The Kid and I cracked up watching this. Hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

Luke…….. There is no Santa!

Apparently Hollywood thinks that if you put anything female in a movie that isn’t all tits and ass- boys and men in the Kid’s demographic will run away screaming. It’s part of the reason the rebranded the fairy tale Rapunzel as Tangled and promos focus on the manly prince.

I told the Kid he was a mythical unicorn in Hollywood land because he likes stories that have kick ass protagonists, both male and female. He looked at me like I’d been doing drugs. So I conducted a little test. Here’s a list of the Kid’s favorite characters in some popular entertainment.

Harry Potter- hands down, Luna Lovegood. Not even a second of thought on that one.
Buffy- Zander followed closely by Evil Willow
Firefly- River Tam
Bones- Bones
Leverage- Parker and Haridson
Favorite series of books- Tamora Pierce, Protector of the Small

So my hetero teen boy, in a completely unscientific study, tends to prefer female protagonists. There are 2 dudes on that list (Zander and Hardison) and they come with female co-characters that he loves.

I’m not sure if my unicorn child actually exists now, since the purveyors of pop culture think he is imaginary. Though his dirty, crusty socks all over the floor tell me otherwise.

Kid and I both loved the awesome Hit Girl in Kick Ass. There may not be enough kick ass action hero women in film, but there are more and more kick ass action hero girls in film (see also the movie Let the Right One In).

In that vein- Kid and I must see this. Cate Blanchet as evil government agent. Kick ass girl child trained as an assassin. The preview looks sooooooooo good.

Kid says that The Hunger Games, which is also be made into a movie, was pretty good. So 2 movies we have to see.

I am one of those people. And since I am all about sharing just how hard this poverty shit is with you all, I am now going to break down my tiny income and taxes for you all. It’s a huge taboo in this country, to talk honestly about your own money. So you all might understand if I’m feeling a bit squeamish. It’s a bit of social programming I am trying to break.

Last year my adjusted gross income was $5963

My tax refund (including the earned income tax credit plus the $400 Making work pay credit, minus 15.2% in employment taxes for blogging income) was $1823

This year (so far) my income is $4930. If the schedule for the earned income tax credit stays the same (they haven’t published 2010 yet) then my refund is $1675 before I pay employment taxes. And because I am considered self-employed (like many of the disemployed who are selling whatever they’ve got in order to get by) I am responsible for all of those taxes.

So $1675-749 (15.2%of 4930) is $926. Or about half of 2009’s refund.

Now before anyone gets all cranky pants about how much of a refund I get compared to how tiny my income is- I would LOVE to be in a tax bracket where I am no longer eligible for the earned income tax credit. That bracket is $35,000 a year for a single parent with one kid. If you know of a job like that- pass it on.

Of course if I were in the Million plus club, the average tax benefit under the new tax plan is about $139,000, or enough to pay for 4 $35,000 jobs. But that’s not where it’s going to go, is it?

I have to see this!!!!

1) Aung San Suu Kyi!!! I am a sucker for political dramas. Burma, military juntas, activism and resistance. Yep.

2) Michelle Yeoh!!!! I think she’s the perfect choice to play Aung San Suu Kyi. She’s totally got the “I can still kick your ass when I’m broken hearted” thing down. And I love that.

3) directed by Luc Besson!!! (who did not sign the “it’s ok to rape children if you’re Polanski petition) Also directed the Professional.

This is going to rock, hard.

Some banksters aren’t getting a bonus in their Christmas stocking. Poor dears. Their salaries have been doubled in the past 2 years to compensate, but the poor “Zeros” are facing psychological trauma by receiving their ill gotten gains in their regular paychecks instead of the fat, end of year bonus checks.

My heart breaks. My soul is crushed in empathy. As a poor, homeless single mother, I know the pain of trying to live off $200,000 or $500,000 a year. Why we have had to settle on the standard trash can fire for warmth, instead of this high-end, designer trash can.

It’s the Christmas season. Can’t we all spare a moment to think of the banksters? Do they know it’s Christmas time at all if they aren’t getting their bonus checks?

(FWIW- I find this whole song terribly offensive. Why on earth would non-Christians know when Christmas is? Do you know when Ramadan is? Ah colonialism, happily spread by 80’s pop stars under the guise of charity)

Have you all played with Google’s word tracker thingy yet?

What is does is counts the number of instances a word is used in all the books Google currently has scanned from the last 108 years or so, and then delivers the percentages.

The chart of the words racism and sexism, for anyone playing oppression olympics. ( Ableism and kyriarchy are barely nudges if you include them as well, though homophobia gets a slightly smaller but similar curve to sexism). I find it very interesting that the more politics is written about, the less often corruption is. And perhaps some of our handwringing over dreadful poor people while ignoring that ever widening wealth divide has to do with how little the wealthy are actually written about?

So peeps, what words are you checking out?

The Kid and I spent our Friday afternoon in the office of child protective services thanks to the lovely stalker.

After long individual interviews with each of us, the social worker called me back in to say that the Kid is an awesome kid and that she is closing the case as it was completely unfounded. We joked about how CPS should really stand for “Creates Panic Syndrome”. We also discussed the strain that the stalker is putting on the Kid by putting him in the middle of this shit, but of course the stalker would never see it that way. It would totally fuck with the stalker’s world view that zie is not the awesome heroic savior to acknowledge that zie causes damage.

But case closed, completely unfounded, Kid is an awesome kid.

Afterwards we met up with the amazing Amanda Panda who took us out for the best tacos in the city (Barracuda in Queen Anne). I had 2 sangrias with dinner, which is enough to send me straight to bed. Kid had a coke with real sugar. And now we are back to our end the crappy campaign.

Moody’s just downgraded Ireland’s government bond rating. Which means drastically more woe for the Irish people, even though they got very little actual benefit from the better rating.

So at a time when housing prices are upside down and there are no jobs, Ireland will have to do some massive austerity measures in order to spend the cash to appease the fraudulent Moody’s gods.

It is not unlike having to spend half or more of your paycheck on credit card debt (that you racked up because wages were stagnant and you couldn’t buy groceries without a line of credit). (Household economics and macroeconomics do not usually have direct analogies. You don’t print money in you house, and you can’t issue bonds to borrow for expenses, etc.)

For the average person, this is how it works. Go to college. Get loans to pay for college. Get a job to pay for college loans. Job requires transportation, certain dress standards. You also need to eat, pay for housing, pay for childcare. First chunk of your money goes to pay the loans. So you get credit cards. Credit cards make up the difference as long as you are able to access greater and greater levels of credit. You need credit for housing, for transport, etc. When shit finally hits the fan in the cycle of unending debt, you default.

For governments,

Continuing the theme of no more crappy- here’s some favorite Christmas songs.

The Waitresses- Christmas WrappingThe Ramones- Merry Christmas I don’t want to fight tonight with you

The Pogues and the late, great Kristy Maccoll- Fairytale of New York (warning- this song contains at least one homophobic slur)

The Kinks- Father Christmas

ETA

The Hives & Cindi Lauper (I just found this song and FUCK YEAH CINDI LAUPER)

Okay okay okay, one more (I can’t seem to stop. I’ve been possessed by the Christmas spirit. Oh shit. Bahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh)

Bob Marley & The Wailers- White Christmas