Fasten your seatbelts, it’s going to be a bumpy interview.
Well, maybe not so much bumpy as meandering. Wayward? Erratic? Not your straightforward point A to point B, that’s for certain.

Greetings, Tild fans! I am an imaginary interviewer, a hypothetical composite of the typical readership of Tild’s blog, aka Tild~, or tildology.com to be exact. I’m a mashup of all the folks who tend to show up here:

…The woman in Georgia with a cold who’s looking for information about nose washing;
…The guy in Dubai who wants to read about bad girls who don’t keep their tape sticky;

…The She-Blogger fan in Toronto;

…The folks in the UK who can’t get enough of Laurel & Hardy’s “Way Out West” dance;

…One of the hapless clods who keep trying to hotlink to the wily strawman picture so that they can add it to their comments and thereby look totally super-bitchin’ in those endless flame war threads at FARK or the Something Awful forums; .

…The many admirers of Easter Jesus’ chocolatey goodness;

And the people who come here looking for Meerkat Manor family trees

or for a bit of Minnesota-specific political snark , be it about prominent local prig Katherine Kersten , Minuteman-wannabe Dick “Rambo” Day, or notorious now ex-MnDOT commissioner and fandancer Carol Molnau,

…or maybe just for a little cheesecake.

Whatever you’ve come here for, you’ve no doubt noticed that it’s been pretty quiet around here for quite a while now. We’re lucky to get one new post a week. What’s the deal with that?

Look! There’s Tild now. Let’s ask her.

Imaginary Typical Tildology Reader: Hey! Tild! It’s 4:30 in the morning. What are you doing up?

Tild: Oh, hi. Hey, if you’re one of those idiots looking for the strawman picture, goddammit will you PLEASE learn how to save images to your own server?! Use your own bandwidth for a change, asshole!

ITTR: Umm, excuse me Miz Tild, but I am most certainly not one of those idiots. What I am, in fact, is an Imaginary Typical Reader of your blog, come to interview you and find out what’s next in the exciting ongoing history of tildology.com.

Tild: You are? Hmm. Do you mean to tell me that the typical reader of my blog is the disembodied head of Agnes Moorhead’s even snider younger sister inexplicably floating in the stratosphere next to a “flying wing” airplane?

ITTR: You tell me. You picked this image to be the ITTR avatar.

Tild: Oh. Yeah. Well, alrighty then. Never mind! What was the question again? Why am I awake at 4:30 AM? Well, my youngest kid the high school senior is in the high school’s Concert Choir which is going to Washington DC for four days, and they needed to be at the high school at 4 this morning to board the buses to the airport. I’ll never get back to sleep now, so I guess I’m up for the duration.

ITTR: Aha. So then. Please tell us: What have you been up to lately? Sure hasn’t been blogging.

Tild: Well, you do know that I have a full time day job, right?

ITTR: Yes, I’ve gotten that impression over the years, but you’ve never really described what it is that you do. So, what exactly is it that you do?

Tild: I work for a large corporation; a big player in an industry that’s run for profit but really shouldn’t be. The mitigating factor for me is that the particular division that I work in is more or less a watchdog unit. We investigate the billing habits of the purveyors of our industry’s services. Our work is to keep those purveyors honest — or, you could say that in an ethically challenged industry we try to make sure that its practitioners adhere to the laws, such as they are, and to industry standards, imperfect tho they may be. That fact helps me sleep at night, I gotta admit. You know, because I feel like in my little corner of the industry I’m more a part of the solution and not so much a part of the problem.

ITTR: Wow, that’s quite discreetly phrased, I must say. Can you describe what you do there?

Tild: Sure. I gather data from various sources, convert the data into the formats used by several databases, and upload that data. One might say that I’m a data wrangler.
Yeehaw!

ITTR: Gosh! Sounds fascinating!

Tild: Uh huh. You said it, not me. I’ve also been working part time at a book store since last fall. The end result of all this toil and trouble is that I haven’t had huge amounts of free time to devote to blogging. Or when I do have some time, I often don’t have any energy for it.

[TO BE CONTINUED...]

Posted: March 10th, 2008 under Blogistan, Chez Tild, Meta, Personal History.
Comments: 1

 

This is all really just a question of hats. 

At any given moment, when scrutinizing the stories Michael Brodkorb posts at MDE the question is not, a la Watergate What did the president know and when did he know it? but rather:

Which hat is Brodkorb wearing and when did he start wearing it?

It’s a good question and one that should have been raised long before now, and by a lot more people, particularly those  in local media outlets. 

Brodkorb now seems to think that asking questions is the same thing as attacking MDE:

You are able to attack my work for Mark Kennedy, because FEC rules require expenditures to be public ally reported.  You are able to see that I was paid a one-time fee from Bachmann’s campaign, because it was publicly disclosed. You are able to attack me for my work with the Campaign for St. Paul’s Future, because it was publicly disclosed.  

No, Michael, you’ve got this wrong.  The post at Minnesota Monitor does not attack MDE over your payments from the Kennedy and Bachmann campaigns. Mentioning publicly disclosed data and asking questions relating to that data is not necessarily an attack.  However did you happen to arrive at that mistaken conclusion? 

 

 

Posted: September 28th, 2006 under Blogistan, Michael Brodkorb, Minnesota Democrats Exposed, Minnesota politics, Politics.
Comments: none

MN Observer links to Ann Althouse’s scandalized shitfit so I don’t have to. Oh, and be sure to read the entire comments thread.

Now Jessica of Feministing (the object of this frenzy of onehanded wingnut conjecture) responds.

BTW, dear Jessica (says I): Keep standing up straight; chin up; shoulders back. You make me proud, kid.

*sigh* Yet again I find myself wishing I had a daughter, or daughters. No, not instead of my sons. In addition to!

Hey, where’d I put that “Estrogen: flaunt it if you’ve got it” pic I posted a year or two ago?…

Ahh. Here it is:

“ I could never be a woman, ’cause I’d just stay home and play with my breasts all day.” - - Steve Martin in LA Story

You might die of envy to hear this, Steve, but the attractive, agreeable, young (ie,  preferred) women and the fat old ugly man-hating feminists concur on this opinion:  Having breasts is fun!

UPDATE: When I posted this earlier today, I should have known that the fun had only just begun.

Julia of Sisyphus Shrugged to Ann Althouse:

Wank the fuck on, dear.

Hmmmm; I’ll bet Ann decides to take a different tack the next time she throws a tantrum because she wasn’t invited to lunch with the kool kids du jour and the Clenis.

Dr. Helen the Insta-Wife joins in:

We Don’t Support Gropers Except For Bill Clinton

..to which Amanda replies:

If you’re wondering what’s motivating Ann and Dr. Helen to hiss and spit in Jessica’s direction, the comments from their male readers in the threads bring it all to light. Ann even helpfully noted that she thinks that Jessica looks like Monica Lewinsky, so that her imagination-stunted readers put two and two together and got the idea—Lewinsky performed that oral sex we’ve been hearing so much about! This is important for some reason! Dark-haired girls must do that act we’ve heard about! If you want to start a research project on the relationship of sexual repression and right wing nuttery, those comment threads are a good place to start.

The fabulous Echidne has the last word (at least for the moment):

I am very tempted to join in the fray and to start sending arrows here and there, but I will restrain myself, don a neutral pin-striped business suit and write about something very erudite and academic.

Which is tits and their role in feminism. And don’t worry, I first bound my own breasts very tightly. If I stood slightly angled towards you I might come across as almost breastless. Or breast-free or something. Except that now I can’t breathe at all. Argh. Proper erudite feminism is damn inconvenient.

Posted: September 16th, 2006 under Being Female, Blogistan, Feminism, General.
Comments: 2

Calling all fans of silent film; of great movie music; and especially all fans of Tristero, who has been posting since the beginning of this year over at Digby’s place.

Turner Classic Movies is showing the 1928 Carl Dreyer film

The Passion of Joan of Arc tonight at 12:15 AM Eastern Time

–that’s 11:15 PM Central Time for those of us here in Minnesotistan.

Of special interest is the musical score accompanying this silent film:

The Passion of Joan of Arc is undoubtedly one of the most difficult silent films to score effectively; one could even argue that it is, atypically for silent films, best viewed without music. There is always a danger that the prospective composer or arranger will fall back on cliched notions of “spirituality” without somehow confronting the film’s radically experimental style. The searing close-ups, off-centered framings and disjunctive editing are, after all, an important source of the film’s emotional power. The 1951 version distributed by Lo Duca, for instance, appropriates music by Bach, Vivaldi and Albinoni in an attempt to impose a comforting sense of piety on the proceedings.

The version broadcast on TCM is accompanied by Richard Einhorn’s acclaimed 1994 oratorio Voices of Light, which has often been performed in conjunction with the film in recent years, though it is also designed to be performed independently. The voice of Jeanne is sung by Anonymous 4, a leading female vocal quartet specializing in medieval music; texts quoted in the oratorio include writings by the famed medieval feminist writer Christine de Pizan and male ‘misogynist’ writers from roughly the same era. The bell sounds were recorded at the church in Domremy, Jeanne’s birthplace.

For those of you who missed Digby’s reminder, composer Richard Einhorn is also the blogger Tristero.

It wasn’t a secret, but many of us didn’t know it, so there was much whooping and exclaiming in greater Blogistan when Digby pointed out the identity of Einhorn’s alter ego.

I’ve been waiting ever since for this movie to show up on TCM, and tonight’s finally the night. That time once again:

The Passion of Joan of Arc

on TCM (Turner Classic Movies; check your cable company’s listings)

tonight, Sunday September 3rd, at

11:15 PM Central Time

12:15 AM Eastern Time

Posted: September 3rd, 2006 under Blogistan, Cinema, General, General.
Comments: 7

Yeah, maybe because I’ve done more than my fair share, I know a little bit more than some other folks do about just how much fun it is to rib the old Wegian.  Still, today I’ve just gotta say: damn, it’s good to have Norwegianity back!

He’s in particularly fine fettle today. Go read Norwegianity

Posted: August 6th, 2006 under Blogistan, General, Minnesota politics.
Comments: none

Had the opportunity yesterday to watch a taping of our favorite ad-vivisection TV show Mental Engineering, which as you may know is hosted by our favorite DL irregular John Forde.

(Go here – scroll down — for a really crappy photo of John taken at the 331 Club during Kosapalooza in May. It’s really not any more crappy than the other photos I took that day, using the World’s Cheapest Digital Camera –$19.95 at Target!)

Among the panelists on the show, which will be airing sometime during the upcoming new season of ME — check the site for scheduling — was Brad Friedman, well-known blogger and go-to expert on the Diebold voting machine hijinks in recent elections.

UPDATE: Ooh! Brad gives us a mention today!

I was lucky enough to chat with Brad for a little while. Among many topics discussed, I got an update on the Truth About Ann Coulter documentary which is being made by Brad Blog guest commentator Dan Borchers. Borchers had hoped to have the documentary finished in time for the 06-06-06 release of Ann’s latest hatefest “Godless” , but it’s not quite done yet. Soon, tho.

I’m really looking forward to seeing it, especially because Borchers linked to one of my “Tild Newsstand” magazine covers from last fall and then contacted me asking if he could use the Comeuppance Magazine graphic in the documentary. Of course I said “Heck yeah!”

That one’s worth a revisit:

Posted: August 6th, 2006 under Blogistan, I only drink Liberally, Mental Engineering.
Comments: 1

A few nights ago at the entrance to the vast, deserted, crumbling blog that was once Norwegianity…

SECURITY GUARD: No ma’am. I don’t see “itinerant band of Norwegian lutefisk wranglers” anywhere on my Approved Visitors list.

SECURITY GUARD: Oh yes, ma’am. Very sure. I don’t see anything about a “lady bloggers night” either. Are you sure Mr. G gave you permission
to stay here?

SECURITY GUARD: I ask because unfortunately we’ve had to tighten up security quite a bit lately. There have been… incidents.

SECURITY GUARD: Yes. Incidents. Somebody’s gotten in several times and vandalized the property while Mr. G has been away.

SECURITY GUARD: Yes. For example, according to the latest damage estimate, several very valuable music files containing hundreds of hours of Lithuanian broken-beat Mantovani have been completely destroyed.

SECURITY GUARD: There’s also a large stain on the rug in the den. It looks like somebody spilled an entire bottle of Rhubarb wine in there.

SECURITY GUARD: As if that wasn’t bad enough, someone was apparently eating Cheetos in the library and didn’t wash their hands before rifling through the priceless goatse collection.

Security Guard: Yes. Mr. G is quite upset.

SECURITY GUARD: Certainly.

SECURITY GUARD: Yes, well. Look, I’m sorry but you’re all going to have to leave now.

 

Welcome back, stupid Wege.

~~~ 

UPDATE:  Well, that was certainly an ugly little fiasco. I should have just gone with my original idea; I went digging in my old back pages and found something suitable for the occasion:

  

 

Posted: July 25th, 2006 under Blogistan, General, General, I only drink Liberally, Scandinaviattitude.
Comments: 5

Over at the Power Liberal, Smartie is blogging like KvM today.   He’s clocked 9 posts so far.  Hang on for every breathless detail!

What do bloggers get in lieu of hazard pay when they go so far above and beyond?    

…Smartie, on Thursday I’m buying you a beer.  And the OTC analgesic pain reliever of your choice. 

 

       

 

Posted: July 25th, 2006 under Blogistan, General, General, I only drink Liberally, Minnesota politics, Politics, Republicans.
Comments: 1

Michael Brodkorb of MDE and other conservative henchmen stooges sycophants bloggers met with the President’s favorite turd blossom Karl Rove on Friday during the Ãœberweasel’s visit to Minnesota.
By all accounts the hourlong blogger briefing was a hot ‘n’ heavy session of high level GOP strategy. Brodkorb was heard to murmur “Pinch me! I can’t believe this is really happening. He is just so totally bitchin’!” as he crouched in passion-drenched delirium at Rove’s side.

UPDATE:

Meanwhile, Moses caught the action from a different angle…

Posted: July 22nd, 2006 under Blogistan, Evil made visible, Michael Brodkorb, Minnesota politics, National politics, Politics, Republicans, Wingnuttia.
Comments: 9

This was a fun weekend. Will wonders never cease?

I took Friday off and spent the entire day wandering from one delight to another, and just really enjoying the absence of deadlines and quotas and goals and imperatives. Ahh. Peace –it’s wonderful.

First was a gabby long breakfast catching up with a dear old friend ; then an hour spent nosing around in the reference stacks at the Chan library; then to the EP mall to catch a bargain matinee of The Devil Wears Prada

[Meryl Streep plays the hands-down most scarifying, scenery-shredding , monstrous boss in movie history; what they used to call a "Boss Lady" in movies from the 40s and 50s; a part usually played by Joan Crawford or Bette Davis or Barbara Stanwyck. *sigh* I could watch La Streep for days.]

What really made me bust out in guffaws, tho, was the trailer for Running With Scissors, coming out this fall, and starring imo two of the most criminally underrated actors of all time: Alec Baldwin and Annette Bening. I think I’ve definitely gotta see this one as soon as it comes out.

After the movie I realized that I had two coupons for stuff at my local B & N. One for a free drink from the cafe and the other for an additional 15 % off one item, so there went another hour…

Finally, the day was bookended with another long gabfest/dinner with dear friends.

[Not only dear but also tolerant. While they discuss substantive issues of the socio-economic-political world, they smile benignly and nod at me as I lamely prattle on about how cool those "picture tube" thingies are in Paintshop Pro and now if only I could figure out how to use them....

Now that's tolerance, for which I am very grateful.]

After dinner at Erté we walked across the street to talk a while longer at our usual Thursday evening DL destination, the 331 Club. When the Crazy Uke, one of our favorite denizens of the wingnut fever swamp and FOL [Friend Of Lileks] made his usual appearance as he does every evening, we were sitting outside exactly where we’d been the night before for Drinking Liberally. We tried to convince him that we’d never left. Heh.

Gotta get to work. More to come, including: the sophisticated European ambience of — Minnehaha Park?

UPDATE: I don’t remember what happened Saturday. Alas! Another day lost forever to the unforgiving void! Ehh, so what.

I do remember that we spent Sunday afternoon at Minnehaha Park. It was Norway Day, altho I don’t know how anybody could have easily figured that out, considering the anemic little stage program and the paltry crop of merchants selling  swords and hauberks and shields and leather leggings and woodcarvings of tomtes riding on pigs and denim vests decorated with rosemauling and Lutefisk Chef aprons — you know, the usual.

We tried the Sea Salt Eatery, and agreed it was several jumps above the kind of place you’d expect to find operating in a Minneapolis Park Board refectory. The cajun shrimp po’boy sammiches SYTU* and I had were really good, but SETU’s** squid steak sandwich was even better. Definitely worth a return visit.

Maybe it was because of the World Cup final game showing on the mini-jumbotron TV in the refectory to a big crowd of mostly Italy fans, or maybe it was because of the corgis and daschhunds sitting calmly at their people’s feet under the bistro tables outside the Sea Salt — a common sight both inside and outside many European cafes, but pretty rarely seen in Minneapolis.

I don’t know why it was, but yesterday Minnehaha Park had a distinctive Modern Euro atmosphere that I’ve never noticed before. Gone, or mostly gone, was the geriatric white belt and golf pants set that has populated Norway Days and Svenskarnas Dags since the dawn of time. The doddering unfashionable oldsters have been replaced by large numbers of buff, tanned, over-60s bicyclists wearing Pearl Izumi and Under Armour. The place looked like the Senior Circuit of the Tour de France. When did that happen?

There was nary a feed cap nor a JC Penney polyester pantset to be seen in the entire park. Just crowds of elegant grandparents in batik strolling with their adorable grandbabies in organic cotton by Hanna Anderson.

Uhh, gee — can anyone tell I just saw a movie about the fashion industry?

*Surly Younger Teenaged Unit

**Surly Elder Teenaged Unit

Posted: July 10th, 2006 under Blogistan, Cinema, General, General, I only drink Liberally.
Comments: none