The A+ Fall 2021 Ask Us Anything IS NOW!!!

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452 Comments

  1. Oooh I’m first! (? Is this where you ask?) If so, my question is, what are your most controversial opinions?

    • Shelli, how many people are in your phone contacts currently? And are you just constantly asking people who they are?

          • Please let’s share that post far and wide so that we can all be released from the shackles of having unnecessary phone contacts and emails!

          • Now Shelli, I’d agree with that, but I really like being able to avoid and block folks. I deleted a number once and then ended up answering the phone thinking it was someone else and having a whole conversation with the very person I thought deleting would mean I didn’t have to deal with.

  4. What are your favorite snacks for when you know it’s too late to be eating something but you really want it anyway?

  6. I just had a baby! Anyone want to talk pregnancy, breast/chestfeeding, parenting, or related topics?
    Also here obvs to talk about my usual topics which include (queer) books and Buffy the Vampire Slayer!

    • Recommendations for books that tackle both Queerness and mental health at the same time, but not as the main plot? (I especially like YA, light fantasy, and scifi)

      • SAM are you into manga? Have you read Nagata Kabi’s My Lesbian Experience of Loneliness & the subsequent volumes?? It’s great! I can’t wait for the English release of the latest one!

        • Yes, I loved My Lesbian Experience of Loneliness!

          Borderline by Mishell Baker is a great urban fantasy with a bi character with borderline personality disorder (author is own voices too).

          Samantha Irby also writes about depression in her very funny essay collections.

          I Hate Everyone But You by Gaby Dunn and Alison Raskin is a YA about a bi / poly girl and her BFF who has a mental illness. (I can’t remember which one!)

          Fans of the Impossible Life by Kate Scelsa is one of my all time fav YA books and is about a trio of queer friends that features mental health stuff.

      • Definitely tied for main plotlines, but Not Otherwise Specified by Hannah Moskowitz is great.

    • idk if i’m allowed to ask questions but i would love to hear pretty much every single thing about your pregnancy (that you feel comfortable sharing obviously).

      how did you know you were ready
      what was it like trying to conceive
      what was it like being pregnant

      etc etc literally i want to hear anything you want to share but i also don’t want to be invasive. thank you for offering and congratulations again on your baby! <3

      • I think you’re allowed! 😊

        Re: being ready was mostly practical?? my partner and I were in a good place financially and I finally had a permanent fulltime libraian job that I could get maternity leave/pay from. I’m 36 and have always wanted kids so it felt like now or never??

        My partner is a cis guy and to our great surprise i got pregnant the first cycle we tried. It was easy for us which I am si grateful for because just waiting one month to see if I was pregnant I found very anxiety inducing.

        Being pregnant for me was a pretty … unpleasant experience physically! I had debilitating nausea pretty much from the beginning to 16 weeks in, then horrible heartburn for the second half, plus it seemed like every other possible terrible symptom. But it was amazing and wonderful when I could finally feel the baby moving and it felt real that there was a human in there!!

        My baby is 7 weeks old now and I have to say I like having a baby even with all the newborn wildness and sleep deprivation and emotional ups and downs much better than being pregnant!

          • 😊😊😊 happy to share!

            One thing that was fun about being pregnant was being out in the world and having strangers, especially older women commiserate with me about pregnancy symptoms, offer kind words, and share their experiences. It felt like being accepted into a club! Luckily with Covid I avoided the ppl coming into my bubble and touching my belly thank goodness.

    • I love hearing/talking about parenting! What is most like you expected it? What is the least like you expected? And anything else you and/or others just want to share!

      • I am constantly surprised at how strong and resilient my baby is, especially since she was born 4 weeks early! She’s 7 weeks old now (but developmentally 3 weeks) and pushes with her arms and legs and grabs things with such strength! And with my support she pulls herself up on her feet! And she can push herself up on my stomach, find my nipple, and latch to start breastfeeding all by herself! I thought of newborns as so fragile and weak. I was very wrong!

  8. Okay while I think of a real question I just want to say, during the March A+ AMA session I asked about how to navigate my strong feelings for my partner/wanting to commit but worrying that since much of our relationship has been during COVID, I/we might not be prepared for challenges in more “normal” day to day life. You all were so kind and helpful and reassured me that pandemic time does “count” and maybe even demonstrates more resilience and strength in our relationship. I wanted to follow up and let y’all know that I proposed in August and they said yes!!!!! Thanks for your perspectives 💓

    • i like to use a medium boos cutting board and usually try to include one hard cheese (i love cabot clothboard cheddar), one soft cheese (like a creamy goat with herbs or honey), one washed rind cheese (like grand cru surchoix), and one wild card that’s a little funky (like a stinky bleu or bloomy rind). i arrange those first, then lay out sloppy piles of different kinds of crackers and breads – sliced baguette is great. if i have olive tapenade, honey, or jam i put them in little bowls on the board, and then i fill in all the gaps with dried fruits (i love dried cherries, apricots, and cranberries), fresh fruit (grapes are wonderful), and nuts (almonds, walnuts, and pistachios are fun). if i do it right, it serves as dinner for a few people or hearty appetizers for a whole party 🖤

    • So unfortunately I have some horrifying GI problems that are currently preventing me from eating gluten and dairy AND YET I still manage to throw together a mean cheese board. My top gluten-free, dairy-free picks are:

      -dates stuffed with cashew cheese and sage (and maybe wrapped with bacon?)
      -fig jam
      -Simple Mills gluten-free crackers (I honestly like all of them but I’m really digging the rosemary ones these days)
      -all of the olives
      -extra salty cashews

      • Ooh I love Simple Mills brand crackers!! 😋 Do you have any favorite dairy free or vegan cheeses, Ro? Brands/flavors/recipes? I’m curious about cashew cheese, but never know where to start with picking one out or making from scratch.

        • Oh christ, I got too excited/hungry and didn’t read your comment close enough! 😂 Cashew cheese in dates sounds so bomb!!!!

          • Miyoko’s makes incredible cashew cheese of many different varieties! Unfortunately, it’s pretty pricey, so I only snag it when it’s on sale. I used to make my own when I dated someone who had a Vitamix (RIP my Vitamix Romance), and it was pretty easy to do, so if you have a nice blender, go for it!

    • omfg a DREAM of a question… tempted to find some photos of my fave cheese boards i’ve created in 2021.

      – 4 cheeses: a soft creamy slutty brie, a spreadable goat, something funky (probably blue), a hard cheese (my fave is gruyere)

      – 2-3 meats: i love coppa, calabrese, and prosciutto

      – fancy crackers

      – apple slices (green AND red if i’m being wild)

      – 1-2 other fruits/veggies: i like to slice up radishes real thin, also love carrots, sungold tomatoes, pickled anything, grapes, berries, etc

      – nuts / spicy toasted corn / chocolate chips / something small and like, extremely easy to sprinkle many of to fill empty spaces

      – 1-3 jams/honey/sauce: strawberry jam, blackberry jam, vanilla honey, dijon mustard, etc etc

      i also rly love putting the jams and sauces into cute little ramequins and using special cheese knives and tiny spoons to create a beautiful visual.

      • vanessa, one of these days we’re going to have a cheese board party and go absolutely bonkers and make like four different cheese boards and it’s gonna be incredible.

      • Fuck I love a slutty brie! This is a damn good board. 💖 I’d never considered adding fresh radishes!

        • they’re so great for an extra bit of spicy snap! like i rly love grabbing a fancy cracker, spreading some strawberry jam on top, adding a little chunk of blue cheese, and topping with a lil radish slice! HELLO GORGEOUS etc.

    • I finally started listening to You’re Wrong About and I’m obsessed. My all-time favorite podcast is Slate’s Represent which doesn’t exist anymore but has a VERY good back catalogue worth listening to.

    • My favorite podcast right now is Maintenance Phase (two queer hosts research and shit talk diet culture — it’s funny and cathartic and I HIGHLY recommend it!).

    • i also love you’re wrong about! and if you’re into astrology you should check out “ghost of a podcast” jessica lanyadoo is so so so smart and hilarious and honestly gives really clear astrological readings without all the um… well she calls it “bullshit” which i translate into the whole “the blank is in blank and trine to saturn” or whatever. bc i really don’t know like… what’s going on there, i just wanna know what it means for me! and her insta is very funny too.

      https://www.instagram.com/p/CP12NdAhjyo/

    • My favorite podcasts are all the unpolished “friends in a room” type podcasts. That also are about true crime and/or supernatural stuff. Banshees & Booze, And That’s Why We Drink, Wine & Crime. (Hm I just noticed another theme these three things have in common…)

      I also love Teen Creeps (two friends discuss pulp fiction novels with a heavy emphasis on Christopher Pike and RL Stein), Still Buffering (three queer siblings talking about ‘teens through the ages’), Sawbones (medical history comedy podcast).

      I also like D&D liveplay podcasts like Rude Tales of Magic. Unprepared Casters is my most recent fave, partially because it’s incredibly queer.

      (I listen to A LOT of podcasts…)

    • If you grew up on Harry Potter and are wanting to explore it from a feminist, queer, anti racist, non-TERF etc perspective I highly recommend Witch Please. Its hosted by two women academics and its basically like taking an awesome womens studies class with two hosts who are great friends and love each other. The new rebooted season is more structured but the old ones which are more shooting the shit are also very fun!

      I also love Still Pretty, a Buffy podcast run by two profs as well, one of whom is queer, gender fluid. Amazing insights. They just finished so there’s a lot of back episodes to listen to.

      Apparently I like feminist academics talking about the pop culture of my youth. If anyone has recs of podcasts that are similar to these I would love to hear about them!

  12. Why did my bag of potting soil get moldy? It’s not kept in a damp space. Are we supposed to switch containers? Use it all at once?

  13. HELLO here I am, ready to talk about A N Y T H I N G

    and listen if anyone reading this wants to reply in this thread introducing me to a D&D character they’ve played/are playing/created for future play, i would not be mad about it

    • I played a fighter who was a Longtooth shifter (basically werewolf-lite) – she was tall, buff, and hairy, enthusiastic and LOUD, super nice when not going berserk. I didn’t know the term “herbo” at the time, but that fits. Unfortunately the campaign never really went far but I repurposed her for stories elsewhere.

      • Longtooth shifter!!! That sounds badass. My air genasi rogue got a *touch* of lycanthropy so she’s an in-control hybrid “were genasi” now and it’s amazing.

    • Hadron was a punk rock water genasi fighter who met their wife while burning down a warehouse belonging to the evil empire, but eventually their wife got into government to change it from the inside, but then got corrupted by power and the last straw was when she cheated on Hadron (with a centaur! while on a diplomatic mission abroad) (my friend said I couldn’t be a centaur because it was a water world). During the first battle, I almost got another player permadeathed when Hadron broke into tears at the sight of a minotaur instead of doing the battle for several turns. Their finest moment was when the DM had this cute little side quest moment planned where we were to help a gnome work up the nerve to hit on his crush but instead a nat 20-ed my persuasion roll (despite a very low charisma score) w/r/t love being a lie. Alas, the bard managed to outmaneuver me and now the gnome is in love somewhere, probably.

    • I play a hermit warforged fighter named Socket! They lost an arm in battle, and the injury left them with lasting trauma and damage to their programming – a chip that controls their empathy is now permanently on the fritz, so they have to roll a d20 before battles to see if they will be physically able to hurt enemies. They desperately want to get enough money to persuade some powerful people to remove this chip so they can make their own autonomous decisions, but the only way to make money for them is as a mercenary. I love my trauma robot.

    • This is maybe one of the things that I don’t wanna reveal BUT I will say that my salary as a subject editor is mad gracious for an indie publication. When I was solely a writer though I got paid 80-125 per post and got paid handsomely for the Virtual Weeks I helped to plan.

    • Hi Lauren!

      We give transparent pay for any public job postings at https://www.autostraddle.com/work-at-autostraddle/

      In addition to the information found on that site, we pay $80-$300 on average for written posts and a similar rate for illustrations.

      Beyond that, we don’t want our writers or editors to feel obligated to share pay during an AMA.

      Thank you!

  15. Ted Lasso thoughts/feelings/opinions/hot takes? I watched the whole show in like 4 days this past week and have a burning desire to discuss it w/ other queers 😂

    • I would die for Rebecca. I’ve never identified with anyone more than Keeley in s2 when she’s like fuck, let’s invade France.

    • AHHHHH YES! I have a strong love for Roy Kent, feel very much like a Keely, I actually share a name with one of the characters so I love that. I actually don’t understand why people don’t like the fact that it’s a fucking happy show? like, I love the fact that there is a show out that has happy endings you know?

    • I am not a sports gay so I really didn’t think I would like this show but I LOOOOVE it. It’s just so…soft. I love it. I love Rebecca and Keely’s friendship. I love Roy Kent. And I want to get a pep talk from Ted.

    • i have never seen ted lasso and up until about a week ago i thought it was a show about a hardware store, which i realized was because i’d conflated ted lasso with the actor tim allen from the 90’s television show home improvement.

    • Oh, I have so many thoughts:

      1. I want so much for Keely’s attraction to Rebecca to become canon bisexuality/pansexuality/queerness…but then again, I love Roy Kent so I don’t know?

      (Also? The hiccups in their relationship this season were terribly contrived.)

      2. Jamie Tart really won me over this season.

      3. I wish the show had grappled with the power dynamics of Sam’s relationship with Rebecca. Once they were off the app and knew who the other was, that should’ve been something to come up.

      4. I saw the capacity for Nate to grow into the awful sack he is from the beginning. I was disappointed that the worst thing he did – kissing Keely without her permission – was treated like a joke.

      5. Dr. Sharon was one of the best second season additions to a cast as I can recall. She made the show so, so much better.

      I really could go on for days. I love this show so much.

      • strong strong strong echoes re: power dynamics with sam’s relationship with rebecca, roy/keely problems feeling contrived, dr. sharon being amazing, and nate’s kissing keely being laughed off.

        re: keely’s canon bisexuality/pansexuality/queerness i have been struggling with this a lot because i think, on the one hand, like her attraction to rebecca was very real and it was pretty easy for me to translate this to like, keely is queer but dates these football guys because that’s what she’s always known (& she does have a speech about this) & keely dating roy doesn’t erase that she experiences attraction to non-men, but i also don’t want it to be laughed off as like keely’s silliness/playfulness/lack of inhibition toward overt sexuality by people (particularly not queer people) who will read it as just gals being pals so i would very much like, at least, some explicit, textual acknowledgment to some capacity, even (especially?) without eliminating the keely/roy relationship. give me an ex-girlfriend or something

        sorry for replying i don’t even know how much we’re supposed to engage with responses to these questions but i have a lot of ted lasso feelings that i need to engage with queers about as someone who was like “i really don’t need to watch a show that’s about mostly a bunch of cis white dudes playing sports, i am currently only in the market for shows that center people of color and queerness” but ended up falling in love with it anyway

        • Hard same to all of this, including the not sure I should be replying but I can’t resist because I so want to talk about this show with queer folx.

          I would also like Keely to be canonically bi+ / pan / fluid / not straight and be with Roy – there are so many ways to acknowledge it and take it seriously in the show – an ex-girlfriend, a comment about crushes on other women, a comment during Pride month, etc.

        • No apologies necessary, @marchesemi, especially since we’re in the same boat. I’ve got a good friend that’s giving me the side-eye for avoiding Schitt’s Creek because I wanted to watch TV that centered POCs…and then became an evangelist for Ted Lasso. I relish the opportunity to talk about this show, especially with other queer folks.

          I think you’ve hit the nail on the head. They’re obviously very different shows but every time Keely expresses her attraction for Rebecca it feels like its The Good Place redux…like, we’re watching Eleanor and Tahani all over again. The idea to give her an ex-girlfriend (who Roy thinks he can’t compete with) would be great.

      • I def hated that they treated the keely/nate situation like that. I also do really like that they allowed nate to turn into a villain because when some folks get power that’s what happens.

      • I’m only halfway through season 2 but I agree with all of this!

        Especially #3! Especially given Rebecca’s talk about accountability in relationships season 1.

        I love Dr. Sharon so much!

        I would like Keely to be canonically queer and I think that can happen without breaking up her and Roy. (speaking as a queer woman married to a cis straight man)

        I’ve been disappointed that there aren’t any openly, obviously queer characters on this show. Especially since it has what I consider to be a pretty queer sensibility. It seems to me that one of the underlying themes is an exploration of masculinity and what healthy masculinity looks like and the impact of toxic masculinity and I think it’d be so much richer if they had queer masc characters of any and all genders.

        • Great point about the show not having any canonically queer characters, @cepperly, but I kind of got the sense that they were heading that way with Colin. What do you think?

          • Oh yeah, I’d forgotten about his Grindr comment. I would love it if he comes out. When I saw that episode I couldn’t tell if it was just a cheap gay panic type joke or something they were going to develop.

    • i don’t know anything about this show other than that my ex-husband told me i had strong roy kent vibes and i had to ask my friends if that was a compliment or not.

  16. Calling all the plant queers. Halp!! I have spider mites. Again.

    Have any of you successfully vanquished them or do I just have to learn how to live with them?

    (I’ve tried regular spraying with neem oil and Captain Jack’s Dead Bug Brew and buying predatory mites to eat the spider mites plus getting rid of the most susceptible plants / panic plant purging).

    • If these are what I think they are, Neem oil didn’t seem to work for me? Or maybe it did. But I used it in conjunction with those little yellow sticky traps? They caught literally hundreds of them each. I also starved those plants of water bc I heard that mites are a result of overwatering the plants. I tend to over-love my plants and have been getting a lot better about watering my plants less. It will become even more necessary as there will be less sun soon.

      I am not an expert but this worked for me! Good luck!

    • I asked my plantier friends and they did say neem oil works for most of them but here’s advice from one of their mom’s (lol)

      “Wash every single leaf with a spray mixture of dishwashing liquid and water by hand with a wet paper towel. A couple of drop so dw liquid to a small spray bottle. Once the leaves are all rubbed, spray again and leave it.”

      • Update: another friend said that they had to buy concentrated neem oil and dilute it vs a branded spray with neem oil in it before it worked for them

      • I’ve read this advice too and have been hoping to avoid doing it because I have so many plants. But it’s hard to argue with someone’s mom.

    • yep, your own potion of neem oil + dishwashing soap + warm water, wipe every leaf, spray again, repeat about once a week. I also like to put the plants out in the rain or give em a shower every so often in wintertime.

    • i actually teach high schoolers once a week as a teaching artist (very fun, strongly recommend to other writers if you have a flexible work schedule / like teaching teens / have an org in your area that pairs writers with classrooms!) and the creative writing class i’ve been teaching most frequently focuses on journaling and figuring out what the difference between private writing vs public writing is, and how we want to share ourselves publicly vs what we want to keep private! i love teaching it and the kids seem to enjoy it, too.

    • i taught an 8th grade class called “life skills” that was essentially whatever I wanted it to be. We talked about careers (and I got some professional POC in to talk about their jobs) and money … but also we talked about the drug war and we did like, personality assessments and talked about core values and we did art and self-exploration and i had them interview their parents and make lil’ zines about them and basically we just did some dope shit. some of it was actually “life skills” and the rest was just, being introspective and well rounded, with some ethnic studies and bigger picture consciousness raising thrown in.

      i wish that was like, a class elsewhere lol

      • That sounds really really cool and so needed!

        I feel like a whole class just dedicated to “jobs you can have, things you can do” would have been so helpful, as well.

    • This is maybe boring, but I wish I had learned about voting/Canada’s political system, taxes, and basic financial information in high school.

  18. 7 years ago I was coming out to myself and happend upon Autostraddle. As an analytical queer, I felt like researching, informing myself, and getting a sense of queer culture I hadn’t yet tuned into. So much appreciation for the content I dug into here. You also gave me the cursory over view of ‘The L Word’ to keep myself in the loop. With Covid though and more time for TV watching I finally binged the complete 6 seasons of ‘The L Word’ to better enjoy the nods to the original series in Gen Q. Is it just me, or is it shocking that despite all the steamy sex (thank you!) that queer sexual health or STI visits never played into storylines for the queer characters? Always educating doctors and med professionals I encounter in presumptions or less serious checks (get those mouth swabs!). Do you feel like we talk about this enough?

  19. Are you dressing up for Halloween?

    or

    Best kitchen tool?

    or

    Your favorite book/tv show/fan fiction featuring weather?

    • Oooo your third question! I loved the Riddle Master trilogy by Patricia McKillip and, after thinking about your question, I just realized that book is probably why I love the wind so much!

    • Yes, I am. But it’s super lowkey and thrown together unlike my usual all out costuming unfortunately.

      Garbage disposal, to be honest.

      First thing I thought of was Jesmyn Ward’s Salvage the Bones.

    • I’m doing a couples costume for the first time in YEARS: Nancy Downs (The Craft) and Lydia Deetz (Beetlejuice) as a lesbian couple. I’m Nancy.

    • yes, gonna be sandy from grease (even though grease 2 is better, lol)

      best kitchen tool is a very sharp knife

      melissa faliveno’s “tomboyland” opens with a scene about weather in the midwest that i think about FREQUENTLY

    • 1. I am not dressing up for Halloween but I am very excited to see my nephews’ costumes this year.

      2. This is tough but I’ll give the edge to the Instant Pot. I’ve finally been able to perfect my rice and bean cookery.

      3. Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward

    • I’ll probably just put on my glow in the dark skeleton dress for fun but I am hoping to dress up my newborn in a black sweatsuit with a skeleton stitched on it!

      Also gonna go with sharon knife! I also love my immersion blender for soups and my instant pot for spaghetti sauce, curries, and soups.

      N.K. Jemisin’s Broken Earth trilogy is one of my alltime fav series and it features characters who can control the forces below the earth, causing (or stopping) earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, etc. Amazing Black and queer rep too. She is a fucking genius!

    • Yoga, always. Although in fairness I don’t think I’ve ever taken a pilates class and I am VERY picky about the kind of yoga class I enjoy.

    • YOGA! I do wanna try out pilates though but mainly because the machines turn me on and look really hot.

    • i can never get into yoga but i have LOVED the pilates classes i’ve taken… i’ve never used the machines but i’ve done floor stuff and it was so satisfying. that said i’m into whatever feels good for your body, whoever you may be!

    • I love yoga! I did it right up to 8 months pregnant and it helped me so much, physically, mentally, and emotionally.

    • a fair amount of pilates is variations on boat pose! so possibly a false dichotomy but both are great for the people who respectively enjoy them.

  21. @Vanessa, I just wanted to let you know that I took your advice to get a onesie to heart and now own two- a fuzzy black and white snowflake one and a soft sloth one that I got test for $8! My kids were so impressed!

    • THIS IS THE GREATEST THING TO EVER OCCUR (FOR ME) IN AN A+ AMA, THANK YOU SO MUCH AND MAZEL TOV ON YOUR ONESIES! I’M SO IMPRESSED TOO! <3

  22. Where do you get comfy, cute clothes for small fat bodies? I’m under 5 feet/150 lb and honestly, I feel like now I just try to hide myself in all my clothes.

    • I guess I need to know what you mean by comfy? Or do you just mean cute clothes that aren’t like extra tight everywhere?

      • Yeah! Like I have not found a single pair of jeans that’s comfy, or a shirt that’s at all flattering. It’s either too short, rides up and shows my belly or too long and drapes weird.

    • i REALLY love old navy. they have great basics for really reasonable prices and they are the only place i reliably find jeans that fit and feel great. i’m also into modcloth if you want sort of fancier/funkier/pricier options. fashion nova and forever 21 are hit or miss for me but when they’re good they’re really good. but i gotta say, the older i get, the more my wardrobe is just like…60-75% old navy.

  23. Is Riese going through every article ever written to fix the tags? I think I read this somewhere, but I’m not sure. Perhaps I’m making it up. Sounds insane if it’s actually true. AS has probably published more than 20k articles over the years.

    • YESS!! That happened. Riese eventually reached out for some help, and Kayla (now our new Managing Editor!) responded to the internal call we gave to the team for extra work. They worked on that project for literally months during the winter and spring.

    • in fact i am not!!! the project of re-organizing the website, in addition to taking a great deal of time, involved a lot of repetitive clicking + small hand motions which is really bad for this nerve damage / wrist pain problem I’m dealing with! So eventually I had to stop. However! We will eventually finish consolidating our tags and making them more clear and better organized — not every post one by one but by bulk deleting, bulk adding and consolidating tags to create a clearer taxonomy. I’m also glad to have Kayla on our full-time team now because she was doing a lot of that work figuring out which tags could go etc !

      • Thanks for the answer! That sounds like an incredible amount of work (that’s probably also boring). Wild.

  24. Is Kayla here tonight? I have to go to Miami next month and I’m stressed—does anyone wear a mask?

    • Kayla is actually off today celebrating the long Holigay weekend!

      But she might stop in later if she gets time.

      (One of my closest friends lives in Florida and has confirmed to me it’s pretty mask optional? But what that looks like for you might also depend on where you currently live, like friends from New York were pretty horrified to see how mask optional The Midwest, my home, has become — to be honest I don’t love it either, even though I still always wear one indoors.)

    • I am in the Daytona Beach area and very few people wear masks. Miami and the tri-county area of South Florida have a lot more Democrats so you may see more Covid precautions than the north Florida area. Florida is pretty much a sh*t show. Stay safe.

      • I would! I joined after someone on an AS discord recommended. And I’ve made so much progress reading the books I own (and finding new ones). It’s also an easy way to keep track of what I’ve read—mostly so I don’t draw a blank when people ask what I’m reading. And there are pretty graphs.

      • I would recommend! it’s a dope non-amazon alternative to goodreads with free/paid options, content warnings, and nice algorithm recommendations that don’t feel creepy and aren’t (to my knowledge) sponsored.

  27. Do you have any music/TV shows/movies that you’re really really into but that none of your friends really like that much? If so, what are they?

      • Omg same! I have friends who are horror movie people but not many and not many in my city and I also always seem to date people who aren’t into them!

      • Same! I would watch horror movies with you Nicole. My partner gets too scared.

        I have no one to watch the L Word with! At least I have To L and Back to listen to and respond to in my head.

      • i want to watch horror movies w everybody!

        the two shows i love/would love to talk about more but no one else ever seems to want to watch are Harlots and The Magicians. wild to me that there’s a genuinely good show with solid and complex portrayals of a main cast of entirely sex workers (with liv tyler?? as a queer character??) and so many folks are cool with passing on it

        • The Magicians!!!! Maybe the only book-to-TV adaptation where the TV is better than the source material.

    • watching tv is a pretty solitary activity for me because i don’t watch a ton and i never watch it in a current events kind of way, so i’m always behind or know spoilers etc.

      recently i’ve been making my way through season 3 of Unreal which is pretty bad but i can’t seem to quit, and The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.

    • The first things that came to mind for me were We Are The Tigers, a murder mystery musical I only just discovered and can’t convince anyone else to listen to so I can give them my OPINIONS.

      I do agree that I like horror movies in a way very few of my friends do, with some exceptions.

      And I feel like not enough people are watching Elite? I had to yell at my friend who doesn’t watch about Spanish teens as if they were real people I knew because I had to get my feelings out somewhere.

    • This is so interesting that so many of y’all are into horror movies!! I am very much not, but my answer to this question would be the show Letterkenny. I’ve been so into it for the past few months and watched all 9 seasons and now starting over again with season 1, but I have no one to talk to about it!

      • MARY HELLO I love Letterkenny! To the point that now whenever I say “to be fair” I have to pause because most of my friends will start a chorus of TO BE FAAAAIIIIIR after. I saw them live before the pandemic and they were such a delight!!!!!

    • Nobody wants to talk to me about Dr. Death for some reason!? Also although it was incredibly popular, Heather’s wife Stacy is the only other Chernobyl stan I’m aware of in the Queer Community. My favorite genre of film/tv is stuff based on true stories — like bad education, the big short, one night in miami, shattered glass, quiz show.
      I think “Goliath” is the one show I watch that I have not even met anybody who has heard of it (besides the ex who recommended it to me in 2017)
      I also read a lot of mainstream psychological thrillers that I think are not necessarily popular amongst my demographic!

        • DID YOU WATCH THE PEACOCK SERIES ALSO

          it’s definitely my favorite podcast of all time besides to l and back

    • really on my highest horse about this franchise lately for some reason but TWILIGHT, it’s twilight.

    • Oh yeah, I am a big time country music person. I listen almost exclusively to country music and any kind of playlist called like Bedtime Beats. And I’m really pretty deep into Doctor Who fandom.

  28. Will AS be doing any in-depth articles on the nwsl? I feel like a lot is going on in the league, but that the majority is discussed on social media and I have no idea what’s happening

    • Oh definitely, @nameiwontforget. I was hoping to have something out when Meg Linehan’s story on Mana Shim and Sinead Farrelly dropped — especially because homophobia imbedded within that story hasn’t been talked about nearly enough — but things with the league, the Players’ Association, etc. were moving so fast that it didn’t feel like there was time to get ahead of the story. Now that things have settled down, I hope I can talk to some of the folks involved and get a story together for AS.

  29. Not a question really but I need help with the site!

    a) I’m having trouble viewing embedded Instagram images. It doesn’t show the image, just a link to click which brings me to view the photo on IG externally.

    b) I tried submitting this on the contact form under “I think something’s broken” and …it’s broken. It won’t let me submit my info and problem.

    Halp!

    • With a) I can say that I, too, have experienced this and I think it’s because IG (or FB really) is cracking down on making everyone get an account to see IG content. So usually I can see like 1-2 posts embedded and then the rest are as you described and it refreshes, IDK how often? Ultimately, I gave in and created an IG account after years of resisting just so I could see the Bollywood memes my sister was sending me lol…

      With b) I have no idea, I think Nicole or someone on the senior team can help with this though

      • I’ve got accounts on both IG and FB and am logged in to both so this is pretty confusing? Anyway thanks for all you do. I appreciate it!

        • Thank you! <3 Yea I should've clarified that even with the IG account and even being logged in, it still does the same thing you're describing and I don't know why. But without the IG account I was blocked from seeing the content altogether so ::shrug:: FB being FB I guess..

    • Hi yes! I know we’ve also had some problems with this for No Filter (some readers unable to see the embeds), but whenever we’ve tried to recreate the issue on our end… we haven’t been able to? Most readers confirm that if they “click thru” the image, they can see it that way. So I think HImani might be right that part of it is Instagram wanting people to see it on their actual website.

      But thank you for the reminder to bring this back up to the tech team!

    • SO! The fundraiser tracker is currently breaking the contact us form. Apparently, for some reason, you cannot have both of these two completely unrelated things. Which is Not Great and was brought to our attention just a couple days ago…and, basically, we don’t have a fix so we’re just trying to ride it out 😬

      • I am sorry I had to give you the most indie media answer of all time about the fact that the form to report broken things on the website is broken, but only temporarily! Less than $4k to go!

    • this is a great place to ask us questions because our contact box is… BROKEN!

      we just found out why yesterday. apparently our fundraising tracker has built in javascript that’s breaking our contact form somehow. it’s a wild tangle of code back here! but… we’ve tested it and it’s true that once we remove that tracker the contact form works! and we’re really close to the end of the fundraiser, so … any day now.

      thank you for your patience as we navigate this. 😅

  31. I just quit a queer nonprofit job that was draining my soul. Because of my community work, I ended up with a lot of fb friends etc who are people who attend the programming I did (I know, I should have had better work/life boundaries the whole time, I’m working on it). What is the best way to go about refocalizing my social media to focus on people I actually want to be friends with vs. People who work in the same circles I do and/or people who I was too scared of their reaction and how they might lash out in programming spaces if I rejected friend requests

    • A good friend of mine is a musician and the way she’s handled this is by creating separate accounts for her professional work and relationships versus her actual personal friends. It seems to work ok for her? I’m not really on social media so unfortunately all the ideas I have on this are second hand.

    • LMAO when this happened to me I basically just gave up Facebook altogether and created new accounts for everything else! WHICH WAS PROBABLY NOT HEALTHY AND THAT’S WHY I’M LAUGHING!

      Hopefully someone else has a better suggestion.

    • I have definitely remained “friends” with but “muted” many a person who found me via social media through past nonprofit work. And also, honestly, another strategy that works for me is contacting the people you want to be friends with directly via text / DM / in-person / phone calls and stepping back from social media if it reminds you too much of things that drain your soul. <3 Wishing you good things and lots of healing.

    • Go through and clean out your friends first. Only keep folks that you actually want to see the content that you post and who you know won’t have any wild reactions to what you post. Your social media is YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA. its FOR YOU – not anybody else. You should be able to post the things you want without worry about how the folks that follow you will view it.

      So go thru and firstly clear out the people that you follow to make sure you are only friends with people you actually wanna be, then go through and (this may take time depending on how many followers you have) remove people from following you that you don’t want to see your content. This could mean just removing them or it could mean removing and blocking them but do what you have to do regardless of how you think they may feel – you have to put your feelings first.

      Then after that’s all settled, think about your privacy settings: turn off your comments, go private, etc things like that. This all may take a few days to do but it’s worth it, because once you clear out the friend stuff and all that it will be easier to maintain your social media peace

      Social media is supposed to be a fun outlet, so curate it to be that way for yourself.

      • okay just wanna submit my monthly request that shelli write a LIFE ADVICE GUIDE FOR US ALL, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE

      • Shelli I would love to collab with you for a like, “How To Extricate Yourself From Social Media” post. Bc I was gonna give very similar advice!

        • If you all do this, I’d love to be in on this too! I say I’m not on social media, but the truth is that I am, in very very specific ways!

        • would love to see this article! I extricated myself from all the social medias and it’s been such a gift, honestly, but I had to find a lot of creative workarounds for staying in touch with people and keeping up with events I want to go to. the long slow demise of facebook, sorry I mean “meta” (?!?!) is helping! as is getting on signal to keep in touch with mutual aid/action type of stuff locally. but I often feel like the only person in the entire world who isn’t on social media so I’d love to hear some other perspectives especially queer ones!

    • I’m going to go a step further and ask you — why are you on social media? What does it add to your life? And I don’t mean that in a leading way, necessarily — it will help you decide what to do.

      I personally recommended completely leaving Facebook, but if it benefits your life in some way, then tailor your friends/followers around that specific benefit (I have to have a FB account for work, and I friended a handful of my coworkers for specific work purposes. Otherwise no fb).

      For other social media, do you really benefit from spending time scrolling through IG accounts of strangers, for example? Do you even benefit from scrolling through your friends’ accounts (I thought I would, but honestly I don’t. We videochat frequently. They’ll send me any of their best pics directly). I know some people use Twitter for work stuff, especially media people.

      Finally, I wouldn’t worry about whether people will be offended if you unfriend them / deny their requests or whatever.

    • Yall are THE BEST and I am so here for Shelli and Abeni’s article expansion of this answer too! You’ve given me a lot to think about and a lot of ways to be brave in setting boundaries and finding what is helpful for me! So grateful to you folks, so glad to be an A+ member.

      • I know me too! I’m like this is an amazing question. I have no idea but I’m going to ponder it for a while…

      • I am back to say a date with Hildegard von Bingen! What do I have planned? Hopefully, just an all-night conversation, one of those that goes into early morning because you can’t get enough of talking with each other. Is this a date? Sure, it’s a date, especially if she lets me look through her drawings.

        • omg Nicole! I was also thinking of Hildegard von Bingen and then I was like “but was she queer? who knows!” I didn’t know she drew? I know her as a composer lol!

    • Katharine Hepburn!!

      I love her so much I don’t care what we do. I’d even let her drag me golfing.

    • I would love to go back in time and hang out in the queer literary circles in 1920s Paris. I would date any of these writers: Natalie Barney, Virginia Woolf, Djuna Barnes, Vita Sackville-West, Romaine Brooks, and more and I’d want to attend literary soirees and salons with them.

    • Josephine Baker, one of the coolest humans to ever live on this entire planet! I’d take her to a WNBA game ’cause that’s honestly probably one of the very few things she hasn’t done, and then we’d go to Chez Josephine, because I think she’d be DELIGHTED to know it’s still thriving and would enjoy a refined French dinner after the nachos I bought us at the basketball game.

    • leslie feinberg no question. hit the anarchist bookstore to browse, grab dinner and then head to the protest, maybe hang out at an all-night diner afterward with our phones on for arrest support 😍

    • natalie barney just to see what all the fuss was about yannow?
      or dorothy arzner
      or thelma wood or annemarie schwarzenbach because hotness
      or louisa carpenter and our date would be her giving 1 million dollars to autostraddle because she was an heiress to the dupont fortune

    • I had to think about this all night, but I had to come back here and share that I landed on hiking with Mary Oliver

  33. Guilty pleasure/weird food habits? I don’t know if it’s that weird but I always put jam or honey in my grilled cheese

    • I’m just popping in to affirm your life choices! I *always* put jam (and sometimes bacon) on my grilled cheese.

    • THAT IS NOT WEIRD THAT IS JUST WHAT YOU SHOULD DO!!!!! creamy gooey cheese with sweetness is CALLED FLAVORRRRRR

    • when i’m sad i’ll just microwave two corn tortillas with a slice of gouda in between and then top that with hot sauce and it’s so comforting but also maybe a travesty

    • guilty pleasure/weird snack: dipping fritos in cream cheese. healthy? no. delicious? hell yes.

    • This reminds me that my dad loves peanut butter and pickle sandwiches, which are actually not bad??

    • refuse to call anything related to food “guilty” but i suppose these are slightly unconventional choices on my part:

      1. OBSESSED with dry oatmeal packets, like the quaker oats single serving maple and brown sugar packs just…without water? yes plz.

      2. when i’m sad i like scrambled eggs with ketchup on buttered toast

      3. as a kid i used to microwave plain string cheese and then eat it immediately as sort of an unbreaded mozzarella stick and frankly i still think it rules

      also i think sarah is right, your jam/honey grilled cheese scenario is simply THE BEST AND PERHAPS ONLY WAY <3

    • Guilty pleasure that only Southerners may appreciate: if there’s pimento cheese on it, I’m probably going to buy it.

    • THERE is this stuff (sichuan chili crunch lao gan ma) that I put on pretty much everything and it’s delish – ESPECIALLY ON ICE CREAM. but I think I’m going to try honey in grilled cheese because that low key sounds smacking.

      • Oh. You just made me realize I haven’t yet tried making a lao gan ma grilled cheese. Or dare I… a lao gan ma AND honey grilled cheese??

    • My weird food habits are: I will not eat onions or scallions at all ever. I won’t pick them off my food and eat what’s left. I won’t eat around them. I won’t eat yellow ones, sweet ones, red ones, or white ones. I won’t eat them raw and I won’t eat them cooked. I *hate* onions. I also won’t eat ketchup, mustard, or hot sauce if it’s cold (it HAS TO BE room temperature). And I love pickles so much, but I cut the seeds out of them. Pickle seeds gross me out.

    • my mom raised us dipping pretzels into cream cheese from a young age, and i also now like dipping doritos (or other flavored chips) into sour cream

    • Ahh so many people here share my love for honey/jam on grilled cheese. Is it like a gay thing?? I hope it’s a gay thing.

  34. As A+ grows is it harder to put personal and behind the scenes info out there? Thinking of the insider and the old conversations with my ex series.

    • I *think* what happened with that one is that folks just ran out of ex’s they could get to do interviews? It wasn’t as much of a privacy thing. This is my understanding of that series. As to the insider, though content is sometime changed up for fun, it remains largely similar and there haven’t really been issues! Honestly, I think as time has gone on, a lot of personal essay style pieces that writers may have wanted in A+, they now want to be publicly available for a variety of reasons. So, that is a bigger shift in a different direction!

  35. 1. best book you’ve read lately? (always and forever a question i will ask)
    2. best purchase you’ve made lately that cost less than $25?
    3. just – thanks for being here, y’all :)

    • 1. I mentioned this book a while ago in one of these types of settings, but I’m finally getting around to reading Sakhiyani by Giti Thadani. Still only half done but I’ve found it really satisfying because it feels like she’s putting into words things I’ve implicitly understood about Hinduism my whole life.
      2. I bought a left handed ergonomic mouse for $25 + tax (so a little more than your cut off but really quite cheap for this type of thing!) that has been a real life saver bc I’ve been having a ton of problems with my right arm/shoulder situation. (Pinched nerves aren’t fun, y’all…)
      3. Thank you for being here too!!! :)

    • I finally read The Haunting of Hill House last month and I loved it!!

      Also I recently purchased a Ouija board + planchette at a thrift store for $10!

    • I was just making a list of my fav books I read in 2021!

      Margaret and the Mystery of the Missing Body by Megan Milks (90s nostalgic book about a teen girl missing her middle school detective club and going to an eating disorder clinic)

      A Dream of a Woman by Casey Plett (short stories about trans women and their relationships with each other)

      NDN Coping Mechanisms by Billy-Ray Belcourt (queer Indigenous poetry)

      Shadow Life by Hiromi Goto and Ann Xu (graphic novel about a bi Japanese Canadian woman in her 70s metaphorically fighting death)

      Stoop City by Kristyn Dunnion (punchy short stories about outsiders, queers, sex workers)

      A Natural History of Transition by Callum Angus
      (Amazingly weird nature focused trans science fiction)

      Generation Loss by Elizabeth Hand (dark mystery/thriller about a bi hasbeen punk photographer)

      Little Blue Encyclopedia by Hazel Jane Plante
      (A queer trans woman writes a tribute in the form of an Encyclopedia of a cult tv show to her trans BFF who died)

      Butter Honey Pig Bread by Francesca Ekwuyasi
      (A mother and two daughters from Nigeria healing from a childhood sexual assault, very hopeful and with lots of yummy food!)

      A Duke in Disguise by Cat Sebastian (bi woman m/f relationship historical romance with radical bookselling/publishing sideplot)

      Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse (black/Indigenous epic fantasy with many queer characters and an incredible story!)

    • i bought a $3 ceramic donkey from goodwill a few months ago and sat it down on the base of this brass desk lamp and just… never moved it, and now it lives there, giving the lamp a novelty vibe and making every day a little better 🥺 (there is no donkey emoji)

    • I bought slide-on shoes that are positively HIDEOUS for $15 while on vacation because I needed something that was easier to put on than my chucks but I could still wear with socks unlike my flipflops because we were meandering from inside the lake house we rented on VRBO to the back deck so often and i am OBSESSED with them. now that i’m back home i use them to take out the trash and it’s truly a game changer even though it’s very silly.

    • 1. i’m reading I Love You But I’ve Chosen Darkness by Claire Vaye Watkins and it’s VERY good, and i just finished Hurts So Good by Leigh Cowart which was ALSO very good!

      2. hmmm maybe the tacos i had last night?

      3. thank YOU <3 sincerely.

    • 1. Circe by Madeline Miller!
      2. A mandoline from IKEA. I can’t believe how many hours I wasted using my poor knife skills to try to thinly and evenly slice vegetables when I can do it with a slicer in like two minutes.
      3. Thank YOU

      • I really liked Circe! If that’s your vibe, STRONG recommend for Naamah by Sarah Blake, which is the Flood from Genesis from Noah’s wife’s POV (who in this retelling is functionally pan). Highly corporeal, almost prose poetic, and unapologetically sensual pushback to the patriarchal interpretation of this foundational narrative.

      • Vanessa – I have a hold on Chosen Darkness as we speak :)
        And Riese – I love the psychological tension in Abbott but haven’t read that one yet; shall have to check out soon!

  36. Is there anything you’d love to write about, but aren’t sure autostraddle is the place for? (Or do write about but not for autostraddle, or used to)

    • I wish there was a place I could write recaps of my D&D sessions because my friends are so smart and funny and queer and I love the stories we’re building but that is simply not the kind of thing the internet wants or needs!

    • My cousin in India died (long story, I barely knew him) and I may write about it for AS at some point (on the fence still, given family, public internet, etc etc) but this also got my mind jogging about an idea for a fiction story that I need to do a ton of research for, so who knows if it’ll ever happen, especially without some concrete deadline to work towards. (I need accountability in my life to do anything, basically.)

    • I had a piece about Black Latinx representation in In the Heights (the movie) that burned inside of me for so long, but I couldn’t find a reason to write about for us — and the timing for it didn’t work out for me to write about it anyplace either — but that’s probably at the top of the list.

    • Ann, thank you for asking my favorite question! I have four cats: Dobby Bobbi, Beth March Bobbi, and Socks Bobbi, who are all the rescued feral kittens of our beloved first TNR cat, Bobbi Jean! And then there’s Quasar Peterson-Hogan, who is no relation to the Bobbis, hates the Bobbis, and is my wife Stacy’s very very very best friend.

    • Very niche but, watching the Philadelphia Orchestra play a Rachmaninoff Symphony (I can’t remember which one but it was 2 or 3) and also the Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto (the third one) at the Kimmel Center. I still think fondly back to those two concerts like, all the time.

      • Those sound absolutely amazing. I have always wanted to see symphony orchestra but I can not seem to find anyone to go with. I just may have to just go by myself one of these years.

        • It’s totally worth it!!! But if I can offer a word of caution, I would stay away from the NY Phil! I’ve seen two concerts with them and really did not like either one. My violin teacher in college once observed that the musicians are just super bored and it really comes across in their performances.

          I haven’t seen the Philadelphia Orchestra in years but they are definitely one of my all-time favorite symphony orchestras. That said, I’ve barely seen any of the European orchestras or the NHK Symphony Orchestra so I don’t have much to go on.

    • Anything Goes and Jacob and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat performed by my high school and starring my little sister, followed by Hamilton. :)

      • Hamilton reminded me, Hadestown! OMG that was incredible, with Eva Noblezada, Amber Gray, Andre De Shields! Last life performance I’ve been to since COVID and it was just like beyond words incredible. And I usually don’t even like musicals!

        • i got to see hadestown live too and it’s honestly one of the best live performances i’ve ever seen – completely amazing!

    • Oh this is a tough one. For now, I’ll have to say Peaches since I was just talking about that show last night. She wore a suit covered in breasts. She also inflated a giant dick that stretched out across the audience and proceeded to WALK THROUGH IT ON PEOPLE’S HANDS.

    • But also one time I watched a performance artist staple pages from the Bible to her naked body. That was pretty wild.

    • @mushjet I’m totally jealous of you having seen MJ live.

      I’m not sure I’ve seen anything on the level of Michael Jackson but I’ll always relish seeing Adele in a small DC club, right before her popularity exploded. My favorite live performance, though, was Brittany Howard and Alabama Shakes…she’s such an amazing performer.

      • Adele’s voice in a small venue must have been mind blowing. I would have a tough time making the decision between MJ and Adele (in a small venue). Michael Jackson was my first concert and I have compared every concert after that.

    • A dance performance, sym. by Pittsburgh’s PearlArts Studios. It was based off of Fledgeling by Octavia Butler and it has been years and I just still think about it.

    • I volunteered at Governor’s Ball in 2014 so I could go for free and basically what this meant is there were three shifts each day and we got one shift off and spent the other two shifts picking up trash in a random designated area. During one of my trash shifts I was assigned to the field in front of where Janelle Monáe was performing. I didn’t know her at the time and she was INCREDIBLE and I became an instant fan. I saw her again years later and that was also one of my favorite concerts but the total surprise of discovering her while on trash duty makes that first show extra special.

      Another of my favorite concerts was seeing Lucius in Dublin before their first album had even come out in Europe. It was a very small venue and their opener were these cool Irish sisters. They ended up playing a lot of the show in the crowd because there were so few people and it was just so intimate and beautiful.

      Theatre-wise… I’m having a harder time because I’ve seen so many life-changing plays!! Billy Elliot when I was visiting New York to look at colleges holds a special place in my heart though. As does Fun Home the first time I saw it at The Public.

      • lol the only time i ever went to coachella was when i volunteered there doing trash duty! this was … like 2006?

        the decemberists killed. i know it’s not cool to like them or whatever but it was a great show.

    • I have way too many to list them all or pick a favorite but here are some highlights, in no particular order:

      – The first time I saw Ellie Goulding live
      – Missy Higgins
      – Chyler Leigh and her husband giving a mini concert in the bar attached to the concert venue after an East of Eli concert she was super late to because of travel delays
      – Original Broadway Cast of Next to Normal
      – The last musical I ever performed in (Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, performed by StageOne in Everett, MA in 2005)
      – My Favorite Murder on tour, in Toronto
      – Jagged Little Pill the musical at the ART in Boston before it came to Broadway

    • paul mccartney at bonnaroo 2013 singing blackbird — the whole set was great and i love the collective energy of a festival, but that song is my dad’s song, so for those few minutes it was just me and paul and him, on a hill at night in tennessee

      • This story made my heart smile. Nothing like a solitary moment of reflection brought by a song.

    • I saw Rent on Broadway in the 90s when I was 12 years old and it changed me on, like, molecular level.

      My favorite concerts were Grace Jones in 2015 at Afropunk, where she stripped naked at 70 years old and performed in Body Paint.

      I’ve also seen Beyoncé twice (2007 and 2016), and I refuse to pick.

    • this is a weird one because they’re not like, a band i’m a big fan of or even listen to at all — but i used to work at a place that served as a late night venue after hours, and we’d host shows a few times a week, sometimes big artists but also a lot of small weird indie ones. this weird band Terror Pigeon came through where i worked and their live show is so hard to explain but there were like props and costumes for the crowd and the music was SO loud and immersive in this very small space and everyone was packed together dancing and moving, and i was (basically) stone cold sober but it was so fun and intense to be part of a crowd experience like that i legitimately felt high. would very much recommend!

    • i saw sylvan esso in concert at a shitty Chicago dive bar 5 years ago before they were hella big as a pre-show for lolla and it was the best live performance i’d ever seen and they encored until like 4 am

  39. thanks for doing this AMA, it’s super fun to read all your answers! feel free to respond to whatever speaks to you:
    1. fundraising sounds very intense! what are you doing for self care during this time?
    2. favorite type of bodywork to get done? (massage, reiki, stretching, or whatever the term “bodywork” means to you!) OR if this is a thing you don’t enjoy, what is a physical self care activity you like instead?
    3. favorite text message to send a friend you haven’t talked to in a while? like how to casually reconnect/reach out?

    • for #3 i like to use a specific topic as a point of entry. and since i’m me, it’s usually like omg are you watching X show, i’m watching it and it made me think of you.” but really any “saw this thing, thought of you” works and usually naturally transforms into proper catching up

    • 1. so many baths! in fact, i posted all the merch stories from my bath this morning. i post A LOT of instagram content from the bath if i’m being honest!!!! and wearing warm, comfy sweats. which reminds me, my feet are cold and i need socks!

      2. meditation, but i need to be led through it. i went to an amazing zoom meditation/dance class over the pandemic and it was super healing. anything from yumi would prob be incredible: https://www.instagram.com/yumisakugawa/?hl=en
      3. usually i’ll see a meme or content that reminds me of someone and i’ll send it to them and just be like “LOL YOU”

      • I love all these baths for you! long showers are a personal favorite of mine! I’ve also been living in a super thick hoodie and a pair of fleece pants, it’s the only way I survive the transition to colder weather.
        meditation is so good! I’ve fallen off with it and would like to get back on at some point.
        “LOL YOU” iconic

    • I unfortunately can barely do self care during fundraisers! It is, as you said, incredibly intense! Self care will have to come after.

      • But it will be okay! We’ll get there! Mostly I just am imagining doing nice things for the holidays. And I try to make the fundraising activies, um, fun?

        For physical self care in general, nothing beats walks for me, especially this time of year. 🍂

        • I also am a big fan of walks especially when there are so many vibrant colors to look at! I’ve been digging bike rides too, there are some fun ones around pgh this time of year. hang in there Nicole!

          • Yes just giving the mind time to wander while the body does a thing! So important. Thank you Mary!!!

      • Oh you know what I didn’t think of self care until now? I limit social media and also pay attention to what I’m listening to and how I’m feeling. Like sometimes it’s time for an asmr video in the background even if I can’t stop working. And then there are also the notes I make for myself about post fundraiser writing projects.

    • 2. Hot baths! I couldn’t have them too hot when I was pregnant and then couldn’t have them at all recovering from a c section and now I am so excited to get in the bath again! With candles and Fiona Apple.

    • I’ve become very protective about my night routines this fundraiser??? And like getting 8 hours of sleep (I kinda lost the thread this week, but we also we are almost at the end!! But before then.)

      I hadn’t thought about it as self-care before now, but I think it comes from that place of knowing I’m rested and prepared for what’s ahead, so I guess you’re right!

      • omg Carmen would love to hear more about your night routines, that has been a major struggle bus for me recently! I love getting 8 hours of sleep but it’s hard for me to get in bed and relax enough to sleep at the appropriate hour. anyway I love all this sufficient sleep for you and hope you are having a very well rested fundraiser experience!

    • for bodywork i am 110% in on myofascial release – my mom is a clinical PT who has been trained in it over the past 10 years and it’s been SO helpful for my chronic back pain as well as like, overall wellness and growth? i had some intensive treatment a few years ago that definitely like, preceded a very intense breakthrough moment in therapy that i don’t think is a coincidence. it’s hard to find practitioners depending on where you live and insurance often doesn’t cover it, but would really recommend if you can access it!

      • super interesting to hear about, thanks Rachel! myofascial release is something I’ve been curious about for a while and may look into trying – I have a good (and queer!!) massage therapist where I live so if they don’t do it themselves maybe they can give me a rec?

  40. 1. constantly sending good vibes to Nicole and telling them in slack to drink water and eat is my version of self care thru the fundraiser.
    2. Sex
    3. “What you doing bb?!?! lets get some food and booze and talk about how much we miss each other – my treat!”

    • I think the funniest thing I have ever experienced in my entire life is Sarah reading a fan fiction she wrote when she was younger out loud to our senior staff at one of our annual shakedowns. I really don’t know if I have ever laughed that hard or long before.

      • heather!!!!!!!!! oh my god!

        one of my favorite moments is in that same podcast, when i was trying to figure out who was a top or a bottom you were describing what you think all the bottoms at autostraddle would request and you were like “let me tie you up so you can shut your laptop and go to sleep for ten hours!”

        (4 min mark for the curious! 😅)

    • I love every conversation we have in the TV Team slack. It’s such a unique combo of people with a wide range of TV tastes and opinions and it makes me giddy whenever we get going in there.

      I also love LOVE LOVE meeting Autostraddle readers in the wild. 90% of the time when someone I’m just meeting asks me what I do and I list my day job and this gig, I say I write about TV for “a queer media website called Autostraddle” and most people smile and nod but every once in a while someone will be like I LOVE AUTOSTRADDLE and it fills my gay heart with glee. (Similarly, I love bragging that I know the writers here because they’re all such awesome people. Like the time I saw my cousin looking at 3am Tarot on instagram and I was like “did you know that’s my friend” and she was like “YOU KNOW 3AM TAROT” and I got to brag about how awesome Meg is IRL, etc.)

    • Every time someone tells me they read a book because I recommended it on AS it warms my queer librarian heart. 🏳️‍🌈📖

      • Casey almost everything I have read over the last three yrs is because of you!!! exceptions which I would also recommend are Michi Saagig Anishinaabe This is our Territory by Doug Williams (Gidigaa Migizi) and everything by Leanne betasamosake Simpson (who is queer!!)

  42. would love to hear folks who started as AS readers/contributors, and are now staff writers/senior staff, talk about how that progression happened for them!

    • I had read AS occasionally, then I got a campership to go to A-Camp. At A-Camp, Kayla did a workshop on how to pitch for would-be freelancers. I followed her advice, and pitched AS and got my first ever essay published. I then started freelancing, kept writing for AS a bunch, and they’ve kept me around. And then that branched out into other opportunities, and now I’m a full-time writer/editor making a salary! Pretty cool :)

      One of those opportunities was to do sensitivity reads — I thought your name sounded familiar. I hope your book release went well. Just checked it out on Goodreads, it has good reviews :)

    • I saw a job posting and applied! I think some other folks have less straight-forward stories, though :)

    • Thanks for this question, @rstoeve…

      A lot of people know that I was a regular reader and commenter on Autostraddle before I started writing here — leaving paragraphs long comments on TV posts — and I guess people assume that that’s how I got the opportunity to join the TV team but that’s actually not the reason. My job here was almost 5 years in the making.

      Back in 2012, @heatherannehogan was doing Pretty Little Liars for asitewhoshallnotbename and, of course, I was a fixture in the comments section. At the end of the second season, TPTB on the show decided to kill off the queer black character and in the comments to Heather’s recaps, I expressed how disheartened I was about the decision (disagreeing with Heather in the process). My words struck a chord with Heather and changed the way she thought about her work. Five years later when she had the opportunity to build a TV team, she tracked me down and offered me a position.

      I hadn’t done pop culture writing since college but Heather knew that I had worthwhile to contribute and I’ve been writing here, steadily, ever since.

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