Work From Bed Friday

Amy & Tommy start with Portland’s stand up comedy scene and end with pubic hair. Sandwiched in between is a discussion of self love and self esteem. Also, they would like to contradict themselves—things ARE really bad in the world. Just get out there and love yourself, your people, and your community! Mentioned in this episode: All About Love: New Visions  by bell hooks Portland's Chill &...

Chapter 3 of All About Love by bell hooks is THE chapter that precipitated Amy and Tommy's famous "breakthrough" as detailed in Season 1, Episode 1. What do they think of it now? Listen for lots of opinions, a peek at a new tradition for New Year's Day, and some Miranda July-style crowdsourcing on hormone replacement therapy.  All About Love: New Visions  by bell hooks Radical...

Amy and Tommy dig into Chapter 2 of All About Love by bell hooks, following her discourse on justice and advocacy for the rights of children. It seems far from a theory of love, but perhaps that's the point. Whatever the case, Amy and Tommy gamely engage in a lively conversation about the chapter, flanked by a discussion of the holiday classic movie, Love Actually, and on the other end, pubic...

It turns out that Chapter 1 of All About Love by bell hooks brings up more questions than it answers: what actually IS cathexis? Do you have to have cathexis before you have/practice love? Are we throwing around the word love too cavalierly??  Lots to unpack here, but don't worry, we come back to our favorite topic (Does size matter?) in our "Let's Make it a Threesome" segment!...

Work From Bed Friday is proud to present Season 2! Fresh off the perimenopausal rollercoaster and sexual awakening of Miranda July's All Fours, Tommy & Amy begin their conversation of All About Love: New Visions by bell hooks. They begin with the preface and introduction and their storied history with this book. To spice up this season, they've added two new segments: The Titillating...

Amy & Tommy close out the premiere season of Work From Bed Friday with a review of "More: A Memoir of Open Marriage" by Molly Roden Winter. They disagree about Winter's motives, wonder about how on earth people have time for polyamory, and discuss the the cringe moments that pepper the whole book. It's the story of a one woman's evolution through dating apps and fairly...

A long lost Brady Bunch episode inspired a gifting tradition in the Borffmann household that has been going strong for 20 years! Instead of purchasing gifts for Christmas, Amy and Tommy and their two daughters exchange only three types of gifts: homemade items, found items,, and favors/acts of service. Not only does the tradition short-circuit the consumerism frenzy that typically dominates the se...

Amy & Tommy discuss Nightbitch by Rachel Yoder, comparing it to American Psycho, singing the praises of speed control, and marveling at the prowess of a newly minted novelist.  BUT FIRST! They introduce a new segment called "The Tantalizing Tangent" (that's actually called "The Titillating Tangent")—a short addendum to a current hot topic. This week, of course, more on...

Amy and Tommy take on the age old question with their unique blend of honest conversation, questionable knowledge, reckless internet research, and a component new to them both: crowdsourcing! The discussion is spicy and thought-provoking. They don't uncover the answer to the question, but find that there are many possible answers. Perhaps as many answers as there are sizes of penises. Could i...

After bingeing Season 1 of Your Friends and Neighbors on the plane home from Rome, Amy & Tommy dive into analysis. Does extreme wealth change the story of marriage, sex, and connection? Is repressed rage the common denominator for all of us? Why does Jon Hamm look so good in a suit?  Also: watching raw and vigorous sex scenes on a personal airplane screen seems transgressive in itself. But whe...

Coming off of Miranda July's All Fours, Amy & Tommy record the first of a few season-ending bonus episodes...from Rome! It's a honeymoon that patiently waited 21 years to happen. In 2004, en route to a 5-week drive through the Sahara desert, the newlyweds were to use their gifted "buddy passes" (standby airline tickets from airlines employees) to first spend a more honeymoo...

Amy and Tommy finish their in-depth analysis of Miranda July’s All Fours. They discuss the final chapters, about which they have a lot of feelings . Aren’t we all over Davey by now? But maybe if Benson Boone played him in the movie…. Were these two chapters written after the fact to appease an editor who needed more closure? Or perhaps if was an attempt to distance the story from Miranda July’s ac...

Recording their first episode from their new bedroom in their very old (1896) new house, Amy and Tommy determine that Chapter 28 of Miranda July's All Fours should be the final chapter in the book. End it HERE.  But the actual editors of the book disagree. They leave them to their fantasies of ending up where they started, but brand new in that same place. The repetition of days, like the rep...

In an attempt to stay out of our character's foray into the deathfield while navigating the sounds of "progress" during some hard-core home repair, Amy & Tommy go off-piste. There's the story of the two kittens that kept Amy from breaking up with Tommy 24 years ago, the one about Tommy's nervous breakdown in West Africa, and various discussions about art and the physic...

Is it a better way to be married? Or a better way to divorce? Amy & Tommy discuss Chapter 26 of Miranda July's All Fours, in which a newly conceived idea of marriage leads to the mythical "breakthrough" but not as anyone ever imagined. The couple compares this fictional transformation to their own real life version with its very different outcome. The magic moment of menopause,...

It's a pretty good band name, amiright?? It's also a composite of Chapter 25 of Miranda July's All Fours, at least according to these two intrepid podcasters. Amy & Tommy use the chapter as a jumping off point for a discussion about the staying power of monogamy, the way that jealousy can act like gasoline on the spark of desire, and the non-primacy of marriage. Did Miranda July...

Is it an open marriage? Or co-habitation with girlfriends? Amy & Tommy discuss Chapter 24 of Miranda July's All Fours wherein kissing is invented and orgasms are water creatures. There's more, of course: how preparing for a first date is good advice for long term relationships, the way in which a flash of attraction that melts away should be available to all of us, and the pressure o...

Amy & Tommy record this episode from the basement of their new house, Beatrice. Even in the middle of a major move, the two come together to discuss Chapter 23 of Miranda July's All Fours, touching on the subjects of vaginal dryness, third things, and polyamory. They know nothing about polyamory, but that does not stop them from discussing it, and also the lack of human predisposition to...

Join Tommy & Amy as they stumble into the house of mirrors created by the shifting identities of Chapter 22 of Miranda July's All Fours. They explore the new terrain created inside a spontaneous few days of role playing between our main character and her husband. Can we be more honest inside fiction then we can in real life? And does that honesty mean that real constructs (like marriage)...

Do we ALL need a room of one's own? Could it just be Room 321 at the Excelsior? Amy thinks yes, yes it could.  Amy & Tommy discuss Chapter 21 of Miranda July's All Fours , examining the anatomy of a marital standoff by sharing their historical responses in the aftermath of an unresolved dispute. This, and more, including the bodily freedom of pop stars,  menopause as a catalyst, and...

Chapter 20 of Miranda July’s All Fours is one of Tommy and Amy’s favorites. Our character invites her friends to Excelsior’s Room 321 in order to crowdsource marital advice and a whole lot more. But once there, the room expands into another dimension and a new portal seems to open, a place where one can begin to understand oneself and one’s own desires via the sharing of others. Through it all is...

True to form, Tommy & Amy "very thoroughly" examine Chapter 19 of Miranda July's All Fours . In the aftermath of a marital fissure, our character moves through her days in a haze of formality, cupcakes, and bones to chew on. All of which allow our fearless hosts to explore their past marriage tensions, typically beginning with a tiny pea, twenty mattresses down. This chapter see...

Amy and Tommy's discussion of Chapter 18 was particularly long...and juicy! So, they continue their conversation from last week in this episode and unearth a  memory of the time that Amy got kicked off Facebook for a nipple. The marital clash in the chapter brings up a lot of "before times" incidents that Amy & Tommy enthusiastically excavate while the All Fours heroine treads w...

Chapter 18 of Miranda July's All Fours is barely three pages in total. It only takes eight minutes to listen to it on audio. Tommy and Amy, however, do not let that stop them from talk talk talking for so long about rage, intercourse as a disappointing end game, and centering pleasure. They dig deep into the anatomy of a marital argument and hit on a profound distinction: working on your rela...

You can't always get what you want, but sometimes you get what you summon. And it will blow your mind. At least it did for our heroine at the end of Chapter 17 of Miranda July's All Fours .  In this, the second part of their long and juicy discussion of this pivotal chapter, Amy & Tommy tackle pre-fab structures, reveal how objectification is a total turn-on, and consider the body as...