On Facebook, Joelle Stepien Baillard posted an old cartoon (pubished 8/8/94) by New Yorker cartoonist Sam Gross:
(#1)
A cartoon with a translation from one world to another. There’s the world of cats, in which they go outside to hunt small animals; and then, simultaneously, the world of (human) household relationships, in which someone going out on an errand will often ask if they can get something for the others while they’re out.
That gives us a talking cat.
A pair of still lifes — digital compositions — by Stephanie Shih for Halloween, with the customary flowers in vases, prominently supplemented by Halloween candy: a large lollipop on the left, a candy stick on the right:
(#1) Stephanie: “ode to childhood memories of Halloween candy”
(You might want to enlarge the images to examine the details.)
(From my posting backlog. Not for kids or the sexually modest.)
The Daily Jocks ad (for the premium homowear firm Pump!) from May 29th, a little masterpiece of the hard-cruise soft-porn genre, the underwear model as steamy rentboy:
(#1) A hard cruise’s a-gonna make you crawl, my blue-eyed son, my darling young one
Piercingly cruisy insolent contempt, combined with a display of the goods available, in a pitsntits display, plus an oiled torso and legs spread so that his crotch can be thrust forward for his trick.
But the hard cruise is mostly conveyed with the face: direct gaze, narrowed eyes, and tight mouth.
(This posting starts with a homoerotic Daily Jocks ad — nothing close to the line visually or textually, but you might still want to exercise your judgment — moves through Doan’s pills and ends with musician Rod Stewart.)
… but what story? They’re just pictures, after all, subject to many interpretations. Even when the creator’s intentions are clear, there are often two (or more) intended stories for the same picture — typically, one literal and one allusive (consider still lifes with moral messages). In any case, other viewers are free to see stories the creator did not. And sometimes the pictures have no clear interpretation.
Which brings me to the Daily Jocks mailing of 10/26:
(#1) At the gym, two hunks eye each other’s crotches with facial expressions that would be heavy sexual cruises if exchanged face to face
Well, it’s a menswear ad, and comes with no explicit clues as to how it’s to be interpreted — maybe just as a generic homoerotic encounter (certainly homoerotic). But still you wonder: what’s their story? Are they an established couple, shown here appreciating each other’s bodies for the camera? Or did they just come across one another in the gym and are now setting up a trick? Or maybe merely complimenting each other through their gaze and facial expressions, each conveying that he thinks the other is really hot? (Nice body, buddy.)
Four photos (by Kim Darnell) from yesterday showing the current state of my patio, including a bird feeder pole system and its four stations for feeding birds of different sorts: two more hanging feeders (to add to the three feeders installed previously), a hummingbird feeder, and an open pan, a few feet off the ground, filled with seeds and nuts.
(About my life, though with a linguistic note along the way)
From Ann Burlingham in Pittsburgh, locally sourced gifts to comfort me in very tough times. In particular, cookies from Barlow Bakes in Ford City PA; and a flour sack tea towel (from the “love, Pittsburgh” site) with text on Pittsburghese.
Observed on the (regrettably short-lived) tv show Martial Law in recent reruns, the hard-working actor Louis Mandylor, playing a Los Angeles police detective Louis Malone, paired with the title character Sammo Law, a Chinese detective and martial artist (played by Sammo Hung). Notable as a prime member of what I’ve called the Acting Corps and also as an exemplar of amiable high masculinity.
Mandylor in a stock p.r. photo:
(#1)
Yesterday’s morning name, which (in my mind) came unavoidably with the Andrews Sisters’ 1944 version of the song in English (a feature of my childhood), in which tico tico represents the tick tock of a cuckoo clock.
(#1) The Andrews Sisters’ 1944 recording
You can listen to this recording here.
Then it turned out that it has a much more complex history.
From reader BJP on 10/22, from The Cut website “There’s Drama in the Queer Penguin Community” by Amanda Arnold on 10/22/20:
Drama is afoot in the Dutch queer penguin community after two gay lovers with a reputation for trouble stole an entire nest of eggs from a neighboring lesbian couple at the same zoo.
Within the queer penguin community at large, fostering eggs is relatively common: On multiple occasions, zoos and aquariums have gifted unhatched eggs to gay and lesbian couples exhibiting behavior that suggests they’re desperate for a chick, like building mock nests out of pebbles. But rather than demanding the same of their caretakers, one pair of African penguins at the DierenPark zoo in Amersfoort instead took the matter into their own claws by snatching eggs from two mothers-to-be, according to DutchNews.nl. The conniving boys have since been sharing caregiving duties, taking turns keeping the eggs warm and foraging for fish.
I know, I know, guys just take whatever they want.
