Today is the 40th anniversary of the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance. Happy birthday, NAAFA!

If you have a strong “Yeah, but–” reaction to that, I understand. Read this, and the links here. Fat Acceptance is something that took me a long time to come to–it goes against almost every message we get in our society. Heck, I still haven’t made that final leap of accepting my own imperfect body for what it is. Still working on that one. But this is a movement that makes sense. Deep, deep sense. Check it out.

We’ve been talking a lot the last two weeks about the wrongs of judging people by the color of their skin. Judging them by the shape of it is just as bad.

I’m open to comments on this post, but please don’t hit me with elementary arguments or ask me FA 101 questions, okay? That’s why I put the links up. There are people who write and research and think about this stuff on a much deeper level than I do, so no point re-inventing the wheel here. (I mean, even re-inventing the wheel has already been done–see item #8!)

Those of you who aren’t “Mad Men” fans, or at least fans of the cool sleek lines of early-60s design, are going to have to be a bit patient with me for a while, I’m afraid. I’m fully in the grip of “Mad”ness! I’ll be doing the photo shoot to enter the contest for a walk-on role this weekend. You can only submit one picture, I think, so I’ll post a few up here and ask you to vote.

In the meantime, I went to madmenyourself.com again and did one of Mr. Improbable. Here he is, at his first day at Sterling Cooper. They hired him because they thought his quirky sense of humor might help them land more high-tech accounts … of course it’s ridiculous to think that people will ever have computers in their homes, but the secretaries sure love that new copier, so maybe these “business machines” are the wave of the future.

This is nowhere near as good as the Simpsons version of Mr. Improbable, but it still works. I like how it looks like Mr. Improbable is thinking, “Um, I should have worn a suit? And shaved?” which is an expression I’ve seen on his face all too often.

Everyone else is thinking, “Who hired the Jew?” Except for Joan, who is checking out his butt and thinking that he might clean up nice. Hands off, Ms. Holloway!

Bothered by chatty folks sitting next to you on the plane? PeaceBang, who also writes the blog Beauty Tips for Ministers, has a solution.

According to CNN, “The Boston police officer who sent a mass e-mail referring to Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. as a ‘banana-eating jungle monkey’ has apologized, saying he’s not a racist.”

Of course the poor dear wasn’t being racist, his comments were taken entirely out of context. People who aren’t from around here simply don’t understand. All the officer meant is that, as most Cantabridgians know, academia is a jungle. To be as successful as Skip Gates, one must be nimble and clever as a monkey to climb the ranks of professorship and grab the sweet fruit of tenure. Such work is stressful, of course, so the wise academic will make sure to eat plenty of bananas to protect them from high blood pressure and peptic ulcers. Really. I’ve referred to Steven Pinker and Drew Faust as banana-eating jungle monkeys, oh, I don’t know how many times. And why do you think the Harvard Faculty Club is nicknamed “The Rainforest Cafe”?

Honestly. Some people just want to see racism, they really do.

Hat tip: Kate Harding

Salon’s Andrew O’Hehir has a nice review of a new movie with an Aspie protagonist and the overall portrayal of people with Autism Spectrum Disorders in the movies:

Autistic and Asperger’s characters in movies are only beginning to move beyond the “Sidney Poitier phase,” in which members of previously despised or misunderstood minorities are presented as symbols, saints or seers — whose most important function is to provide other, more relatable and “normal” characters with the opportunity for moral and spiritual growth. African-Americans, gays and American Indians have already enjoyed this dubious cinematic-shaman role, which is undeniably superior to old-fashioned bigotry but a long way short of actual equality.

So, yesterday I found this article on the NYT blogs about how “parents, educators and addiction experts would react” to the multiple scenes of drinking in the new Harry Potter movie. It seemed pretty silly to me yesterday, and after seeing the movie last night, I’m downright flummoxed. Apparently the big fuss is that Harry, Hermione, and Ron go to a pub, have a “butterbeer”* or two, and relax sufficiently that Hermione puts her arm around both boys on the way back to Hogwarts.

Hermione, you drunken slut.

Honestly, what a fuss over nothing! If you’re a serious temperance advocate, go ahead and tell your kid that butterbeer is nonalcoholic, like root beer or ginger beer. Because whether you drink or not, getting away from the daily grind with your friends for a few hours will relax you. At this point in the movie, the trio desperately needs a break from the romantic, scholastic, athletic, and oh-by-the-way-Death-Eaters-are-trying-to-kill-the-world tensions that Hogwarts has come to represent. Of course they’re going to be in a more laid-back mood after a day trip to Hogsmeade. Booze isn’t the point at all.

The other objection is that teachers are seen drinking, apparently. Not so’s you’d notice, or at least not so’s I noticed, but some folks did, and they’re not happy about it. I hope they realize that if they do not want their children to be aware that professors drink, they had better avoid exposing them to any British or American literature published after World War II. They might also want to avoid exposing their children to higher education itself.

But here’s the kicker–for all the tempest in a butterbeer stein about booze, why hasn’t anyone pointed out that the entire first half of the movie is about drugs? It’s sort of unavoidable when your new main character is a Potions Master. Harry psychs Ron up for the big Quidditch match by making him believe that he’s been dosed with magic steroids, and then takes the drug–oh, sorry, “potion”–himself later in the movie. Love potions are all over the place. And the new Potions Master is not only found sneaking around the school’s “herb garden,” he knows the precise street value of certain highly valuable leaves!

If you’re going to get upset about anything, get upset about that. Because the movie doesn’t portray alcohol as doing anything other than relaxing you for an hour or so. Booze doesn’t work in the Harry Potter universe. Drugs, however, do. If the movie does have a message about substance use, it’s rather clear: Boozers are losers. What you want to do is learn how to grow and mix your own.

Now, honestly, I don’t care about any of this. I’m not a puritan about drug and alcohol use, and I’m certainly not a subscriber to the notion that all children’s entertainment must be scrubbed squeaky clean lest the child Get Ideas. (If I were taking a kid of my own to the movie, a little Miss Conduct Jr., I’d be doing a debriefing afterward, for sure. Not about the chemical substances, but about why it’s really not a good idea to fall in love with a lazy, cowardly, self-centered fellow who can’t succeed in anything without your help and then resents you for helping him. If it were a little Mr. Improbable Jr., he’d be getting the lecture on why men with quiet courage, little ego, and no fear of looking nerdy–you know, like his father, or Neville Longbottom–are the real men to be looked up to and emulated.) But if you’re going to make a big fuss about nothing, at least make a big fuss about the right nothing, eh?

*A “butterbeer,” Muggles, is a mildly alcoholic beverage, kind of like what we Kansans call “3-2 beer.” I’m sure this is what magic folk would call it, too, if they weren’t too stupid to do math. The only creatures ever known to get actually drunk from butterbeer are house elves, who are approximately a third the size of humans and have severely compromised free will to begin with.

The first half of July was so action-packed I’m going to be spooling out the adventures until mid-August, I’m afraid. One thing I did was pick myself up a couple of quality-paperback treats at the Logan bookstore before I left: Curtis Sittenfeld’s American Wife and Tana French’s The Likeness.

American Wife was quite good–if you somehow don’t know, it’s a novel based on the life of Laura Bush. Political novels are always so risky; will anyone still give a damn once the characters they’re based on are out of history’s spotlight? I won’t speculate as to whether Ms. Sittenfeld has written a book that will last or not. But at this moment in history, it’s an entertaining, thought-provoking, page-turning read. I suspect if you don’t like Laura Bush, reading about “Alice Blackwell” may make you more sympathetic, and that if you are a fan of the former First Lady, it will make you a little less so.

But The Likeness is the one that really had me going. It starts off a bit slow, so be patient–it takes a while for the characters to get established. But the opening situation is such a grabber that I was willing to plod for a bit, and once the plot really took off, well, that was that.

We start off meeting Cassie Maddox, an Irish detective in the domestic-violence squad. Cassie’s got a past in undercover that didn’t end too well. One morning, her boyfriend Sam, himself a homicide detective, calls her out to a crime scene. Was it a spousal killing? No. The victim is Cassie’s body double … and the contents of her wallet identify her as “Lexie Madison,” the same name Cassie used as an undercover agent.

Granted, the entire thing is built on a coincidence of Dickensian clunkiness, but once you get through that, it’s a brilliant read, a detective story that is also a deep examination of identity, friendship, family, and loyalty. The plot is nicely twisty and turny and the language literary without causing eye-rolls (and these here eyes do roll at the whiff of anything resembling a precious “prose style”).

What good novels have you read this summer, or hope to read? (We’ll do nonfiction later, so let’s stick to fiction for now.)

It’s been a while since I’ve posted any recipes, hasn’t it? Here’s one that Mr. Improbable and I have been more or less living on this summer. If you, too, find it hard to eat in hot weather, this is a good one for you. As usual, all amounts are subjective:

1 cup plain yogurt (we prefer Fage’s full-fat)
1/2 cucumber
1 pressed garlic clove or about 1/2 tsp juice from a jar of minced garlic if you’re lazy like me
1 t olive oil
1 t lemon juice

Grate the cucumber into a bowl using a cheese grater (the finer the grater, the better). You can peel it or not; I usually get one of those long European cucumbers that come in their own special condoms (what is up with that?) and don’t peel it. If you get one that’s all waxed and all, peel it. (Okay, why are cucumbers either in a condom or waxed? I don’t even want to think about this.)

Squeeze excess cucumber juice out of shredded cucumber.

Mix all ingredients together. You can also add dill and black pepper if you like that.

This is great plain, with rice or potatoes, as a topping for salmon or a dip for vegetables.

“Mad Men” is ramping up publicity before season 3 debuts on August 13, and I’m loving it. I definitely plan to enter their contest for a walk-on role, and I will let you know when pictures of me are up on the site! (I hope to do the photo shoot this weekend with the assistance of History Girl–who better to bring out my inner Rachel Mencken than a theater-loving history teacher turned vintage boutique owner turned history teacher again?)

If you’re not interested in the contest, but still like to envision yourself rocking that great early-60s style, check out their terrific “Mad Men Yourself” site, where you can choose the physical features and clothing to make a Mad Men-ized version of yourself. Here’s me (you’ll notice I chose a backdrop to go with the cover of my book):

Not bad, eh? Although the coffee should be iced.

Yesterday’s column is online here. Last week‘s dealt with cell-phone rudeness and when to celebrate birthdays. One reader shared her thoughts on both:

Cell phones:
When eating out with friends, I said, “I am turning my cell phone off. I
find it so disconcerting when cell phones interrupt my time with friends.”
Then when a cell phone at the table rang, I said, “Oh dear – did you forget to turn yours off?” It worked!

Birthdays:
I have always claimed a “birthday month”, doing my best to celebrate as
long as I can. Many of my friends have adopted this as well. For one dear friend whose birthday falls on the 31st, I buy a “Happy Birthday Month” token gift and leave it at her front door. Then she gets her real gift on her birthday. She outdid me one year – she had a canvas tote embroidered with my initials. It contained 31 gifts – one to open every day!

Charming! She sounds like a fun friend.

My birthday was last Tuesday, and I celebrated, if that’s the word, by going on the “Today Show”! This past weekend, though, Mr. Improbable took me to Montpelier for the much-needed weekend getaway that was my real birthday celebration.