The New York Beyoncefication of Pittsburgh
The New York Beyoncefication of Pittsburgh
"Does this ducking stool make my hysterical ass look big?"
Yinz! It’s late today, but at least I got to it on the right day. Cookie for me!
Over the past week, readers emailed and tweeted me a whole bunch of horror stories about bathroom troughs and men’s bathrooms in general, and I just want to say that, men, you don’t have to live this way.
You don’t have to pee against wall leading to a communal drain. You don’t have to drunkenly retrieve dropped cans of beer from the troughs and then proceed to drink said beer. You are not Bear Grylls; you are a drunk jorted yinzer. You don’t have to NOT wash your hands and you certainly don’t have to NOT wash your hands because the men’s room doesn’t even have a sink and also the sink it might have is currently being peed into. This is some truly Mad Max bonkers-ocity and I am horrified. I don’t personally care one iota about the gender of the people using the same restroom as me, but I think we might want to have a societal discussion about designating public restrooms as either “Sanitary” or “HERE BE DRAGONS* AND DISEASE.”
Let’s talk!
*not a euphemism
1. “Oh, I’m a demon all right. Just wait until l get off this stool.”
A bunch of years ago, I learned by accident that there used to be a ducking stool at the Point. This was a form of public punishment brought to America from England during colonization. Essentially what would happen is a woman—
Oh. Did I not tell you? This particular public punishment was largely reserved for women who had the devil in them or were hysterical or gossipy or, just, you know, not being a good little girl and instead deciding to do something like show emotion or have a single individual thought in her head that ran counter to the patriarch—
I am ranting. Forgive me. Were this the 1700s, you could just drag me to the Sheriff and have him strap my demon ass to the ducking stool by the river’s edge. It basically looked like a chair attached to a wooden arm that would allow the punishers to repeatedly dunk/duck the “scold”* underwater (one report said for 30 seconds at a time) and bring her back up until she was properly shamed, dripping wet, and the hypothermia had finally beat the devil, the hysterics or the individuality out of her.
Recently while researching the history of the Fort Pitt Block House (just added to the Pittsburgh Remains to be Seen map), I learned that Pittsburgh’s ducking stool came into existence by way of the 1770s land dispute between Virginia and Pennsylvania. Lord Dunmore of Virginia, in an effort to establish his position of power, ordered that a ducking stool should be built at the confluence (drink!). The book containing this information, 1922s Fort Pitt by Charles Dahlinger, included an old timey illustration!
I love her. I’ve named her Molly. She’s like “eff all’youns’all,” and is a half-second away from defiantly raising her middle finger before they duck her for something like “nagging her husband to help with the 14 children while she plucks the chickens for supper.”
The book also includes a likeness of Lord “Duck that Bitch” Dunmore:
Fancy-looking feller Just ITCHING to duck hysterical bitches in the Mon, that one.
As a student of history, I can never stop at a reference; I have to find the source. So I found the minutes of the February 2, 1775 Virginia Court and, yep:
DRINK! COURTESY OF LORD DUNMORE!
But, yes, February, and yes, indicating likely imminent use. In February. In Pittsburgh. Sounds icy. What would that even look like? Good news! There’s a poem! By Andrew Johnson’s one-time secretary Frank Cowan of Greensburg, no less, who wrote it in his 1878 book Southwestern Pennsylvania in Song and Story:
It goes on, but you get the point (drink! Wait. Ah, screw it. CONFLUENCE. Drink!) There is so much more I found — illustrations, processes, men wanting to bring it back during the early 1900s to properly shut suffragettes up about the vote.
Now, despite what some claim, I’ve not found proof that the stool was actually built and/or used here. All I can say for certain, based on the record, is that Lord Dunmore ordered one to be built at the confluence (drink!) for seemingly imminent usage.
If it was built and used, I hope every single Pittsburgh woman that went under, came back up cursing like a sailor while flipping the whole town the double bird.
Dod rot ‘em, indeed, Molly**.
* A scold was defined as “a glib woman with a too active tongue.” Next to that definition is a picture of me.
** “Dod” is actually a euphemism! For “God.”
2. Steve Carell hearts Pittsburgh
I am a huge The Office fan. I actually didn’t watch the show until about three years after it ended because I am late to everything. Steve Carell (Michael) was interviewed by Jenna Fischer (Pam) and Angela Kinsey (Angela) on the latest episode of The Office Ladies podcast, during which they asked him some listener-submitted questions. Here’s a transcript of one in particular:
Office Ladies: “Favorite place you visited in the United States?”
Steve Carell: “Pittsburgh was pretty cool.”
OL: “Oh, yeah?”
SC: “I mean, I’m not saying that ironically, either. I’ve done a couple of movies there and I liked it. It’s a cool city.”
OL: “All right, there you go.”
SC: “It’s the first one I thought of.”
OL: “Shout-out to Pittsburgh!”
SC: “Shout-out to Pittsburgh.”
Now, “Oh, yeah?” was said much the same way New York said …
And Moira Rose said …
Straight-up disbelief. But we are used to that and we secretly like being the underdog. Also:
Steve Carell is hereby an honorary Burgher. What power do I have to decree it so? The same power Lord Dunmore had to decree the commencement of the ducking of the bitches … self-ascribed.
Is The Commencement of the Ducking of the Bitches too long to be a band name? What about The Monongahela Ducken Bitches?
Our tour of tri-state Hard Rock Cafes* will def be sponsored by Dunkin’ Donuts.
*There is one. It is here.
(h/t Matt Shaffer)
3. Sentenced to the ducking stool for stupidity
A local man did a very Florida Man thing and stole a 1,000-pound church bell. Now, if you paid attention last week, you will ace this pop quiz:
(round answers to the nearest whole number)
How many baby elephants is that? ______ baby elephants
Now give it to me in full kegs of beer: ______ full kegs of beer
Email me your responses and be sure to show your work.
Now, let me sum this up. This thief, who clearly had an accomplice, stole a forklift from the Greenfield Giant Eagle parking lot, used it to remove a bell from a Squirrel Hill cemetery, forklifted said bell to a trailer which “accompanied” his Ford Explorer, at some point, removed the clapper (I think that’s the ding-a-ling-thing?*), dumped the bell onto the side of the road, then returned the forklift to Giant Eagle. This is the bell in question and I’d like to submit it as evidence to the court:
I have some follow-up questions, your honor:
Do forklifts just generally have the keys in them for anyone to take one at random and return it like a short-term U-Haul rental?
Why remove the ding-a-ling-thing and dump the bell?
Did the two yutes think this through at all?
If you read the article, you’ll learn that the arrest came after the police used various city cameras, Ring doorbell cameras, and cameras on the Homestead Grays Bridge to track the bell’s movement.
And some of you boobs are worried about a tracking chip in your vaccine. My loves, they know everything you are doing and where you’re going and they know what you’re going to search on Amazon before you do. In fact, they’ve already moved the item you’ll buy to a warehouse near you. Just embrace the Matrix and accept that the next time you steal a bell the size of seven Corgis, you’ll be arrested before the Iggle re-opens in the morning to find their forklift parked in a handicap spot.
*not a euphemism
4. Top-secret Pittsburgh meatball recipe
I’ve heard about this local meatball recipe found in the famed 1973 Three Rivers Cookbook, and in case you need it:
The no cooking instructions thing? Yeah. As I tweeted recently:
Times were different then. My favorite recipe of my gram’s calls for “a box of powdered sugar.” They no longer sell powdered sugar in boxes, so I do math and however much sugar I think it needs, I double it. I’m a kitchen genius. You should see me make meatballs.
I only use my best tennis racket.
Also, I changed my mind. My new band is Special Spaghetti Supper. We play volunteer firehall weddings and ONLY volunteer firehall wedding because those are the best.
5. “Let me just check my watch real quick”
Washington DC’s Jim Lokay, formerly KDKA’s Jim Lokay, currently Virginia Montanez’s good pal Jim Lokay, used his end-of-show commentary time on his DC news show The Final 5 to do … this:
The watch-look before giving the year of 2017? No notes. Perfect timing.
Bravo to Jim. I would steal a forklift from the Iggle and rob a cemetery of a thousand-pound church bell with you.
(As a reminder, I am not contributing essays/Forum pieces to the Post-Gazette during the strike and will maintain that stance until the strike ends.)
6. Book update and final notes!
My gosh, I’m nearing the end of the journey with my novel Nothing. Everything. which is being published this Spring. The edits are done (I think I have all 375 pages memorized by now). The acknowledgements, author bio, and synopsis are written. I just need to get an author photo taken (soon) and that will be that.
I saw the final cover design and boy, did that make it feel real. I love it so much and I can’t wait to share it with you in the lead-up to offering the book for pre-order. This has been, if I’m being honest, a lifelong process. I’ve been writing since I was a teenager. I wrote a terrible book in my twenties that I never did anything with. But this is the one that I’m ready to put out into the world so I can say I did it—there’s my book. It’s on my shelf. I created something that will still be here when I’m gone one day, and isn’t that something?
Enough emotions! The book is coming! Please buy it and read it. Have a fantastic week! Be kind! Don’t drink trough-beer! If you make meatballs, sanitize your racket strings first! And no matter what, don’t let them strap you to a ducking stool over the Mon.
There be dragons and disease in that river.