that darn kat

fatmanatee:

meowsense:

msavignon said: Can we also talk about how much Natasha Leggaro sucks?

I am trying to figure out if I know who she is.  I have been watching Pretend Time and she’s on that so I guess I’ve seen her.  Speaking of which, I love Nick Swardson so much (Grandma’s Boy is one of my favorite movies and his standup is great), and I find it really disappointing when he goes for the low-hanging fruit in his comedy (see: frequent use of word “retarded”) because he’s funny enough not to have to.  Pretend Time is really up and down for me in terms of how funny I find it.

ryanpurtill said: So many great female comics are overlooked (Tig, Bamford), while awful comics who are mildly attractive get tv deals (See: Chelsea Handler)

I have a strange loyalty to Chelsea Handler because I used to watch Girls Behaving Badly and she was really good on that.  I don’t know why attractiveness needs to be a requirement for comedic success for women. I mean, Patton Oswalt and Louis C.K. (both of whom I love) aren’t exactly doing any GQ covers soon.  I suppose it’s a statement on who the presumed consumer of comedy is (dudes).

Also, the thing where this convo is white-centric because a lot of the big names in comedy are white people is another (but related) issue.

There’s an extension here about Bridesmaids and What It Means For Hollywood And Women In Comedy, and basically I don’t trust Hollywood at all, and I would just about blow it up and start over if I had the choice.  I would do this for a lot of things that are structurally bankrupt.  You take the good things (Bridesmaids and Wiig/McCarthy getting hired to write more movies) and dump the bad.  The bad includes pretty much every other shit sandwich in Hollywood and the boys club environment of standup.  

At this point I mostly let the internet be my guide for comedy (both standup and other realms) and it’s probably better than letting Hollywood do it.  I have friends who got their start with the internet thing while working on stage and now some of them host comedy nights at random bars in NY and LA.  Asie used to host one in NYC and it was really great.  There was one lady on A Drink With Dave (I’ll see if I can find the video) who talked about how she had a rough time getting stage time, so she just started her own thing.  That way, she not only gets stage time, but she can choose who else performs and it’s obviously a more balanced show.  

Then there are podcasts, and Julie Klausner, who didn’t exactly endear herself to some people here because she made fun of rompers, has this amazing podcast where she hosts really funny women and makes fun of Bill Maher… ALWAYS a crowd pleaser in the manatee household.  I don’t even watch podcasts, but I downloaded the episodes with Jackee and Joan Rivers while I was recovering from LASIK and they were AMAZING.  Top notch stuff.  I know her adulthood post set people off, but I haven’t found a bigger supporter of funny women than Julie. 

I thought the Mila Kunis GQ thing was goofy, but as a trade off, GQ’s hired Julieanne Smolinski, Edith Zimmerman, Kelly Oxford, and Lauren Bans to write columns.  I thought his was pretty great because they’re all pretty funny and it’s nice to see internet-types rewarded.  Vice, of all magazines, spotted Megan Amram a column.  If you’re looking for subversive/male-feminist Louis CK types, Rob Delaney is doing a weekly column there.  He’s very good.

(Remember: prior to Mila Kunis, GQ featured Chris Evans on the cover and told Edith Zimmerman to do something with him, which was dumb, because Chris Evans seems incredibly boring as a human being.  None of what GQ plants on the cover has anything to do with editorial discretion and everything to do with whoever has a big movie that month.)

That’s basically how I look at it.  I’ve realized that it’s far more useful for me to promote new voices to read and listen to.  The more, the merrier, you know?  I’m not particularly concerned that Carrot Top exists as long as Louis CK has a spot too.

I think I should have said Details covers instead, because I don’t know what the Mila Kunis thing is and I was just referring to the male comedians’ conventional attractiveness levels.  And yeah, I don’t ever really turn to Hollywood for advice on who’s funny (those jokers forced Dane Cook down our throats) — the problem is that there are structural inequities here and it seems like regardless of who you and I and whoever else support the reality is that certain types of voices are the ones most commonly heard and it kind of blows!  But I will check out all the stuff you mentioned so yay for the (sometimes) egalitarian nature of the Internet!

msavignon said: Can we also talk about how much Natasha Leggaro sucks?

I am trying to figure out if I know who she is.  I have been watching Pretend Time and she’s on that so I guess I’ve seen her.  Speaking of which, I love Nick Swardson so much (Grandma’s Boy is one of my favorite movies and his standup is great), and I find it really disappointing when he goes for the low-hanging fruit in his comedy (see: frequent use of word “retarded”) because he’s funny enough not to have to.  Pretend Time is really up and down for me in terms of how funny I find it.

ryanpurtill said: So many great female comics are overlooked (Tig, Bamford), while awful comics who are mildly attractive get tv deals (See: Chelsea Handler)

I have a strange loyalty to Chelsea Handler because I used to watch Girls Behaving Badly and she was really good on that.  I don’t know why attractiveness needs to be a requirement for comedic success for women. I mean, Patton Oswalt and Louis C.K. (both of whom I love) aren’t exactly doing any GQ covers soon.  I suppose it’s a statement on who the presumed consumer of comedy is (dudes).

Also, the thing where this convo is white-centric because a lot of the big names in comedy are white people is another (but related) issue.

and think it has so much power to shed light on issues from different angles in a non-confrontational way that I hate when it’s used to reinforce tired stereotypes.

ryanpurtill:

Just saw a promo for Whitney Cummings new show and apparently when a woman says, “I’m fine.”, she is actually really really upset! LoooooOooOOOL! OMG!

So I watch a LOT of standup (I watch it basically every night as I drift off to sleep) and I really try to support female comics because there aren’t a ton of them who are super successful, and while I won’t say she’s unfunny, this is pretty representative of how original her jokes are.  I watched her special recently and was really disappointed that the running gag seemed to be that women are crazy and overemotional.  Meanwhile she gets her own show and the amazing, amazing, amazing Margaret Cho is underused on Drop Dead Diva (I loved All-American Girl as a child).

Unrelated: I find the friendship between Lewis Black and Kathleen Madigan oddly touching.

squee-gee:

droppingthefbomb:

• Your sex life doesn’t automatically improve.
• You do not automatically become a better person.
• Let me put this into perspective for you…
• Someone
• is
• having
• good
• sex
• and
• is
• enjoying
• themselves
• and you are in the corner complaining about it.

I actually had use this line on a slut-shamer during my biz trip this past week. tumble is so servicey at times.

• Run to Target at lunch because didn’t bring yoga mat down south with me and also don’t really have top to wear
• Work on details for upcoming event and strategic recommendations for launch of corporate social responsibility program
• Private yoga lesson so I won’t be scared to go to group class
• Whole Foods
• Make some sort of vegetable-heavy low-carb dinner
• Wash hair; possibly get a little wild and do a gloss treatment
• Dexter Season 5 4 Lyfe (or for eight hours)
• Sleep
• Pay ALL THE BILLS; weep over bank account depletion
• A.M. cooking class/brunch
• Book flights to go visit my bestie in LA for a week next month
• Lay out by pool with The Carrie Diaries
• Spend an hour or two at the High
• Charity event

This list brought to you by The Coalition to Remind Myself that I Have a Really Good Life and the Sooner I Stop Thinking About All the Bad Stuff the Sooner More Good Stuff Will Show Up.

Please to cheer up via ask box.

and get some more exercise without really trying.  My goal is supposed to be 10,000 steps per day, which is roughly five miles (I once read that this is the average distance a New Yorker walks in a day and that’s why people in NYC are generally thin — other than that they have to be because otherwise they won’t fit in their apartments), but I think I’m going to make it something crazier so I’ll burn more calories.  Anyway you are supposed to clip it on your waistband but I am wearing a dress with no belt so it’s clipped on my underwear.  Whevs!

johncarney:

…

So here’s five things I think you should know.

1. Everything is going to be okay. 

2. It is your job to forgive people. This is the hardest job you’ve ever had. But if you do it well, you will be the happiest person you know.

3. If you love someone, you need to care about the things that are important to her even when they don’t seem important to you. You need to make her caring enough cause for you to care.

4. It’s never too late but it always seems to be. Start right now. You won’t regret it.

5. I will help. No matter what happens, no matter what you’ve done or what’s been done to you, no matter what you think, I can help you. I want to help you. I will help. Everything will be okay. You can be forgiven. I care about what’s important to you. It’s not too late. You don’t even have to ask. Just come around or invite me over.  

…

#3 #3 #3 #3 #3 #3 #3 #3 #3 #3 #3 #3 #3 #3 

I find that I am unwilling to miss Christmas with my family, also, especially given how they have basically propped me up like one of those doll stands over the past year (tear :’-|).  Depending on how exorbitant flights are, maybe I take a one-week trip to South America (haha this sounds like I am such a jetsetter but seriously before Japan in March I hadn’t left the U.S. since I was 17 and it’s a miracle I got into business school having never lived abroad in our global economy and all) and come back for Christmas.  I will probably get to go on another trip over Spring Break assuming I have a job by then (personal goal alert!) so NBD if this one is brief.

Anyway business school is hilarious in that I feel like I am the only one heading back in September without having had my passport stamped in Reykjavik this summer.

A person really wants to go to Machu Picchu.  A trip has been planned to South America over the holidays.  The Machu Picchu trip is on a day on which said person is required to be in a significantly less-sexy location to take an exam.  Does the person join the trip late and miss Machu Picchu (and apparently Christmas with her family) or scrap the entire thing and go to South America some other time (this will likely never happen)?  Person has never been to South America.

(Don’t worry y’all I will owe various entities $140k after this year and never be able to travel again!)

so who am I to call things outdated?

Based on the research I’ve been doing for my job, I feel like the mommy blogosphere — at least the part that is supposed to be influential — stopped evolving in like 2005.  It’s all huge, ugly graphics and Blogger blogs and ridiculous sidebar buttons with “You Go Girl!” type sayings (and more ugly graphics).  This is not an anti-mom post; I hate hate HATE the anti-mom sentiment in a lot of corners of the, uh, everywhere.  Moms are just women with kids and they’re on the Internet like everyone else and then there’s this whole subset with really ugly blogs and something called Google Friend Connect and the appearance that whoever this woman was before giving birth has been totally subsumed by little Harper or Aidan.  Moms = awesome; moms on the Internet = awesome; whatever this subset is = decidedly less so.

where Gavin Rossdale is a singer who is maybe also a secret vampire.

because I’m walking down the street thinking about people I don’t like!