Simonson also tweets: "This woman is alone, living in squalor and drinking." Prescription drugs too. (Click on the image to see the full cover. There's lots of stuff on the floor.)Is this cover intentionally dark? Christ pic.twitter.com/2CryDhwTAd
— Joe Gabriel Simonson (@SaysSimonson) December 1, 2020
Simonson adds: "People say it’s meant to be dark but this interview with the artist doesn’t make that clear." And he links to this piece in The New Yorker, an interview with the artist Adrian Tomine.
And I must say that before I read the interview, I went to Amazon and bought a hardcover book of his, "The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Cartoonist." That's how much I love that beautifully drawn cover.
I think the cover is about the built-up effects of the lockdown on a young person in a small apartment and how it remains nonetheless possible to present a pulled-together image within the frame of a video call. The woman is struggling with the long ordeal of isolation but still looking out into the world for social interaction. She has a pretty cocktail in her hand, so it must be a social, not a business call. She's got her polished looks — lipstick, ruffled blouse, earrings. She's ready to move forward, optimistic. Outside of the frame of the call, the place is a mess, but it's a homey mess, with kitty cats and snack containers. She's comfortable, in shorts and fluffy slippers. And now that I'm looking closely, unshaved legs. The expression on her face is a serene smile.
Now, I'm reading the interview. The book on the floor — lower right — is the book I just bought. Nice. The artist was influenced by Edward Hopper. Here's the closest thing to a statement about the darkness/nondarkness of the cover:
In your book, and in your New Yorker covers, you seem to home in on painful moments to find the humor in them. Do you experience a eureka moment when you locate that contradiction?I think that’s a good way of putting it. To be honest, I don’t know how someone could get through life without being able to bask in that contradiction. In my personal life, I’ve often felt very moved by that act of finding humor in pain. If someone can authentically pull that off and be really funny, that’s worth more than a hundred words of earnest consolation to me.
At Amazon, where I bought the book, there are no 1-star reviews. There is one 2-star review. A classic Amazon unfair bad review: "The book is great. The way it was shipped to me was awful. Completely damaged corners."
There are two 3-star reviews. One is solely about the sticky spot left on the cover after the removal of the price tag. The other is at least semi-substantive: "I’ve been a fan of Tomine’s work for ages. For the life of me, I’ll never understand why he decided to muddy up all of his art in this book with the graph paper background. It’s completely distracting."
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109 comments:
Intentionally dark? The Whitechick in her ethnic guise is still a whitechick.
Puppy influenced by Hopper
For the mystified, you have to click on the image twice before you can see the bottom third which delivers most of the punchline.
People of Color
suffering from White Privilege
the eminence front
its a put on
The woman needs to be about twenty pounds fatter for accuracy.
The cover is dark and maybe it is meant to be, but that aspect of these lockdowns is hardly being addressed.
My friend's daughter dropped out of her first year at college. She went away from home, got shut up in a dorm room, all the classes went on line, and the students weren't allowed to congregate. Dropping out of school would be tough to see as a parent, but doing that to first year college students who are all alone sounds like a substance abuse problem that's bound to happen.
I spy a Zojirushi!
What makes this interesting is that a hundred different people can read a hundred interpretations into it:
*a brave face while desperately lonely
*seeking a moment of normalcy in an abnormal world
*a phony sophistication amidst squalor
*a young striver doing what young strivers do
Makes you stop to ask, "What's going on here?". That's one function of good art.
She’s also swiping on Tinder.
It’s her only hope to get out of her situation.
People are dying of alcohol and drug related causes in some cities in larger numbers than COVID. Yet 12 step meetings have been pushed either entirely online or to small groups. For AA there is no sign up to go. You just go. But not in times of COVID.
There are so many awful things we are doing to people in the names of these shut downs and "pauses". Stopping AA meetings. Keeping college kids in their dorm rooms away from others. Shuttering businesses. Locking old and sick people away from their loved ones. Blaming people who get COVID for doing something wrong-- not taking it seriously enough.
She looks happy to me.
It makes me glad I don't live in a New York City tiny apartment. It makes me glad I can video chat with my friends without trying to fool them by dressing differently from the waist up than the waist down. Is the current word I can be "authentic"? I don't find the cartoon "dark". It's sad.
There's a sublime quality to the darkness of this cover--she looks happy and well put together, enjoying her cheery quarantini on camera, while all around her, and she herself, is squalor, dirt, decay. But she looks nice on camera.
She is ashamed of the state of her life, but is also probably proud of how she hides it and puts on a good face for all the other people who are also putting on a good face while hiding the lonely squalor of their lives.
The drink, the shirt, the smile, just makes it sadder.
Squalor? I've seen squalor and that ain't it. Though the open cabinet door is pretty shocking.
Finding humor in pain, isn't that what we aren't supposed to do? Like when the founder of Zappos dies in a fire?
Over the summer and early fall, mrs. stevew and I were living in nearly identical conditions: mostly locked down but for occasional trips to do errands and such. The big difference, and why it was more difficult for her, was that I am working still and so on zoom meetings every day. I get to interact with others, coworkers and customers, and the nature of these meetings has a social element to it that was absent pre-Covid. The missus does not have that, and she naturally needs more of it than I do, so the negative affect of the lockdown on her state of mind has been greater.
The people I worry about are not like me and mrs. stevew or the woman depicted on that cover - it is the ones that are losing their jobs & businesses, and those that have medical and psychological issues. Try and find some humor in that.
Turnout for the last NYC mayor's election was 18%. Now they have a dictator. As far as I'm concerned, this woman can be bricked up in her apartment.
My friend's daughter dropped out of her first year at college...
My daughter, a sophomore, came home, dropped out of her 4 year school,(same isolation as you describe) and will complete her A.S. at the local Jr. college then transfer with what we hope will be a near 4.0 gpa while saving 70% tuition and working and saving $. Her mother and I are wonderfully surprised at her maturity and clear goal setting. Her vastly improved relationship with her high school age sister is also a source of pride. 'The best of a bad situation' seems a phrase we won't have to define for her any longer.
stevew said...Squalor? I've seen squalor and that ain't it. Though the open cabinet door is pretty shocking.
Look around that room a little more.
She’s wearing Umbro shorts. Thought those disappeared circa 1990.
Two cats, three bottles of wine, one martini. Plus a bottle of pills. The contempt for western civ accelerates.
I agree on the Hopper influence and share your enjoyment of the art, but this post needs a poll. Is that a/an
Instant Pot
Rice Cooker
Ultrasonic cleaner
in the upper left corner? Somebody's already dropped the Elephant Brand into the comments, and that's no bread machine. Those of us on the spectrum have to know.
Well tim maguire, I did and we'll just have to disagree. Messy? For sure. Squalid, not even close. And I like things neat and tidy.
One of my nephews just completed his first semester at UNL. Only one class in-person. No football games. No parties. I want to cry for all college kids. Thanks Trump for the vaccines in record time.
Bill Owens- that is wonderful for your daughter and your family. Hopefully all the young adults floundering right now will find their way back on their feet.
Thanks Trump for the vaccines in record time.
This is one of the political things that really makes me want to scream. He was mocked at debates for saying this was going to happen. Biden's big idea is to wear masks and lock up, and Trump got Operation Warp Speed going and got no public credit for it.
This is one of the political things that really makes me want to scream. He was mocked at debates for saying this was going to happen. Biden's big idea is to wear masks and lock up, and Trump got Operation Warp Speed going and got no public credit for it.
That's why they hate him: he's demonstrated that the political class are uniformly awful and incompetent. See also: the Mid-East peace deals.
One of my nephews just completed his first semester at UNL. Only one class in-person. No football games. No parties. I want to cry for all college kids.
Meh, I don't have a whole lot of sympathy. College has become too much of a four-year vacation which is part of the reason that costs have ballooned.
It's always like a science experiment to view the thinking and world perception of New Yorkers.
I wont get that cover til today's mail, thankyou very much. Another damn weekly hilite
jilted. I liked last weeks cover, I was even thinking of cutting off the top and tacking the bottom to the wall. I was showing the blue Empire State Building cover to a 9 year old. She didn't even know what the Empire State building is. And I was around this college freshman at Tday. I like jiving with the college students - except the ones I'm around are sooo perfect these days. I mean seriously, they're like good students and stuff. I'd bought the college girl Taylor Swift albums thru the years and sorta jokingly ask if she's still into Swift. And I guess shed gotten a little annoyed with my BS and she mentions how the Beatles are overrated. Here Comes the Sun isn't even real rock according to her. When I was 18 that'd a been like me debunking some 1920 music to my grand dad. I spent some time around him and I cant recall him ever being partial to any particular music. He claims he saw one of the Tuney- Dempsey fights. He grew up around Brooksville. Not much there then. His mom maybe died of Yellow Fever. But that's what you see people claiming about people back then, They died from the Yellow Fever.
The picture shows the entire living space of a Ney York City apartment.
And people wonder why 500,000 residents moved out during COVID.
Maybee said. There are so many awful things we are doing to people in the names of these shut downs and "pauses".
This is the biggest and probably longest lasting issue. The psycological damage being inflicted on people is going to be something that may not go away. Life changing in some ways.
Young people, in particular, who have bought (hook line and sinker) the Democrats line of "we are all gonna die" are being the most damages. Children whose formative year(s) are being scarred by this Covid panic may never recover.
I'm really concerned about some of the young people that I know, and who I am related to. They have progressively become more brittle. Depressed, hopeless, angry, frustrated and worse. Lost jobs, financial issues. I fear for their interpersonal relationships, marriages breaking up, children becoming lethargic or acting out in their own levels of frustration. Some of them have become even more self isolated, not answering calls or returning emails. I'm quite afraid for them.
What can I do? I can't reason with them, because it would only cause an argument. "Science!!" "Denier!!!" etc etc etc. So....I don't. All I can do is offer solace and try to be a source of comfort...if they would get out of their bunkers and try to live.
Not a very hyggelig apartment.
More like a Potemkin setup, where the subject has put on a face (maybe one she keeps in a jar by the door) to meet the faces that she meets.
The title is 'Love Life.' The young woman is on a Zoom 'date.' With her cellphone in her other hand the entire time. In other words, treating her date with exactly the same indifference she did back in pre-COVID days.
Greg Hlatky said...
Turnout for the last NYC mayor's election was 18%. Now they have a dictator. As far as I'm concerned, this woman can be bricked up in her apartment.
"For the love of God, Montresor!"
THEOLDMAN
Her cats like her.
Yeah, that one cat is in the box maybe hoping a trip to the vet is in store.
she's not living in squalor...She's living in a pig sty
her legs need a shave too. (don't want to think about her more private parts: YUK)
"For the love of God, Montresor!"
"Yes," I said, "for the love of God!"
Snowflakes melting in the heat of a pandemic. Oooooh, it's so hard to do a few simple things to blunt the spread. Nazi freedom ghouls stealing our souls and the election.
Charlie didn't get much USO. He was dug in too deep or moving too fast. His idea of great R&R was cold rice and a little rat meat. He had only two ways home: death, or victory.
There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
But this time there will be no going out when the evening is spread out against the sky
And no, you won’t dare to eat a peach.
About the room in the mag cover.
Seriously. Clean up your space!!! Pick up and put away. Make your bed. Clean your kitchen counters.
First of all in a small area, like a NYC apartment or a travel trailer you MUST be meticulous in putting things up, cleaning up. A space for everything and everything IN its place. No exceptions. Even the smallest object out of place, rumpled up or disheveled will stand out. It only takes a moment and it will heal your soul.
SECOND and more important, your mental state will be calmer, more serene and less agitated if your 'space' is neat and orderly. Your brain will be able to function and concentrate on other things, than the fact that your space is a pig pen.
When everything else in life fails and you feel you are losing control....the one thing you DO have control over is how your "space" looks. You are in control. You are the boss in you house.
"Is that a/an
Instant Pot
Rice Cooker
Ultrasonic cleaner"
Not an Instant Pot. Looks exactly like a "smart" rice cooker.
Heh. I love the stack of books under the laptop. Part of the looking-presentable-on-Zoom set of skills so many had to learn this year.
Negative close associations h/t NYT. The diversity you say.
The New Yorker publication portends of evolution... nay, progress to the twilight fringe.
Thesis: prog cruelty toward young people shows they don't give a damn about social justice.
Well said DBQ @8:15.
1) It think some of The New Yorker's readers might benefit from reading Jordan Peterson's 12 Rules for Life. The one about putting your house in order before criticizing the world might be particularly helpful.
2) I've known enough New Yorker readers well enough to suspect that a disproportionate number of them are likely to see that cover as an ideal to strive for.
The cat taking a dump next to you while you're on a zoom is pretty squalid.
Haha. Also, funny.
Also, can we call a cover illustration of a POC "dark"? Tsk tsk.
If you look at that cover and think "squalor," you have a pretty nice life. Clutter, I see; filth, I don't. I think this piece works because you can get it to say "This woman is coping" or "This woman is failing to cope," and what it says to you is about you.
If you like this, you'll really like Love and Rockets.
At first, I thought it was AOC in the drawing. That could be her life if she hadn’t been elected to Congress.
P J Said If you look at that cover and think "squalor," you have a pretty nice life. Clutter, I see; filth, I don't.
I see filth and slovenly living. Old containers of take out food on the desk. Drink containers on the floor. Sink full of unwashed dirty dishes. (all a recipe for cockroaches and mice.) Full trash bag in the kitchen. Paper towels on the dirty floor.
Cat litter box in the kitchen. Yeah I know small apartment and not much room. But given the condition of the rest of the house and her own sloppy personal hygiene, I doubt the litter box has been cleaned and sanitized.
Clutter I can understand. I don't like it, but it is easy to happen. Dirt, germs, stinking decaying food, garbage, cat POOP.
Yes. Squalor and filth.
For more verisimilitude her brows and upper lip need to be more furry.
maybe Dennis Hopper.
...not Edward
PJ: yeah I think you nail it. She's on the edge between coping and falling apart. Isn't that what we were taught that the veneer of civilization was paper thin. In practice, this is what makes life meaningful. Kurtz hints at it in Apocalypse Now!:
I watched a snail crawl along the edge of a straight razor. This is my dream; this is my nightmare. Crawling, slithering, along the edge of a straight razor, and surviving.
It's also the knife edge of the Heros journey Peterson describes in his Maps of Meaning Harvard lectures. He uses the yin yang symbol as an illustration.
Where's her vibrator?
That's squalor?
I used to dream of such squalor when younger.
Sounds kind of racist to me...
Squalor is something that even the rich can live in. You can have plenty of money and yet live in squalid conditions. Poverty is one reason for squalor. But not the only reason.
You have to have the whole image - the bottom - to get the whole squalid picture.
It's meant to be ambiguous or ironic or whimsical. Life sucks but what can you do, but smile at it?
You can get angry or not get angry or be depressed or not be depressed, but it won't change anything, so what are you going to do? You can look down on the woman and laugh at her or you can identify with her and laugh at yourself.
It's the usual New Yorker attitude - when they can't blame everything on someone like Trump.
Also on Simonson's Twitter feed:
The Babylon Bee
@TheBabylonBee
Biden All-Female Communications Team Won't Tell Nation What's Wrong, Nation Should Already Know
She is wearing a nice top while drinking a martini in front of the laptop with a Soji screen hiding the background of her slob living.
I see it as a take on COVID humor memes of appearing classy on Zoom while living like a slob.
The people seeing it as "dark" are projecting their own emotions into it.
She wanted to call herself catturd but the name was already taken.
Biff said... [hush][hide comment]
1) It think some of The New Yorker's readers might benefit from reading Jordan Peterson's 12 Rules for Life. The one about putting your house in order before criticizing the world might be particularly helpful.
I sent a copy to my left wing daughter (Bernie Bro) and she loved it. Called to thank me. I wasn't sure she would read it.
Since then she has gotten married and has a daughter. She says the daughter has changed her world.
I have five grandkids. Three are my younger son's. They go to church, have a sort of "hybrid" school at a charter school (Two are now in high school.) The younger girl is a competitive swimmer. Her brother is 15 and 6 feet 5. He plays baseball and football. He lost out because no season in CA. The oldest is going to U of Alabama, her 1st choice.
The other two I never see and they are being raised by a crazy left wing mother who is probably a friend of Blasey-Ford, the Kavanaugh accuser. I have little hopes for them.
I can see how this would be triggering for sometime who identifies as "Dust Bunny Queen."
Tina Trent said...I can see how this would be triggering for sometime who identifies as "Dust Bunny Queen."
LOL....You caught me! The only thing to do is tame those dust bunnies. Be the Queen. Show them who is boss!
Lurker 21 You can get angry or not get angry or be depressed or not be depressed, but it won't change anything, so what are you going to do? You can look down on the woman and laugh at her or you can identify with her and laugh at yourself.
I choose the last one. Identify with her and laugh at myself. I don't look down on her. She is trying. But I also have the strong urge to just give her a kick in the pants to be able to fix herself. Kind of an intervention like you do with a person who needs to be helped to stop drinking or using drugs.
The NYer will be saddened for a bit now that its Target-in-Chief is leaving. At least Remnick's faux Upper West Side outrage hasn't cost him writers like Rebecca Mead, Anthony Lane and a few others.
Squalor? Really? Looks like my first apartment.
I know a few young single women who live with that personal level of cleanliness. They spend plenty of effort on their own appearance, but live in a mess like that. I would consider them off the table for marriage. I would date them, and do whatever, but I ain't marrying no slob. Once they get married, their personal standard will drop to the home level, not the other way around.
Alcohol consumption is usually represented by a martini glass, but that's probably the least common glassware used for it. Us authentic alcoholics drink our booze from coffee cups, then they never really know if you like them or are just hammered.
“There are so many awful things we are doing to people in the names of these shut downs and "pauses". Stopping AA meetings.”
What is awful is to blame the inevitable fallout from Covid-19 on the public health restrictions rather than on the virus itself. It’s also awful that attitudes like the author’s have successfully undone the good resulting from those restrictions such that we now suffer from both the economic and health consequences of the virus.
And, speaking as one who knows, AA has thrived during Covid. In my county of 250,000, there are almost 250 AA meetings a week on Zoom. Today, local meetings include not only local members but many logging in from around the state, coast to coast and countries all over the world. In person meetings are best but AA has paid no attention to politics and is just getting on with the mission.
If the entire country had done the same instead of insisting on their right to infect others, we would have had far fewer deaths from the virus, far less economic impact and greater national unity. The right has now ensured that Americans will never again make any sacrifices for their country. We have been and remain in a war but the Vichy Republicans first tried to deny it as a hoax, then pushed miracle drugs that did nothing and now cowardly claim that nothing can be done. Patriots? I think not.
I cancelled my New Yorker subscription at 5:25 am on the day after they published the hit job on Brett Kavanaugh written by Ronan Farrow and Jane Mayer involving Debora Ramirez ("wanglegate"). It didn't check out, but they published it anyway.
Good-bye, New Yorker. You are not what made you famous, and you never will be again.
As to the life skills of the bibulous young person depicted on the cover, I stand with Jordan Peterson: clean up your room, lady.
"Us [sic] authentic alcoholics drink our booze from coffee cups." (hic)
You mean Dean Martin didn't have coffee in that cup? Well, I never...
Obviously a single nurse working 16 hour days,no time for cleaning checking in with mom back home, acting as if everything is ok and she is not on verge of suicide.
Not a rice cooker, old portable cd player/radio for nostalgia.
What is in unopened Amazon box?
It’s also awful that attitudes like the author’s have successfully undone the good resulting from those restrictions such that we now suffer from both the economic and health consequences of the virus.
Speaking from Hong Kong, the center of personal freedom. You sound pretty happy there, "Bound." That CCP stuff seems to agree with you. Once Biden establishes "Hong Kong East" in the Bay Area, you can come home.
It's obviously AOC. I have never thought about it before, but this is the way I would picture her living space. Sloppy thinking; sloppy living.
All of that crap on the floor in the drawing, along with the empty Amazon boxes, has clearly been left there for the cats to play with. Any cat person should know that. Ditto the prescription bottles - put a dry bean in one, put the lid on....cat toy. I see nothing but cat toys in that drawing. What? You don't have a messy play area for your cat(s) festooned with torn paper and chewed on cardboard boxes? Shame on you.
The lockdown theme in art is tedious already. I've seen 100 things like this, and don't care whether this one is maybe better or more interesting than some of the others. Perhaps it's because I'm also so angry at the idiots inflicting this on us that artists capitalizing on it seems almost inappropriate. Kind of like Holocaust movies (and no, I'm not saying the lockdowns are the same magnitude of evil as the Holocaust).
Yeah, I first thought it was a cd player. But it seems to old for the youngish woman.
And a dang sexist thought crossed my mind about the unopened amazon box. Like that's believable ... maybe if she had 2 young kids instead of cats. She must know what's in the box, right? What could it be? A Christmas present for somebody? A box for her room mate whos been in Florida for the last 6 months blithely eating out with wanton killing abandon?
Not dark in any way. The mess looks just like my office except I don't drink from a stemmed glass and earrings and flip flops are out of the question.
My sister got me on the information super highway back in 98 when AOL first went to a monthly flat rate. Let me have one of her dialup screen names. AOL had a ton of chat rooms back then. A lot of em were political. From the Left, From the Right.... I've had a lot of experience with AA family stuff so I should have known, but somehow I thought the Friends of Bill chat rooms were, you know, like political in support of Clinton. I was on one of those and it took me several minutes to figure it all out. The political chat rooms were pretty cool for about a year then the spammers appeared and it went way downhill fast. antifa.
Obviously a single nurse working 16 hour days,no time for cleaning checking in with mom back home, acting as if everything is ok and she is not on verge of suicide.
Heh. It’s all in the imagined backstory. .
"You mean Dean Martin didn't have coffee in that cup? Well, I never..."
In fact, he had apple juice. From the LA Times:
"When he started to redo his nightclub act, he started at the Sands Hotel and had some writers helping him," [his daughter] said. "It was like Jack Benny who had the violin thing and made fun about being cheap. Dad was so handsome, so debonair. They just thought, 'We'll put a drink in his hand and a cigarette.' Every man wanted to be him, and every woman wanted to be with him." The truth of the matter, she said, was her father was swigging apple juice and not liquor when he performed. "He would be home for dinner every night," Martin said. "He would come home, and he and mom would have their one cocktail at the bar. He was kind. He was so different from what everybody thought he was. There was no one who could do Dean Martin better than Dean Martin.""
Hey, I liked it; it seems real enough to me. Especially the shoji screen with the unmade bed behind it. And the detritus on the floor, which is mostly COVID paraphernalia (rubber gloves, paper towels, hand sanitizer). And the Amazon boxes. She knows exactly what her Zoom camera shows and what it doesn't. Unlike, say, Toobin.
My husband's "lair" (combination music studio, instrument and sheet music storage, desk, computers, and -- yes -- a shoji screen, behind which is a truly massive CRT television that the house's previous owners left behind and that we are physically unable to get up the stairs even to throw out) looks very like that, only it's probably twice the size of her whole flat. At the moment, there's still a giant umbrella wedged into the skylight to prevent unfortunate lighting at certain times of day. This is a relic of his teaching in May and June, before he started going back to school in fall (the kids aren't there, just him). He cleaned it up recently b/c a kid was coming over for a lesson, but before that there were piles of stuff everywhere not in camera range.
My own office, which is about a quarter the size, is very neat at the moment, but only because I just had a bunch of work done on it a couple months ago -- repainting, a curtain rod installed, a window screen fitted. Right now I imagine even DBQ would approve. The bedroom and bathroom on the same floor, though . . . not so much.
The unopened box probably has the cats' Christmas presents.
Incidentally, why is everyone seeing prescription pills on her desk and assuming opioids? That's what all prescription pill bottles look like. Not everything in one is a narcotic.
I like the cats, and the fluffy slippers. Me, I'd probably be in a robe rather than shorts, but not if I were videoconferencing. And the pile of books on her desk is what I typically have on mine.
Finally clicked through... In shaved Leg hair is conspicuous
The unopened box probably has the cats' Christmas presents.
Gonna go with toilet paper. No need to open until the last roll on the floor is used up.
OK, so the cover was MEANT to be enigmatic...to be interpreted as one sees fit.
An older interpretation:
Matthew 23:27:
'Woe unto you…for ye are like unto whited sepulchers, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men's bones, and of all uncleanness'.
If the entire country had done the same instead of insisting on their right to infect others, we would have had far fewer deaths from the virus, far less economic impact and greater national unity.
Calling us murderers while demanding unity?
Yeah. Fuck you.
Looks exactly like a "smart" rice cooker
It's 'neuro fuzzy'!!!
Somebody's already dropped the Elephant Brand into the comments, and that's no bread machine.
Wait- they make bread machines?
I'm going with squalor for the same reasons Maybee did. There's empty food/drink containers on the floor. That's not cluttered, that's slovenly.
The sink full of dishes could be excused by just having made dinner, but the Chinese food shows that isn't the case. So either the Chinese food is old or the dishes are. Gross.
The artist didn't just accidentally draw trash all over the floor so I'm going to have to go with "intentionally dark." Kind of funny, but still pretty dark.
If the entire country had done the same instead of insisting on their right to infect others, we would have had far fewer deaths from the virus, far less economic impact and greater national unity.
Ann was worried there were going to be four million deaths. Instead we have a couple hundred thousand, the vast majority of them from the elderly that co-morbidities.
I've seen the studies. The general cloth masks don't work. Isolation doesn't work. The shutdown was a scam and our leaders excuse demonstrations against Trump and go to funerals for their political buddies and refuse to self-quarantine when they get home. Gov. Wolf of Pennsylvania was caught on a hot mic joking about mask-wearing as political theatre.
If you dare, look at Ivor Cummins' videos on YouTube. This one is only 14 minutes long. It quotes the WHO and 22 papers from sources such as the Lancet and the British Medical Journal that show lockdowns show no demonstrable affect on death rates across countries.
This is the science everyone screams about, and it shows that lockdowns have damaged us far more than helped control the virus.
People who are saying this looks like your offices . . . really? Just empty bags of cheetos and used masks and other garbage strewn across the floor?
I mean, I can be pretty slovenly -- I have a tangled mess of chargers by my bed; many of my tabletops and countertops are cluttered with books, plastic models, and other bric-a-brac; and my working desk has a pile of old tax forms on one side and five messily rolled neckties on a bed of handkerchiefs on the other; there's an empty plate I ate some sliced pear and cheese off of earlier today and never cleared away by the computer -- but I at least use a trash can.
Balfegor: It's cartoon art. The strewn items are touchstones of the Covid era. It has to be cluttered to fit every Covid lockdown cliche into the finite dimensions of the frame.
I find it light and hopeful.
Blogger bagoh20 said...
I know a few young single women who live with that personal level of cleanliness. They spend plenty of effort on their own appearance, but live in a mess like that. I would consider them off the table for marriage. I would date them, and do whatever, but I ain't marrying no slob. Once they get married, their personal standard will drop to the home level, not the other way around.
I have been shocked at how many women of all ages are slobs. Allowing their homes to be filthy especially bathrooms and kitchens. Bathrooms that haven't been cleaned for months full of mold, yikes. They take care in their personal appearance appear to be have an extreme phobia towards housekeeping.
Howard, are . . are we looking at the same picture? Are you just trying to bait me here? I don't think it's a cliche yet that lockdowns turned Americans into total slobs who just toss used chip bags and takeout coffee cups and used masks and plastic gloves on the floor. Or is it? I'm out of touch with this stuff sometimes, I suppose.
Re: Unknown:
There's degrees. Mold in the bathroom or bugs in the kitchen are revolting. (I let a relative stay in my condo for several months and was horrified to find tiny dead bugs all over the kitchen afterwards) But honestly, given the slovenliness I confessed to above, I would be hesitant about a girl who is too rigorous about cleaning. E.g. a girl who finds it deeply irritating if you don't turn your shoes around to face outwards after you take them off in the entryway. I mean, I'll do that in someone else's home, but in my own I just shuck them off as is. It's not that turning shoes around is such a huge hassle -- it just seems like a marker for likely inflexibility on a host of other tiny things, like how one rolls one's toothpaste, or how clothes should be organised in the dresser. A girl whose home is constantly photo perfect seems like she would be a poor fit for me at least. So I find a little bit of slovenliness is not unattractive in a woman. But to each his own.
Birches said...I'm going with squalor for the same reasons Maybee did. There's empty food/drink containers on the floor. That's not cluttered, that's slovenly.
Back from Costco shopping. They actually had TP this time woo hoo.
I'm with Maybe and Birches. There is clutter...everybody has clutter to some extent for a while... but then....there is slovenly. Clutter happens. BUT..if you let clutter accumulate for months, you might be a hoarder.
My house is not extremely cluttered. I have some decorative items, knick-knacks all which require dusting right now. My toiletries are always put up in the bathroom, because who has room for that crap all over the place (my husband approves) Our house is lived in...not a model home, staged for a photo shoot. HOWEVER, I don't have used food containers on the floor, dirty dishes for days in the sink, or bins of overflowing trash that can attract bugs and rodents.
And I am definitely not like my Aunt Renata from Germany. You could do surgery on any surface in her house. Chairs covered in plastic. Neat neat neat obsessively neat. We were afraid to touch anything!!
Yes..I know it is a cartoon and he was trying to make a point about Covid and being incarcerated in our homes. I do get that.
DBQ, if you were at Costco and bought TP, I'd bet you're set for the next several months. We could probably do the Costco TP run to coincide with estimated tax payments and come out OK.
The division of labor here is weird. My husband does most of the outdoor work (though I have a ton of bulbs just now and will have to put them all in myself), and will vacuum in an emergency; he washes his own clothes, but is scattershot about, um, filing them afterwards, so sometimes I go into his bedroom and sort socks and Ts and undies. He'll take dishes to the kitchen, but balks at putting them in the dishwasher, so I do that, and always clean the washer out. I do all the cooking that isn't plain 'waving, which is almost all of it. And most vacuuming, scrubbing the kitchen floor, &c. But he has taken on the cats' litterboxes.
(Incidentally, the litterbox on the New Yorker cover is clearly not in the kitchen; it's in her office space or whatever you want to call it.)
We have tons of junk mail, especially now, and sorting that is mine, too. But he pays the phone and electric and gas and water and trash and newspapers, plus the property tax. I consider I have much the better half of the deal, really.
I saw this and thought, "If she's at home that much, why is her house such a mess?" And, "Is she doing anything really productive? I retired from a job that required hands-on work, and immediate results. This makes no sense."
Depressing as heck, that screen is far too small.
Balfegor said...
I agree with your assessment that extreme cleanliness is very irritating. My comments were not about minor clutter or a bit of disorganization that can be found in people's daily life. Its about maintaining a minimum standard of hygiene in important areas such as kitchens, bathrooms, floors, etc. Leaving dirty dishes in the sink for days, dirty countertops, somehow failing to clean a bathroom for months on end, rarely if ever sweeping or vacuuming floors.
Balfegor: I'm not trolling you because one can't troll a reasonable man.
The mess on the floor contains every thing we all use for Covid. Masks, hand sanitizer gloves, Amazon boxes, take out food, junk food, etc. To get all that shit in the picture, it had to be cluttered on the floor. I'm sure some people look at it and say, oh it's missing xyz but there is enough stuff for most people to identify as theirs.
It's like movies about real life. They condense several things into one scene and several characters into one actor. I look at the cover and think this isn't a snapshot of the clutter, but a compilation of everything used for Covid coping.
In any event, it's not a real scene, it's telling a story that takes place over months but can only appear as a snapshot.
I know I am not explaining myself well I'm a visualizing, hearing and number crunching thinker. Words are my forth language.
Anyway, the clutter is just a way to compress time and space. It doesn't represent piggishness. That's expressed specifically by the open cupboard and the dishes in the sink, which are not particular to Covid world.
At least that's how I read it. She looks good she looks upbeat and she's making the best of a crappy situation.
It's uplifting to me.
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