Jamie Moyer Didn't Quite Go Out In Style, But He Came Damn Close

Uncle Goober mentioned that he wanted to start a feature on his Geocities website where he would wait 28 days or 30 days before reviewing something. Kind of like having a first second look or sort of like just a really lazy reviewer who can't get his shit together. It's a good idea, which is why I'm stealing it.

That said, I'm not really stealing it because A) he probably will never get around to doing it so no one would be the wiser and B) I'm not really waiting 30 days to say something about something because I already jumped the gun and said what I wanted to say about [doing math here] about 38 days ago.

Except I've changed my mind a bit about HBO's Girls, especially after seeing how thick subsequent episodes have been laying on what was initially kind of just a slight parallel with Sex and the City (the one-to-one archetypes and the on-again-off-again relationship with Adam/Mr. Big kind of stuck out, not to mention the juxtaposition of the unpublished writer who spends too much time on Twitter with Carrie Bradshaw and I guess the fact that it takes place in New York Fuckin' City).

So if the show is sort of a gritty verité take on Sex and the City, then maybe Girls is HBO's way of buying carbon credits against their campy excesses with Sex and the City. Which is kind of a clever thought experiment, although I kind of wonder to what end. And then I think about Michael Patrick King and Judd Apatow sitting at the top of two shows about women and kind of get skeeved out, which is when I decide that's all I have to say about it, and mercifully cut myself free from the historical present. Jen thinks it's pretty funny though, which is why it's still occupying my mental space.

Fortunately There's Still Time To Tackle This Terrible Dessert Culture That Persists

We were driving through Central Pennsylvania this past weekend and along US 11 somewhere there was a McDonalad's billboard that I really wish I would have taken a picture of. That's a good lesson: You don't know when you're going to want to return to something, so you should take a picture of all sorts of stuff.

Anyway, the billboard was pretty simple: Just a picture of an Egg McMuffin with probably a McDonald's "M" arch logo and, if I remember correctly, just two words: "300 Calories."

OK, I thought to Google it and found a picture here. It's actually a picture of an Egg McMuffin with the words "eye-opener" and underneath that it reads "300 calories." There's a "M" arch logo in the corner with the tag "I'm lovin' it," which is that tag that they've had for a while now.

We were on our way to a family event, and when we arrived it didn't take all that long for some of Jen's relatives to bring up what kind of silliness the mayor of New York City was up to. We knew, we knew. Sure, banning cups is silly, and what was worse, etc., etc. We'd been talking about it all week, so we had already mastered the talking points.

I think that's the way the mayor would like it: His administration proposes something "bold," people start talking about it, George Will denounces it on This Week and then all of the sudden not only has he invaded the mental space of people across the Eastern seaboard but you're also trying to explain how and when New York City became so fucking stupid about shit.

Which is why I wish I had a picture of that billboard, because it basically exemplifies how one of the mayor's other stupid ideas ended up so backwards. After all, New York City "pioneered" calorie counts a few years back, on the theory that if people knew how many calories they were consuming, they would think twice about what they ate.

Sometime during the first week of mayorally mandated calorie counts, Jen was at a Dunkin' Donuts, where she overheard a lady remark, surprised, that a doughnut had fewer calories than a bagel, so she would take a doughnut instead. Which is exactly what McDonald's perfected in this Egg McMuffin ad campaign I saw — it might be shit, but it's only 300 calories of shit. Or as they say:

Our signature sandwich is made with a freshly cracked Grade A egg with extra lean Canadian bacon and a slice of melty American cheese, held together by a freshly toasted English muffin. And all that for 300 calories.

Brilliant. They took the mayor's message and co-opted it perfectly.

And that's the biggest problem with the calorie stuff — it's so shallow. The message becomes that it's not so much about healthy eating as it is staying thin. Maybe you know someone who skips meals in order to indulge in vodka drinks later? That's the mayor.

The frustrating thing about the talking head debates was that the "opposition" was the New York State Restaurant Association, which is fine of course — they have a lot at stake — but it meant that the discussion was too polite. So while you listened to all this neutered talk about "serious concerns," "proper advocacy and voluntary measures" and being "adamantly opposed to increased regulation", what you really wanted to hear was someone finally say that "This is fucking stupid." And then instead of hearing equivocal nonsense about New Yorkers being "supportive of taking bold steps to address the problem of obesity" or some such, the headline might read "New Yorkers Find Latest Mayoral Initiative 'Fucking Stupid.'"

For a few days I wondered if anyone outside of the administration actually supported the idea. The closest thing seemed to be some man-on-the-street soundbites of people who thought that obesity was a problem. Then I saw some moron in Newsweek or whatever it is unsheathe some contrarian bullshit about how he was happy that the mayor wants to crack down on soda because soda is "treacly" and gross, and that the mayor probably should double down and mandate that burgers be no bigger than four ounces because larger burgers are equally gross. And then I really wish someone got ahead of the curve and instead of worrying about personal liberty — because that's so "theoretical" — they'd just come out and call this all what it is: Fucking Stupid.

Either that or maybe someone — people in Newsweek or Thomas Farley — can finally come out against dessert. Maybe the president could do this, because I remember he doesn't like sweets. Because there's really no point to dessert — it's just extra calories, mostly empty ones, and loaded with refined sugar. Have you been in a dessert shop? Have you seen the slow, sad twirl of spoons in treacly sugary goo? There's certainly nothing healthy about desserts — as Thomas Farley might put it, "they are particularly associated with weight gain, associated with diabetes and associated with heart disease." And someone should finally do something about it. Maybe even the mayor of New York City.

The Breast A Man Can Get

To me, the issue with Time's "Are You Mom Enough?" cover is not so much about the depiction of breastfeeding, the fact that the child depicted is still breastfeeding at three or the idea that this the lady in the picture is attractive (and somehow that makes the image "pornographic") but rather now that child will forever be known as the kid who, at three, was pictured standing on a chair suckling at his momma's teet.

We take all manner of goofy pictures of Animal and Jen is always joking that she is going to have a ball showing them to Animal's future prom date, the joke being that of course we wouldn't embarrass him like that. We never, ever joked that we were going to take a picture of him breastfeeding and use it as the cover of Time. Although, believe me, there are quite a few that would make the cut, they're just that cute.

No, we decided early on that we would never take a picture of Animal and use it in a way that seemed in any way exploitative. In doing so, we realized that we may miss out on many good opportunities for publicity, but ultimately, we felt that exploiting our child was probably just not worth it in the end. You know, issues of dignity/self-esteem (or whatever they're calling it nowadays).

Then again, who are we to judge? What, if anything, is wrong with using your child to make a statement about something you believe strongly in? Even if he is teased mercilessly in a few years, that's just a reflection of his tormentors' small minds.

I was telling my own parents about this story and explaining that it had something to do with "attachment parenting" — "whatever that is," I added. A little while later Jen explained that every time I strap the little Monkey on with the carrier I was, in fact, practicing attachment parenting. And that we actually own the book the article was apparently about (though I don't know that there is an actual article).

"You're not breastfeeding him until he's three though, right?" I asked.

No, she said, these people are taking the concept to an extreme. In her opinion, she added. She does not judge other people's parenting.

Which of course is the first thing you learn as a new parent — or really, the second thing. The first thing you learn is that you're kind of an idiot, and it follows logically that you wouldn't be judge-y about stuff. Unless your a huger idiot, that is.

So, what do you do? Oh right, not put your child on the front cover of Time with your tit in his mouth, because, jeez, that's just kind of mean, you know? I mean, right?