Tutorial: Make a purse out of a can of soup

I'm not much of a craft blogger, but tonight I made a craft, and I thought if you wanted to make it, too, you'd probably need a tutorial. The photography is blurry and poorly lit and not very helpful.

You will need:

• Large can of Campbell's Tomato Soup 
• Fancy special can opener that removes lids without creating sharp edges 
• Ribbon, in a color and length that pleases you (I used black, because of the rest of my outfit was black, but you could reasonably go with red, white, gold, or possibly something else, but that seems crazy.)
• Scissors
• Hot glue gun 
• Glue for said gun 
• Dishtowel
• Water
• Bread 
• Cheese 
• Butter 
• Saucepan 
• Frying pan

 First, open your can. Save the lid.

Put the soup in a pot with a canful of water; heat it while you make grilled cheese sandwiches. You are probably hungry and it makes no sense to waste perfectly good soup. Yum!

Clean the inside of the can thoroughly, being careful of the label, because that's what you buy that fancy name-brand soup for in the first place. A fastidious person might remove the label first and glue it back on later.

Dry the can thoroughly.

On the back of the can, create a hinge by gluing a small piece of ribbon to the inside of the can and the inside of the lid, ensuring that the lid and can fit together properly.

On the front of the can, glue a small tab of ribbon to the outside of the lid for easier opening. If you wanted to get bonkers with this, you could add a dot of velcro to the outside front of the can and the underside of the tab, so it would stay closed.

Measure the ribbon against your body and add an inch or so. Fold and glue each end.

Glue each end to a side of the can, and voilà!

Soup can purse!

Are you ready to take this to the next level?

I thought you might be.

Use this tutorial to make yourself a horn. (You really only need to watch the first minute and 50 seconds or so.)

Use this tutorial to make yourself an Andy Warhol costume. (Hint: Betsy Ross wigs were very cheap at my local iParty, and easily trimmed.)

Put 'em all together and voilà!

























Andy Narwhal!

Halloween costumes: Now, even more fun!

I loooooooove Halloween. Love, love, love it.

But also, I work on a college campus and live in a college town, which means that there is approximately zero chance I will not see a racist, sexist, or homophobic costume. There is some chance I will not see an ableist one, but there is also a chance I will.

I am pretty sure none of my readers would ever do such a thing. But in case you know people who might, I will write this post so you can share it with them and save everyone some trouble.

Here's the thing: No one says, "Hey, Halloween's coming, how can I be superoffensive?" No one says, "I am a big racist, and like other big racists, I think this is funny. My racist friends will be so amused!"

People wear superoffensive costumes because they aren't thinking about it at all.

So here are a few things you can think, very quickly, about your potential costume, to see if the offensiveness of it might override the scariness or cleverness or awesomeness.

• Might someone else possibly construe this as offensive? This is a good one because you don't need (or get) to excuse it with, "My black best friend thinks it's hilarious." It's not about your one black best friend. It's about all the other people who don't know you and how awesomely clever you are, who will see you in person or on Facebook or anywhere else.
• Am I dressing up as a stereotype of people who actually exist? If you got past the first question but stumbled a little on this one, go back to the first one again now.
• Might my costume hurt a real person's feelings? This is a little trickier, but maybe (probably) you actually know someone who has struggled with addiction or unwanted pregnancy or mental illness. Maybe you know someone who embraces a religion you think is hilarious. Maybe you don't, but maybe someone you don't know will see you at a party and you will remind them of the person they used to know who died, and it will make them sad. If you're stumbling here, go back to the second question, and also the first.
• Does my costume rely on making fun of someone, and can I do better than that? Because, if yes, then yes. 

Did I ruin everything for you? I'm sorry you are having a hard time thinking of a really good costume.

May I offer you this one? I love it, and really feel like someone should do it. I think it's equally good for a kid or a grownup. Plus, now, if I see anyone dressed as a snail, I will assume they were thinking of dressing as a lesbian or a Mexican and decided, based on this post, that a snail would be better, and that will make me so beyond happy.

I might even give them a hug.

Hey, thanks

Longtime readers will know that November is traditionally my month of gratitude, in which I share a post a day on what I'm thankful for.

Longtime readers may also remember that last year, I made noise about how maybe I wouldn't do it quite the same way anymore.

At the time, what I was thinking was that maybe I'd do a month of gratitude every 13 (or 11) months, so that it wouldn't always be November — at least that might lend some diversity to my nature- or weather-based gratitudes. And I reserve the right to do that in the future.

But for this year, I just had an even better idea.

Guest posters.

Any of you want to do just one post in November for CMC on the subject of something for which you are thankful?* I'll take volunteers here in the comments. Every day I don't have a guest post to share, I'll post myself, just the way I have the last few years. Won't that be the funnest?

If you have questions, you can drop those right into the comments, too.

*Guidelines: Volunteers should be prepared to write a guest post on the subject of something for which they are thankful. Posts can be of any length. Deadlines will be mutually agreed-upon. Guest posters who have their own blogs will obviously be free to link to their own blogs. Guest posters who prefer to remain anonymous will be assigned a name to distinguish them from other guest posters or commenters. Potential volunteers who prefer to blog on a different topic are encouraged to look at my old month-of-gratitude posts and observe a long and proud history of writing whatever I want and twisting it to vaguely connect to gratitude.

Redefining "productive"

Today has been an unusually productive day.

Among the things I've done are going through old (in some cases, very old) notebooks at work, which have sometimes doubled as to-do lists or places to take notes about other things I've worked on. I've recycled a lot, filed some more. It's been very gratifying.

My note-taking may or may not be conventional. It was for sure shaped in the seventh grade. In seventh grade, it involved a hodgepodge of me actually taking relevant notes and writing down things for the edification of my friend and lab-table-mate Trisha, which I would then oh-so-slyly show her.

I still do that in meetings, except generally, I don't have anyone to show. I am essentially passing notes with myself, in among all the to-do lists. Sometimes I just make note of funny things people say; often I write down my real feelings about what is being said. I curbed that last impulse briefly when I was a reporter, lest my notes ever be subpoenaed, but made up for it with all the funny quotes I was taking down.

Anyway, here are just a few of the gems (quotes, to-dos, and my real feelings) that have emerged in these old notebooks today, for your lab-bench edification.

• This is the creepiest form of joking.
• "Oh, you're really talking. I thought we were quoting the play."
• And then remember the next day, when it was still all like that?! Hahahahahahahaha
• I understand XYZ, we'd be glad to have you join us — talked to J&D — SC
• Made reserve pool for phone interviews
• "accidental butt reiki"
• "tastes like brown"
• "calls himself a witch"
• Add to cauldron: Irish soap actress, Chaz Bono
• Who's real?
• "I don't anticipate it's going to be smooth right away"
• She took me to the carnival — I wonder what that means.
• BE Akzidenz Grotesk
• has a knack for wording good, reasonable questions so they sound as rude as possible
• It is weirdly complicated, and most folks here wouldn't be able to articulate it
• Talk to Ellen re: weather
• So. Angry.
• "I just carried a bust of Granny D made of plaster wrapped in a sweatshirt from the back of her son's Jeep to the archive."
• Colonialist approach to service
• diversity=lawyer

...and one haiku:

I won 3 raffles

Sang 9-5 with Manley

Lots of integers

Breaking: Conservative Men Threatened by Poor and/or Working Mothers

Note: On the Facebook page, I mentioned a little while back that I had a folder full of drafts I never finished: More than 60 of 'em, in fact. I'm going through that folder now, deleting what's not worth it, posting what might entertain you. This dates back just to June 2013. 

So, by now you may have seen some of the hubbub over on Fox News. Apparently, there are conservatives who believe that women should be at home with their babies, and apparently, some of their colleagues, who are women working tirelessly to advance the cause of conservatism on TV wish they would shut the hell up.

That is an oversimplification, for sure, but not much of one. I do not need to speak for Megyn Kelly and Greta Van Susteren; they are happy to speak for themselves.

Now, you might think what I'm all riled up about is the sexism — or even the homophobia. Yawn. I am used to the sexism, and it does not surprise me at all when it rears its ugly head. Particularly on Fox News. Like, Kelly and Van Susteren should not have to stand for that crap, and should call folks out on it when they can, but if they are just now noticing it, I am going to have to start calling her Greta Van Winkle, because, y'know, wake up.

I am more interested in getting riled up by following the argument to its logical conclusion, which would appear to be that nonrich people should not breed.

I know there are people of many sexes and genders who work because they love it. I also believe that most people, regardless of how much they love their jobs, or enjoy the work they do, work for pay largely so that they can pay for stuff. If those people, regardless or sex or gender, happen to be parents (or hope to one day become parents) much of the stuff they hope to pay for is kid-related, directly or indirectly: diapers, education, housing, food, 8th-grade trips to Washington, whatever.

And if your family situation is such that you can buy those things (or at least the things you prioritize) with no woman-generated income, and all the adults in the household are pleased with that as an arrangement, then great. I can think of a number of ways that might be true: Wealth. Heterosexual couple with a high-earning male in it. Gay male couple. Single dad doing the best he can. Polyandry.

But even if Lou Dobbs was right that kids with working moms are worse off (which has not been demonstrated), the logical conclusion of his train of thought is that households with one or more women in them, all of whom need or want to be earning a living, should be disqualified from having or raising children.

And I can think of a couple ways to accomplish that, but I don't much like them.

Apology accepted

Note: On the Facebook page, I mentioned a little while back that I had a folder full of drafts I never finished: More than 60 of 'em, in fact. I'm going through that folder now, deleting what's not worth it, posting what might entertain you. This dates back just to August 2013. 

I don't know how to write about body image and weight stuff, exactly. Because I've been many of the things.

• I've been thin and happy(ish) with my weight. (OK, that has hardly ever been true. But it has literally ever been true.) 
• I've been thin and thought I was fat, and been unhappy about that.
• I've been fat and happy.
• I've been fat and unhappy.
• I've lost weight unhealthily (physically and emotionally).
• I've lost weight healthily.
• I've gained weight unhealthily.
• I've gained weight healthily.
• I've had people tell me I was too big, needed to lose a few pounds, ask when I was due — and those people have included doctors, when I was at a wide range of weights. In fact, they've included every doctor I've had but one, since I was about 14.
• I've had people tell me I was beautiful, perfect.
• I've had people tell me it doesn't matter, as long as I'm healthy. 
• I've had people project their own fears onto me — whether by openly dreading the possibility they could ever look like me or by insisting that I would be happier thinner.

And in case you're wondering what I think these days, philosophically, intellectually, I think this: I think for me, any weight I am is fine, as long as I'm healthy. And I think any weight I am is actually none of anyone else's business, even if I'm not healthy. And even if the weight is related to the health.

Emotionally, I waver from all of that a lot, as much as anybody does, maybe. I let it be other people's business, sometimes. I decide that my weight is not fine. I assume people who don't think I'm attractive are probably specifically not attracted to weight. And then I get over it, because that philosophical, intellectual belief is every bit as real as those sometimes devastating emotional waves.

That's a long introduction to this, which I think everyone should read. By everyone I mean:

• Every woman who has ever worried about her weight and considered doing something about it.
• Every person who has ever thought they knew anything at all about anyone else's weight.
• Anyone who has ever trusted a salesperson.
• Anyone who has ever known what 1,200 calories looks like.
• Anyone who has never had to know what 1,200 calories looks like.

Because there is a lot in there of value. (Speaking of value, I actually originally saw that post when it was linked to at A Black Girl's Guide to Weight Loss, which is a terrific, smart, non-shaming, antiracist blog about exercise and eating well, regardless of who you are and why you want to eat well and exercise — that also includes some excellent and very real insights about racism and sexism in America, and how they intersect.)

Dirty Dirty

Sunday night, I was fortunate enough to attend a Dirty Dancing-themed birthday party for a friend.*

We watched the movie and followed up with a dance party. People were encouraged to bring watermelon — and dress as their favorite characters.

I obviously went as Vivian Pressman.

For those of you unfamiliar with the film, or who just haven't seen it, say, this week, Vivian Pressman is this woman:

Recreating that hairstyle wasn't easy, but it was spectacular. I showered and washed my hair early Sunday evening, and then employed a whole lot of gel and very many bobby pins. Sadly, there are no pictures, but I looked awesome.

Monday, I had a long drive and decided I'd just showered the night before, so I could skip it that morning. The hair gel was sort of an issue, but by combing my hair and putting it back in a ponytail, I looked presentable — and thanks to said gel, the ponytail stayed in place all day.

Yesterday, I overslept and was running late for work. Also, my hair looked fantastic, practically immediately on getting out of bed. That is obviously a sign. No shower.

Yesterday afternoon, in what I assumed at the time was an unrelated event, I could smell myself. You know how you assume people who smell bad are accustomed to their own odor, and therefore do not smell themselves? Yeah, that was not me. I smelled awful, and was really worried that was just how I smell now. I thought of lots of possible causes, mostly ones that would be difficult to rectify.

It was not until this morning, as I got ready to take my shower, that it occurred to me that that might solve the whole smelling-bad problem, and that I could have fixed it more than twelve hours sooner by just showering when I got done with work.**

*It was in a yurt in Vermont. RI and I obviously called it "Yurty Dancing," and I amused myself and at least a couple other people by observing that the big advantage to being in a yurt was that nobody could put Baby in the corner.

**Actually, I couldn't showered quite when I got done with work, because I was dealing with the fact that apparently e-mailing pictures from my phone is sufficient to break it in such a way that I can no longer make phone calls. But that's a post for another day. I could have showered a few hours after I was done with work, certainly.

And then (almost) a whole month went by

Today, one of my very favorite readers (and, you know, real-life friend), sent me this e-mail:

You there?

Hadn’t seen anything on the blog in a while. Just wanted to see how you were doing and check in on an old friend. And by old I mean, longtime. Not chronologically.

Never mind.

...which was perfect, in that it let me say to him what I have been planning to say to you all regarding my absence:

Ha! I have half a dozen posts in my head. I'm doing great, actually, thanks for checking in, just busy: away for a weekend with high school friends, college reunion, bananas at work (in mostly good/ok ways), trying to fit in time with the romantic interest. I will try to start getting some of those posts out of my head and onto CMC soon.

How are you?

No, seriously, how are you?