Awesome! :-D

So...
Yesterday, right up to about 5:37pm, was pretty miserable.
I felt sick (sick-sick-sick! As in dizzy and nausious (as opposed to noxious) and too-hot-too-cold, and generally aweful). And I had to go into work early, and I had to leg-it to my office hours (for-which I was late, due to an oh-so-wonderful scheduling problem), didn't have a chance to eat anything -- although actually having people come to my office hours was pretty awesome -- and then had to do a lecture, with a film to show. Guess what: I left the podium code at my house. :-P

But.
It was all good. :-)

Why?

Because we had awesome discussions, and I was able to give the class the high-lights of the film (Judy Chicago, Menstrual Etiquette -- as discussed by Sophie Laws and Mary Douglas -- and reuseable menstrual products[1], (and Midwifery & homebirths, although they're not part of the film, I personally see them as being in the same field as re-usable pads and cups) all within the context of "who has control of a woman's body?"
I also discussed Naomi Wolf's Promiscuities and Ariel Levy's Female Chauvenist Pigs in relation to The Gaze (as discussed in their course readings) and the idea that women's sexuality is, in this culture, very much tied to *being desired* rather than *desiring* -- as such, we continue with the idea of woman as passive-sexual and/or on sexual display.
We had a chat about skin-trade workers (like strippers -- and one of the guys in the class brought up the book "Taking it Off, Putting it On" (written by one of the Women's Studies profs) about just those skin-workers) and how much of all-of-that is social pressures, and how much of it is perpetuated by the workers themselves, and why people choose (for what-ever reason, against what-ever alternative) to work in the sex- and skin- trades.

It was excellent. :-D
I was totally happy with the way that class turned out! :-D
(Today I do my prep for Women and Religion, which is tomorrow's lecture).

This morning, I finally decided to actually clean the tub (baking soda = awesome cleaner, by the way!) and actually have my bath! :-D

It was lovely. :-)
I used honey-nut body-wash as bubble bath, and mixed this with milk-&-chamomile bubble bath powder, and then threw in the Honey-B Bath Bomb from Lush that I've been saving for just such an occasion. I also threw in about 1/3 of a cup of soy-bean oil just to make it that much richer. :-)
It was lovely.

I sat in my bath for about an hour, and read:
CUNT: a declaration of independence
By Inga Muscio. :-)

It's awesome!
A little too heavy on the Barbara G. Walker (who gets on my nerves with her absolute conviction (or at least that which is displayed by her writing ) that ALL MEN, ALL THE TIME, ARE E-VILLE AND CRUELY-TWISTED, whereas ALL WOMEN ALL THE TIME, ARE GOOD AND HEALTHY-MINDED. Which is just a bit of a generalization, don't you think?
But, beyond that, CUNT is awesome. :-)
It's chatty and friendly and talks about woman-power and reusable menstrual products and such-like as if it were one big "Duh! Of course this is intelligent!" yack-fest. It's jut fabulous and I am delighted by it. :-) (Although she does, ick-ick-ick, use the term "shawomen" on page eleven, which looses her some points for being anglo-centric. But she hasn't used it since, so she's probably going to be let off the hook for it, for the most part. ;-)
Also, it has a big gerbera daisy on the front, and if that isn't happy-making, I don't know what is. :-)

Speaking of big, pink flowers. I've (finally!) decided what my sister is getting on her "thank-you for being my bride's maid" clutch-purse:
She's getting a big, fucia orchid.
(Paul's sister, Katie, is getting a gerbera daisy, thense the subject-change, just so you know the connection, and my maid of honour is getting a star-gazer lily).

After my bath, I used the body butter that Paul got me.
I think it's totally awesome. (Have you noticed I've been using "Awesome" a lot in this post? Clearly things are going well today. :-)
Also, it's all of ten dollars and change for a Kilogram jar tub of this stuff! :-D
Take that Body-Shop! :-)
Note of slightly-less-awesomeness: You have to mail-order this stuff (See address, below), but you have to order a certain amount of stuff from their company -- you can't just order one kilogram of body-butter and be done with it.
As such, I recomend getting together with your body-loving, sensual friends and ordering the minimum-order (or more, depending what you like from the place), getting it sent to one of your houses and having a divy-up party, complete with facials or manicures or something, and lots of yummy finger-food (deviled eggs and trifle, even though trifle is anything *but* finger food, and mango-strawberry skewers w/ cream and/or chocolate dip (see recipe below), and other sensual things). It would be fun. :-)

[Edit: My copies of Linging Goddesses, The Sacred and the Feminine, and Women in New Religions just arrived in the mail. Whee! New books for me! New books for me! :-) ]


So:

Address for New Dirrections Aromatics Inc

Web Site (The body butter is under "cosmetic bases", although it is currently out of stock).
It also carries soap supplies, essential oils, cocoa and shea and olive butters, etc. etc. etc.

( AND It's Canadian! )

Recipe for Chocolate Dip:

Ingredients
1C Whipping cream.
500mL (small) jar/tub Nutella (or other chocolate hazelnut/almond spread, such as the ones available from PC).

Partially whip the cream. (So that it's floopy, but not actually forming into peaks yet).
Add the chocolate spread, and whip together thoroughly until it is whippy, light and airy. :-)

Serve with fruit for dipping. :-)

(Or use as a hella-decadent icing or trifle-sylabub). :-)


Hm.
Now I want to cook. :-)

- Nam'ara,
- Amazon. :-)


[1] Also, thanks to the menstrual cups community I joined (which has another 6'4" woman in it! Whee! :-) I now know that I should go with the pre-kids size for now (or just wait another two years) because the post-kids/30 size will be too big (most likely) and therefore will not unfold properly.
So good to know. :-)
( TMI )

- TTFN,
- Me. :-)