Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Archive for the ‘Biography’ Category

Wear your boots, kids.  –  Mary K. Brown

The great Tom Lehrer had so many hilarious songs, I decided to pick one that, in his case at least, turned out to be wrong.  The links above it were provided by Phoenix Calida, Wendy Lyon, Mike Siegel, Walter Olson, C.J. Ciaramella, Radley Balko, and J.D. Tuccille, in that order.

From the Archives

I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one.  Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful.  But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer.  So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets.  Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements.  Thanks so much!

Read Full Post »

Yes, representation is important, and never more so than when the type being represented is those who refuse to allow themselves to be sorted into herds and driven to build up power for those who would rule others.  –  “Representation

People who refuse to consider ideas on their own merits, preferring to assign value based upon their personal opinions about the speaker of said ideas, are not serious thinkers and should not be treated as such.  –  “Julius Tweeter

“Rescue” narratives are not only nonsense, but distracting from measures that really help sex workers.
–  “Served Cold (#1359)

I will always be grateful to QAnon cranks for making “sex trafficking” rhetoric unpalatable to anyone outside of the MAGA cult.  –  “Small Mercies

Read Full Post »

As I mentioned in my anniversary column a few weeks ago,

…my Muse of Fiction wants my attention again; perhaps she feels I don’t need her when I’m happy.  Whatever the reason, I’ve written three new stories since finishing Who in Review, and I’m starting on a much longer one than I’ve ever written before, in part as a tribute to Grace…

Because I did want to write a much longer story than is typical for me, I’ve had to develop a new technique; typically, even my full-length short stories come into my head almost fully formed, and all I need to do is write them down and fill in a few details.  But that won’t work for this one, which is currently over 7000 words and only in the vicinity of half-done (generally speaking, anything under 10,000 words is considered a short story; longer than that is in novelette territory).  So what I’m doing is writing each episode of the tale as it comes into my head, then fitting the pieces into the larger whole and editing as necessary.  The first scene I wrote was a pivotal one perhaps halfway through the narrative; I then wrote the first full scene, then the climax and denouement, and now I’m beginning to fill in.  The characters are based upon Grace and myself, the setting is New Orleans in 1931, and the genre is adventure mixed with black comedy (which is why I recently re-watched The Avengers and watched The Thin Man series for the first time).  I’m enjoying the process, and writing action and dialog for Grace’s character is almost like having her nearby, which is part of why I’m doing it.  And I’m already thinking of other situations for the characters.  So even though the word “therapeutic” is probably overused in this sort of context, it’s the right one.  And I hope it will give my readers a little (fictionalized) taste of Grace’s personality, and the chemistry that made us such a great team.

Read Full Post »

Nobody is safe.  –  “Thomas”

The perfect song to honor Ozzy’s passage to the afterlife would’ve been “See You On the Other Side”, but I already featured that one in a column about Grace’s preceding him into that realm in January.  But I think this one’s a good choice as well.  The links above it were provided by Jason Kuznicki, David Ley, Dan Savage, Kevin Wilson, Phoenix Calida, Mike Masnick, and Radley Balko, in that order.

From the Archives

I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one.  Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful.  But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer.  So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets.  Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements.  Thanks so much!

Read Full Post »

Diary #786

As you can see, our turkey has grown quite a bit! She isn’t nearly as skittish as the chickens, which is quite annoying when I come to throw out scratch for them early every afternoon; she will get up right behind me while I’m getting the corn from its bin, which means when I back out of the corner I often step on her toes because she’s directly behind me (and being a literal bird-brain, she never learns it’s a bad idea to stand there).  I hope it’ll be better when we expand the coop in the next few weeks, and it’ll be interesting to try her eggs when she finally starts laying.  We’re actually not getting as many eggs as usual right now, but that should change once the four white pullets start laying; normally that starts in July, but remember we got these later than usual, so I expect it’ll be a couple more weeks before we start seeing those.

Read Full Post »

We don’t think he did anything wrong, obviously.  –  murderous cop’s lawyer

This has always been my favorite Connie Francis song; I love the way its sweet, slow tone masks absolutely vicious schadenfreude.  The links above it were provided by Scott Greenfield, Mike Siegel, Jesse Walker, IncarcerNation, Nun Ya, Jacob Sullum, and Yasmin Nair, in that order.

From the Archives

I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one.  Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful.  But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer.  So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets.  Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements.  Thanks so much!

Read Full Post »

Diary #785

For most of the year, this is the perfect place for the animals’ water trough; it’s directly below the highest-volume downspout, not far from the stable, and it’s low enough that the pigs can drink from it as easily as the llama can.  But from the beginning of June until mid-September, there isn’t enough rain to keep it full at all times, so earlier this year I hooked up a battered old hose to the faucet directly below the water tank in the utility room, and ran it through the basement to the trough.  I check it two or three times a day, and when I find the water level low I turn on the spigot and fill it.  But Louie has learned that on hot days, he can actually put his front feet in it and splash water all over his face and back; if the level is low enough or he’s persistent enough, he can actually empty the whole thing and invert it onto his back!  I have seen him out there, looking like a tortoise with a rubber shell, but I never have my phone handy when he starts doing it.  What all this means is that on hot days, I need to check it even more often because it can go from completely full to bone-dry in a relatively short time, should he decide to have a wade.  And that may help those of y’all who have never lived around pigs to understand why we have given the word “pig” the metaphorical meanings we all recognize.

Read Full Post »

The power of telling people you pray is incredible.  –  Josh Hawley (sort of)

Since I featured an Avengers-themed music video last week, I figured I’d do it again with one my over-40 readers may remember.  The links above it were provided by Phoenix Calida; Greg LukianoffFranklin Harris; The Onion; IncarcerNation (x3); and Franklin Harris again, in that order.

From the Archives

I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one.  Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful.  But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer.  So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets.  Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements.  Thanks so much!

Read Full Post »

I’m only just beginning to internalize that yes, it really is okay to keep slowing down, rather than just saying it aloud but not really believing it.  –  “Fourteenth Anniversary

When my dearest friend and companion passed away in January, I wrote:

When my marriage was starting to fall apart, I threw myself into this blog, churning out essays at a prodigious rate so my mind would have something to chew on other than my pain.  But Grace was with me that whole time, quietly offering her unflagging support; I’m not sure what will happen to my creative energy this time, so it’s possible you may notice some changes to adapt to that.  Because there has never before been an Honest Courtesan site without her.

Well, it has now been long enough that I’ve begun to see the answer.  It has, for the most part, become easier to get my daily work done, because I no longer have my Grace to care for, and focusing on my writing crowds out the pain just as it did fifteen years ago.  And strangely, I’ve found that my Muse of Fiction wants my attention again; perhaps she feels I don’t need her when I’m happy.  Whatever the reason, I’ve written three new stories since finishing Who in Review, and I’m starting on a much longer one than I’ve ever written before, in part as a tribute to Grace.  They’ll all be included in Lost Angels, which I expect will be published around this time next year.  And in the meantime I’ll keep going, just as I always do and always have done, until the day finally arrives when I no longer have to.

Read Full Post »

Diary #784

Those who follow me on Bluesky or Twitter know that every day, I do a short thread with links to my posts from one, two, and three years before that day.  Well, a week ago today this was one of the links, and when I saw it I started crying.  That may seem strange to you; after all, there’s nothing sad or moving about the column, which merely describes the process of tearing the nasty old roof off of what was originally the wellhouse and is now the utility room in the center of my atrium.  But I remember that day well; it was one of those days which, when described concisely, seems not to have anything especially memorable about it, and yet are etched indelibly in memory.  From the dates of pictures and text in my Annex columns, it appears to have been Thursday, June 9, 2022; I had only recently finished the atrium roof, and I asked Grace to come out and supervise while I tore off the old wellhouse roof and replaced it with a clean, flat surface.  It was raining heavily (“a toad drowner”, Grace used to call such rains), but I had done a good enough job on the roof that there were no leaks.  I think we played music while I worked, but whether we did or not, we certainly joked around and teased each other as we always did in such circumstances.  Even though I had to do all the physical labor, I relied on her advice about the best way to do such things so I didn’t injure myself or work harder than necessary to accomplish the task at hand.  That’s really all there was to it; just a work day like any other, made lighter and more pleasant by the company of a dear friend.  But now that she’s gone, there will never be another day like it again; that makes it a precious thing, to be treasured in memory.  And perhaps one day, I’ll be able to look back at it (and others like it) fondly, and it will evoke only a poignant nostalgia rather than sorrow and tears.

Read Full Post »

« Newer Posts - Older Posts »