Sarah Palin, in defending herself since the Arizona shooting, has done what people people do when defensive–gone on the attack. On Tuesday night, both Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert discussed the hypocritical move of saying this event shouldn’t be politicized and then totally blaming liberals for everything, as Palin enacted the double standard of saying rhetoric shouldn’t be taken as an incitement to violence, but then claimed that liberals wouldn’t be happy until they destroyed the country (she said something about bringing America to her knees).

My favorite comment was that “if it weren’t for their [liberals’] double standards, they’d have no standards” on her Hannity appearance.

I didn’t think that woman could incite me to violence, but . . .

I’m not actually motivated to attack, just to start gathering weapons for when her minions eventually come for me. My master’s thesis (and something I’ve been interested in all my adult life) is about how you use words to turn your neighbors into something you can kill–how you can make them an enemy, a traitor, an animal. When you research how rhetoric has been used historically, you do start to see the signs of when the villagers are going to start building a bonfire for the witch.

And while Palin keeps saying everyone’s coming after her, we know that’s not true. She’s on tv all the time. She’s not the lone woman on the outskirts of the village; she’s the powerful woman in the village who keeps deciding who’s a witch and making sure that everyone knows it.

Her comment about liberals having no standards is a way of making them sound like they’re not you–they’re not American, they’re traitors, they can’t be trusted. For example, it can’t be that they want health care because they’re bleeding hearts or because they have pre-existing conditions, but because they hate America and love Stalin and somehow want you to have healthcare so they can join a panel that will send you to your death. And even if they don’t want to kill you, they want healthcare to kill your job!

I’ve seen the villagers who are most likely to attack. Yes, some are just unbalanced. Others, however, are being trained to attack. They are the children of the quiverfull movement; they are the children in Jesus Camp. They are the fringes of the Republican party that is now gaining dominion over the moderates.

They believe–and people like Palin don’t correct them–that this is a “Christian” nation. They believe, like Palin, that liberals have no morals. I know some personally who believe in witches (and I’m not talking about the wiccan next door, but the actual sacrificing your baby in her dark sabbath kind).

They keep being told what Americans are–people like them (that’s how you can say that “Americans” want the repeal of healthcare when all of the studies show this is a minority opinion). I am apparently un-American. I teach at a university. I don’t believe in their god, and  am dedicated to the separation of church and state. I want healthcare for all of my fellow Americans. I have more faith in science than in the Bible in terms of understanding history and things like germ theory.

Once upon a time, they would have called me a heretic and burned me. Or witch. Or accused me of being a Jew. Later, the terms became “radical,” “communist,” “traitor,” and “terrorist.”

We need to be careful when we make everything “us” and “them.”  “Them” never fairs well in that scenario. You shouldn’t have to make me a “them” to vote differently than I do.

I disagree with Palin and those like her, and I may think they’re stupid (or brilliantly mean), but I don’t think they’re un-American. America is my family; like any family, it contains people I don’t agree with, but they’re still family. And just because I disagree with them doesn’t mean I want the destruction of our family unit.

So I don’t like it when I see the fires getting stoked and the words being thrown around that indicate that Americans/people like me are so different/evil that we aren’t even Americans/people.

As many of you know, I don’t have a twitter page, but Denise, social goddess that she is, made one for our book, The Simpsons in the Classroom–you can follow us under Simpsonology. It is through this apparently fabulous entity that we got in contact with some of the heavy hitters at THE SIMPSONS: David Silverman, animator & director; Josh Weinstein, producer & show runner & writer; and Chris Ledesma, music editor. The latter invited us to see a recording of the music for the show if we were ever in LA. This year’s MLA happened to be in LA, so down we went last weekend.

Walking on to the Fox lot, we were nervous. As Denise had explained to our friend Kathy, our excitement was extraordinary because the circumstances were. How many people have loved one thing and been obsessed with one thing, since 1987? How many people then teach it and write about it? How do you expect people to react when they get to meet their obsession after over twenty years? (I think we held ourselves together very well, all things considered.)

Getting our passes from the guard seemed surreal; I think we were both expecting to be turned away, like it was all some sort of mistake, but the passes were given and we set off down a fake street that they use on BONES and HOW I MET YOUR MOTHER toward the FUTURAMA trailer to meet up with Josh. Josh used to work on THE SIMPSONS, but now is on FUTURAMA, which Comedy Central will hopefully renew (it’s been really good lately–check it out!). The two nice people in reception were expecting us, and Josh was summoned.

We started with a tour of the Futurama building–his office, the revision room, etc. Josh offered us some Matt Groening doodles that were on post-its in the revision room. Apparently, Groening can’t sit down without doodling something and we now have our own proof of that.

Then Josh took us on a brief tour of relevant parts of the lot. The recording stages in one building are named after three famous Hollywood women–Jane Russell, Marilyn Monroe, and Marge Simpson. We couldn’t access Marge’s studio because they were doing some dubbing for BONES. “You mean Angel from BUFFY might be in there?” quipped Denise.

The old SIMPSONS‘s building itself looked like a motel–it was small and two stories and all of the rooms were accessible by the outside. When you look straight on to it, you see a fountain with koi (and netting to unsuccessfully keep feral cats out) and bathrooms. Groening’s office is behind a nondescript door to the right of the bathroom doors.

Along the way, we met Ian Maxtone-Graham (who wrote, among other things, “24 Minutes” and who is very tall), Rob LaZebnik (“Homer vs. Dignity”), and Michael Nobori (“To Surveil with Love”). Due to Denise’s description of my love for Weird Al Yankovic, Mr. Nobori has probably banned me from the lot from now on.

Josh then took us for coffee at Moe’s Bar on the lot. We talked about working with his old writing partner, his brief stint on SIT DOWN, SHUT UP, Groening, and the behind the scenes stories of some episodes.

By this time, it was 11; we’d been there for an hour. Josh had to hand us over to Chris, which is where I’ll continue with the next post.

(Relevant pictures are being uploaded to Facebook; I can’t get them to post here . . .)

Day Five started with the boy and I doing a quick tour through the Natural History Museum, one of the most beautiful buildings in the world. Alexander wanted to look at the giant sloths and the dinosaur exhibit. They have an animatronic t-rex that looks really good. When he looks you in the eye, you start to worry for just a second that his legs will move toward you. Alexander was getting video of him and asked me to get him to turn his head and roar. I explained that he wasn’t real, but when I moved, he moved his head to follow me and I got the silliest feeling in my stomach.
We also looked at the Darwin exhibit, which I love because it does not feel the need to mention that one country would find it “controversial.”
Then we had Chinese food, which was good, but took too long, before going to the Petrie. The Petrie museum is a small collection of Egyptian artifacts housed on the University College of London campus. Most things were unearthed in the Victorian era by the Petries. Lots of beads and potteries and two linen dresses that were 5000 years old!
Afzal, who teaches on that campus, then showed us around and bought us coffee.
Then off to Wagamama, the noodle place, before heading into The Rivals. The Rivals is big here because the leads are a famous couple from Of The Manor Born–it’s fun to watch them fight the younger generation and to attempt to placate each other. As it was a Restoration comedy, it was silly in all the right ways, and predictable, but this was an excellent show.
Yesterday, the boy and I were up early to get in line at the National Theatre to get day tickets for Hamlet. It worked (and they were only 10 a piece)! Then we wandered Covent Garden and had lunch so we could go into the afternoon Hamlet full and ready. It was by far the best Hamlet I’ve seen. There was one moment where I felt the timing was off, but the acting and directing was strong. Hamlet’s madness was not annoying, etc.
Then it was off to Pizza Express with Liam and Courtney and then back to their flat to open presents and watch short films.
Today I’m coming down with something, which will taint our last day here a bit, but that’s why it’s important to close this out now, so I can go brace my immune system with a few pints of something.

Neither the boy or I slept particularly well last night, but we dragged ourselves up and went down to have our British breakfast and then headed over to the British Museum, where we actually live when we’re in London. He copied down Japanese symbols while I waited for headache medicine to kick in.

Which it did–just in time for Afzal to join us for the special exhibit on The Book of the Dead. Beautiful examples of the book–including the longest ever found (at 37 metres). We also learned many spells, including ones for chasing away beetles, crocodiles, and snakes. My favorite, though, is the spell that keeps you from having to subsist only on feces and urine in the afterlife. I’m glad someone thought of that. There are 42 deity names to memorize–you explain to each deity that you haven’t committed a particular sin–“Oh, X, please note that I haven’t poked a badger with a spoon and thus should live on.” You have to memorize the names of six cows to get to eat them in the afterlife, etc. etc.

Life, apparently, was just prepping for this really really big exam. The Book of the Dead was your cheat sheet, which is why you wanted to pay a lot to have it done well (and on new and not recycled papyrus). Many rich people had additional spells inserted from the standard ones–for extra perks I guess.

I’ve been thinking all day about what I would put in the book of the dead. I mean, I would like to not eat feces and urine, but what would I eat in paradise? What animals would I chase away and which ones would I draw near? What games would I take with me? Whom would I want buried with me?

After all these uplifting things, we headed out for Turkish food. Then the boy and I skulked around for a bit before heading over to the other end of town for a play. Alex was turning his nose up at the food offerings, but luckily I saw a certain Portuguese rooster and thus Nando’s saved us from despair.

The play was Joseph K, a revised Kafka piece. It was dark and funny and terribly surreal at the end. The theatre was small, but the audience was engaged. The acting was superb and I’m still thinking about some of the choices–like the use of between scene music and radio clips–so I’m happy.

Back at the hotel before another big day tomorrow.

It was colder today and only promises to become more so. I don’t like this aspect of things, especially since it’s so warm inside all the buildings that I have to strip off (almost) all the layers and then carry them around. Still, I’d rather be cold here than warm in most other places.

The boy has had to borrow a coat from Liam because he’s shivering so much. If there were an ounce on his body and if it were warmer than a 3 degree celsius high, he might be okay.

He slept for about twelve hours last night and then woke up all weird. He turned down tea at breakfast, but then drank all of mine.

We met Courtney and Liam and had a wonderful Sunday roast at the Adam and Eve. Then we went to the conference, where I gave my paper. Note to presenters: time your presentation. 20 minutes means 20 minutes, not being cut off at 40. Don’t count on the computer working. Proofread your damn powerpoint or else you look like an idiot.

After the conference, we went to Courtney and Liam’s neighborhood to have drinks at The Camel. Alexander and I have come back to our place to have Indian and to do some work before we turn in.

Have just checked my email and found a message from a student who thinks she’s going to get kicked out because of the C I’m giving her (which is overly generous of me already). Of course, that means that her grades in her other courses are worse. She admitted that she hadn’t studied and said she didn’t want to get kicked out. My understanding is that since this is her first quarter, she would only get on probation for a D average. I would like to pass on this bit of advice to everyone, though. If asking for a grade change, don’t have a message littered with grammar errors. It only reinforces that you really should have gotten an even lower grade. How will this turn out? Well, the grades are turned in. The math is done. The grade will stay the same, no matter what impulse I have to change it for the worse now.

Did you see the oldest copy of Beowulf, from circa 1000 today?
Did you help Liam pick out a porno magazine for a secret Santa gift?
Did you see the oldest book ever printed in English?
Did you have Indian food behind a locked door guarded by two police officers because the student protestors were rumored to be nearby?
Did you see the oldest recorded version of the verb “to fart”?
Did you get caught in a Santa Claus flash mob?
Did the boy fall asleep beside you before 9 p.m. because he was up at 3 this morning?
Did you hear someone say “sublime” too many times?
Did you have a sip of extraordinarily good mulled wine?
No? That’s weird, cause I did all that today. 😉

I’m in my hotel in London, sated by a perfect chicken dinner from Nando’s, followed by a nice g&t from a pub down the block. It’s so good to be home!
Colin Firth’s face was almost the first thing I saw at the airport, in an ad for his new movie–he’s welcome to greet me any time. Then Alexander and I made our way slowly here (seventeen hours door to door, Davis to London). Although British train and tube stations need to have lifts and escalators instead of just making me lug suitcases up stairs, things went smoothly.
We checked in and headed straight over to the British Museum so we could see our good friends in the Egyptian Hall, the Parthenon Gallery (Alex likes the fighting centaur pieces), and the enlightenment library room. We didn’t have time to see the new special exhibit on The Book of the Dead, but we’ll be hitting it soon.
Liam and Courtney met us for dinner and then bought us drinks. We shall see them again tomorrow when Courtney talks about World War Z at the conference.
Everything is familiar, except that I’ve never seen London all dressed up for Christmas before (except for in movies). I was exceptionally worried about it being really cold. It’s cold, but not so cold that I’m severely uncomfortable yet. I hope I don’t have to take that back before the week is out. However, if the weather does turn nasty, I at least have the shoes my boyfriend bought for me just a few hours ago. Because, yes, I had absolutely no appropriate shoes for rain/snow, nor the time to get any. (Nor the will–I hate shoes and shoe shopping.) Luckily, although my boyfriend hates shoe shopping as well, he loves me enough to make sure my feet are protected.

Sorry for the short, disjointed blog–when I started traveling, it was yesterday and I’m knackered. I’m going to work on my Shaun of the Dead paper a bit and fall asleep.

A woman interviewed on NPR today explained that if she were flying, she wouldn’t want to walk through the body scan machine because she’s over forty and “there are places no one should see.” She then explained that she’d opt for a pat down.

Um.

I’m not sure how people feeling you up is somehow less invasive than someone seeing a flash of your naked outline.

I think this is a remnant of our conflicted puritan and victorian past, which takes us back to this time of year–Thanksgiving. The puritans came over here for the opportunity to be uptight. No–they didn’t come for religious freedom–they came to establish a theocracy in which they could make everyone follow their interpretation of the Bible (or else), which is the opposite of freedom of religion (their descendants are among us today). Only a third of the people who came were puritans, by the way, the others were fortune seekers and convicts who chose America over English jails (because we were a prison colony, too).

The puritans were famously prudish about sexuality and their bodies. Yet they had a very high out of wedlock pregnancy rate. As long as the couple got married, the community didn’t really say anything about it.

The Victorians who came later were uptight as well. They covered their table legs and referred to chicken parts by color rather than saying breast or thigh. Yet venereal disease ran rampant. Most soldiers in the Civil War were not taken out of duty by death or battle injury, but by some form of sexual pox. 1 in 6 homes in Victorian London was a house of ill-repute.

No wonder all of these people who are so concerned about their privacy are opting instead to have a stranger’s hands caress them. Why settle for a grey outline of my breasts when you can put your hands right on them? (Go ahead–pretend to be outraged–Americans are great at that; I used to know a minister who’s wife would catch him watch Cinemax at 3 in the morning. He would then pontificate about the filth that “they” put on tv.)

(Of course, some people are opting out of flying all together. If they are the people who wanted to start wars for our safety, or accept civilian casualties for our safety, or who believe in preemptive strikes for our safety, or who insisted that if you didn’t agree with Bush then you were siding with the terrorists, then they need to be inconvenienced for my safety. Thousands have died for our “safety”, yet these people won’t go through a scanner? I don’t like waiting in line; I don’t like being inconvenienced; I dislike being blown up even more.)

If you know me at all, you know that I love Margaret Atwood (who sometimes refers to me as Karmel). My dissertation was on her work, I’m the former President of the Margaret Atwood Society, and I run a weekly book group that started out as an all-Atwood reading group some six years ago. One of the great pleasures in my life is getting people to read Atwood if they haven’t done so already.

Like most people, my first glimpse at Atwood was with The Handmaid’s Tale, which we read in High School. It was banned by the district, so my private program required it be bought. One of my aunt’s found it in a used bookstore and came home to announce that I shouldn’t be allowed to read it. Apparently, there was sex with three people described vividly. My mother decided I could handle whatever it was. The sex scene referred to was far from sexy (it was the opposite of sexy, actually), but the book was glorious. It was poetry and it was social justice. It scared me and thrilled me.

After I left high school and before I went to college, I found a book of Atwood’s poetry. I wasn’t in the habit of reading poetry then, but I had loved Handmaid’s Tale so much that I took the book home and read it. If you’ve never read her poetry, check out “Variations on the word Sleep,” “Siren Song,” “This is a photograph of me,” and “you fit into me.”

If you haven’t read Atwood, you should. Because of her breadth and her use of various genres, she’s written at least one thing you would like. Not everyone loves Handmaid’s Tale, but if you’re a sci-fi person, you need to read Oryx and Crake. If you like historical novels and/or psychology, you will love Alias Grace, which is based on a true story. Shoot me an email; tell me what you like; I’ll find an Atwood for you.

My book group is throwing Atwood a birthday party in absentia today–we’re having our favorite main dish (crock-pot lasagna) and a birthday cake on which a flying pig will wish all our dreams come true. And then we’ll raise a glass to her and wish her happy birthday and many more years (and many more books).