"Dear Ms. [ZombieDeathKoala],

I am pleased to inform you that the NIDCD Division of Scientific Programs recommended award of your fellowship application at its meeting this week. The Institute’s Fiscal Management Branch has indicated that funds are available for this award. The NIDCD Grants Management Branch (GMB) will begin, very shortly, to process your award, based on your requested start date or the earliest possible start date for us.

[Yada yada details]

Good Luck,

Sincerely

Dr. --------
Research Training Officer
National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders"

From the Department of Nauseatingly Cute:

Sleeping otters holding hands

If you haven't ever read the blog Girls Read Comics (And They're Pissed), deduct 10 coolness points from your score.

Author Karen Healey is one of life's winners. Exhibit A: her most recent post about dolls, busts, and comic book playthings of all sorts. I particularly like the use of this Supergirl bust...

...as inspiration for a whole new view of Superman.

Heh-lloooo, Man of Steel!

Yesterday was International Women's Day. As I completely missed it, I am now expected to turn in my uterus and be forever expelled from the Womyn Power Club.

I have been catching up on some of what I missed by visiting some of my favorite blogs, like Pandagon, Feministing, and Echidne of the Snakes. As expected, most of the mainstream discourse on the subject is dude-centric, since some yahoo always feels the need to ask, "When is International Men's Day?!"

I am forced to giggle as I remember back to when I was 6 years old, and I asked my mom,

"Mom, how come there is a Mother's Day and a Father's Day, but there's no Children's Day?"

I had chosen my moment well. Mom was fresh off a 9-hour work day, and was picking up my toys while she kept dinner simmering on the stove. Dad was outside breaking ice off the driveway so that he wouldn't have to do it at 6:00 the next morning before work.

Mom fixed me with her eye and said, firmly, "Kid, every day is Children's Day."

Even at six, I got the point.

Sorry, dudes, but there's one downside to holding the vast majority of political, financial, and social power throughout the entire world, and that is that you aren't going to get to enjoy a completely obscure and generally ignored nominal holiday. I know, I know, this is clearly oppression and men are obviously facing a kind of discrimination that dwarfs anything women have ever had to endure. But I know you manly folks will be able to suck it up.

My family cat, Hobbs, died yesterday. He was a very old fellow. In fact, he was older than Boo by a couple of years.

Hobbs' brother, Beezie, died a little while back. I can still remember the day we brought Beezie and Hobbs home from the Human Society. I held a kitten against my jean jacket as I carried it into the house, and when I tried to set him down inside the house it felt like pulling Velcro off my jacket.

The funny story about our kittens was that we thought they were girl cats when we got them. They were named Suzie B (for Susan B Anthony) and Lizzie (for Elizabeth Stanton) when we first got them. But when we took them in for a vet check up, the vet lifted up a kitten's tail and announced, "Suzie B is a boy." Then, "So's Lizzie."

So instead of naming our kittens for feminist leaders, we named them as demons. ("Hob" is an old nickname for the devil, and Beezie was short for Beelzebub.)

I don't think I'm really a cat person at heart, but I loved Beezie and Hobbs. I'm glad that they enjoyed long lives with us, and I hope we made them as happy as they made us.

I have to take a moment to brag, here, because Boyfriend has landed a full-time position at NASD (where he has been temping for a bit) and is now making exactly double what I earn. While I mourn the loss of my position as Sugarmama, he has promised to buy me ponies made of diamonds and condor-egg omelettes. Huzzah!