3 very different places to live.

These 3 architectural idiosyncrasies charmed me today:

Which U.S. First Ladies have received the cruelest treatment in the press (and in public conversation)? Especially which ones were disrespected as, essentially, whores?

I asked Grok. Answer after the jump. The easiest guess as to who came in first is the correct answer, so see if you know who came in second:

"At the moment the power balance between somebody working in prostitution and the punter is very much in the punter's favour..."

"... and quite often punters use that in order to exploit women's vulnerabilities more. 'So they'll say to them "you know if you don't do what I say I'll tell the police about you" and so on, whereas it turns around in the Nordic model. The women in prostitution can say to the punter: "No I'm not going to comply with that request, and I can call the police on you." It doesn't sound like a lot but that is a subtle power shift which I think gives more security and more safety to those working in prostitution.'"

Said Independent MSP Ash Regan, quoted in "'I would love to be doing this in my 60s' - the debate over selling sex in Scotland" (BBC).

The quote in the headline is from someone called Porcelain Victoria, who "says she started selling sex when she was 18 and used it as a way to escape an abusive household": "I plan to do this until I can't, basically. I would love to be doing this in my 60s. My plan is to hopefully semi-retire and become a counsellor helping couples and solo people figure out their sexuality when it comes to kinks and fetishes."

I had to look up "punter."

"She works as a cocktail waitress, a go-go dancer, a racetrack stable hand and, for a long stint in Phoenix, a sex worker..."

"... sometimes out of a trailer. Drink and drugs soften life’s jagged edges and get her through the day: 'I found the perfect formula to work on was a mixture of Spañada wine, Cold Duck and Squirt poured over crushed ice. That and bennies, or as Jenny called them, whaaat crawses. The drink, though quite potent, went down like cherry soda, and when coupled with the speed, produced a loose capable vigor just made to order for the job. During a normal day I would make about three trips across the lot through the quivering airwaves to the Circle K in my pink halter to hoard ingredients for the precious punch.'"

From "Her Father Wrote ‘On the Road.’ She Lived Her Own Version. Jan Kerouac’s 1981 novel 'Baby Driver' chronicles a fearless and windblown life entirely distinct from her famous parent’s" (NYT).

That's a review, by Dwight Garner, of "Baby Driver" — which is getting reissued.

"What must William, a man who ferociously hides his holidays, think when he reads how Andrew trotted the globe, splurging thousands of taxpayers’ pounds on helicopters, private jets, golf courses..."

"... rejecting cheaper alternatives, while telling everyone he was a great ambassador for us all? And then being so indiscreet and arrogant in front of senior diplomats that onlookers couldn’t believe he would 'speak so openly' about matters of great sensitivity? One consul, on being asked to provide 'blondes,' said: 'I’m a diplomat, not a pimp.'... [N]o one in the Palace would want to tell Her Majesty that in Bangkok her second son had been sent 40 prostitutes. But she must have known about the cash, because when things got really bad, she was the one who bailed them out.... She showered them with gifts, money, land, yet it was never enough. What was she thinking? Nothing, clearly — Andrew’s faults were simply beyond her imagination...."

From "Andrew and Sarah Ferguson? It’s a case for revolution/He hasn’t only disgraced himself — he is trashing Queen Elizabeth’s reputation too" (London Times).

"One day last year, when she was hungry, a woman came up to her and offered what sounded like a dream proposition..."

"... would she like to work in a studio, performing on camera and earning good money, in safety, without anyone touching her? She went to the studio: a block of flats where an administrator registered her. She soon realised everything she had been told was a lie.... For the clients who watched her she was a fantasy: a young Colombian woman in her bedroom they paid handsomely to act out their desires. In reality she was a prisoner. For three months Victoria was held captive with five other women on the eighth floor of a block of flats, forced into violent sexual exploitation, on camera, for at least ten hours a day. Her earnings were stolen by the men who controlled her.... Every time she asked for the money she’d been promised, they told her she had debts that she had to work off first: food she’d eaten, paper towels they’d given her. If she cried and refused to perform, they fined her.... "

From "Inside the world sex-cam capital" (London Times)(describing conditions in Cúcuta, Colombia).

"The judge ruled that the hired male escorts involved in freak-offs can be considered victims in the context of sentencing."

"And he ruled that Mr. Combs does not get the benefit of having accepted responsibility for his crimes. The judge said the defense’s narrative of freak-offs as nothing more than voluntary sex between consenting adults was 'flatly inconsistent with both reality and any acceptance of responsibility.'... [T]he judge’s explanations do not bode well for the defendant."

From the NYT coverage of the sentencing hearing for Sean Combs, happening now.

UPDATE, 11:34: The prosecution has argued, and now it's the defense. This is interesting:

"There are pieces of varying length and wallop on sloth, stripping, shoplifting, overspending, suicide and light virtual sex work to raise money for Bernie Sanders’s presidential campaign."

"'I’d rate fifty penises in an hour, and I’ll admit now that I rated few of them honestly,' she writes of trading nude-photo appraisals for political donations. 'Look, corners were cut.'..."

From a NYT book review, "Sex, Sloth and Shoplifting: Notes From a ‘Sloppy’ Girl/In her second essay collection, 'Sloppy,' the writer and social media personality Rax King embraces the mess of living imperfectly."

"[S]he takes such obvious pleasure in and sustenance from being an author with a capital A, even as she mocks how the profession might be perceived at her physical therapist’s office ('a soft-handed little typer')...."

That's not writing, that's....

How ugly was he?

That's from my son Chris, who, as I told you before, is in the midst of a project of reading a biography of every American President. He reads his books in book form, so he texts photos of paragraphs when he's got something to share.

The paragraph above comes from Ron Chernow's "Grant" (commission earned).

How ugly was General Benjamin Butler? Pictures, here, at Wikipedia. He looks bad, but not as bad as those words make him sound. As Chris put it: "You have to really hate someone to describe them that way."

Here's Butler's General Order No. 28 (with rhetorical flourishes that may remind of a certain modern-day President):

Chris and I independently thought that seemed like a Trump tweet! The capitalization is so evocative. And that willingness to use strong interpretations of law to intimidate those who are affronting you....

Maybe Trump is tapping into a deep vein of American rhetoric.

"The jury has found Sean Combs guilty of two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution but acquitted him on the most serious charges of sex trafficking and racketeering."

"Combs covered his eyes and appeared to exhale in relief as the not-guilty announcement came in. After the verdict was read, he quickly touched hands with his lawyers and turned and smiled at his family...."

WaPo reports.

Defense counsel Marc Agnifilo has asked the court to release Sean Combs back to his home in the millionaire enclave of Star Island in Miami. “This is his first conviction, and it’s a prostitution offense,” Agnifilo said. The attorney noted that the charge he was found guilty of was significantly less serious than the ones that kept him detained in a Brooklyn jail for the past nine months....

ADDED: From the NYT reporting: "Sean Combs is on his knees, his elbows on the chair where he was sitting, his head buried. He appeared to be praying. He started a round of applause, which was echoed by his family, who are jubilant." 

AND: "With a touch of levity, the judge said he assumed that Sean Combs would not want to return to the Brooklyn jail where he has been held. Mr. Combs shook his head vigorously and put his hands together in prayer." It's hard to believe, then, that the judge would send Combs back to the jail. He should go free today. 

"Winners at the April tasting... included melt​ed snow that had been filtered through Peruvian volcanic rock, and deep-sea water that had been pumped up 80 miles off the coast of South Korea."

"There was water gathered from nets hung in a misty Tasmanian pine forest, and a Texas brand laced with lithium called Crazy Water.... Hotels are adding precisely designed water bars. Home wine cellars have become water cellars, where children are encouraged to select bottles with their parents. Water sommelier programs continue to grow. And of course, water influencers gather more and more followers...."

From "You’ve Heard of Fine Wine. Now Meet Fine Water. Bottled waters from small, pristine sources are attracting a lot of buzz, with tastings, sommeliers and even water cellars" (NYT).

It sounds like comedy, but it's really happening. As for that water pumped up from the "deep sea," it sounds salty, and it had me wondering if it's possible for unsalty water to somehow exist below the salt water. The NYT article doesn't impinge on the fantasy of the specialness of the water, but I believe these waters are processed, are they not? That deep-sea water must be desalinated and then a chosen mix of minerals is added, right? And "water gathered from nets"? Does that sound ethereal to you... or unclean? Why not water gathered from towels hung in a steamy bathroom?

"I also, again, just want to recognize and honor the sex worker community."

"I will continue to support and be an ally. All of the incredible people, the women that I’ve had the privilege of meeting from that community has been one of the highlights of this incredible — of this entire incredible experience."

Said Mikey Madison, quoted in "Mikey Madison wins best lead actress for 'Anora'" (NYT).

Madison also underscored the influence that sex workers had on her performance. To study her character, she read memoirs by sex workers, underlining sections of Andrea Werhun’s “Modern Whore.”... She also... took pole-dancing lessons. The role involved significant nudity and a number of intimate scenes, which Madison said was never daunting to her: “I was always comfortable, and I also think because Ani was too,” she told The Times.

I haven't used my tag "the [blank] community" in a long time, but here we have "the sex worker community." 

Mikey Madison becomes the 10th woman to win an Oscar for playing a prostitute — 12th if you count Donna Reed in "From Here to Eternity" and Jo Van Fleet in "East of Eden." And Madison is the first to win an Oscar for playing a prostitute since the #MeToo movement shook Hollywood to its nonexistent core.

The fact that I'm wondering if the things said to be "a real program" are perhaps not actually real — that says enough.

I found this because it's easy to find things tweeted by Elon Musk in the last 24 hours:

pic.twitter.com/VyFYXCDG9p

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 5, 2025

I am reminded of the old "Golden Fleece Award":

The Golden Fleece Award (1975–1988) was a tongue-in-cheek award given to public officials in the United States for squandering public money....

One man controlled this award: Senator William Proxmire. His idea of what sounded stupid ruled. You had to be careful about how your research project looked, at first glance, to a politician who wanted to make a general point about out-of-control federal spending.

"The problem with eating out in America today is that it’s making us fat."

"Studies done at my laboratory at Tufts University showed that the relationship between eating out and weight gain is very straightforward: The more frequently you eat out the more likely you are to carry excess pounds.... Our metabolism, hunger, and even the synthesis of addiction neurochemicals like dopamine are controlled by our environment.... When we see, smell, or taste something good, the sensory signals that get into our brain through our eyes, nose, and mouth activate what is known as the cephalic (preparatory) phase of digestion. Our saliva secretion increases; our blood glucose drops; our stomach muscles relax (so we have a larger stomach that needs more food in it to feel full); and our digestion accelerates (so we can put away that food more quickly to get ready for more)....."

From "Why Restaurants Make You Fat/Restaurant Syndrome: 1. Eat out. 2. Eat too much. 3. Feel bad. 4. Repeat" by Susan B. Roberts (The Daily Beast).

By chance, last night, I was watching a movie where there were characters who regarded a restaurant as a strange new form of business that was going to wreck the good thing that they had going (a saloon). 

Dialogue: 

"Have you ever seen a restaurant? They serve food. Next, the church will open up again...."

"The Judge is losing his grip. He's afraid of a place that sells vittles. Vittles and a pack of calf-faced girls...."

The "calf-faced girls" were the wholesome women who were coming to town to work in the restaurant — so different from the saloon women. 

"In what at first glance might seem like a positive (and possibly 'sex positive') move, the term 'sex work' suddenly appears to be everywhere...."

"It’s now commonly used by politicians, the media, Hollywood and government agencies. But make no mistake: 'Sex work' is hardly a sign of liberation. Why, you might wonder, does exchanging money for sex need a rebrand? Derogatory terms like 'hooker' and 'whore' were long ago replaced by the more neutral 'prostitute.' But 'sex worker' goes one step further, couching it as a conventional job title, like something plucked out of 'What Color Is Your Parachute?' Its most grotesque variant is the phrase 'child sex worker,' which has appeared in a wide range of publications, including BuzzFeed, The Decider and The Independent. (Sometimes the phrase has been edited out after publication.)... In recent years, language has undergone drastic shifts in an effort to reduce harm. Sometimes these shifts result in contorted language that obscures meaning. Sometimes these shifts make people feel better without changing anything of substance. And sometimes they do move the needle toward positive change, which is always welcome. But the use of 'sex work,' however lofty the intention, effectively increases the likelihood of harm.... To help people hurt by the sex trade, we need to call it like it is."

Writes Pamela Paul, in "What It Means to Call Prostitution 'Sex Work'" (NYT).

"'The point of this whole thing is to decrease the demand for commercial sex,' said Maine state Rep. Lois Reckitt (D), who sponsored the bill..."

"...  adding that she wanted to do something to help women in the 'revolving door' to get out of the sex industry. Reckitt said police traditionally have used the women they arrested for prostitution to get to the people trafficking them. 'Now they’re going to have to arrest the johns and lean on them to find out where the trafficking is coming from,' she said.... 'It denigrates all women when some women are being bought and sold,' said Reckitt, a former officer of the National Organization for Women who for three decades led an organization that fights domestic violence in Maine. 'There’s no way to have total gender equality in this world if we’re selling women.'"

From "Maine becomes first state to decriminalize selling sex/Buying sex will remain illegal in the state, as communities nationally reconsider how best to legislate prostitution" (WaPo).

"Perhaps it’s unreasonable to expect the free version of a 2022 AI to be able to discuss heady philosophies of personhood and the nature of sentience..."

"... when it probably has little claim to either. Still, Rachael seemed perhaps too ready to be non-committal, to change the subject, or to give a vague, generic, universally-appropriate answer to questions which really demanded more...."

Writes Phil Rhodes in "The melancholy experience of making an AI friend" (Red Shark).

I'm reading this after writing about my desire for an AI app that would  engage me in philosophical conversations. I said I wasn't looking for "a companion to stave off loneliness or make me feel good about myself — e.g., Replika." 

But Rhodes's "Rachael" does come from the app Replika. He writes:

I've got 9 carefully curated TikToks for you this evening. That is, these are all things I liked.

1. Some have FOMO, but a lot of us have FOPU.

2. A lobster has been seen in real life.

3. Kayak camping and the coconut crab.

4. The L.A. conversation.

5. What does Dolly Parton think about prostitution? 

6. I remember when I lost my mind.

7. When David Bowie shouted out "It's great to be in Cincinnati..."

8. The different generations react to they/them pronouns.

9. Unclogging the drain.

"It’s a list of something. The question is what."

That's all I have to say after my son John posts — on Facebook — a link to "'Jeanne Dielman' Tops Sight & Sound’s 2022 Poll of the Best Films of All Time."

The Sight & Sound poll results are much anticipated — every 10 years. I've been noticing this thing since the 1970s, so I'm familiar with what normally ends up at or near the top. Favorites come and go. But I've never seen the #1 position go to something I've never even heard of:

Directed by Belgian filmmaker Chantal Akerman and released in 1975, “Jeanne Dielman” is a three-hour, 20-minute film following the title character (Delphine Seyrig), a single mother and prostitute, as she carries out a monotonous daily routine that slowly breaks apart and collapses. Since its premiere, the film has been highly acclaimed as a landmark of feminist cinema.

What's going on here? And do I need to watch a 3-hour, 20-minute monotonous movie to have an opinion? A movie about a prostitute — but feminist. Keep watching, because she will break apart and collapse, and we're told it's feminist.

I've had my own feminist opinion about the overrepresentation of prostitutes in the movies, and I've had it for a long time — for many cycles of Sight & Sound polls. So I don't need these critics trying to make up for all their past decades of boosting the work of male film directors... if that's what's going on here.

"People of no ethical background for you are easy prey, and they’re your line of business—patronizers, snobs and highbrows, whoever they think they are."

"But you understand them as geometrical bodies, with solid angles and planes, and you know how to make them see wonderful things, and you can make music that drives them mad. You’ve got the character of Saturn and the spirit of Venus. Passion and desire, you give it to them under the counter. Your guidelines are simple, and you rule nothing out. Strip yourself bare and dance the sword dance, buck naked inside of a canvas tent, fenced in, where the town royalty, the top brass and leading citizens, bald as eggs throw their money down, sometimes their entire bankroll."

From Chapter 47 of Bob Dylan's "Philosophy of Modern Song." 

That's Bob, talking about — what songs did you think he was going to talk about? — "Gypsies, Tramps & Thieves."

In the song the men of the town would lay their money down. But for Bob, they throw it down, those bastards. And they're all bald. As eggs. But they are understood as geometrical bodies, with solid angles and planes. You try doing that with an egg. Bob, he's a genius. He's like Picasso. He sees the angles and planes in what, for you, is ovoid.