"The Martyr of the Solway" by Millais
...or a redhead, as it's more commonly known here in the USA. I'd ask you to just ask this woman, but she died in 1680. Her name was Julianne McCambridge, aka "The Martyr of the Solway". Poor Julianne had the misfortune to win the Scottish Lottery, which should be a good thing, right? Wrong! Number one, no one expected a WOMAN to win the lottery; Number two, She could READ (this at a time when most men couldn't) and, Number three...well, just look at her! Need I say more? She was declared a witch, and sentenced to death. The last time a witch was killed in Scotland before Julianne was 40 years before, and that one was burned at the stake. By 1680, that was considered somewhat distasteful (sooo 1640...) and so they decided on "death by three tides", which was supposed to be more humane. Since there were no tides in her vicinity, Julianne was taken to "the Solway", an area of Scotland where the tides rose up just high enough to drown someone. Julianne was tied (or chained) to a post in the bay, and as the tides came in, she recited psalms to the music of old Scottish tunes, and the story of the "Witch of Lambert" began to turn to "The Martyr of the Solway".
Now undoubtedly, Julianne's education and sex had a great deal to do with her misfortune (as well as the greed of the men in her community). But look at that HAIR. You can't tell me that doesn't have something to do with it. I say this as a woman who is "ginger" in all senses of the word (spicy, red-haired and queer). Think I'm being paranoid? Just look at all these "fun facts" I discovered about redheads:
Did you know...?
1. Redheads were once thought to be witches? Popular theory says they were thought to be conceived during their mother's periods, due to "uncontrollable lust" (which somehow was also the fault of their mothers). Which also leads us to...
2. Redheads are thought to have 3x the sex drive of a "normal" person. This probably has it's root in #1, but must still be widely believed today -- just try googling "redhead" and see how many porn sites you get.
3. Redheads were also thought to be vampires or werewolves.
4. Mary Magdalene is often pictured as having red hair.
5. Redheads are thought to have "bad tempers" or, in more pc terminology, "anger control problems".
6. Redheads are 1% of the world's total population, with the largest concentration of us occurring in the UK (about 12%) However, redheads occur naturally everywhere in the world, including Africa and Asia.
7. Prince Charles' first words upon seeing Prince Harry were "Ugh..he's got that rusty hair..." (and he says the divorce was HER fault!)
8. The term "ginger" comes from Cockney rhyming slang, "ginger-beer/queer", so being ginger is equated with being homosexual, as well as having red hair, and has long been considered a derisive term.
9. "Gingerism" has been compared to racism in the UK, and there are actually support groups to help people cope with their "gingerness" (that is, the red-haired kind).
10. Not to mention such terms and sayings as "redheaded step-child", "redheaded bastard at the family reunion", "carrot-top", "I'd rather be dead than red in the head", "hey kid, your hair's on fire," and so forth.
Despite all this, or maybe because of it, I have come to embrace my gingerness. Ironically, this comes in a time in my life when (sob) the red is actually leaving my hair! All those years, I longed to be anything but ginger, then, when I finally come to love it, it starts to go away. To rectify this, I did what any sane woman would do -- I asked my daughter to help me color it (Did I say sane?). Therefore, instead of the new penny shade of my youth, it is now a deep, dark, reddish-PURPLE.(I tried to fix it, but trust me -- only time will fix this).
But red is more than hair -- it is my heart, my soul. It's my pale skin, freckles, and tendency to bruise. It taught me empathy, to root for the little gal/guy. No matter what color my hair on my scalp is, I'll always be ginger....
Here's some lovely links for y'all:
South Park, Cartman's "Ginger Kids" Speech
Realm of Redheads, website For Us, By Us
Genetics of red hair
The Redhead Cluster Phenomenon
BBC News Magazine " Is Gingerism As Bad As Racism?"
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
It's Not Easy Being Ginger...
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
57 comments:
Five minutes before I read this I handed Anne Of Green Gables to my daughter to read. If you know Anne, you know she hated her red hair, and her long standing feud with Gilbert started when he called her "carrots."
I've always loved red hair, and often wish I had it. Alas, mine was dark brown and now is snow white.
Shado...please post of photo of your locs...sometime...would love to see them.
I really appreciated your post here and didn't know about gingerism. ready to research and learn...thanks for the links.
I'm not sure where I fall with this. I had very strawberry-blonde hair as a baby; everyone thought I was going to be a redhead. But I went blonde instead, which I never liked.
So I've been dyeing it auburn for several years now. I like it much better this way. My heritage is English and Scottish; my skin...well, I think it was someone on the DTWOF blog that used the phrase "a woman of pallor." That's me. (I'm used to folks asking me, "Do you feel O.K.?" if they're not used to The Pastiness.) Also, any slight tap causes a bruise. (What can I say? I'm a delicate flower. A delicate fucking flower.) My hair is also very thick, as the links Shadocat provided say is common with red hair. (I didn't know that.) Over and over, people are shocked when they find out that the auburn's not my natural color.
So. I don't qualify as ginger, but in my family, I'm most definitely the red-headed stepchild. And Liza, when I go "gray," I'm so hoping I get the beautiful snow white you have - it's stunning.
I've always felt Anne Shirley and I should be "bosom friends", even if she is fictional. We have so much in common, besides hair color; little shado was once falsely accused of stealing a piece of jewelry from an aunt;she once accidently got a childhood friend drunk (we tried to make popsicles with Mogan David), and now, of course, I've dyed my hair a heinous color.
The "gingerism" seems to be a bigger problem in the UK than it is here, but I think many Americans are guilty of it, if only in a "mild way"---despite what those Yanks who commented to the BBC said.
I'm working on getting some pictures together, just so I can put a face to my voice; however, I'm reluctant to let any picture taken of me right now, as I'm sufferring from a bad haircut, as well as purple hair. I wouldn't mind having snow white hair, liza; once upon a time, Bill Clinton's hair was red, and now he's a "snowy". Maybe that could happen to me too? Just hope I don't have to be president first.
And ginjoint- Having strawberry blonde/self-turned auburn hair makes you divinely ginger in my book...
For the love of Ginjy...
Liza, your "locks like the snaw" literally make me swoon. I'm hoping to reach that state as well; my father did before he died.
My mother's father and his four siblings were all red-haired and over six feet tall, including the women. Lanky and well-read and each radical in their own way. Mama hoped I'd turn out like them. I didn't get the red hair or the height, but I obliged her with the politics. Her uncle Auther, who adopted her and raised her as his own when she was orphaned as a baby, was a Wobbly who was called "Red" by all the locals in his rural part of Texas, and we've never been sure if it was the hair or the socialism.
I have, at various times, dyed my hair red, the latest a shade called "Celtic Dawn". It always looked good, although I don't have the pallor and am definitely not a delicate fucking flower. Do post the photos, Shado. If I can ever get my scanner operational, I'll do the same.
Now, for the interthread tie-in, when I lived in an all-dyke flat in SF, I once took my next-door neighbor Joan with me to Michigan. She was one of those curly-locked redhaired Jews. The first day (circa 1981 or 82), there was a workshop of redheads discussing all the stuff you've mentioned, Shado -- a little valley crammed with red in various shades. They radicalized each other and spent the rest of Michigan traveling about in packs, shouting their liberation slogans. They were very prominent at Teresa Trull's performance, I remember. It was eye-opening and extremely fun.
shado,
I loved the picture of Julianne. And I have always loved Anne of Green Gables, and to this day, on the occasions when I meet someone really special, I tell them we are "kindred spirits."
Regarding Ginger folk, I have loved two different people (20 years apart) with truly "ginger" (like the root) -colored hair--that slightly golden copper color where their leg hair glows in the sun...and strangely, neither had a fiery temper nor a huge libido, but they were both lovely, gentle souls. I suppose the Ginger Tribe has its non-conformists, like everyone else!
While I am sure your cockney rhyming derrivation is correct, perhaps the color of the noble ginger root is implicated in there too!
And then there's Julie Brown, once known as "the hottest little henna-head on MTV."
Mr gator and I both think red hair is sexy, especially the Irish Setter shades(bright and dark at the same time). And like my mother, I have a thing for blue-eyed men.
So I married a green-eyed blond who is now brown haired. and he married a hazel-eyed brunette who is now salt and peppery.
My ancestry is mostly Irish and English, and I too am a person of pallor. All six of my sibs were blue-eyed blonds as children, though some have become brown hairs and one of the brownies is almost auburn.
I have some odd hair color genetics.
My mother was born blond, but suddenly truned to dark brown around puberty, and it's slowly faded to light brown with grey as she aged.
Mt father was white-blond as a child, and it got darker thorugh his teens. In his 20s it was totally grey, and by his mid30s was completely white and stayed that way.
One more thing-ginger tabby cats(aka red, orange, yellow, and marmalade) are usually, but not always, male. I've heard that that only about 10% are female. Feline orangeboys have a reputation for being the most indiscriminately affectionate of cats. I've only had one, but Rudy Paootie sure fit the stereotype.
I've had three ginger cats in my life and I can confirm---they were all little "affection sluts" (I say this with love)--that is, none of them ever knew a stranger. An axe-murderer could've broken into the house, and I'm sure each of them would have jumped into his arms demanding to be loved. My daughter's ginger cat (named, of all things--Orangeamo--and yes, she's the one who died my hair!) is so beloved by her friends, that they even created a MySpace page for him. When the time comes to bring in another kitty, I'm hoping it will be an orange tabby
Oops! I meant to send a shout out to my girl Silvio! It's so good to hear from you!
I sell natural/herbal-based hair color, among other things, and lemme tell ya, "bright copper" is one of the most popular hair colors. People WANT red hair.
Yes, Shado, show us your hair! :)
I've heard of "suicide blonds"(dyed by their own hand) so Im sure there are plenty of suicide reheads.
In Kipling's Kim, he describes a habit practised by some subcontinenal Muslim men. They didn't dye their head hair, but many of them dyed their beards with henna to hide the grey. I didn't know what henna-dyed hair looked like when I first read it, so I imagined these characters with crayola-red beards.
I've never quite understood those products designed to recreate your hairs "natural color." Seems to me that if you have grey to conceal, then grey *is* your hair's natural color.
One more family legend-my maternal grandmother always had dark brown hair, and when she died at 67 she still had few if any grey or white hairs. My mother has verified that my grandmother would *never* change her hair color, and it was naturally unfaded.
Rudy Patootie, 1996-2004 Best Cat Ever, with apologies to Leela Mew who previously held the title.
Rudy was an orange tabby with white in sort of a Boston terrier pattern. They said he was 1/4 Siamese.
PS: I've known many cats, but none ever approached Rudy's level of love sluttitude. Human, dog, or boycat, he loved everyone. The odd exception was he hated female cats. Since he also liked to hide in closets, we figured he must be gay.
He would jump on anyone's shoulder till we taught him to get permission first, and he would fetch. he liked to drop catnip mice in his water bowl and make catnip tea.
he liked to drop toys on our sleeping faces. One memorable time it was a live mouse.
I miss him yowling in my face demanding to be let under the covers.
Judas was a redhead, or so says popular legend.
My parents have a female (mostly) orange cat, and she has the biggest attitude problem I've ever seen in my life. In fact, her name is Princess, as in Princess and the pea, because there's always something that's not to her liking. I attribute it to her being gorgeously ginger on top and rich, creamy white underneath, on her belly. She obviously thinks she is simply too beautiful to suffer the jostling of the common herd.
Finally, I saw men all over Central Asia and India who had dyed their beards red with henna. There's a good picture of just such a Pakistani man on this webpage: http://www.sheherazad13.com/. He's about halfway down the page, in a big block of pictures under the heading about the Karakorum Hwy.
Thanks for the link, Kellan. Did you notice the orange and white kitty further down the page?
Is there *any* topic I can't work around to being cat-related?
English comedienne Catherine Tate has a series of sketches about "gingers" being persecuted. The first is set in a police station, and is about a woman who's been "ginger-bashed". (You can see a very poor-quality video of it on YouTube here.) The clueless police suggest hair dye, and the woman says "Don't you think I've tried that? I dyed my hair and my eyebrows black when I was 15, but at the end of the day — I've still got freckly arms." It's actually a great parody. (In a bit I couldn't find on YouTube, a "ginger counselor" comforts the woman, telling her "the police are some of the most ginger-phobic people in society".) There's a better quality clip of a subsequent bit (in a "ginger shelter" called Russet Lodge) here.
Now, when I saw these sketches I had no idea that prejudice against red-headed people was such a real problem in the UK (see this terrifying story from the BBC, as well as the audio interview linked from it).
josiah,
That story about the family being abused for their hair color I find totally surprising. I had no idea it was an issue. But I suppose most prejudices are pretty absurd viewed by people outside the cultural circle.
I am reading a book about Alexander the Great (not a redhead; I believe he was a blond)--Mary Renault's historical fiction, THE PERSIAN BOY, and from it I learned that adult males in ancient Persia were known by their beards, whereas, castrated eunuchs did not develop facial hair. I don't quite understand the biology of it, but the fact that Asian men dye their beards fits in with the beard equaling masculinity. But the fact that they dye them henna either means that it is the only dye easily available, OR that they value a bit of (ginger) style! :)
shado! Thanks for the warm welcome! I concur about orange cats...I have known two, and they were both sweeties, although the most recent one was into toe-nipping as a kitten, but he got over it and became very affectionate. The older orange cat was most beloved by his owner, a presbyterian minister and my father-in-law; a very affectionate man himself; probably an orange cat in a past life!
That clip from the BBC WAS a little scary, although I'd recently read about that story somewhere else, the audio really brings ir all home. Those poor kids!
silvio, I didn't know you were a Mary Renault fan! Have you read "The King Must Die", or "The Last of the Wine"?
How could I forget that the Harry Potter books have an entire ginger family?
The Weasleys also remind me that twins are far more common in large fictional families than in large nonfictional families. Wiht a set of twins who are similar if not identical you get two characters for the writing effort of one. Hmph.
I dunno, I was a redhead all through my thirties (Lady Clairol Medium Auburn) and I never encountered anything but admiration.
Jana C.H.
Seattle
Saith E.G. Forbes: Never spoil a good story with too much truth.
Daisy; I'd be interested in that hair color; could you e-mail me at shadocat55@yahoo.com?
When I was perusing a royalty-free sight, I found this picture of Julianne, and just fell in love with it. I'd read the story before, and when I went back to do my research, I saw a couple other renditions of "The Witch of Lambert", but this was my favorite, partly because she looks so contempory in a Kate Winslet-y sort of way...
SILVIO! Play that squeezebox for us, girl.
I read "The Persian Boy" as a late teen, when finding Lesbian or gay literature was verra verra difficult. I still remember lines from it, 35 years later. If I have a copy, I'll dig it out and re-read it. A couple of decades later, I found out Renault was a pearldiver. Go figure.
During the late 1970s/early 1980s, dykes who were blonde or had light brown hair in the SF area got into the trend of using henna to turn their hair red. Everybody thought it was cool in a way that dyeing hair would not have been. Something about henna being from outside the U.S., I suppose. I used brown henna on my hair twice a month, just because it was supposed to be healthy. As I write this, the strong odor of it comes back to me in memory.
Kellan, your post (and those wonderful photos linked) led me into my family's joke herstory. From shortly after my birth until I was four, we lived in Calcutta, and my little brother Bill was conceived there. Mama would often say, laughingly, that he was actually the son of a red-bearded Seikh taxi driver, and Daddy would laugh along with her. Now I wonder if there was a particular taxi driver they were referencing, or if it had another general meaning. I don't think it was racist, not coming from my mother -- she adored India and gave up being Christian as a result of her plunge into Indian religions. Your link gives me a "red beard" to visualize her joke.
Daisy, nice to see you again! Your icon, even when I look at it full view, is a little hard to make out. A red and blue skull with a lightning bolt zigging across it diagonally, is that right? Does it have a specific meaning?
Josiah, our honorary dyke feminist! Thanks ever so for the Youtube links. Youtube is my favorite international yard sale.
And Little Gator, I'm assuming you're proclaiming Rudy Patootie "Best Cat Ever" in Gatordom, because around here, that title is reserved for Alice Booboo (ginger and white Manx). My current catmate, Dinah, frequently abjures Alice to "Go into the light!" when I start reminiscing. Alice's ashes, in a small wooden box at the head of my bed, are the item Dinah most wishes to extract from its nook and push onto the floor. Dinah says you don't have to work to make everything about cats, because everything already IS about cats.
Maggie, Daisy's icon is the symbol of the Grateful Dead!
http://www.dead.net/
Woe is I that no one ever took me up on the suggestion of dtwof deadheads for AB's 2009 book tour...
Hey, Kellan -- here we are conversing on two blogs simultaneously. Must both be night shift workers.
Yikes! (about the Grateful Dead graphic) Goes to show how out of touch I am with some aspects of pop culture. I don't know why I'm embarassed by that one, but I am. Thanks for clueing me in.
Maggie, I was just wondering what you were doing up at that hour. I work nights, but by now it's 2 PM here (I sleep from 6 AM to 12 noon or so) and I'm supposed to be cleaning the apartment for a farewell party tonight. I'm going to go vacuum now and ponder your excellent comment from AB's blog.
*ahem*
make that *an* icon of the Dead, not *the* icon.
I like the bears myself.
Maggie, I'm so honored to be an honorary dyke feminist. Thanks.
I think that the Greek word used to describe Alexander's hair falls somewhere between red and blond. In horses, it's translated as "roan", but it's usually translated as "red-headed" in Homer (Menelaus and Achilles are both described with the same word). My wife is the classical scholar in the family, so I'll ask her for specifics.
In fact, my wife is mad about Mary Renault's books, too. She'll kill me for mentioning this here, but she's written a mytho-historical novel about Achilles and Patroclus, somewhat in the style of Renault's The Bull from the Sea, and is looking for an agent — anyone know any literary agents who might be interested in queer historical fiction?
Josiah, can't wait to read your wife's book -- what's her nom d'plume?
Two suggestions. One is the Frances Goldin agency -- she's handled Dorothy Allison and Barbara Kingsolver, among others. In New Yawk. I have no idea if they do historical fiction or take unsolicited manuscripts, but they are a great agency.
Second is, whoever published Island in the Sea of Time by S.M. Stirling has established themselves as risk-takers with a good eye for success. His trilogy, technically scifi, posits Nantucket Island being removed from the U.S. and sent in toto back in time several thousand years. His main hero is an African-American Lesbian Coast Guard pilot. The history in it impeccable and very progressive. But they published him, and it's a knock-out seller. I keep waiting for the movie...
oof. just spent a few hours chopping up the oak tree, the half that;s down anyway.
toady's job was to cut off all the brush small enough for lopping shears, and drag it off into separate piles. tomorrow we chop them a bit flatter and spread them in the pine grove. Then I get to mow the yellow but still growing grass under it.
Maggie, thanks for the agent suggestions. My wife (who will publish under the name Erin O'Neil) has been going through Writers' Market for agents, to no avail so far, so helpful pointers like these are extremely welcome.
Actually, Maggie, she says that if you want to read the first part (the book is in four volumes) you can email her at erowe(at)student.uchc.edu, and she'll send it to you as an attachment. It's already been dyke-tested by her sister and several of our friends, but all opinions and criticism are welcome. Since it seems that even Jane Austen couldn't get an agent in the current literary market, we don't know how long it will take before it sees print...
My secret shame:
I never could stand jane Austen and have never read a whole book of hers despite many attempts.
I've been told my many people I trust that
she's wonderful but I just don't get it.
Ooohhh, Little Gator, just call me and I'll rush right over and do all your wood chopping for you, 'cause you're like so totally awesome and I can't even speak around you and everything you do is brilliant beyond words and show us some naked butts again and can I be your girlfriend I promise to learn how to not slobber when I'm around you and ... oh, wait. Forgot where I was.
Back to real conversation. Gator, do you have a chainsaw or are you using axes? I love watching the lessons on safe chainsaw use on This Old House, winds up scaring the bejesus out of me every time. In the Lesbian land collective, we heated our house with wood and did a three-day run into the national forest lands every year to gather it (six of us), exhausting work. Then had to chop it all. I was NEVER allowed to even touch a chainsaw. It's not a butch credential, it's about attention span. Or whether you've read Jane Austen.
No, just kidding about that last. If you've read Joyce and Proust, I meant to say.
But in your honor, L.G., I've decided to name the leather gator with rubber jacket you sent me (right here on my monitor) Jane Agitator. Your hand-crafted catnip mouse is still Dinah's Favorite Thing In The World. She periodically re-discovers it in the house and lets out a distinct, primordial cry, deep in her throat. I then hear her scurrying toward me, and in the next minute she drops it on my desk, looking at me with whirling pupils. I throw it across the room, and the hunt is on. She is most grateful. Life with a crip is hard, hard on a Type A kitty.
Maggie, You are soooo bad! What am I ever going to do with you? Wait a minute, don't answer that...
I'm delighted to read about Josiah's wife's book! I love historical novels, particularly from that time period. And May Renault was a pearldiver too? Now if we only had some evidence that Lucy Maud Montgomery was "family" too. my life would be complete!
Maggie's *crazy* about me!
Maggie and gator, sitting in a tree,
K I S S I N G
First comes love, then comes blogging,
then comes gator in her front yard logging.
No chain saws, and I find axing wood to be frustratingly tedious unless I'm splitting wood with a maul(a heavy ax blade made for splitting wood)
First I did what I could with lopping shears. Today I am using a 5" battery powered circular saw. When we get the money we hope to get a small chainsaw. I've used them before but only feel confident enough to use small ones.
Mr Gator is suffering from nerve pain in his leg(he gets it now and then.. he is helping me move the humongous logs but I'm stuck with the rest of the job. He is doing all the housework his leg will allow(he gets killer cramps when he neds it). This is especially good beacuse I'm sweatign so much I need to change clothes every few hours.(eeeuuuw)
The guys who cut down the reswt of it will cut it all inot stove lengths and a friend of ours is paying for the slicing in exchange for the wood. Silly man almost refused cause he has no place to store a whole tree, but we're happy to keep it in our yard for him.
But the part I hate is dragging the smaller stuff into the woods.
I've always hated safety glasses, but have foudn a full face mask is fairly cheap, gives more protection and is far more comfy.
Don't be mad gator, but I'm having a good chuckle, imaging some unknowing hiker coming across you in the wilderness, with your full face mask, and your little chainsaw...
Shado, now I'm laughing too. Gator gave a chill earlier with the line "But the part I hate is dragging the smaller stuff into the woods."
The year Fargo came out, the Christmas gift version of the video came with a snowglobe that had Steve Buscemi's character feeding body parts into a wood chipper. When you shook the globe, mixed in with the floating snow were small pink bits. It was the most fought-over item at the cancer clinic's gift exchange.
Funny you should mention that. I am distantly related to an infamous serial killer, who was fond of dismembering.
Email me if you want to know more. We share an uncommon last name, so I'd rather not say in public.
Well, I e-mailed ms. gator, and wow---what a story! Remember that book written a few years back, "Devil In The White City?" It was about YHAT guy. Plus other books, films etc, made about him. Makes all these recent "scary movies" look like a Disney flick.
On my way to check the lock on the back door...
In case anyone cares, he was my fourth cousin thrice removed, and you have to go back to the 1700s to find our common ancestor.
Damn, gator, I guess I put my foot in my mouth again---yes folks, the ancestor is very, very distant.
For what it's worth, several years ago, I was on yet another geneology kick, and found my children's father and I shared a common ancestor( also 1700's), making our children---well, true Missourians...
Every human being on the planet is related as 30th cousin or closer. Don't sweat it.
And, Little Gator, you know seasoned oak makes for wonderful open-fire cooking, especially for grilling, say, liver...with some fava beans and a nice Chianti?
Oh gawd Maggie---remember my blood pressure problems a couple of days ago? Tomorrow I go to the doc so they can start "checking out my kidneys". Well, I immediately went to the internet to diagnose myself, as one will do, when in the middle of an article about the human kidneys, there appeared KIDNEY RECIPES, for what I hope were kidneys of the non-human variety, although I could be wrong. Anyway, it was a bit unsettling, to say the least...
OT, but did we ever decide the winner of the "Name the Drag King Contest?"
Hey, here's my latest picture (it's pre-dye job). Remember, you asked for it.
Thanks MJ!
Oh Shado,
You're cute as a button!!
and y'all are creeping me out with the serial killer and fava beans!!!
We should decide the winner of the best drag king name..but, how to do it?? how to decide???
that is the question.
I just finished reading the seventh Harry Potter...my daughter and I were the seventh people in line to buy the book at the big shindig at the local...ugh...Borders on the evening of July 20th. Our ticket was drawn so we got to be one of the first ten folks to buy the book..good thing too cause by midnight I was so ready to go home and we were out of the store by 12:05!
Anyway, oh, I really brought that up cause there is at least one instance of someone making a derogatory comment about Ron Weasley's red hair.
Goodnight or maybe good morning...time for me to get some zzzzzzzzs.
I've always hated fava beans.
Someone on YouTube has done one of those video mash-ups of the South Park "ginger kids" scene with clips from the Harry Potter movies: Snape as Mr. Garrison, Draco Malfoy as Cartman, etc. It's here.
Little Gator, you're related to that guy?! How cool and creepy. I wish his mansion was still standing here in Chicago - but I'm macabre like that.
As I'm helping to care for a sick relative, once again my net access (read: net privacy) is spotty. But I'm still able to check in here at least once a day, and you all are helping to keep me sane. (Which is frightening in and of itself, really.)
But thanks.
And Shado? Cool pic. Wish I was a "pureblood" ginger! (Currently reading the latest Harry Potter here.)
It couldn't still be here. The so-called Murder Castle was condemned shortly after the news broke. It was so sloppily and cheaply built that it was structurally unsafe. If it hadn't "mysteriously" burne dit would have been demolished after investigation anyway.
The site was an empty lot from the 1809s through part of the 1930s. during the 30s a post office was built there which still stands. Of course it's said to be haunted.
When he built it Englewood was a Chicago suburb. It's since been swallowed by the city and is a nasty neighborhood in which most buildings are empty ruins. I think its only has a population of 4000 or so, tiny considering it's area and urban location.
scuse me. that should be 1890s not 1809s.
I always thought I'd fit right in with the Weasleys; the thought of someone making fun of Ron's hair make me blood boil! Grrrr!!!
Josiah, that video mash-up was hilarious; I laughed so hard I shot diet coke out my nose...
Oh, I live in Chicago and am very familiar with the...uh...raucous goings-on in that neighborhood. Englewood alone skews our crime statistics, I think.
And I did read "Devil in the White City" - I live a block away from Daniel Burnham's grave site. It's beautiful; the best in the city, I think. He (and his family) are on an island in a lagoon that you reach by a little foot bridge. Nothing but the best for him - he's one of our local heroes. When I walk through the cemetery, I always stop and say hello, and update him on the current events in the city.
I had almost given up this redhead post as done and dead; and then we became innundated with the misfortunes of poor Lindsay Lohan (although this pop culture moment in the media is probably meant to keep us from discussing more important things---such as; isn't there a war going on somewhere?)
Back to Lindsay; I think I make have found the source of part of her problems: Gingerism!
Think that's a stretch? Friday afternoon, I watched Vh1; and while waiting for the intellectually stimulating "Flava of Love", I caught the end of a tabloid show, where they showed the now infamous film clip of the rich , waste-of-space-on-the-earth-millionaire-playboy proclaiming she was a "firecrotch" and "she has freckles crawling out of her...". well, you get the picture. Apparently, after this happened, Lidsay dropped a dangerous amount of weight,covered up her freckles with a spray-on tan, and went through a variety of haircolors before settling on the current blonde.
Now certainly, I'm not saying this is the source of all her probems. But I have noticed a disturbing trend among female entertainers/actresses who start out Red. For example:
Bette Midler - Once a curly-curvy redhead with a sprinkling of freckles, she is now slimmer, freckle-less,sleek-tressed and blonde.
Rachel Hunter (former Aussie "Supermodel") - Began as a buxom, ginger-girl with a mop of copper-corkscrews; now thin, tan, and blow-dried blonde.
Nicole Kidman - Remember her in "Days of Thunder" and "Far And Away"? All that thick red hair, and a healthy looking body? Now very thin, and very blonde.
Laura Prepon (from "That 70's Show") - started the show as a young woman with a tall, healthy body, with freckles and long, straight hair, the color of a new penny. Ended the show very thin, very blonde, and not a freckle in sight.
Any opinions as to what's going on here???
Here's an interesting take on Ms. Lohan's problems from our friends at Salon:
http://www.salon.com/mwt/broadsheet/2007/07/27/lohan/index.html
Yet another article on Gingerism from ABC News:
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=3378972&page=1
To Kat from Berserkely: The bickies are here! I just received a HUGE package of McVities (regular digestives, caramel-chocos, ginger nuts, Hobnobs) (did she say GINGER NUTS?) plus Maltesers, a mile-long strip of Penguins, and the Jaffa cakes (chocolate AND orange, how utterly radical). I'm eating the Jaffas as a type this.
You rock for all time. Myra and Ginny both thank you profusely, and Myra is insisting you go into the book, after all, so we're working on that.
Love to you, and to the East Bay! -- Maggie
Post a Comment