Yes, it’s the John McCain condom.

I just learned, courtesy of Broadsheet, that Planned Parenthood is busy at the DNC handing out more than 700 pounds of rubbers encased in a pink matchbook that reads: “Protect Yourself from John McCain (In This Election.)”

Apparently the back reads, “10 Things Everyone Should Know About John McCain.” No. 10: “Has voted against women’s reproductive rights and privacy 125 times in his 25 years in Washington, D.C.” Nice.

Just sayin. Ok, g’night!

Two news items this afternoon on women, work, and life:

Women Have Another Who Understands
8/28/08 Denver Post: Hours before Michelle Obama’s big speech, she watched the “Cosby Show” cast reunited on Oprah to discuss how their sitcom gave the country its first glimpse at an educated, career-oriented black mom. “Americans didn’t believe there were black families with two professionals,” Michelle Obama says. “Sometimes, I feel that people don’t believe I exist.” After her speech, it would be tough not to believe in the authenticity of Michelle Obama. And after talking with her the next morning, I’m struck by how far we’ve come since 1992 when Hillary Rodham Clinton dissed half the women in America by saying, “You know, I suppose I could have stayed home and baked cookies.” Obama gets the complicated tug….Read the rest

And an odd yet slightly interesting little item on housework:

Women Might Like Being Housewives, But Not Every Day
8/28/08, Telegraph, UK: Feminists got it wrong. Women don’t want to be bread-winners; they want to stay at home and bake bread. This, at least, is the view of The Yorkshire Building Society, that well known repository of expertise on gender psychology/publicity-mongering. The key element to all of this is choice. Scrubbing floors has a therapeutic value as a contrast to a week of sedentary desk-based toil; compulsion would take the shine off, in more ways than one…Read the rest

So in spite of the fact that someone put a rather important convention and tons of enticing coverage smack in the middle of this writing retreat I’m on, I’ve finally had a little breakthrough. After a few days of a hellish start out here in writer’s paradise, I’m settling in on my chapter and slowly making headway. The whole experience has got me thinking about how fragile one’s sense of progress can be when one has chosen, for whatever fercockte (Yiddish for nutty) idea, to be a writer.

For anyone who’s ever gotten stuck in the middle of a writing project–meaning, in other words, anyone who seriously writes–a few upbeat quotes to share this morning:

“Writing is the hardest work in the world. I have been a bricklayer and a truck driver, and I tell you – as if you haven’t been told a million times already – that writing is harder. Lonelier. And nobler and more enriching.” -Harlan Ellison

“A writer is a person for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people.” –Thomas Mann

“All writers are vain, selfish and lazy, and at the very bottom of their motives lies a mystery. Writing a book is a long, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand.” –George Orwell

“I was working on the proof of one of my poems all the morning, and took out a comma. In the afternoon I put it back again.” –Oscar Wilde

“Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia.” -~E.L. Doctorow

Hey wait–all the writing-is-hell quotes I could find were by guys. Got a favorite writing-is-hell quote by a woman? I know they’re out there. Please feel free to illuminate us and share in comments.

It’s live! It’s live! My personal website is now live at: girlwpen.com

I’ll likely change the domain name to my name, since the GWP blog is going group and all, but that’s where the individual stuff lives for now. I’ve listed upcoming talks and past writings and all the usual suspects, and now info on the consulting and coaching and training that I do is listed there too.

For those of you needing to make (or redo) websites, it’s a WordPress template, with a personal redesign engineered by Kristen Loveland the Brilliant. Kristen, you are a goddess. (And I hope you are getting some rest.)

Did anyone see that article last weekend on the Olympic athletes and sex? The Times Online’s Matthew Syed reported on how the athletes were acting like bunnies once their sport was over. Of greatest interest to me, he noted that success on the field didn’t necessarily translate in gender equitable terms. While Olympic gold is a “surefire ticket to writhe” for even the geekiest of Olympian men,” says Syed, “gold-winning female athletes are not looked upon by male athletes with any more desire than those who flunked out in the first round.”

Why might this be? Syed’s hypothesis:

“It is sometimes even considered a defect, as if there is something downright unfeminine about all that striving, fist pumping and incontinent sweating. Sport, in this respect, is a reflection of wider society, where male success is a universal desirable whereas female success is sexually ambiguous.”

In all fairness, Syed is not condoning the phenomenon, merely noting it. Is he correct? What do you think?

GWP readers responded with some links to great analysis of Michelle Obama’s speech yesterday, and I wanted to share them here.

Renee over at Smilla’s Simple Life points us to a piece by Katherine Marsh at The New Republic titled “Let Michelle Be Michelle”. Also check out Renee’s thoughtful response, along with urbanartiste’s, in comments to “Isn’t She Lovely”.

Frau Sally Benz points us to her own post at Jump Off the Bridge about why how the speech made her internalize the historicity of this campaign.

And Frau Sally also points us to a post by zakstar from SchizoFrenetic about how undeniable it is that Michelle and Barack love this country.

Next up: Hillary. Please post links to good analysis of last night’s appearance in comments and I promise to share!

I’ve presented at the Women, Action, and Media (WAM!) Conference twice now and highly recommend it for its colleagiality and bloggy networking opportunities. The organizers are currently collecting proposals for their 2009 conference, which takes place on March 27-29 this year at MIT. CFP embedded below (you can click on the image to make it larger). Have at it, GWPers.

What better time to kick those new writing projects into gear than early September? Once again, I’ll be joining Kristen Kemp (feature article maestro) and Catherine Orenstein (op-ed mistress) for a weekend of nonfiction instruction up at the Woodhull Institute‘s retreat center in Ancramdale, NY. Here’s a description of the module I’m teaching:

How to Write a Book Proposal

In this module, instructor Deborah Siegel will teach the group how to take a subject about which they are passionate and generate from it an exciting, marketable, serious non-fiction book proposal. She will cover the proposal itself, the chapter outline, the bio, and the marketing section. Deborah will then walk the participants through the cycle of submission to an agent; the agent’s submission of the proposal to multiple houses; the bidding process; the signing of the contract; the writing cycle; the editing and copy editing and fact checking cycle; the publishing cycle and the publicity phase of the hardback non-fiction book. She will show participants what the common mistakes are that writers make in crafting book proposals and will demonstrate the difference between an unpublishable and a highly commercial book proposal both of which are based on an identical subject.

More info on it all, including how to register, here.

As a very fun distraction (though also out of necessity), I am redoing my personal website. The new one will launch soon, but just thought I’d share a snapshot of the new header, because I’m stoked. Thank you M! Thank you Kristen!

I’m also getting VERY excited about the unveiling of the new format for the group blog. Yes, it’s confirmed–GWP is going group this fall for reals, with contributions from some amazing women crossing academic and nonacademic (er, postacademic) worlds. More on all that soon.

Ok ok, now back to work….