Still find it wild that my YMCA has a 9/11 Memorial “StairMaster Challenge” that they advertise every September.

So the pope has some inspiring words on cinema, yes. But he (or his speech writers) also quotes D.W. Griffith without any recognition of the racist caricatures he helped proliferate. So all told, a very on point Catholic response: some progressivism mixed with some inadvertent racist acquiescence.

Yesterday I was publicly shamed at the gay bar when a friend asked me what I thought a Stanley cup was and in all seriousness answered “Isn’t that a hockey thing?” The look of horror on his face and accusation of being a bro were priceless.

The Republican president is a pedophile who has doubled my healthcare costs and let scores of violent criminals out of jail. But a Democratic mayor-elect wants to make busses free in a city I don't live in. I have never felt more politically homeless.

Nothing could make me less likely to want to shop at a store than store-mandated faux optimism, friendliness, smiling/staring/asking how my day is going. Y’all need to learn how to be human. This is not the way.

I feel like we have the opportunity to turn David Lynch's quote into this moment's "Keep Calm and Carry On" and it's a far better rallying cry too.

Real?

All day, many of you have been asking for a Cheney obituary from me. Get ready:

It is right to remember people as they were, for their deeds, and in the case of politicians for what they did and made possible, and not sugarcoat or produce milquetoast revisionist hagiographies. This man was vile and America is worse off because he existed.

One of my strongest compulsions is the desire to get stickers fully off of products I buy, and this irrational need has resulted most recently in me accidentally stabbing my thumb with a razor.

Will I ever be able to grade essays quickly? Survey says…

“If every disappointment, criticism, wrongdoing, or trauma is treated as a sacrifice that one must give up to God, how is introspection, change, or personal responsibility even possible?” My therapist is going to love me this week.

The punishments will continue until morale improves!

I remember when the idea of a “dark room” at a club used to mean something.

Frantically patting myself down looking for my car keys that were in one of my two hands frantically patting myself down looking for my car keys.

Bizarro Bucket Boy was a success: I wore buckets and held singlets. This made sense to my friends, and that’s all that matters! Have fun, be weird.

It’s a beautiful day out there!

My favorite coffee shop in Durham is super dog friendly and today all of the dogs are in costumes because they’re doing a free Halloween pet photo shoot. I am in heaven.

It just doesn't feel like Halloween if I am not frantically finishing up my costume and also bleeding all over my costume because I accidentally took a razor to my thumb!

lmao david byrne showed the video of the ice agents tripping over themselves while trying to run after a biker on wacker drive during the “life during wartime” segment of his chicago show tonight

Shout out to my fellow state employees of North Carolina who are discovering our health insurance next year will cover less and cost twice as much as last year. Oh, and we have received no cost of living adjustment or raise to our salary because we're 4 months behind having a state budget.

It should be illegal to use the sound effect of a siren on the radio.

Ugh, I have a vague note in my calendar that "_________ visits Durham" for seven days in November and I don't know who _________ is or if this means I offered to let them stay with me. Love my brain.

People in coffee shops who take calls on speaker phone are wild. Y'all need to rediscover shame.

“Being a lil gay found to be fun, heteros discover.” ~ NYT

Time to bring back Douglas Crimp’s “How to Have Promiscuity in an Epidemic” or my own article “Vocalizing Queer Desire: Phone Sex, Radio Smut, and the AIDS Epidemic.” Fucking AI drivel.

Meta, referencing the people they’re not firing: “Each person will be more load-bearing” Me: GAY! www.miamiherald.com/news/busines...

First day back at the gym in a month and I successfully punched myself in the mouth with my hydroflask, which simultaneously led me to bite my lip. Now I’m bleeding out into my mouth. Ahh, to be alive!

Does anyone happen to have a Broadway quality CATS (the musical)costume of the character Deuteronomy that they would be willing to overnight ship me? I have the opportunity to do the funniest thing in my class this week.

Public universities that sign onto Trump's "Loyalty Oath" will violate the constitutional rights of their students.🤯 AAUP General Counsel Veena Dubal breaks down why in this clip from our recent AAUP TV update. @veenadubal.bsky.social #DefendHigherEd

That one time your grad students surprised you at the Wolfpack Pictures screening by having everyone dress up as "bald" characters, but they didn't tell you because you're already a bald character.

There is nothing hotter to me than the surprising combination of youthfulness & visible signs of aging. A guy who goes grey in his twenties. Crows feet and abs. A bald spot and buns of steel. You get the point. I'm a whore for anachronism. We should age in different directions. Time out of balance.

Favorite moment of the day: a friend I haven’t heard from in a minute messages me out of the blue with: “Ok, say we’re designing a t-shirt—what objects or logos best symbolize gooning?”

I have been sick now (to varying degrees) for ten days and I'm very over it. Ready to have a new relationship to snot, as in, we're gonna go on a break soon I hope.

Looking forward to seeing which porn bot follower will push me into my 2000 followers era! I’m stuck in 1997.

Tonight!!! Presales end at 5pm. Tickets available at the door. #Durham www.eventbrite.com/e/the-pink-t...

This is my moment

I don't think I've ever had a student analyze a film too closely, although now I want to experience that, or maybe I should create an exercise that just keeps honing in further and further, getting increasingly particular. Spend ten minutes writing about five seconds.

This!

Mamdani talking lucidly and passionately about trans rights and history in a video that should frankly shame every politician who has hemmed and hawed and triangulated and said, "Well, but sports..." It's not that hard to tell the truth and stand for what's right. www.youtube.com/watch?v=bEvV...

We're hiring at USC Cinematic Arts! Non-tt, teaching faculty. Focused on teaching our famed Intro to Cinema class. Phd Req This is a cool role w/a lot of influence for the whole cinema program at USC. I'd be applying if I weren't in a gig Be my colleague! usccareers.usc.edu/job/los-ange...

Ah, nothing like being on the phone for an hour and a half, trying to get my insurance to agree to give me the medicine I take regularly and have a prescription for. Oh, you won't let me use my home pharmacy anymore? Cool cool cool cool fun thanks cool cool thanks American healthcare fun fun thanks.

Abject cookie failure. These vegan chocolate chips would not rise. Gonna need some rebranding ideas for my students’ bake sale. Blargh.

I joined AAUP this summer and encourage my fellow academics to join the fight for academic freedom.

This is why I love Chicago so much. Their “we will fuck with you” reserves are BOTTOMLESS.

I did it! I woke up!

The @aaup.org beat Marco Rubio in court, with a Reagan-appointed judge ruling that ideological deportations obviously violate the first amendment. These cases cost money. And we need millions of people moving together to make them stick. If you're faculty in the US, join AAUP and join the fight.

Normally I hate writing my bio when I’m asked to do so for an event, but today as I listed projects that I’m worked on, it made me feel lucky to be able to do the kind of research/writing I do.

The amount of a “Star Trek: The Next Generation” A.I. shipping vids about Riker and O’Brien that I’ve seen in the last week has been… well, it’s been a lot.

Real