1.) One Life to Live Does Grey Gardens
During a drunken daydream, one character on the soap imagined life as Edie Beale. They did a musical number, and the Costume of the Day speech, although the accent was way off.

2.) Joan Rivers on Live TV
I love that for her publicity tour for her new reality show, she keeps dropping F bombs on live television.

3.) Police Women Get Stuck With The Vagina Jobs

4.) Moe
Former Jezebel editor Moe Tkacik was on MSNBC on Tuesday morning, where she talked about the economy and possibly got hit on.

5.) Do You Remember the Time?
It was discovered that a 3000-year-old tomb of a mummified woman looks exactly like MJ.

6.) Lesbians Aren't Into Sausage Parties
Zing to you, Gordon Ramsey!

7.) Wasted Housewives of Atlanta
I love how drunk and loving NeNe and Kim got at their "let's be friends again" dinner.

8.) Who Pulled Tiger Woods' Finger?

9.) Do You Wanna Hear Someone From Chicago Pronounce "Coup d'état"?

10.) Why Am I So Obsessed With Her?
Her feigned modesty is one reason.

For while all happy babies look basically alike except for the ones who are born with a full head of hair which is always kind of funny, each abortion story is its own unique saga of dysfunction and the foibles and limitations of human biology. To that end, welcome back to Crap Email From A Dude. In which Noah and Jess run into a rough patch (understatement!) over differing views on "choice."

Noah and Jess met in a creative writing seminar at one of those schools where everyone meets in a creative writing seminar. Three years later in some "cozy" Brooklyn apartment they would conceive, in a tale in which dark and ageless truths of the human condition would reveal themselves through the unwinding of a few generation-specific fables and delusions.

Boomer parents would get involved, is what we are saying.

As with all Crap Emails, the story of Noah and Jess is perhaps best told in two parts: the email, whose desperate diction and hand-wringing over the politics of Facebook hold a sort of universal appeal, and the context, which is more specific and subtle and amazing. The email will in all likelihood affirm your commitment to keeping abortion legal. The context may deepen any feelings of antipathy you harbor for the generation of liberals we have to thank for it! Here's the email. (All names have been changed.)

—-—-—-- Forwarded message —-—-—--
From: Noah
Date: Tue, May 19, 2009 at 7:47 PM
Subject:
To: Jessica Pitt Schaefer

Jess,

I'm not going to make any bones about this and try to be as direct as possible, because I think right now I've been too indirect. While I don't regret bringing my parents into this, I realize now I should have been more directly involved. So here's my shot at trying to change that.

Jess, I know you're making the wrong decision if you think you are going to have this child. You might feel like you possibly couldn't make any other choice right now, but I know you aren't thinking of how hard this will be. Jess, even if your parents and all your friends support you as a single mother, you'll still be a single mother. No one will be there at three in the morning, to take the kid the to school, to be there when you want to go out. What do you think will happen to your social life? You see how Marisa goes about her life now, and from what I hear, she complains a LOT. What do you think will happen to your dating life? To your looks? You think your acne is bad now, what will the stress of having a child tearing at you every minute do to it?

Here's what I believe: even if you're married, a child should be planned. You've told me you were a planned child, don't you want this kid to be planned the way you were? Do you want to have to tell this kid that it was an accident? Jess, it is so hard to take care of a child as a single parent, regardless of the situation. You might have a billion dollars or be a wandering hobo, it's still too much to handle. I really know that you don't realize what you're getting into. You also have to realize that I won't be there and that most normal men (sane ones) won't want any part of something like this.

You can wreck my life and your life, that's fine, we're adults and we can handle it- but you can't wreck an innocent child's life Jess! What has this child done to deserve a broken home? We used protection and this happened, it's a fluke, an accident, nothing more. It wasn't "meant to happen" and it doesn't "like you." If you really think this child likes you now, how do you think it will like you after 18 years of not having enough attention- the attention of a real family. I can guarantee that you won't find the kind of husband you would normally have found if you have a child tagging a long. You might think nobody understands you now, but Jess- that's just because you haven't found the right person! A child deserves a loving environment, and I sure as hell don't love you and you don't love me.

Jess, you are better than this, I honestly think you can write a great book, grab a fantastic guy as long as you're allowed to move at your own pace. This throws you off course and I know you'll regret it later. You can always have another child later on, you can't take back one that's been born.

If you really insist on going through with this mistake, then I want to make sure you get my point of view. I want to be completely off the hook, I want no contact from you ever again, or the child. I do not want my name down on any certificate because there has still yet to be a blood test to determine paternity. Before that even happens I want to go to a doctor with you to make sure that this is a healthy pregnancy. To make sure you aren't putting yourself in jeopardy with this. Unhealthy pregnancies can happen and they are very real. I don't care if you went to a doctor yesterday, I want to go for my sake.

I also do not want you telling any of our mutual friends that I'm the father, because of this lack of DNA evidence. And while I realize I can't control any of your actions, I would hope you have the good sense not to post anything on facebook where someone I've recently met (or have known) can see (maybe even unfriending some people like Ben and Jason makes sense). I won't leave New York and neither will you, so we'll have to learn to pleasantly avoid each other forever. I really don't want someone tracking me down in twenty years either so if you take this on, it's your duty to tell any child the situation and how fucked up it was. I will do no such explaining or legitimizing.

Lastly, as good as you feel about this decision now, what do you think you'll feel six years from now, after you have a kid and are tired of taking care of it? You'll feel like a terrible mother and Jess, you don't deserve that. You have so much love to give, it's just that now is not the time for you to give it. You deserve to have a life of your own, before it's dominated by a child, that way you can comfortably bring a kid into your life with a proper partner. I remember you telling me your dream of having a stay-at-home husband, which won't happen here. Seriously Jess, you and me are through after this if you decide to keep it. This is your decision, yes, but it doesn't just affect your life. Forget about me and you, think of the potential child it will harm. This action you want to pull right now is destructive to you and it. You'll be sick of each other before you know it. You won't assimilate with anther partner or family as easily as you would hope. You will be tied together for the rest of your natural life.

This is not about what your parents, my parents, myself or even what you think. This is about the future and what comes of it. Right now, you are at a crossroads, one that could have a huge, terrible fallout. Are you ready to bear that on your shoulders? Are you ready to have a child who's angry with you because of this situation? Life is hard enough without this kind of confused and vulnerable beginning. Jess, children get angry their parents on some level, but those born into unfortunate and unloving circumstances do so more often and with greater meaning.

To be honest Jess, I'm worried about you. I known you are not capable of making up for the love of two parents, especially at your age. I've also heard bad things about post-partum depression and I don't want this adding to your other psychological issues.

Jess, you are not thinking about the larger picture, you are just acting quickly, doing what you feel is comfortable right now. To act this way, without thinking of the consequences to the rest of your life is a dangerous action that I cannot support you in.

Please get back to me as soon as you read this,

Noah

Contextual notes:
1. Yeah, she knew he was sort of, in her words, "damaged goods." Sometimes he claimed to hear voices. Another time they were having sex, and she innocently asked to change positions, and he snapped back, "Stop asking questions!" And he said once that he wished there was a statute under which children could sue their parents for burdening them with their faulty DNA, that he would win a huge judgment. But you know: this is a small liberal arts college. and that stuff is, like, the "liking Dane Cook" of that particular brand of higher educational institution. You'd never know he was a dick, she swears. He was really good with kids, for instance…

2. They were friends first, fuckbuddies second. So she had talked about abortion before, probably when Juno came out or something, and like many girls who assume people who say shit like "I want to sue my parents for crippling me with their rotten DNA" are just being melodramatic, Jess was one of those "abortion is a really important choice for women to have but I don't know if I could do it, kids are cute, etc." people.

3. And anyway she had met Noah's parents and figured he was exaggerating about hating them so much. They smoked pot and seemed really cool, even if his mom was a little "TMI" about sharing certain private details of her life, as in how Noah had been an "accident" resulting from a broken condom.

4. All that said, they were both just a year out of college and when she missed a period, she was hit with a proverbial "reality check". She still lives at home, after all.

5. And Noah babysits for a living.

6. So she told him about missing her period, that she didn't know what she would do, and…

7. Noah threatened to commit suicide and left town. Jess later found he had gone home to his parents' house.

8. Jess made an appointment at Planned Parenthood.

9. Meanwhile at home, Noah tracked down Jess's father's work phone number and instructed his own father to strongly urge him to force Jess to have an abortion.

10. Jess had not told her father she was pregnant.

11. "Noah is in a very fragile emotional state," Noah's dad told Jess's dad. "We are not ready for a child."

12. Jess found out about the conversation from her mom. (Her dad didn't speak to her for a week; it was too "awkward." To his credit, he told Noah's dad to "fuck off.")

13. Jess called Noah's dad. "You can't call an adult woman's parents to talk about her reproductive health!" she said. "Oh yes I can," he said. And anyway, "I wasn't calling as Noah's father, but as Noah's lawyer."

14. Jess says: "The thing is, his mom seems like she'd be an awesome feminist. She runs some charity that teaches poor women how to cook cheap, healthy meals. She told me she was really pro-choice, and i thought, you're not pro-choice, because you're trying to make my choice for me."

15. She had gotten into healthy cooking after battling a weight problem, and formed the nonprofit after "opting out" of a high-powered corporate job after realizing she was "jealous" of the time her sons' "caregivers" had to spend with them.

16. Jess received the Crap Email, and replied to it with the details of her appointment.

17. "I now knew that I made the right decision," Jess says.

18. Interestingly, Noah returned to accompany her to Planned Parenthood.

19. They are no longer Facebook friends.

20. "At least," Jess's mom said, "you know you're fertile!"

Related: Crap Email From A Dude [Moe's Site]

So: we winced a bit hearing the details of the yearlong courtship of Jared and Maggie, a 36-year-old lawyer and 35-year-old publishing industry person who met at a New Year's Eve party in 2007 and dove right in to one of those mature relationship-py relationships that involve unabashed public hand-holding and getting up early enough on Sunday to watch the talk shows together and few restaurants that don't serve respectable beet salad. (Oh also! A week-long vacation in Rome/Florence/etc..) Anyway, the week after their first anniversary they were sitting in a charming little crepe joint in Chelsea when… he dumped her, reader.

"Are you fucking kidding me with this?" she asked.

"I just don't think about you when you're not around," was his response. That would of course change. But in the meantime Maggie, who is not a psychopath like most of us, maturely ceased all contact, "moved on" and eventually successfully stopped thinking about Jared when he wasn't around. Until October, when Jared found himself thinking about Maggie sufficiently often to warrant emailing…her coworker Tom! Who had met Jared approximately twice.

—-—- Forwarded Message
From: Jared Fitzpatrick
Date: Tue, 2 Oct 2008 14:45:05 -0700 (PDT)
To:
Subject: Hi Tom

This is Jared Fitzpatrick, the guy who dated Maggie Sellers last year.

I was going through my email addresses and I came across you and I figured this would be a good way to find out how Maggie is doing. Understandably I'm sure she never wants to see or hear from me again. I always felt that you were a standup guy so I trust you to use your best judgment as to whether or not to tell her that I've inquired about her. You know, don't tell her if it would upset her. I'm not looking to get back together with her. I just would like you to tell me if she is doing O.K. I don't mean to sound like a self-promoting prick but I believe I hurt her badly. I hope she has put it behind her.

And are you doing OK? Married yet? I'm still out there on the prowl and I'm not dating anyone at the moment. If you'd like to go prowling/scamming/trollop hunting sometime just let me know.

Jared

—-

*Just in time for this feature's two-year anniversary, Moe bothered to register the URL CrapEmailFromADude.com, where she and her partner Georgia Cool will post supplementary analysis, outtakes that never made it to Jezebel for reasons of being too convoluted or grammatically impaired or Moe just being lazy, and sundry other notes from the "field."

• We said our final au revoir to Moe [sniff]
• The McCain campaign said it's final goodbye to tasteful commercials with its eminently mockable Paris-Britney one, its new Moses one and it's kicky Spanish language one.
• Watching Gavin walk a mile in Tracie's shoes made for far, far better viewing.
• We tried it out ourselves, metaphorically speaking, in posts talking about sterilization, teen pregnancy and sex workers.
• Walmart talked to its workers about voting Democratic. It's bad, they think. [HuffPo]
• It might have been cool to be a pretty girl when we were younger, not that it keeps you from getting hurt or getting Photoshopped into something supposedly prettier, but some people think it might help you get a man.

• Obama got taken to task for supposedly not paying enough attention to the issues of the African-American community, and we took a woman to task for making a stupid list about what dudes don't know about her.
• Moe tackled the complexities of mass murderers' psyches and the psyches of female suicide bombers while finding time to weigh in on boy-shorts — but left the even absurder man-tights questions to Sadie and the important questions about the decline of the ladies' magazine industry (to which her departure will certainly contribute) to Dodai.
• Margaret and I got a little obsessed with incest. Yeah, don't ask.

The depth of her curiosity and the amount of energy she brings to the table constantly astound me: her contributions have made laugh harder than I ever thought possible when sitting alone in front of a computer and also moved me to tears. She has challenged some notions, and solidified others. Her ideas are never predictable but always provocative. Of all the writers, editors and bloggers I had the pleasure to know over my professional career, she is one of the most consistently exciting.

But let's be honest here: there's no reason to make this into some sort of eulogy; Moe is not going very far. Starting next week, she will be found over on Gawker, where she will have the luxury of having a broader range of subjects to write about and a (somewhat) new audience to get to know and love. And she'll continue to do a few of the features she created for Jezebel on Jezebel ( yes, that means more Crap Email From A Dude, occasional Crappy Hours, and hopefully, more rants against women's magazines) although I doubt she'll ever let me convince her to attend NY Fashion Week again. Until that time, please join me in reliving (in chronological order, no less) the past year and a half of everything from pop culture to politics, tampons, and Paul Janka...below. (Your additions welcome, in the comments.)

• May 27, 2007: Lindsay Lohan does blow, causes blow up.
• July 15, 2007: Angelina Jolie, Mariane Pearl, and blowjobs.
• July 16, 2007: Pregnancy scares and Plan B.
• July 17, 2007: Boozing it up with Obama Girl.

• August 14, 2007: The Glamour/black hair debacle.
• September 13, 2007: Meeting The Pick Up Artist's "Mystery" man.
• September 20, 2007: Trying out a $4,000 handbag made from the skins of abused and slaughtered Asian reptiles.
• October 29, 2007: Reminiscing about her crap stint working retail at American Apparel.
• November 14, 2007: Breaking open the MySpace/Megan Meier story.
• December 4, 2007: Hating on the NY Times' Modern Love column, and on other women.
• December 19, 2007: Coming close to calling the cops on Paul Janka.
• December 20, 2007: A post-mortem on her time with Paul.
• January 14, 2008: More on Megan Meier.
• March 10, 2008: Ripping a Daily Show dumbass a new one.
• March 18, 2008: One of many in a series of Jezenomics.
• April 1, 2008: Fun with April Fool's and Conde Nast.
• April 14, 2008: A personal exegesis on American Apparel.
• April 22, 2008: When the shit hit the Clinton supporters fan.
• May 2, 2008: An investigation into her own mortality, maturity.
• May 7, 2008: Ten days (ten!) in the life of a tampon.
• July 8, 2008: An apology.

• Slut Machine finally revealed her makeup secrets by painting the tender, bearded visage of Gavin McInnes.
• Sadie debunked the art of the Facebook photo, and proved that every last one of us is a loser.
• Technicolor Kiddie Swimsuit EXTRAVAGANZA!
• Moe is a Jezebel no moe. But don't worry, she'll be sticking around these parts in spirit and in Crap.
• In our dream world, all insane divorce cases would be tried in the court of Judge Judy.
• LOLHillz!
• LOLVogue! Week of 10,000 LOLZ!

• Teri Garr reminded us that there are still many funny, funny ladies in modern film who we'd like to befriend.
• Estelle Getty is a friend who will be missed.
• Even though working during a beautiful summer's day is the pits, it's the weekend, y'all! So enjoy your damn selves.

It was something called an "upside down" sundae, whereby her friend stowed all the toppings on the bottom of the bowl, out of the sight of her superiors, then plopped the ice cream on top, safely hiding her stash of sweetness. "If you want that cherry in life, to say nothing of the hot fudge and whipped cream, youve gotta have that upside down hot fudge sundae." What a wonderful new cliche to replace the "cake and eat it too" crap!

Anyway, we tell that story because we had to employ a similar strategy merely to get entrance to this event, because a press officer at the Y informed us that press had been barred from the event. Using our cunning and the internet, we (Moe, Jessica) purchased two "civilian" tickets and sneaked in as though we were two normal people just interested in seeing what the editor-in-chief of Cosmopolitan and mystery novel author Kate White has to say. What do such normal people look like, anyway?

Jessica: I got there first, and was oddly nervous. I wore more makeup than I usually do, because I didn't want to feel inadequately groomed when compared to the fashion bitches I assumed would attend. I still looked comparatively sloppy — I spotted a pair of this year's Miu Miu pumps and slunk into a chair in my dirty jeans. I had sat down in the middle of two rows of twenty-somethings who all seemed to know each other. I assumed they worked for Kate, so I asked the girl next to me if she, indeed, worked for Cosmo.
"I do," she said, "I'm Ashley."
"I'm Jessica, I work for Jezebel," I told her, and her formerly warm gaze turned icy.
"Oh. I saw that you guys wrote about us today."
"Um. Yeaaaaah."
That ended that conversation! (A quick perusal of the masthead later on led me to believe I was talking to associate web editor Ashley Womble, who was quite possibly responsible for the feature I mocked yesterday. Um, if you're reading this, I'm sorry Ashley! But like, "Boyfriend Wars" is a pretty exquisitely lame idea! Surely you see my point! No?"

Moe: Ha! That explains the forty text messages I got from you. I have to say, I did not notice any Miu Mius. I'm pretty sure i was sitting on the side of the room with all the Conservadox Jews, because...um, everyone's outfits were very modest. But Kate's outfit was fabulous! In a kind of "aggressively approachable" way. She wore a poufy taffeta-ish skirt and black patent leather ankle boots, with black tights and a black short-sleeved turtleneck. It was, like, the most expensive ensemble you could get away with and still probably be mistaken for an elementary school teacher. She is very thin, but she doesn't seem to make it the centerpiece of her appearance, and she has blown-dry highlighted hair that dovetails perfectly with the intense perkiness of her persona. She looked like she belonged on the set of a fifties sitcom. And then she told that fucking upside-down ice cream sundae anecdote. In my notes it is followed by an anecdote about Kate Spade, who apparently is friends with Kate White. I just wrote it all down, but now I'm deleting it because really, it is duller than the sundae anecdote. "Sometimes you've got to break the rules," was the big takeaway. I think that's when I completely lost it.

Jessica:I read Kate's book, You On Top over the weekend, and most of the anecdotes were taken verbatim from that, so they must have been fact-checked, right? Anyway, the book has some actually insightful, practical career advice. Interspersed with "Ways to Tap into Your Inner Sex Kitten." She also warns us to never ever talk to guys about our periods. But she runs a major magazine and still finds time to write mystery novels. You've got to respect that!

Moe: That's true. She also seems impossible to hate. But she's like, impossible to hate in that way where you feel like if you traveled back in time to 1963, and someone advised you not to talk to boys about your period, you would forgive them for that. Why do I feel like I'm in a time warp with Kate White? She's the foremost purveyor of orgasm advice in the country! People were still douching in 1963! And having coat hanger abortions.

Jessica: That said, she managed to make the vignettes sound spontaneous and unrehearsed; even charming. I won't go over her "five rules" in detail. You want some business speak, you can find it elsewhere. Maybe in your own head in that space reserved for common sense, buried under the names of former contestants on ANTM. I will say Kate's an excellent public speaker. Then came the Q&A. I don't remember what questions were asked except for your question about Whether Cosmo had a secret sex lab.

Moe: I swear to God I heard once that Cosmo has a "sex laboratory" where they try out positions and stuff. I was dying for something too-hot-for-Andy Griffith to be said. But yeah, she turned a little red when I asked that. Lady, you're the editor of Cosmo WTF?! Then someone asked a question about how to deal when you've realized you're following in your mother's footsteps and putting your career on hold for your husband. And that's when she pointed out her husband. Her husband was adorable, and all "aw shucks" about the whole thing, and she readily admitted that he was six or seven years younger than her, and that she's glad she married later in life. I felt bad for the woman who was putting her career on hold for her husband. For a moment I felt worse for her than for myself, for not having a husband. But I don't understand why you would do that, unless you didn't really like working. In which case, don't feel guilty about it! We're all about self-acceptance.

Jessica: Yeah, I think she's holding out on us and somewhere in the nether regions of the Hearst building there is a kinky dungeon filled with frilly underthings and eight cartons of batteries. I do remember, however, one of Kate's answers, which stuck with me. She said that women tend not to ask for things in their careers — she told a story about a group of young trainees at Arthur Anderson. When the group got their offers, all the men asked for more money, whereas all the women just took the initial quote. This resonated with me in particular because when I worked at Spin right out of college, the Editor-in-Chief at the time, Sia Michel, told me the exact. Same. Thing. Every woman Sia had hired took the salary that was offered up front. Almost every man negotiated for more.

Moe: Ugh, yeah, fuck men; where do they get off? I fucking hate those motherfuckers. That's why they always think they deserve to have sex with you. Motherfucker, explain to me why you deserve a motherfucking raise when there are kids working for twenty cents an hour in Bangladesh and I don't even make that much? I hate dudes.

Jessica: Leaving the Y, I realized that had Kate's book just been her career advice and her somewhat daffy personal essays, I would have valued it so much more. The impressive example she's set with her achievements is not-so-subtly undermined when she extols the virtues of "walk[ing] around your home with no top on. Feel[ing] the breeze with your breasts!" I realize that she's branded herself quite strongly as EIC of Cosmo (hell, she mentions it every five pages in her book) but that doesn't mean that her voice has to be "sexified" all the time. Last night, Kate told us that we need to "break all the rules" to succeed. Maybe she should listen to herself and stop shilling hackneyed "mattress moves so hot, his thighs will go up in flames."

Moe: You're totally right. She doesn't even like talking about sex! She should really be at a more serious women's magazine. Too bad there are none!