The bilingual parrot on my shoulder in this pic is named Compeche. He lives at the Gallery Inn, in Old San Juan, where we stayed for part of the week, weathering out a tropical storm….

But before anything else, a mongo shout out to Elizabeth Curtis, Alison Piepmeier, and the Catalyst gals (Cheryl, Emily, and Laura) for guest posting in my absence! Elizabeth has been a techy mentor to me these past months, leading me into the wilds of v-logging and elsewhere, and we’ve thrown in to do a panel together (along with Courtney Martin) at this summer’s National Women’s Studies Association–will let you know. In response to the Catalystas’ post, Marco (who cries, bless his male heart) once thought of a starting a blog (or something) called Real Men Cry at the Movies. I still think he should. And Alison is so spot on with her post in trying to figure out where and how the institutional fits in to a younger generation’s feminism, which has been labeled as largely engaged at the personal and symbolic levels. I love Courtney’s response to Alison’s post, which I’m elevating to post space in case you missed it. Writes Courtney:

In an age of social networking where everyone is painstakingly creating a profile of themselves online, adolescents get a crash course in the individual and the symbolic from day one, and repeated entres on a daily basis. I’m heartened that some of these social networking spaces are getting more political, as in Facebook’s cause function, but there is still so much more work to do if we are to reinvent what “social action” means to a new generation of feminists.

I strongly encourage GWP readers to check out these gals’ blogs: A Blog without a Bicycle (Elizabeth), Baxter Sez (Alison), Crucial Minutiae (Courtney–who is currently blogging from her midwest speaking tour). Also check out Alison’s snazzy new website–love the t-shirt she’s wearing, of course!