Life and Linketies (also heads up on a contraceptive pill recall)

Very quiet morning escorting. I taught NL to play Gobblet, which is a favorite of mine, and a good candidate for outdoor play because the pieces don't blow away (usually). We finished up there, picked up the CSA and headed home for a bit of Doctor Who and a quick nap before the Planned Parenthood rally. The rally went well; mostly college feminist groups, which totally made me all warm and fuzzy and nostalgic. I was talking to NL on the way home about why it's important to me to go to events like that. I don't see rallies and marches as being primarily about interacting with the public and trying to convert people. Most of that actually happens in daily life one-on-one conversations. Rallies and marches are for the base, to make them feel less alone and more motivated to do the daily grunt-work of real activism. So showing up and cheering the kids who are just getting their activism feet wet is totally worthwhile, in my opinion.

Now I'm at work. NL's been given the tour of my cubefarm and is headed back home. I'm really ridiculously exhausted and also on cold meds. Hopefully there won't be too much call for actual thinking today.

Unexpected goodness in my day! Got to have a long IM chat with Katy, and a shorter one with Tori. Lots of catching up. Much yay.

Also, after pulling a real doofus maneuver on the drive home from escorting today, I was reminded of one of my long-standing frustrations with non-verbal communicative signals. Why do we have such a clear symbol for "fuck you" but none for "I'm sorry"? There are times, especially when verbal communication isn't an option, that having an "I'm sorry" signal would seriously help a lot. And now I'm curious just how broad that particular non-verbal lexicon is. It's certainly nothing compared to ASL or other true sign languages, but it does seem more comparable to that than to general non-verbal communication; much of that conveys moods but not clearly translatable phrases. It seems like a very specific subset. Any language geeks in the audience interested in providing insight? I'm also curious as to whether other cultures tend to have mostly the same clear signals, or whether others have other messages they find more important to communicate.

Random brainstorming:
Fuck you: the finger
Thank you: smile/nod of head
I don't know: shrug of shoulders
After you: wave of hand
Come here: beckoning motion
Go away: shooing motion

Also, since the story came up this week, I feel obliged to relate that I (and also my brother James, I determined after checking with Mom and Dad to determine the species of big cat involved) got peed on by a lion when we were little. I was about six, James was about two. We had to go home early from the zoo that day.

Birth control pills recalled due to 'packaging error' (that apparently could cause you to take them in the wrong order)
The recall affects these products: Cyclafem 7/7/7, Cyclafem 1/35, Emoquette, Gildess FE 1.5/30, Gildess FE 1/20, Orsythia, Previfem and Tri-Previfem.

On Saturday, September 24th, the Repeal Hyde Art Project will be displayed at the 2011 Choice USA Membership conference in Washington, D.C.
Send in your entry by September 22 to be part of this grassroots community art project!

Growing set of state abortion restrictions visualized -- This is a brilliant interactive chart!

Story Repair
In this feature, we select a story that appeared in one or more major news outlets and try to show how a different set of inquiries or observations could have produced a more illuminating article. For repair this week: "Falloff in abortion rate and in number of procedures stalls" (Washington Post, Jan. 11). -- I'm finding the Remapping Debate site really awesome in general! What a great idea!

Occupy Wall Street Begins [Today], September 17th
more and in-person descriptions and photos from ontd_p folks
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