the beach. She lives in Nevada City, CA.

Illustration by lineartestpilot, via Shutterstock.

---

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28 comments

]]> http://www.theawl.com/2011/12/dont-say-that-say-this/feed 28 The Proper Way For A Post-Punk Legend To Begin An Email http://www.theawl.com/2011/01/the-proper-way-for-a-post-punk-legend-to-begin-an-email http://www.theawl.com/2011/01/the-proper-way-for-a-post-punk-legend-to-begin-an-email#comments Fri, 21 Jan 2011 10:10:29 +0000 Dave Bry http://www.theawl.com/2011/01/the-proper-way-for-a-post-punk-legend-to-begin-an-email

"I never use 'Dear...' It's old-dearish."
—Jon King, managing director of the digital marketing agency Story Worldwide, weighs in on the debate over the proper salutation with which to start an email. King, who is the same Jon King who used to dance like a chicken undergoing electro-shock therapy and sing amazingly great, spiky, neo-Marxist punk rock songs with his band Gang of Four, generally begins emails to clients, "Often with no intro line at all. I assume they know who they are, and cut to the chase."

Those clients include Faberge and Estee Lauder.

Gang of Four reunited a few years ago and—wow! I'm just learning this today—have a new album coming out next week. It's called Content, and it's getting very good reviews in the British press.

Oh, here's a video for one of the songs from the new album:

That looks a little bit more like a scene from Lethal Weapon 2 than it should. And Jon King looks just like James Cromwell. But it's good to see that he still dances like that.

Anyway, I think all emails should begin, "Buckle your seatbelt," and end with "Flocka!"

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13 comments

]]>

"I never use 'Dear...' It's old-dearish."
—Jon King, managing director of the digital marketing agency Story Worldwide, weighs in on the debate over the proper salutation with which to start an email. King, who is the same Jon King who used to dance like a chicken undergoing electro-shock therapy and sing amazingly great, spiky, neo-Marxist punk rock songs with his band Gang of Four, generally begins emails to clients, "Often with no intro line at all. I assume they know who they are, and cut to the chase."

Those clients include Faberge and Estee Lauder.

Gang of Four reunited a few years ago and—wow! I'm just learning this today—have a new album coming out next week. It's called Content, and it's getting very good reviews in the British press.

Oh, here's a video for one of the songs from the new album:

That looks a little bit more like a scene from Lethal Weapon 2 than it should. And Jon King looks just like James Cromwell. But it's good to see that he still dances like that.

Anyway, I think all emails should begin, "Buckle your seatbelt," and end with "Flocka!"

---

See more posts by Dave Bry

13 comments

]]> http://www.theawl.com/2011/01/the-proper-way-for-a-post-punk-legend-to-begin-an-email/feed 13 The Question That Confronts Every New Yorker Eventually http://www.theawl.com/2010/08/the-question-that-confronts-every-new-yorker-eventually http://www.theawl.com/2010/08/the-question-that-confronts-every-new-yorker-eventually#comments Mon, 02 Aug 2010 14:30:10 +0000 Choire Sicha http://www.theawl.com/2010/08/the-question-that-confronts-every-new-yorker-eventually "I saw a woman weeping on the subway and I did nothing. Was that the appropriate response?" The answers may surprise etc.

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25 comments

]]> "I saw a woman weeping on the subway and I did nothing. Was that the appropriate response?" The answers may surprise etc.

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]]> http://www.theawl.com/2010/08/the-question-that-confronts-every-new-yorker-eventually/feed 25 Dear Emily http://www.theawl.com/2010/03/public-apology-dear-emily http://www.theawl.com/2010/03/public-apology-dear-emily#comments Wed, 10 Mar 2010 16:20:49 +0000 Dave Bry http://www.theawl.com/2010/03/public-apology-dear-emily apologyDear Emily,

I'm sorry for wearing sweat pants to our first dinner date and for getting stoned before meeting your parents for the first time.

This was in 1999, before we were married. We'd been friends for a couple years at that point, and had recently started seeing each romantically-the result of a particularly drunken night at the WXOU Bar on Hudson Street, near where we lived in the West Village. I'd asked you out for a first proper dinner date, to Hangawi, a fancy Korean restaurant on 32nd Street.

It's funny now to think about what I was thinking as I got ready to meet you. It was a Saturday, and I had been wearing a pair of green sweatpants that I used to wear on weekends. They were the kind that George Costanza used to wear on Seinfeld, the kind that Jerry once said announced to the world, "I give up. I can't compete in normal society." It occurred to me that I might change into something else, but I stood in my bedroom and thought for a minute and decided against it. I put on a white polo shirt and my Converse All-stars and walked out the door.

It wasn't that I was trying to feign ambivalence, to give the impression I didn't care enough to put on pants with buttons and belt-loops. I had made it very clear, in fact, that I wanted us to be girlfriend and boyfriend. If anything, you were the one who took some convincing. (Glaringly easy, in hindsight, to see why.) My thinking, as best I can explain it, was more along the lines of "take me as I am." I was a guy who wore green sweat pants on a Saturday. I wanted to make a good impression, but changing pants for that reason felt wrong. Like I'd be faking it, presenting myself as someone I was not. This type of thinking makes very little sense to me now and is derailed by something as simple as the fact that I certainly didn't wear those sweat pants exclusively. I had lots of other pants, many of which I often changed into before dinner without much thought at all. But that day, I felt myself in the hands of fate: These were the pants you put on this morning, these are the pants you shall wear tonight.

I don't know. I used to be really superstitious, too. And that's just a terrible way to live. I was smoking too much pot those days, I suppose.

Which brings me to the second part of this apology. A couple months later, our relationship having miraculously survived my sweat pants, you'd arranged for us to go to dinner with your parents-my first time meeting them. Bored, sitting around my apartment that afternoon, I came to the same kind of question as before: Here was a situation in which, on any other day, I would be smoking pot. Should the fact that I was soon to be meeting these important people, the parents of the woman I was falling in love with, should I let that change my routine? I knew that I'd be brighter-eyed and clearer in conversation if I refrained, and I definitely wanted your parents to like me.

But then I thought, well, the way things are going, chances are I'll be spending a lot of time around these people in the future. There would be lots of days like this. I wasn't planning on making any major changes to my personal lifestyle. They might as well get to know me half-lidded and cloudy-headed. I packed a bowl.

Dinner went fine. Your parents turned out to be groovy 60s-types anyway. Towards the end of the evening, after I recognized a reference one of them made to the Steve Martin-Lily Tomlin movie All of Me, and mentioned that it was as a favorite of mine, your dad said, "Anyone who appreciates All of Me is all right by me," and my heart felt warm in my chest. I'd lucked out.

Still, thinking back, it seems pretty stupid. There's a reason most people would choose not to get stoned before meeting their girlfriend's parents. Just like there's a reason to change out of sweatpants before going on a date to a fancy restaurant. Making decisions based on principle rather than pragmatism is a prescription for failure. Even more so when the principle is so confused and self-defeating.

Was all this a test for you? I guess in a way it was, odd as that sounds. Not that I'd meant it that way. But I remember the expression on your face when we met at the restaurant for that first dinner date. You looked down at my sweat pants, and then back up to me, and gave a bemused little sigh. "So this is how it's going to be, huh?" You thought for a second more and said, "All right."

Again, I lucked out.

---

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32 comments

]]> apologyDear Emily,

I'm sorry for wearing sweat pants to our first dinner date and for getting stoned before meeting your parents for the first time.

This was in 1999, before we were married. We'd been friends for a couple years at that point, and had recently started seeing each romantically-the result of a particularly drunken night at the WXOU Bar on Hudson Street, near where we lived in the West Village. I'd asked you out for a first proper dinner date, to Hangawi, a fancy Korean restaurant on 32nd Street.

It's funny now to think about what I was thinking as I got ready to meet you. It was a Saturday, and I had been wearing a pair of green sweatpants that I used to wear on weekends. They were the kind that George Costanza used to wear on Seinfeld, the kind that Jerry once said announced to the world, "I give up. I can't compete in normal society." It occurred to me that I might change into something else, but I stood in my bedroom and thought for a minute and decided against it. I put on a white polo shirt and my Converse All-stars and walked out the door.

It wasn't that I was trying to feign ambivalence, to give the impression I didn't care enough to put on pants with buttons and belt-loops. I had made it very clear, in fact, that I wanted us to be girlfriend and boyfriend. If anything, you were the one who took some convincing. (Glaringly easy, in hindsight, to see why.) My thinking, as best I can explain it, was more along the lines of "take me as I am." I was a guy who wore green sweat pants on a Saturday. I wanted to make a good impression, but changing pants for that reason felt wrong. Like I'd be faking it, presenting myself as someone I was not. This type of thinking makes very little sense to me now and is derailed by something as simple as the fact that I certainly didn't wear those sweat pants exclusively. I had lots of other pants, many of which I often changed into before dinner without much thought at all. But that day, I felt myself in the hands of fate: These were the pants you put on this morning, these are the pants you shall wear tonight.

I don't know. I used to be really superstitious, too. And that's just a terrible way to live. I was smoking too much pot those days, I suppose.

Which brings me to the second part of this apology. A couple months later, our relationship having miraculously survived my sweat pants, you'd arranged for us to go to dinner with your parents-my first time meeting them. Bored, sitting around my apartment that afternoon, I came to the same kind of question as before: Here was a situation in which, on any other day, I would be smoking pot. Should the fact that I was soon to be meeting these important people, the parents of the woman I was falling in love with, should I let that change my routine? I knew that I'd be brighter-eyed and clearer in conversation if I refrained, and I definitely wanted your parents to like me.

But then I thought, well, the way things are going, chances are I'll be spending a lot of time around these people in the future. There would be lots of days like this. I wasn't planning on making any major changes to my personal lifestyle. They might as well get to know me half-lidded and cloudy-headed. I packed a bowl.

Dinner went fine. Your parents turned out to be groovy 60s-types anyway. Towards the end of the evening, after I recognized a reference one of them made to the Steve Martin-Lily Tomlin movie All of Me, and mentioned that it was as a favorite of mine, your dad said, "Anyone who appreciates All of Me is all right by me," and my heart felt warm in my chest. I'd lucked out.

Still, thinking back, it seems pretty stupid. There's a reason most people would choose not to get stoned before meeting their girlfriend's parents. Just like there's a reason to change out of sweatpants before going on a date to a fancy restaurant. Making decisions based on principle rather than pragmatism is a prescription for failure. Even more so when the principle is so confused and self-defeating.

Was all this a test for you? I guess in a way it was, odd as that sounds. Not that I'd meant it that way. But I remember the expression on your face when we met at the restaurant for that first dinner date. You looked down at my sweat pants, and then back up to me, and gave a bemused little sigh. "So this is how it's going to be, huh?" You thought for a second more and said, "All right."

Again, I lucked out.

---

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32 comments

]]> http://www.theawl.com/2010/03/public-apology-dear-emily/feed 32 Social A's: How Do I Deal With These Crazy Racists? http://www.theawl.com/2009/09/social-as-how-do-i-deal-with-these-crazy-racists http://www.theawl.com/2009/09/social-as-how-do-i-deal-with-these-crazy-racists#comments Wed, 09 Sep 2009 17:00:43 +0000 Emily Gould http://www.theawl.com/2009/09/social-as-how-do-i-deal-with-these-crazy-racists SOCIAL A'SDear Answer Lady,

I need help. I grew up in Idaho, a pretty, if somewhat backwards, state. Recently, an acquaintance from high school posted this on Facebook [sic throughout]: "Isnt this great? Americans have put a socialist into the White House – a socialist who wants to indoctrinate our youth with his socialist agenda. Hitler was able to spread his ideas by appealing to German youngsters. Dont let obama get a hold of our children. Socialism always fails."

This is why I can barely stand to look at Facebook.

But my real question is: Do I respond? And if so, how? My instinct is to stay out of it, because any response of mine will probably elicit a dozen angry responses from her right-wing cronies. I do think, though, that letting angry, uninformed attacks like this go unanswered is a problem. I cringe at my computer, and then do nothing. But is it possible to have a reasoned, thoughtful discussion about this? Without making her angry and without making me sound like the smug, condescending east coast liberal I have become?

Thanks,

Teachable Moment?

Dear Teachable,

Two separate issues here. #1: Facebook. FAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACEBOOOK. Of all the near-inescapable modern conveniences that simultaneously make our lives better and worse but mostly worse, Facebook is king. It's like how your DVR dutifully records every episode of Anthony Bourdain's increasingly meh Travel Channel show but inexplicably refuses to record Mad Men, multiplied by spending a day feeling sad about something you found out by Tumblr-searching your name, ALL THE TIME. You think all the time about deleting yourself from it. You even know people who have done so! And you respect them for it, but it troubles you that you now have no handy way of remembering their birthdays.

Also there's something about "deleting yourself" that's just ... well. "Deleting yourself." It doesn't sound cheery.

But then something like this happens and deletion starts looking better and better. If only you could delete some other people while you're at it! Some kind of kamikaze app.

Seriously though I think how you respond to this is: it's not enough to just hide her like you do the people who take quizzes or update you on how many novel-words they wrote that day. You probably have to de-friend this person, and you have to tell her why. Passively maintaining your acquaintance/not rocking the boat is making you feel guilty for a reason, and the reason is not that you're a perpetually-guilty East Coast liberal snob. It's that you're a good, right-thinking human being with a shred of conscience and common sense and soul, and anyone who a) calls Obama a socialist (I wish!) and b) says "socialist" like it's a bad thing is just not.

Your message goes, "Dear Tater Ann, I wanted to let you know that your status update offended me for reasons x, y and z, and it probably also offended a lot of other people who feel that you're too much of a lost cause to bother confronting you about this. I don't, which is why I'm sending you this message. But if you respond to this message with anything less than courtesy and willingness to accept that you might sometimes be in the wrong, I'll start. Your friend, Teachable Moment."

But nicer, I guess. Sorry, I am bad at "nicer."

XOXO,

Answer Lady


Previously: Teen Email Disaster!

---

See more posts by Emily Gould

67 comments

]]> SOCIAL A'SDear Answer Lady,

I need help. I grew up in Idaho, a pretty, if somewhat backwards, state. Recently, an acquaintance from high school posted this on Facebook [sic throughout]: "Isnt this great? Americans have put a socialist into the White House – a socialist who wants to indoctrinate our youth with his socialist agenda. Hitler was able to spread his ideas by appealing to German youngsters. Dont let obama get a hold of our children. Socialism always fails."

This is why I can barely stand to look at Facebook.

But my real question is: Do I respond? And if so, how? My instinct is to stay out of it, because any response of mine will probably elicit a dozen angry responses from her right-wing cronies. I do think, though, that letting angry, uninformed attacks like this go unanswered is a problem. I cringe at my computer, and then do nothing. But is it possible to have a reasoned, thoughtful discussion about this? Without making her angry and without making me sound like the smug, condescending east coast liberal I have become?

Thanks,

Teachable Moment?

Dear Teachable,

Two separate issues here. #1: Facebook. FAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACEBOOOK. Of all the near-inescapable modern conveniences that simultaneously make our lives better and worse but mostly worse, Facebook is king. It's like how your DVR dutifully records every episode of Anthony Bourdain's increasingly meh Travel Channel show but inexplicably refuses to record Mad Men, multiplied by spending a day feeling sad about something you found out by Tumblr-searching your name, ALL THE TIME. You think all the time about deleting yourself from it. You even know people who have done so! And you respect them for it, but it troubles you that you now have no handy way of remembering their birthdays.

Also there's something about "deleting yourself" that's just ... well. "Deleting yourself." It doesn't sound cheery.

But then something like this happens and deletion starts looking better and better. If only you could delete some other people while you're at it! Some kind of kamikaze app.

Seriously though I think how you respond to this is: it's not enough to just hide her like you do the people who take quizzes or update you on how many novel-words they wrote that day. You probably have to de-friend this person, and you have to tell her why. Passively maintaining your acquaintance/not rocking the boat is making you feel guilty for a reason, and the reason is not that you're a perpetually-guilty East Coast liberal snob. It's that you're a good, right-thinking human being with a shred of conscience and common sense and soul, and anyone who a) calls Obama a socialist (I wish!) and b) says "socialist" like it's a bad thing is just not.

Your message goes, "Dear Tater Ann, I wanted to let you know that your status update offended me for reasons x, y and z, and it probably also offended a lot of other people who feel that you're too much of a lost cause to bother confronting you about this. I don't, which is why I'm sending you this message. But if you respond to this message with anything less than courtesy and willingness to accept that you might sometimes be in the wrong, I'll start. Your friend, Teachable Moment."

But nicer, I guess. Sorry, I am bad at "nicer."

XOXO,

Answer Lady


Previously: Teen Email Disaster!

---

See more posts by Emily Gould

67 comments

]]> http://www.theawl.com/2009/09/social-as-how-do-i-deal-with-these-crazy-racists/feed 67 Social A's: How To Deal With Blog Comments From Yo Auntie http://www.theawl.com/2009/06/social-as-how-to-deal-with-blog-comments-from-yo-auntie http://www.theawl.com/2009/06/social-as-how-to-deal-with-blog-comments-from-yo-auntie#comments Thu, 25 Jun 2009 10:30:47 +0000 Emily Gould http://www.theawl.com/2009/06/social-as-how-to-deal-with-blog-comments-from-yo-auntie SOCIAL A'SDear Answer Lady,

Tell me you deal with shit like this:

"A new comment on the post #1 "Clip from [my recent standup performance that I posted on my website, which is intended primarily to get me more comedy gigs]" is waiting for your approval.
Author: Auntie [redacted] (IP: [redacted])
Comment: Well sweetie, Umm I know things are different in the big city but let me tell you....people are the same everywhere. They are going to read into what you are saying [about bikini waxing] and think you are talking about things you were raised better than to talk about. Which, we know, isn't the case. I'm just telling you this because I am older and have more experience and you are just an innocent lamb living in a wolve's [sic] den (NYC). That aside, you are cute as a button! And, btw, when did you go to Brazil? That must have been a fun trip. Love you bunches- Auntie [redacted]"

Signed,

Naughty Niece

Dear Naughty,

First go register the domain for Postcardsfromyoauntie.com. J/k. (But still, the part about Brazil... she KNOWS, right? Doesn't she know? She has to know. What, they don't have TBS reruns of Sex and the City in the wolfless land where she lives?)

I think that obviously you should not approve this comment. I say "obviously" but actually, maybe it's not obvious? For example! I used to think it was somehow my ethical responsibility to approve any comment that anyone left on my blog, no matter how deranged or stalkerish or misguidedly left by a befuddled older relative. That philosophy was self-flagellating and dumb. If you maintain a website, you implicitly endorse all its content, even the comments-so you have every right to exercise discretion about what gets posted. "Approving" a comment doesn't means you "approve" of its content, but it does mean that you feel it is a sentiment worthy, for whatever reason, of inclusion in the discourse around Tarkovsky or LOLcats or whatever your post was about.

For example, I refrain from deleting comments solely because they're insulting to me, but when people use my comments as a forum to insult other people, I delete their comments and, if possible, I email them and tell them why. I also delete comments that are personal, like the one you received, simply because the comments aren't an appropriate venue for one-on-one correspondence.

So all you have to do is contact Auntie [Redacted] and tell her, "Dear Auntie [Redacted], I am so tickled that you read my blog! It's nice to hear from you. But next time you want to get in touch, I'd like it much better if you emailed me directly than if you left your thoughts in the comments. When you write in the comments, you're talking to everyone who reads my website, so it doesn't make sense for you to say something there that you really only want to say to me."

That's all! Problem solved. Also, leave your pubic hair alone! God put it there for a reason.



Have you a problem? Consult our answer lady, who is sensitive to all issues. Write her private email here!

Previously: Do I Have To Go Visit Those Babies?

---

See more posts by Emily Gould

32 comments

]]> SOCIAL A'SDear Answer Lady,

Tell me you deal with shit like this:

"A new comment on the post #1 "Clip from [my recent standup performance that I posted on my website, which is intended primarily to get me more comedy gigs]" is waiting for your approval.
Author: Auntie [redacted] (IP: [redacted])
Comment: Well sweetie, Umm I know things are different in the big city but let me tell you....people are the same everywhere. They are going to read into what you are saying [about bikini waxing] and think you are talking about things you were raised better than to talk about. Which, we know, isn't the case. I'm just telling you this because I am older and have more experience and you are just an innocent lamb living in a wolve's [sic] den (NYC). That aside, you are cute as a button! And, btw, when did you go to Brazil? That must have been a fun trip. Love you bunches- Auntie [redacted]"

Signed,

Naughty Niece

Dear Naughty,

First go register the domain for Postcardsfromyoauntie.com. J/k. (But still, the part about Brazil... she KNOWS, right? Doesn't she know? She has to know. What, they don't have TBS reruns of Sex and the City in the wolfless land where she lives?)

I think that obviously you should not approve this comment. I say "obviously" but actually, maybe it's not obvious? For example! I used to think it was somehow my ethical responsibility to approve any comment that anyone left on my blog, no matter how deranged or stalkerish or misguidedly left by a befuddled older relative. That philosophy was self-flagellating and dumb. If you maintain a website, you implicitly endorse all its content, even the comments-so you have every right to exercise discretion about what gets posted. "Approving" a comment doesn't means you "approve" of its content, but it does mean that you feel it is a sentiment worthy, for whatever reason, of inclusion in the discourse around Tarkovsky or LOLcats or whatever your post was about.

For example, I refrain from deleting comments solely because they're insulting to me, but when people use my comments as a forum to insult other people, I delete their comments and, if possible, I email them and tell them why. I also delete comments that are personal, like the one you received, simply because the comments aren't an appropriate venue for one-on-one correspondence.

So all you have to do is contact Auntie [Redacted] and tell her, "Dear Auntie [Redacted], I am so tickled that you read my blog! It's nice to hear from you. But next time you want to get in touch, I'd like it much better if you emailed me directly than if you left your thoughts in the comments. When you write in the comments, you're talking to everyone who reads my website, so it doesn't make sense for you to say something there that you really only want to say to me."

That's all! Problem solved. Also, leave your pubic hair alone! God put it there for a reason.



Have you a problem? Consult our answer lady, who is sensitive to all issues. Write her private email here!

Previously: Do I Have To Go Visit Those Babies?

---

See more posts by Emily Gould

32 comments

]]> http://www.theawl.com/2009/06/social-as-how-to-deal-with-blog-comments-from-yo-auntie/feed 32 Social A's: Do I Have To Go Visit Those Babies? http://www.theawl.com/2009/06/social-as-do-i-have-to-go-visit-those-babies http://www.theawl.com/2009/06/social-as-do-i-have-to-go-visit-those-babies#comments Wed, 17 Jun 2009 13:30:59 +0000 Emily Gould http://www.theawl.com/2009/06/social-as-do-i-have-to-go-visit-those-babies SOCIAL A'SDear Answer Lady,

I'm a lady at or around the age of 30, as are many of my friends. I live way up at the top of Manhattan, in faraway Inwood, but many of my friends live down under Manhattan, in faraway Brooklyn. When I want to see one of my Brooklyn-dwelling friends, we generally get together somewhere in between, so neither of us has to make the 1-1.5-hour trek to the other's house (and back, which is usually worse, or more expensive, on account of it being at night).

But, oh, Answer Lady... lately my friends have started having babies. Like, in the last couple of months. Sort of all at once. It's weird. ANYWAY, I feel like you can't ask a mom to haul her just-gave-birth-body and her screaming 8-pound new-born to Korea Town or the West Village for get-togethers. If I'm not mistaken, the expected thing is that I go visit them. In Brooklyn.

But it is soooo far awayyyy. Is there any alternative? I like my friends, and I'm sure I'll like their babies, once I see them. Can I just wait 8 months until they're more mobile or something? Or pick a baby-friendly venue and invite them out?

Signed,

Selfish?

Dear Selfish,

Your question is trickier than it seems on the surface, I suspect. I mean, as to whether you ought to suck it up, grab a good book, spend an hour and a half on the A train, and try to hit up as many babies as you can in one trip to Brooklyn: yes, duh. You won't have to do it every weekend or anything, and you won't have to do it that many times. They won't be little immobile babies and weary sleep-deprived new moms forever. It will just seem like forever to *them.*

You won't even really notice it, because your life will go on and you'll start spending more time with your friends who live near you and don't have babies, and they'll start spending more time making macaroni crafts and freaking out about how much mercury is in sardines and stuff like that. And also they'll spend more time with their friends who live near them and have babies around the same age as theirs, because that's how it works. And that's what your question is really about, I think: "Can I still be friends with my friends who have babies, even though our lives are necessarily super different now?"

And, I don't know! I hope so. I think probably not, though? Your friendships will definitely change. And that is okay, Selfish. Imagine how boring things would be if everyone just continued to be childless and carefree forever, and your hangs with your girlfriends were exactly the same now as they were in your early 20s except now everyone is older? People are growing up and doing grown-up things like buying apartments and getting married and having babies, there is just no stopping that stuff from happening, Selfish. And it can be a little sad and lonely and inconvenient sometimes for those of us who either aren't doing these things yet, or don't plan to do them ever.

The compensatory thing, though, is that we don't have to constantly worry about a little human being being totally emotionally, physically, and fiscally dependent on us for his survival. Bonus! Or, is it? I dunno. As a very wise cartoon crab once said, the seaweed is always greener in somebody else's lake. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go make an appointment for my elderly cat to have $1300 worth of dental surgery.

Troubles? We can help! Write to the answer lady's private tipline at advice at TheAwl.com if you please.

Previously: Should An Athiest Tell The Family That She Prays?

---

See more posts by Emily Gould

27 comments

]]> SOCIAL A'SDear Answer Lady,

I'm a lady at or around the age of 30, as are many of my friends. I live way up at the top of Manhattan, in faraway Inwood, but many of my friends live down under Manhattan, in faraway Brooklyn. When I want to see one of my Brooklyn-dwelling friends, we generally get together somewhere in between, so neither of us has to make the 1-1.5-hour trek to the other's house (and back, which is usually worse, or more expensive, on account of it being at night).

But, oh, Answer Lady... lately my friends have started having babies. Like, in the last couple of months. Sort of all at once. It's weird. ANYWAY, I feel like you can't ask a mom to haul her just-gave-birth-body and her screaming 8-pound new-born to Korea Town or the West Village for get-togethers. If I'm not mistaken, the expected thing is that I go visit them. In Brooklyn.

But it is soooo far awayyyy. Is there any alternative? I like my friends, and I'm sure I'll like their babies, once I see them. Can I just wait 8 months until they're more mobile or something? Or pick a baby-friendly venue and invite them out?

Signed,

Selfish?

Dear Selfish,

Your question is trickier than it seems on the surface, I suspect. I mean, as to whether you ought to suck it up, grab a good book, spend an hour and a half on the A train, and try to hit up as many babies as you can in one trip to Brooklyn: yes, duh. You won't have to do it every weekend or anything, and you won't have to do it that many times. They won't be little immobile babies and weary sleep-deprived new moms forever. It will just seem like forever to *them.*

You won't even really notice it, because your life will go on and you'll start spending more time with your friends who live near you and don't have babies, and they'll start spending more time making macaroni crafts and freaking out about how much mercury is in sardines and stuff like that. And also they'll spend more time with their friends who live near them and have babies around the same age as theirs, because that's how it works. And that's what your question is really about, I think: "Can I still be friends with my friends who have babies, even though our lives are necessarily super different now?"

And, I don't know! I hope so. I think probably not, though? Your friendships will definitely change. And that is okay, Selfish. Imagine how boring things would be if everyone just continued to be childless and carefree forever, and your hangs with your girlfriends were exactly the same now as they were in your early 20s except now everyone is older? People are growing up and doing grown-up things like buying apartments and getting married and having babies, there is just no stopping that stuff from happening, Selfish. And it can be a little sad and lonely and inconvenient sometimes for those of us who either aren't doing these things yet, or don't plan to do them ever.

The compensatory thing, though, is that we don't have to constantly worry about a little human being being totally emotionally, physically, and fiscally dependent on us for his survival. Bonus! Or, is it? I dunno. As a very wise cartoon crab once said, the seaweed is always greener in somebody else's lake. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go make an appointment for my elderly cat to have $1300 worth of dental surgery.

Troubles? We can help! Write to the answer lady's private tipline at advice at TheAwl.com if you please.

Previously: Should An Athiest Tell The Family That She Prays?

---

See more posts by Emily Gould

27 comments

]]> http://www.theawl.com/2009/06/social-as-do-i-have-to-go-visit-those-babies/feed 27