All the commotion about Balenciaga’s new ad campaign with children is totally misplaced, besides being just stupid.

Where are the complaints about their awful pantaboots worn to death by Kim Kardashian??

Where is the outrage?

These fucking pantaboots are so egregious, and worn by KK, they are an abomination. They probably cost a million dollars, they make your feet look enormous, and how do you wash them? Everything about them is just aggressively awful.

And yet it’s the ads with little kids that has the entire internet going nuts with inflated umbrage and puritanical pearl-clutching. Balenciaga has been forced to issue several apologies for the ads, evidently confirming that they are inappropriate child porn, and vowing to implement a barrage of “safeguards” so this will never, ever happen again.

Where the outraged masses see bondage paraphernalia, I see classic old-school punk.

Look at this stupid bear, for example. It’s punk, not B&D! Jesus Christ, people of Earth. Get a grip.

Sometimes, pornography, or inappropriate images, is in the mind of the beholder. I think the kids in these ads are cute. They are not sexualized, in my opinion, and there is nothing seductive about them. But the furor is off the charts, rife with allusions to pedophilia and child trafficking.

I would like to have seen a fraction of this outrage in response to the children separated from their parents at the southern border. Children in cages weren’t as incendiary as these kids with teddy bears. Instead of aiming some well-deserved wrath at Kim K for her fucking pantaboots, the internet condemned her for being too slow to denounce the brand currently most associated with her. She finally expressed her concern, even though she dresses her young children in heavy gold chains that she hastens to label as “real.” Her tone was mild but dutifully sanctimonious

Not too long ago, I spent time with my friend’s two year old daughter, who was running around their living room naked. The adorable little girl was making hilarious faces at me, and I took a couple of picture with my phone. I showed a picture to a family member, who accused me of imposing child pornography on her. I was genuinely shocked; all I saw was the funny expression, without noticing the body parts. We had a heated argument, that ended up with both of us threatening to ask our therapists to weigh in on it.

Her therapist sided with her, while mine sided with me. I can guess where they’d stand on the stupid Balenciaga controversy. But me and my therapist would be right.

What do you and your therapist think??

I know I should have seen it coming but let’s call me a hopeless romantic, or just a dope. When Pete talked about wanting to be a father, I heard wedding bells (and calls to available surrogates.) But then…you know the rest.

I need to know why! And who dumped who. Let Pete be the dumper, if you’re listening Jesus! How can they turn on a dime like that? Did something happen in Australia? Did Pete’s BDE fail him, or did Kim suddenly realize that he’s white?

When their thing was first reported, I was amazed by the incongruity just like everyone else. What the hell? I thought. But as it continued, I began furiously projecting. Kim must be smarter than we thought, if Pete likes her. In our narrative of Pete, he’s too smart and sensitive to waste his time on an idiot. She would have to have real substance as a human being, right? This meant that Kim Kardashian is not what she appears to be, e.g. an insufferable narcissist and plastic surgery addict!

And given Kim’s imagined ability to have any man, this meant that Pete is not only a great fuck but also a dynamic paragon of manliness. Plus, she introduced him to the kids!

I found myself daydreaming about Kim and Pete. Mostly it was hazy soft porn. I tried to imagine Pete’s frail physique juxtaposed with Kim’s gigantic mounds of silicone. On the one hand, ew. But on the other hand, I really wanted to visualize how it would work. I think this could be called mental fan-fiction.

I studied every picture of them to parse their body language. Their hand-holding was so cute! Their goofy selfies! Their trips to exotic beaches!

I was googling Kim-and-Pete several times a day. I couldn’t get enough. It as like a Novella only with higher stakes. And here’s the worst thing of all: I watched the Kardashian show for the whole season, eager for news about the budding love affair and for hints that Kim was not an idiot. My husband humored me and watched it too. We agreed that Kendall was painfully stupid but he thought Kourtney was even stupider. It’s a tough call, I guess.

At least I won’t have to watch any more of that crap. No more of their giant nothing-colored living rooms and staged heart-to-heart confidences. No more reminding my husband of how much Kylie has done to her face and how much weight Khloe has lost. No more of those nude lipsticked fish-pouts!

But when I woke up and heard about the break-up, I was devastated. I am not making this up; I was stunned and heartbroken. Could it be a mistake? Maybe so, because we didn’t hear it firsthand from Kim or Pete.

Now I’ve accepted that it’s over, and my hurt has turned to resentment. I feel cheated and duped. First I thought it was selfish of them to take away our only moments of respite from anxiety and global catastrophe. Now I’m wondering if the whole entire thing was a publicity stunt. So was it?? A friend believes it was a publicity stunt AND they also slept together. Whatever.

Now that Pete is history, clarity has returned and I see that Kim is indeed a big ho who can’t take her eyes off herself for a single minute and will do anything to hold the world’s interest. How dare she wear Marilyn’s dress! May she put on all the weight she’s lost and then some. May she take a fall down some stairs in those stupid stiletto heeled shoe-pants. God I hate her. I’m going to unfollow her on Instagram as soon as I wind this up.

I hope Pete can start dating someone twenty years younger than Kim whose butt doesn’t need a wheelbarrow to carry it and who doesn’t need hair extensions. I will forgive Pete for this slip-up because he is chronically depressed, genuinely funny, and because of that big dick. JUST KIDDING about the dick, of course, because a big brain is way more exciting, right ladies?

All we need to do now is predict Kim and Pete’s next love interests. Thoughts??

After violently coughing for a week, I broke a rib, specifically rib #5, which an x-ray revealed to be “minimally displaced.” This means, not broken in pieces but not a neat crack either. It is extremely painful, because it hurts with each breath. When you cough, it’s like being stabbed in the chest with an ice-pick. I had to sleep sitting up at first, because it was worse lying down. Obviously there are a million worse things but still, it is awful in its own right.

This constant pain and misery have reminded me acutely of  A Voice Through a Cloud, one of the best books I’ve ever read, an autobiographical novel about a young man whose bicycle accident destroys his health, and led to the author’s early death. The novel beings in the hospital, where the narrator regains consciousness in terrible, unspeakable pain.

Over the years since first reading it, I’ve come to think of my accidents and illnesses as a Voice Through a Cloud, meaning the sense of isolation you feel when in pain. You’re not really you anymore, you have entered a new consciousness as unlike reality as an acid trip. All your sensations are distorted, food is different, the sheets feel different, other people are shadowy figures who live outside your membrane of suffering.

This has gone on too long but it takes at least six weeks for a bone to mend and sometimes longer. Let this be a lesson to you to get enough calcium!

My brain has been altered throughout this ordeal, focused primarily on How long can I stand this, and Why doesn’t anything help, even opiates.

When I’ve been able to think outside the rib pain, my thoughts have turned to deep philosophical questions interrupted by the need to check on Kim and Pete. They are more real to me than my family at this point, and their relationship more momentous and consequential than any other. I mean, all the tattoos, the dinner dates, the threats from Kanye, the impossibility of their whole coupledom, the thought of him dealing with her enormous fake ass…

I’ve been mentally and spiritually haunted by a friend’s angry statement that she doesn’t want to hear about Ukraine because the world didn’t care about the war in Syria. I believe this is a stance of the far left, the wokity woke, who resent the privilege of the white, European Ukrainians. When I said, But what about those poor women evacuated from the maternity hospital only to be killed in the theater they took shelter in, my friend sneered, They don’t even have maternity hospitals in Syria!

I keep compulsively reviewing this, trying to figure out if one of us is just nuts. I am trying to focus on East Africa, which is facing a terrible famine that will only get worse. At least we can all agree on the heartbreaking unfairness of this, except for a guy in a NYT comment thread who insists that it’s Africa’s fault for not controlling its population.

Then, I wondered whether anyone can have a philosophy or value system that is entirely rational and not an outcome of one’s own psychology and, ahem, personal issues. Just think about that. Do I hate capitalism become I’m not rich and I hate the rich (which I do)? Do I think truth is important because the liars in my family have betrayed me so often? Do my white friends who see racist micro-aggressions everywhere feel guilty or an unconscious need to subscribe to all tenets of the progressive left? Does my half-brother, a staunch determinist, just dread the notion of having free will?

These are the rambling preoccupations of an altered consciousness, plus the worry that the internet has ruined life as we knew it without any off-ramp.

Denton Welch‘s A Voice Through a Cloud on the other hand is a masterpiece that I can’t recommend highly enough. The astounding intelligence of it’s author proves that pain can be an impetus to art in the right hands (rather than a drive to see what Kim and Pete are up to.) It is a work of genius that raises a faint hope for humanity and will elevate your soul at least temporarily while the world careens toward oblivion.

Surprise, I’m focusing on the positive! Because there are still good things, and here’s a short list.

 Pete Davidson and Kim Kardashian

Isn’t this fantastic! Who could have imagined this?? When she broke up with Kanye, it seemed preordained that Kim would hook up with a wealthy Black athlete or maybe another rap “artist”. But no, instead she chose a scrawny white guy and self-professed stoner. Pete has plowed, ahem, his way through every other single female celeb, so maybe it had to happen, or maybe his Big Dick Energy was the attraction? I guess Kim likes her men to be bi-polar, and why not? I hope this goes on for eternity or at least the next few months. Please don’t let me down, Pete and Kim. You’re living your best lives! Take that, Ariana!

The Beatles Documentary. If you’re a boomer or even a culturally literate Gen X or Y, this is just heaven. I actually changed my mind about Paul, who I’ve hated for years and years. Watching these talented, witty, charismatic young men hang out together and create the soundtrack to our youth is enthralling. I never realized their beauty, because I was too young to recognize it. Their glossy hair and beautiful skin and radiant smiles are pure  magic. Just think: we’ve seem more images of the Beatles than of our own families or anything else. They are the best part of us, aren’t they, boomers? George’s style is a nice surprise (to me), as is Yoko’s relative harmlessness. Be prepared for a flood of nostalgia.

Norsemen.  Another gift from TV, Norsemen is a Norwegian series filmed in English, a deranged satire of Vikings, reminiscent of What We Do in the Shadows but more outrageous in it’s extreme battle scenes and it’s over-the-top homo-erotic (or homophobic) subtext. Every actor is totally committed to the deadpan insanity. There are three seasons to binge or savor, on Netflix.

Jean Stafford. What a great writer who I just discovered this year! She won a Pulitzer prize for a collection of short stories, but even more impressive is her second novel, The Mountain Lion. I’m about 3/4 into it and could not be more envious of her brilliance. If you love Flannery O’Connor, I think you will love The Mountain Lion. Jean Stafford has a similarly dark sensibility that seems well-earned, given her miserable life.

Idiotic Word Usage. I am really enjoying the use of “rescue” to mean “dog.” I just heard a news corespondent say “Oh sorry, that’s my rescue barking.” Haha, you idiot, JUST SAY DOG. We’re not giving out points for how you acquired your pet, for fucksake. I’ve read about celebrities enjoying family life with their two rescues. What do you call other dogs….mill-bred? Store-bought?

Then there is “space.”

“In the world, the eating disorder space, and the body positivity space, I don’t think there’s enough time, energy, or resources spent on people on the higher end of the weight spectrum, people who are fat, and people who are gender queer, trans, non-binary,” she said.

This usage is like nails on a chalkboard to me. It was bad enough when “space” meant your apartment. “I like what you’ve done with this space.” Ewwwwwwwwwww! While thinking about this usage, I came across this great glossary of activist terms. It is pretty comprehensive and I would even say poignant. It includes a few words to not use, like “diversity.” Fine with me! Done!

Well, there you go. It’s not much but it’s something. I’m trying to be the shepherd, you know?

If you have some other things to feel good about, let’s hear from you!

When I stopped writing for Popdust a few weeks ago, I never thought I would lose interest in celebrities.

Having to write about them every day involved a total immersion in their real and made-up antics. I labored over the Daily Mail, looking for some news or photos I could spin into a post. I refused to just copy something that had already been posted somewhere else. Even though my writing and the website itself were garbage, I took a pathetic pride in being original.

I became an expert on Kim and Kanye.

My husband had to ask me several times when we were out walking to stop talking about Kanye. I found it hard not to share the contents of my knowledge base. I thought about Kylie and Khloe and Madonna and Gwyneth even when I was off the clock.  I started checking in on them several times a day, worried about missing something.

I followed Rumer Willis on Twitter, and tried to decode her tweets to her sister, whatshername.

Now, I am blissfully unaware of Rumer’s musings, and I don’t know where Kylie stands with Tyga.

Without any deliberate detox plan, I quit celebrities, just like that!

It feels like a miracle. No longer preoccupied with celebrities, I haven’t become more productive and I haven’t developed a new interest, but at least I don’t talk about Kanye. I think it’s a win.

On the other hand, I may have a lot more free-floating rage and hatred. But I will need it for our Insane Clown President. 

In fact, given Matt Taibbi‘s brilliant nickname for Donald Trump, it would be wonderfully fitting if Insane Clown Posse and a few thousand juggalos could perform at the inauguration! Please, universe, make this happen.

Where once I could rant about Taylor Swift with the passion of a crazed zealot, now I have no idea what she’s up to, and I wonder how I could once get so worked up about her.

Maybe it’s the emergence of actual villains that has drained my hatred for celebrities, or maybe familiarity really does breed contempt. Getting some distance from Kim Kardashian’s ass has helped me to refocus on my own ass,  such as it is.

If you fear that you are a hopeless celebrity addict, take it from me, you can live without them. Step 1 is to renounce the Daily Mail, and if I could do it, so can you. Then, move away from your computer and start thinking about your ass.

*photo by Juggalo4U

The horror, right? It was mostly non-stop horror, with the exception of Kanye West‘s comic turn.

Poor Kanye! He could talk forever and never make sense. That is his genius. I tired to explain to my husband why I don’t aim my wrath at Kanye instead of Taylor Swift, by explaining:”Because there’s something wrong with him.” It would be like taunting a special ed kid; I can’t do it.

The show’s most egregious figure was Taylor Swift, because that’s how much she annoys me. She wore herself out trying to prove that she’s best friends with everybody, leaning down to embrace everyone of importance, who all looked like midgets compared to the giraffe-like chanteuse.

Something was wrong with Taylor’s face that made her look Chinese. She had trouble smiling, as though her mouth was full of bigger teeth than her lips could accommodate. Whatever it is, keep it up, girl.

Moving along, Justin Bieber tried to sing and then cried with relief. Pharrell hopped around like a little sailor, and an awful girl named Tory Something shrieked her head off and strutted around like Beyonce-times-ten.

Miley Cyrus was aggressively obnoxious but still relatively sexy. Her tiny butt was the perfect antidote to Kim Kardashian and Nicki Minaj. The latter two women need to manage their asses, somehow, before they become separate entities and use up the world’s oxygen. Remember “The Blob?” Take this as a warning, people of Earth.

What else? Oh, a guy called The Weekend did an impression of a poor man’s Michael Jackson, and wore his hair in a style reminiscent of Woody Woodpecker. (Millennials, that’s a cartoon character.)

John Legend was handsome and charming as usual. Call me, John. You too, Jared Leto, you freak.

Miley Cyrus ended the show with a musical number that involved a fleet of trannies or whatever the word is, bringing a Sixties vibe to the fiasco with her Free Love/Smoke Pot message.

The best moment for me personally was during the Kanye monologue, when my friend Margaret suddenly exclaimed, “He’s gay!” in the exact tone of Archimedes shouting “Eureka!”

My name is Sister Wolf, and I’m addicted to Kim Kardashian.

I write about her at my ‘day job’ but when I’m off-duty, I find I can’t quit her. When I’m out walking with my husband, a dazzling view of the ocean at hand, I’m talking about Kim Kardashian.

This week has been emotionally draining for Kim Addicts trying to keep up with her adventures in Paris. They’re not actually adventures. They’re more like sightings of a rare and horrible primate.

It’s not just me, either, not at all. Each time she emerges from her hotel, there is complete fucking pandemonium. Someone is going to get trampled, mark my words. People are risking their safety to get a glimpse of this creature. She is no longer human, by her own choice. Maybe that’s the source of the fascination?

Her new blonde hair nearly gave me (and the world) a seizure of joyous horror. It was so hideous, so wrong, so absurd, it was a brilliant move on Kim’s part to ensure that all eyes would be on her and not the actual fashion shows she was in Paris to attend.

Boldly reveling in her new image as a blonde bombshell, Kim went all out, flaunting her bare boobs and pursing her tumescent nude-glossed lips, vacant of all expression, striding around with her phalanx of bodyguards through a gauntlet of paparazzi and tourists.

Kanye seemed thrilled with his newly blonde wife, cuddling her amorously and proudly attempting to cup her giant ass in a gesture of ownership. He is one satisfied customer. But fuck him, he is of no importance, except to himself.

Now I’ve come home to find that Kim has bleached her hair even lighter, almost white, after 3 hours in a Paris hair salon. My heart is racing. What the hell is wrong with her and how did she get a colorist to agree to this?

When will her hair break off or fall out? When will she change her expression? When will Anna Wintour take her aside and say, “Kim, you’re killing us. Get a fucking stylist for the love of god!”

I want to make it clear that I’ve only seen one episode of her TV series so I don’t know what she’s like when she’s trying to act like a person. I only know her as a visual monstrosity that I can’t look away from. I am gladly ending that sentence with a preposition, just as I allowed myself to write “phalanx” for the first time in my life.  The Kimmania triggers a giddy sense of unreality where no one has to observe standards or boundaries.

Because Kim is a pathogen. Western civilization is the host. If I’m wrong about this, please explain why. And show your work.

When Kim Kardashian posted a collage of her facial expressions on Instagram, one could only marvel at the waxen immobility of that celebrated face.

Let’s take a closer look.

If only Kim had taken the time to label each expression!

Since she didn’t, I will take a stab at it.

Top row, from left to right: Duh, Look over there, Duh.

Middle row, from left to right: Oh, Duh,Turning my head.

Bottom row, from left to right: Turning my head, Look over there, Duh.

There you have it! Use this expression sampler to amaze your friends, play some bingo, or just add to your Kim Kardashian shrine.

I can’t stand it. There is no escape. It’s everywhere and it keeps coming after me. I hate it.

I need it to go away. The blank face, too.

Why has it come to this?

Explain.

I was thrilled to receive this email today, and considered it a lucky omen of some kind to be called “Lard-Desha.” Isn’t it wonderful? I’m hoping it’s not some derivation of “Lard Ass,” which would confirm my worst fears about my body.

Just today, I tried on some jeans and asked my friend if it gave me a flattering butt. I also grilled the sales assistant on Levis’ new coded jeans. “Slight curve” means a boyish shape, while “Supreme curve” means enormous hips. I think they should make an even “curvier” model and call it Lard-Desha.

What image does Lard-Desha evoke for you? A belly-dancer? A check-out girl at Target wearing huge name-plate earrings? Or this:

Maybe one day Kardashian will become a descriptive word like “gargantuan.”   Or perhaps Kim would like to change her name to Lard-Desha!

Too bad, Kim. Lard-Desha is taken now and I’m not giving it up.