Weekly Flâneur: Wino in the City

Image of red wine and city skyline. Click to enlarge.

Drink up!

Taken at the posh Urban Sip, Charlotte, North Carolina.

Weekly Flâneur: Sunset Slogan

Backside of large glowing sign. Click to enlarge.

JFG Special Coffee

The Best Part Of The Meal

Beloved Charlotte landmark atop the VBGB Beer Hall and Garden, Charlotte, North Carolina.

Friday QuoteDay

 "All things on earth point home in old October; sailors to sea, travellers to walls and fences, hunters to field and hollow and the long voice of the hounds, the lover to the love he has forsaken."

— Thomas Wolfe, fellow North Carolina native and American author

* Inspired by (a kind way to say shamelessly stolen from) the delightful writer Ann Wicker; please visit her site That's All, She Wrote.

FitC Homework Help

Today in "How I Found Flâneur in the City, the World's Most Sporadically Neglected and Yet Somehow Simultaneously Pompous Blog":

Search results for FitC. Click to enlarge.

It seems someone used the handy-dandy Google to search for examples of real-life homophobia, which strikes this wanton writer as a tad suspicious. Doesn't it sound like an essay topic? Well, FitC is nothing but helpful!

So, you want real-life examples of homophobia, Internet Friend?

Here's the American Republican party's latest move: Tripling their budget for preventive measures against gay marriage. How's that for homophobia? They aren't even trying to hide it.

In other news, National Coming Out Day is Tuesday, October 11th in the States and Oct. 12th in the UK. And Spirit Day 2011 is October 20th. Purple is the encouraged colour to show support, pride or solidarity. 

Fight hate with love. (And remember: Teachers also know how to use Google.)

Weekly (Foodie!) Flâneur: Dessert

Cakies! Click to enlarge.

Even though the month of September is behind us, I couldn't end Foodie Flâneur without sweets! 

Beautiful artistic cakes found near Piccadilly Circus in London.

Damn It, Johnny

Really, Mr. Depp? Really?

Despite being one of the world’s most handsome men, Johnny Depp hates photo shoots so much, he compares them to violent sexual assault. He tells Nick Tosches in Vanity Fair, “Well, you just feel like you’re being raped somehow. Raped ... It feels like a kind of weird -- just weird, man.” He’ll pose with fans, “But whenever you have a photo shoot or something like that, it’s like -- you just feel dumb. It’s just so stupid.

 Shakesville sums it up concisely:

No, Mr. Depp. Sitting for a photo shoot to which you have consented does not feel like being raped.
What a privilege you have to not know what a terrible comparison that truly is.

UPDATE: J. Depp has since apologized (as expected and as he should) for his "poor choice of words." Words matter, Johnny-boy. Also, what Melissa says.

Today's Jam

Florence + The Machine, "Shake It Out."

(Incidentally, the video reminds me of a happier version of Sarah Waters' book Affinity. 

There's your music and book recommendation for the day!)

5 Predictions of the Future from the "Rock 'Em Sock 'Em Robots" movie, Real Steel

The future of technology! (Image Via.)

1.) Though a 2010 iPod Touch dies after a couple of hours, technology will advance in the next 3 years so that a large robot built in 2014 will still be able to power-up with no external power source at critical moments, despite being buried in mud, 20-some-odd years later.

2.) Eminem will be the sole soundtrack of the future. The real Slim Shady must have finally stood up.

3.) Apparently, the recession will be over by the 2020s, and the precocious 11-year-old clone of young Anakin Skywalker representing all of America's youth will have the advanced computer and engineering skills needed for robot care and programing. So ... the repeal of the "No Child Left Behind" act and better funding for American public schools?

Check his midichlorian levels, stat!

4.) Women will be allowed to be a part of future robot fighting, but only through the inheritance of their fathers. Not of their own desire to build robots (Evangeline Lily's character inherited her gym/robot lab from her father) or their own interest in the sport as an owner or business prospect (Olga Fonda's character is pointedly introduced as someone using her father's money to fund her winning robot). Because girls don't like robots, unless they're pink and sparkly and capable of baking whimsical low-fat mini-cupcakes. Tee-hee!

5.) "Bitch, get back in your corner and take it!" -- Announcer guy during a robot match. It seems language tinged in misogyny and undertones of sexual violence will be alive and well in our near future. Surprise, surprise.

(Personally, I prefer this version of the timeless tale of robot supremacy and the battle of chauvinism: the Futurama episode, Raging Bender.)

Things I Have Been Doing Instead of Blogging

Home.

Moving! After a whirlwind search, Mr. B and I have found a new place to nest. All moved in, Internet up and running, and my books that have been in storage since 2009 can finally air out on proper shelves.  Happy contented sighs all around.

Ad Placement Fail: Religious Sensitivity Edition

This week's Charlotte Creative Loafing ran a lovely column on the meaning and importance of respecting and tolerating other religions, a particularly emotional topic in the American South's Bible Belt.

Right next to an ad depicting the Buddha in headphones for a club called Dharma.

Religious leaders are so hot right now.

Whoops!

Here's the close-up:

One can apparently receive a Ph.D in Booty.

Would the Christian equivalent to this club be a space called, "On the Mount," or "Eucharist," and feature images of Jesus as the DJ? Or doing the robot on the dance floor? Because I would go to that club. That club would have the best wine.

Friday QuoteDay

"A room without books is like a body without a soul."

— Marcus Tullius Cicero, Roman philosopher

Weekly (Foodie!) Flâneur: Dinner

Beer, meat pie, mashed taters and lots o' gravy. Click to enlarge.

Mr. B's favorite eats! 

The 250-year-old Spotted Horse Pub, Putney, London

Friday QuoteDay

Click to enlarge. Found via.

"The pessimist complains about the wind;

the optimist expects it to change;

the realist adjusts the sails."

— William A. Ward, inspirational speaker

Weekly (Foodie!) Flâneur: Afternoon Drinks

Sangria in a plastic cup = Classy!

It's never too early for sangria!

Borough Market, London

Friday QuoteDay

“Lock up your libraries if you like, but there is no gate, no lock, no bolt that you can set upon the freedom of my mind.” 

 — Virginia Woolf, English author 

Weekly (Foodie!) Flâneur: Snackies

Bread and cheese and German beer, oh my! Click to enlarge.

A light snack, aka Visceral Cheese Orgasm. Drool.

German Restaurant in Richmond upon Thames, UK.

The Things We Write When We Are Young

The things we write when we are young, and wish to be important. The things we write because we cannot make sense of what we see in terrible moments when the safety of adulthood fails us. The things that are too real to comprehend. The things that become dim and somewhat surreal, abused and exploited. The things we think about in passing when a low-flying jet dots the horizon. The things we wish. The things we know. The things we can never know.

9/11/2002 Entry
We are at Ground Zero, in New York, my mother and I. It is June, 2002.   
 
My face pressed against a cold metal gate; I thought I smelled the salt of a thousand tears seeping into my skin.
Though the summer heat pounded, the fence remained cool to the touch. It was deep, this scar. I could see the layers of subway ruined, six or seven stories of floor barely in tact from the fall. Metal beams were hauled away, and a solitary flag hung by a cross of steel. Tiny, it was, compared to the damage surrounding it. I thought Ground Zero to be smaller, the size of a few football fields. I thought the destruction not so massive as shown on the flashing television screen. I thought wrong. Eyes jaded to modern movie effects, I was shaken. It's more than I could have feared. 
My tears joined those staining the brutal ground, dripping slowly onto the fence guarding the unguarded. 
A child hugs his mother's hand next to me, and asks, "Why are you crying?" 
I look at him, as his mother wipes her own tears and says, "Remember it. This is history." 
I part through the crowd to cling to my own mother's hand.