Hi what’s your patronus?? Mine’s a polar bear! Even though I answered the last question against my instincts, which I’ll regret until I expire. But ok wait, what if I was always meant to go against that instinct on the last question? What if it was that act, not the answer I chose, that revealed a crucial true thing about me? Yes I like this line of thinking much better.
You Should Go or Do or Give
+ Support Trish Bendix! She was fired after announcing — on her personal website, with permission from the parent company — that AfterEllen would be shutting down, because straight white men live every day like it’s their last chance to fuck someone over.
+ Get yourself a copy of Distractables: A Super Cute Very Nice Coloring Book!
Queer as in F*ck You
+ Pulse Shooter’s Ex-Wife Says He Was Gay, Targeted Club to Impress Father.
+ Hey you’re in this — AfterEllen is Shutting Down: Is This the End of Lesbian Media?
The imminent loss of AfterEllen—at least as we know it—leaves queer women with just one major website devoted to them: Autostraddle, an independent outlet that uses a premium membership program to stay afloat. Even then, as Autostraddle senior editor Heather Hogan wrote candidly on Tuesday, “We’re often on the brink of not existing anymore.”
+ It’s Jasika Nicole talking about travel and just being generally inspiring and energizing, as is her habit. A font of energy and inspiration! Have you seen Suicide Kale yet? Hm?
+ We are well beyond excited for Grace Bonney’s new book, In The Company Of Women, and very grateful for this list of 10 Must-Read Books for Women in Business, which will have to hold us over until October 4.
+ Why don’t you take a moment to have deep feelings about a sidewalk plaque: Keeping the Legacy of an Iconic Queer Bar Alive.

by Lola M Chavez
“We were open on Christmas and on Thanksgiving, even if there was only one customer at the bar. If you didn’t have a place to go, you could come here,” remembered Liz Landacre, who was a bartender at the Lexington in 2007. “For many of us, the people [at the Lexington] are chosen family.”
+ Mapping Lost Lesbian Bars, 2006-2016.
+ Oh my god everything is making me cry! With “I Am Here: The Lesbian Portraits”, Photographer Aims to Honor Late Sister.

by Robert Kalman
Doll Parts
+ Oh boy do I have some feelings about this! Maternal Mortality Rate in U.S. Rises, Defying Global Trend, Study Finds. America! Capitalist healthcare! The commodification of the human experience especially as it pertains to childbearing people!! What a world!
+ While I’ve got you here: The Disturbing Science Behind Subconscious Gender Bias.
+ Y’all STOP FLUSHING YOUR TAMPONS.
+ This upcoming Maya Angelou documentary, And Still I Rise will probably push your heart right out of your chest and into outer space.
+ From He to She in First Grade.
+ Meet the Woman Who Pioneered Our Search for Aliens.
+ 25 Famous Women On Being Alone. I don’t know your life.
+ Never Enough: Why Does Fashion Expect the Most From Trans Women of Color?
+ The Long History of the Ever-Evolving Rom-Com Bitch.
Saw This, Thought of You
+ If you think Carmen won’t also be putting this in the next Sunday Funday, you’re wrong and also you don’t know Carmen very well. Sad!
+ Teeny tiny galaxies. Cool cool.
+ Listen Up: Five Black Podcasts to Add to Your Arsenal.
+ The Origins of 25 Fall Traditions. They left out the one where I cry in my bathroom floor about my dead dad! Come on, guys.
+ Can’t even convey how much I loved this show. Cannot. Salute Your Shorts Proved That a Good Ensemble Doesn’t Need a Protagonist.
That Hillary between two ferns interview was hilarious.
Both of them had a hard time to not crack up.
P.S. What I meant to say was, that Kate McKinnon couldn’t have been a better Hillary Clinton in this.
“Manufacturers want to give the illusion of mess-free convenience when it comes to dealing with the blue fluid that women supposedly emit at our rollerblading time of the month.”
My favorite animal are orcas and I got a dolphin for my patronus. COINCIDENCE…?
I THINK NOT
I mean TECHNICALLY they are giant dolphins so I think I won this round
My patronus is a West Highland terrier. I really did not expect this.
Also reading “Marie Lyn Bernard” was really jarring!
Mine too!!!
For anyone rushing to find out their patronus ~ I recommend a darkened space, headphones etc. I’m really wishing I had been better prepared, as it’s magical and you can only do it once.
Knowing this now, it feels ironic that mine was a saint bernard puppy, although maybe since it’s a puppy, it’s learning??
Oh Laneia, I’m now forever going to think of you as a cuddly looking magical polar bear…that you should never never never mess with.
Thank You so much for that advice!
I’m sitting in a dark room with headphones on, and I never would have waited to do this in a truly quiet moment.
My patronus was a pheasant. I do not know what that means.
I’m holding off on that Maya Angelou trailer for when I’m locked away in my bedroom because right now I’m at work and y’all already know I cry at my desk too often.
Annd–that piece on being alone was refreshing as I am perpetually alone and not all that sad about it.
My patronus was a dolphin, which is lovely, but also makes me feel common
I want a patronus that no one else has
I want a star-nosed mole, or a hedgehog, or a redwood tree
I got a dolphin which was fine until I read up thread about someone getting a Westie!!!
A friend was complaining about getting a stoat. Which is radder than she thinks.
My patrons was an Orca ! I didn’t know how to feel about it until I learned some people got RAT. Yeah an orca will do juuuust fine.
My “unusual” Patronus (as it said) was a hyena.
I never thought I’d take a website with a sparkly cursor trail seriously, but it was pretty.
I tend to sway more towards canine creatures versus felines, but behold, my patronus was an ocicat.
Also, looking forward to the Maya Angelou documentary.
Camp Anawanna, we hold you in our hearts, and when we think about you it makes me wanna fart.
My patronous is a Hedgehog, and my house is Hufflepuff. But in the old Pottermore my house was Gryffindor…what changed!?
I got a stoat patronus. Not sure what that indicates (though I guess I am tiny and noodly, get really pale in the winter, and enjoyed fried rabbit on the few occasions it was served to me?)
re: The Great British Bakeoff News:
Is someone with Heather Hogan? I hope Stacey’s home. I hope she is okay.
My patronus is a Husky and I’m not sure how I feel about it. I don’t know how I feel about the test since the first instinct I think is more what I feel like I should choose and not what is really in my heart and true to myself, so…
INSTINCTS ARE HARD.
Between Two Ferns was great. The e-mail crack made me laugh to tears. :D
Reading the Hari Nef article I discovered that Jill Soloway has a sister, Faith Soloway. She first worked with Hari and introduced her to Jill. I googled the sister and she’s a Jewish lesbian folk singer. How neat.
I knew exactly what the “Nooooooo” link was going to be because I had the same reaction seeing the news last night. That show is definitely over :(
My city’s lesbian bar recently got sold to non-lesbian owners and while it was not officially a lesbian bar and is still open, they’ve taken the rainbow flag down and pretty much stopped booking queer dance parties, does that qualify it for the dead lesbian bar list?
My patronus is a Chow dog, also known as a puffy lion dog. I’m okay with that. It looks like it could intimidate the heck out of any attacking dementors and that’s just what I need!
Heyo, I want to open a lesbian bar, for real. Time to start working on the dream.
Buffalo. I don’t know what that’s supposed to say about me. And I don’t even know what I would’ve chosen/expected for myself, but it definitely wouldn’t have been a buffalo.