some hard-hitting journalism over at poynter.org, where they interview washington post writer hank stuever:

How do you manage to be witty and wise on deadline?

The only thing I can compare it to is something like a guitar-riff contest at the state fair. When it's your turn, you just get all Van Halen on it, and give it your very best moves, using everything in your arsenal -- reporting, talking to colleagues, talking to sources, talking to the funniest person you know. Googling and surfing like a beast. A quick contemplative walk downstairs for a Diet Pepsi. Some typing. Some pruning.

then they asked, "why exactly is it that your sexual prowress is so renowned?" followed by "how is it that one man can be so good-looking?"

am i revealing how incredibly anal and uptight i actually am when i say that i agree with a lot of this article?

truth is, the american apparel advertising campaign creeps me out (and if an ad for it comes up on a site i'm reading at work, i close the window, feeling unsettlingly like my coworkers would think i'm looking at porn).

and you know what? i think their clothes are kinda ugly. take that, unexploited garment workers!

Susan's got another predictably hilarious post up, this time about boxing, at which she's apparently a prodigy.

Well, good luck to Kriston. I remember a brief fit of panic when Catherine went to a kickboxing class. Fortunately it didn't take; she still punches with mantislike limp wrists (presumably learned from watching Buffy) and usually accompanies each strike with a little explosion noise that she makes with her mouth. Oh yeah, and an evil, deliberate glower. Needless to say I find the whole thing pretty cute, which infuriates her and makes her punch my shoulder until it's okay maybe not so cute anymore.

Anyway, yeah. Girlfriends punching: hilariously terrifying.

(graphic blatantly stolen from this site, which seems amazingly germane given that its introductory blurb states that "THE SITE IS DEDICATED TO WOMEN. WE LOVE AND RESPECT ALL THE WOMEN, NO MATTER IF THEY ARE STRONG OR WEAK, COMBATIVE OR NOT, FEMINISTS OR NOT TOO MUCH" and much of its text appears to be in Cyrillic)