Here is this week’s list of blog posts, poems, short stories, singing birds, and other tidbits from my favourite corners of the web.
Why Vulnerability Doesn’t Really Suck (From a Confessed Sore Loser). This blogger eloquently discusses how scary it is for them to open up emotionally to others. The post is work-safe, but I can’t say the same thing for everything in the archives.
Celladora. Making love is an old-fashioned phrase, but if anything can bring it back in vogue it will be this poem. NSFW.
Dilemma. Should anything be spent on futile care when you live in a society with extremely limited medical resources?
Single Parents: Male and Female via Mediocreventure. My friend Sarah found something depressing while doing Internet searches about single parents. I’ll share some of my results here and rest in the comment section of her post.
Single dads are hot
Single dads are different
Single moms are bad
Single moms are strong
Single moms are selfish
From Call Girl:
For a long time now, private clubs, custom services, and other forms of high–class entertainment haven’t been able to satisfy him. He’s been looking for special experiences, like this girl. The web site described her this way: I sell stories. Special. Expensive. No substitutes. You must come in a beat–up car. You must bring enough money. No matter what happens, you may never come see me again.
From Is Anybody Employable?
But even my peers are worried if somebody snaps a picture of them holding a beer can at the cottage, dressed in a catsuit at a sci-fi convention, or acting silly with kids at the family reunion. Your creativity, your spontaneity, your whimsy? It’s bad for the company’s image.
And expressing controversial opinions? Are you sure you want to take that kind of risk? After all, it’s a bad economy. Better to just stay silent if you want to land a job. Better to keep your mouth shut and be glad for the work you’ve got.
It’s out of hand. Technology gives employers aspects to things that don’t belong in the professional realm – our adolescent diaries, our family photo albums, the spats we had with friends in junior high.
This is one of the funniest videos I’ve ever watched:
In a Perfect World a whirlwind romance with a widowed pilot would end with everyone living happily ever after, but Jiselle marries Mark and becomes a stepmother to his three children just as the Phoenix Flu ignites.
Longterm readers know I’m a huge fan of scifi and post-apocalyptic fiction but sometimes these genres can be a little dramatic. What I love about In a Perfect World was how subdued the scifi and post-apocalyptic elements were in the story.
Yes, there is an extremely dangerous flu that is slowly killing off more and more people, but this book is much more interested in the emotional bond forming between Jiselle and her new family than it is in the gruesome effects of a brand new virus.
What have you been reading?