So, as you might have noticed by now, there's supposed to be an element of biking to this blog. Why hasn't there been? One simple reason: I live in Olympia. Where, in case you didn't know, it rains. All the damn time.
For the last week or so, not only has there been rain, there's been radioactive rain. To be fair, you get more radiation from a dental x-ray than the amount of radioactive fallout on any of the given days thusfar, but having had to go out in it every day has been... well, like seven or eight dental x-rays. And it's been giving me headaches.
This is not the point, though. The point is that I'm blind without my glasses, and glasses plus rain plus biking equals no. And, because I live in Olympia, where it rains all the damn time, that means I can't untie my bike and go for a ride. I've had her stuck down in the bike shelter all winter long, tires rotting off, inner tubes going limp, waiting.
So yesterday it was a clear, beautiful day. Leslie and I needed to go grocery shopping, and ended up running into a friend of ours who ended up ferrying us around in her car in exchange for a couple pounds of meat and a soda and an ice-cream sandwich. (on that note, I've successfully found Safe ice-cream sandies. More on that some other time.) The point is that I didn't get to take my bike out for a spin when it was clear and warm.
And today, it's raining. Again. Just like it was for a week. The paths are flooding, the sky is gray, and I will probably end this day cold and damp. Because just when I thought that the sky might let up enough so that I could put new tires on my bike and go for a spin... the sky started leaking again.
Uuuugh. I feel so incredibly fat and out of shape right now. I haven't been able to get any exercise all winter, because it's been so rainy and cold and hellish and I've been... swamped... in homework. And now, the weather is taunting me.
Friday, April 1, 2011
Saturday, March 26, 2011
A touchy subject?
I cannot help but think that in embracing my Flagrant Tranny-ness, I have somehow revoked my Vagina Card.
Don't get my wrong. I happen to be a man who loves his cunt. It's just that I don't seem to be able talk about things like feminism or male privilege without wondering if someone out there thinks that I am attempting to take advantage of that very privilege.
I read something today which made claims that Transwomen attempting to use Woman-only facilities are guilty of taking advantage of male privilege.
This... bothered me. As a Transman, I routinely find myself outside of any and all privilege. I am not considered "female", therefore I can't get away with the Most Common Superpower. I'm not quite male, so I really, really can't get away with Male Privilege.
So. Now, away with the polite language. If you're sensitive, (and if you're sensitive, why are you reading this in the first place?) stop now.
WHAT THE FLYING FUCK? WHY DO PEOPLE ASSUME THAT ANYONE WITH THE PREFIX OF "TRANS" CAN GET AWAY WITH ANY, ANY, ANY SORT OF PRIVILEGE? It is not uncommon for my sister to get screamed at about being a man in the woman's bathroom. I don't even bother going into the men's room, because I just don't pass. At all. And I don't feel like getting hurt because some asshole doesn't think I should be there.
Don't get my wrong. I happen to be a man who loves his cunt. It's just that I don't seem to be able talk about things like feminism or male privilege without wondering if someone out there thinks that I am attempting to take advantage of that very privilege.
I read something today which made claims that Transwomen attempting to use Woman-only facilities are guilty of taking advantage of male privilege.
This... bothered me. As a Transman, I routinely find myself outside of any and all privilege. I am not considered "female", therefore I can't get away with the Most Common Superpower. I'm not quite male, so I really, really can't get away with Male Privilege.
So. Now, away with the polite language. If you're sensitive, (and if you're sensitive, why are you reading this in the first place?) stop now.
WHAT THE FLYING FUCK? WHY DO PEOPLE ASSUME THAT ANYONE WITH THE PREFIX OF "TRANS" CAN GET AWAY WITH ANY, ANY, ANY SORT OF PRIVILEGE? It is not uncommon for my sister to get screamed at about being a man in the woman's bathroom. I don't even bother going into the men's room, because I just don't pass. At all. And I don't feel like getting hurt because some asshole doesn't think I should be there.
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
The Philad-- Ooops, sorry, The Spokane.
Some time between 1987 and 1993, David Ives wrote a play entitled "The Philadelphia", about an anomalous bit of reality in which everything that can go wrong, will. You need to get to work on time? You bus will be cancelled. You want a cup of water? A simple sandwich (that is, in fact, on the menu, and might even be the special of where you're eating)? "Oh, we don't serve that here..." This is what a Philadelphia is. It is the state of never getting what you want.
But what if it's not quite that bad? What if the state you're in is one of only being half-fail? What if you get what you want... sort of.
Say, you go to Starbucks. You've been craving, for one insane reason or another one of those horrible iced blended coffee monstrosities that I lived on over the summer after oral surgery. You really, really want something frozen and blended and covered in caramel syrup. You order your Venti Caramel Frappichino, fork over five or six bucks, and wait. And what comes is...
Well, it is coffee. There is caramel syrup on it. But the barista has somehow heard "Frappichino" as "Machiado". So what you get is a strong coffee with a head of foam half again as tall as the coffee itself that's hot enough to burn your mouth off. So instead of a nice cold frozen thing covered in whipped cream and enough caramel syrup to give a small country diabetes, you get a hot and unsatisfactory mess of foam and sit bitterly in the corner trying to simultaneously enjoy what you did not order, avoid the strange looks coming from a girl you quickly realize is your professor's daughter, and read your book, all the while thinking that this would have been better had the barista screwed up completely. True story, there.
Or, say, you've been nearly late for class for a week, get sick and miss a day or two, and then, when you finally don't feel like shit, the one day you make it to class on time, dragging yourself out of bed by the hair of your toes and slithering into your clothing before trekking across the athletic field in the beginnings of a snowstorm, you find that class has been pushed back a half hour, and starts at ten rather than nine-thirty, and you realize that you could be in bed right now, staving off the cold and illness.
Your parents, knowing that you like those freaky milk-chocolate oranges, go out and get you three of them. In dark chocolate. When, for all practical purposes, dark chocolate should only be used for mint, and mint alone, and under any other circumstance is so strong it actually hurts. But you have to thank them and eat them anyway because, while it wasn't what you wanted, it's chocolate, and it has orange in it, so you like it, right?
It's a book, it's fantasy! You like fantasy books! Read the fantasy book I bought for you!
It's half-right. It's almost what you wanted. But it's just wrong enough to be crushingly disappointing.
I've had these every once in a while. Most recently, last week. This, I'm afraid, is the source of that long rant about coffee up there.
So. It's not exactly a Philadelphia. So what is it?
In honor of my hometown (Ad Slogan: Near Nature, Near Perfect. It's not.) I've begun calling this sort of thing a "Spokane". It's almost what you want. But really, it's not what you want at all. As for the town itself, it's a nice looking, moderately sized town with a relatively low overall crime rate and a pretty view.
Until you realize that, living about 42 feet from my school (a K-12 Homeschool Outreach centre) is a man convicted of first degree rape of a child. And he's just the nearest one. Within a three mile radius, there are upwards of fifty convicted sex offenders. And the gods only know how many other various criminals. Yes, we have a relatively low crime rate, because all the criminals from all over that side of the state come to Spokane to serve their sentences and go to trial. Meanwhile living in the area around the courthouse. You can live there, and avoid them, really, but there's really nothing to do there. When people ask me what there is to do in Spokane, my most common answer is "Leave".
It is this way in which the town can almost be what you want, almost be a place to raise a family in, almost have entertaining places in it, that makes it the perfect location for this mini-dimension of not quite getting what you want.
With that, I leave you, for now.
But what if it's not quite that bad? What if the state you're in is one of only being half-fail? What if you get what you want... sort of.
Say, you go to Starbucks. You've been craving, for one insane reason or another one of those horrible iced blended coffee monstrosities that I lived on over the summer after oral surgery. You really, really want something frozen and blended and covered in caramel syrup. You order your Venti Caramel Frappichino, fork over five or six bucks, and wait. And what comes is...
Well, it is coffee. There is caramel syrup on it. But the barista has somehow heard "Frappichino" as "Machiado". So what you get is a strong coffee with a head of foam half again as tall as the coffee itself that's hot enough to burn your mouth off. So instead of a nice cold frozen thing covered in whipped cream and enough caramel syrup to give a small country diabetes, you get a hot and unsatisfactory mess of foam and sit bitterly in the corner trying to simultaneously enjoy what you did not order, avoid the strange looks coming from a girl you quickly realize is your professor's daughter, and read your book, all the while thinking that this would have been better had the barista screwed up completely. True story, there.
Or, say, you've been nearly late for class for a week, get sick and miss a day or two, and then, when you finally don't feel like shit, the one day you make it to class on time, dragging yourself out of bed by the hair of your toes and slithering into your clothing before trekking across the athletic field in the beginnings of a snowstorm, you find that class has been pushed back a half hour, and starts at ten rather than nine-thirty, and you realize that you could be in bed right now, staving off the cold and illness.
Your parents, knowing that you like those freaky milk-chocolate oranges, go out and get you three of them. In dark chocolate. When, for all practical purposes, dark chocolate should only be used for mint, and mint alone, and under any other circumstance is so strong it actually hurts. But you have to thank them and eat them anyway because, while it wasn't what you wanted, it's chocolate, and it has orange in it, so you like it, right?
It's a book, it's fantasy! You like fantasy books! Read the fantasy book I bought for you!
Thankfully, to be fair, my mother has never bought me a Gor book.
It's half-right. It's almost what you wanted. But it's just wrong enough to be crushingly disappointing.
I've had these every once in a while. Most recently, last week. This, I'm afraid, is the source of that long rant about coffee up there.
So. It's not exactly a Philadelphia. So what is it?
In honor of my hometown (Ad Slogan: Near Nature, Near Perfect. It's not.) I've begun calling this sort of thing a "Spokane". It's almost what you want. But really, it's not what you want at all. As for the town itself, it's a nice looking, moderately sized town with a relatively low overall crime rate and a pretty view.
Until you realize that, living about 42 feet from my school (a K-12 Homeschool Outreach centre) is a man convicted of first degree rape of a child. And he's just the nearest one. Within a three mile radius, there are upwards of fifty convicted sex offenders. And the gods only know how many other various criminals. Yes, we have a relatively low crime rate, because all the criminals from all over that side of the state come to Spokane to serve their sentences and go to trial. Meanwhile living in the area around the courthouse. You can live there, and avoid them, really, but there's really nothing to do there. When people ask me what there is to do in Spokane, my most common answer is "Leave".
It is this way in which the town can almost be what you want, almost be a place to raise a family in, almost have entertaining places in it, that makes it the perfect location for this mini-dimension of not quite getting what you want.
With that, I leave you, for now.
Monday, February 7, 2011
Binder Bender....
Yeah, I kinda feel like that right now.
My binder, which is a couple of years old, is nearly fallen apart. Therefore, I ordered a few new ones from Underworks (because Underworks is what works the best, apparently.) I mentioned this yesterday over Sushi with the Bois and Gyrls from downstairs, and Cal, wonderful, wonderful Cal, offered to let me borrow one of his binders until mine come in.
This has to be one of the most comfortable things I've worn in a long time. For the first time in I'm not sure how long, my back doesn't hurt. Not only that, but I look right. For the first time. Wow.
I'm currently working out a way to keep the binder from rolling up. Cal uses military shirt stays, which extend all the way down to the feet (he's letting me use a pair of those, too) but I feel like there has to be a better way. Hrm.... *contemplates different ways to do it*
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Perfect, as always.
Today, I woke up with a half hour to get dressed, prepped, and to class. I almost didn't make it on time.
And in the rush to get out the door, I couldn't find my hat (which was sitting on the table in plain sight. I are hasing vision, really...). This wouldn't be a big deal, except that I showered late, and therefore slept on wet hair. Therefore, I stumbled into class, sat down, and informed my friends "I don't want to know what it's doing." I was informed that it looked like the mushroom cloud over Hiroshima. I subsequently attempted to get it to look a little less like massive destruction.
Today, in class, we watched a video. I had seen it before. That didn't change how much I love it. And then, since we are studying Ireland and our teacher is big on kinetic learning, we sat down and drew celtic knotwork. Really, really simple knotwork. I and one of my friends were pointed out as resource people for this drawing, since we'd both done it before. I had to keep qualifying myself to my classmates. "I've been drawing since I was three. I'm not especially talented, I just have nineteen years of practice." After that, we all got taught to dance a jig step. During this, several of my classmates latched onto me as a guide for what to do. We were moving and I was grinning and giggling a little, and it felt good to get up and move and be jumping from side to side and making loud noises on the floor. I didn't really realize that I was encouraging and guiding my classmates until, with my back turned, I heard someone say "I'm just watching what Rori's feet do." Some time during the dancing, the teacher informed me that I was "Perfect, of course."
I was... pretty taken aback. I didn't feel like I was doing it perfect. I didn't feel like I was good enough to be followed. I felt like I was a lumbering bull with jiggling fatty bits and clumsy steps and clunky boots and shin-splints and bouncing hair. But I had done it before. The steps had stuck with me. The rhythms were something that had been engrained into me since childhood (Thanks, mom!), and I felt confident enough in my own skin to get up there in the middle of class and help the other students learn to dance.
Come to think of it, this year has been the best I've felt in my body since I was very small. Yes, I'm on the heavy side. Yes, I have these strange jiggly bits hanging off the front of me (even with a chest binder. They're huge. They jiggle.). Yes, I'm tall and gawky and more likely to fall flat on my face than successfully get off the bus or god forbid dance. But I am feeling good in my own skin. I am beginning to be able to see what I look like in a mirror.
I think it was Zoie who said it, years ago. "Sure, you're kinda average as a girl, but DAMN do you make a hot guy." As a girl, the best I could be described as is "Plain". But as a boy, not only do I look better, but I FEEL better, which I'm sure contributes. Sure, I'm jiggly and have hair like an Axolotl when I wear a hat, and like a mushroom cloud when I don't, but that's okay, because I think Axolotl(s?) are adorable, and mushroom clouds are a sure sign of great and terrible destruction, which, as anyone who knows me will tell you, is sure to follow once I step into a room. And I can draw. I can draw because I've been drawing for nineteen years. There are things I'm not good at. I'm not good at the guitar. I'm not good at running, and I can't do a cartwheel.
I'm not perfect. But I'm working on it. All it takes is practice. "Practice makes perfect", right? I'll get back to you on that in nineteen years.
And in the rush to get out the door, I couldn't find my hat (which was sitting on the table in plain sight. I are hasing vision, really...). This wouldn't be a big deal, except that I showered late, and therefore slept on wet hair. Therefore, I stumbled into class, sat down, and informed my friends "I don't want to know what it's doing." I was informed that it looked like the mushroom cloud over Hiroshima. I subsequently attempted to get it to look a little less like massive destruction.
Today, in class, we watched a video. I had seen it before. That didn't change how much I love it. And then, since we are studying Ireland and our teacher is big on kinetic learning, we sat down and drew celtic knotwork. Really, really simple knotwork. I and one of my friends were pointed out as resource people for this drawing, since we'd both done it before. I had to keep qualifying myself to my classmates. "I've been drawing since I was three. I'm not especially talented, I just have nineteen years of practice." After that, we all got taught to dance a jig step. During this, several of my classmates latched onto me as a guide for what to do. We were moving and I was grinning and giggling a little, and it felt good to get up and move and be jumping from side to side and making loud noises on the floor. I didn't really realize that I was encouraging and guiding my classmates until, with my back turned, I heard someone say "I'm just watching what Rori's feet do." Some time during the dancing, the teacher informed me that I was "Perfect, of course."
I was... pretty taken aback. I didn't feel like I was doing it perfect. I didn't feel like I was good enough to be followed. I felt like I was a lumbering bull with jiggling fatty bits and clumsy steps and clunky boots and shin-splints and bouncing hair. But I had done it before. The steps had stuck with me. The rhythms were something that had been engrained into me since childhood (Thanks, mom!), and I felt confident enough in my own skin to get up there in the middle of class and help the other students learn to dance.
Come to think of it, this year has been the best I've felt in my body since I was very small. Yes, I'm on the heavy side. Yes, I have these strange jiggly bits hanging off the front of me (even with a chest binder. They're huge. They jiggle.). Yes, I'm tall and gawky and more likely to fall flat on my face than successfully get off the bus or god forbid dance. But I am feeling good in my own skin. I am beginning to be able to see what I look like in a mirror.
I think it was Zoie who said it, years ago. "Sure, you're kinda average as a girl, but DAMN do you make a hot guy." As a girl, the best I could be described as is "Plain". But as a boy, not only do I look better, but I FEEL better, which I'm sure contributes. Sure, I'm jiggly and have hair like an Axolotl when I wear a hat, and like a mushroom cloud when I don't, but that's okay, because I think Axolotl(s?) are adorable, and mushroom clouds are a sure sign of great and terrible destruction, which, as anyone who knows me will tell you, is sure to follow once I step into a room. And I can draw. I can draw because I've been drawing for nineteen years. There are things I'm not good at. I'm not good at the guitar. I'm not good at running, and I can't do a cartwheel.
I'm not perfect. But I'm working on it. All it takes is practice. "Practice makes perfect", right? I'll get back to you on that in nineteen years.
Monday, January 24, 2011
Who says I personify everything I own...? >.>
Meredith is my Ukulele, a Makai Tenor, and I haven't gotten to know her enough yet, except to know that she's a lower-class island girl who works in a colonial household around 1880, and loves to wear a Trumpet Flower in her hair.
Rozalynd is my Violin. She's the second Violin I've had, after Andromeda, who now belongs at Leslie and will soon be given a new name. Rozie is a Proper English Lady who is really a wild Irish girl pulling a con on the English Aristocracy. She's in the middle of a wild love affair with her Sikh bodyguard Jassa Singh, who happens to be---
My guitar. He is strong, cryptic, and silent until you get him singing. Like Meredith, I don't know much about him yet, mostly because I'm not that practised on him yet.
Tess (Short for Tesora Tesla Jones) is my Tattoo machine. She's a 25-year-old artist from San Francisco in the mid-seventies, who took her grandmother's diamond earrings and put one of them through her bottom lip. She gave the other to her girlfriend, with whom she lives.
.... Like I said, I don't personify EVERYTHING, I mean it's not like my Bike (Her name is Kitten)... Er, bad example... Or my piggy bank Thomas... Erm... My Stuffed octopus Kefka... Uh... My sewing machine Eatsneedles... My iPod Aiwë or my computer Sam... Well my boots don't have a name and personality! ....Yet...
Saturday, January 8, 2011
New Boots - Why I Am Not A Good Son.
My grandfather is to this day my hero. He was a navigator in a bomber in WWII, and broke his neck bailing out his plane when it was shot down. He landed behind enemy lines, and spent -- if I am remembering this right -- 18 months in a POW camp, trying to dig his way out and smuggling the sand outside in his pantlegs.
Now, I have a long and glorious history of being the only child/grandchild/etc. interested in the things that my family has to pass down. As the only child interested in hearing his stories, I was given a wealth of knowledge and fascinating adventure stories. I was told about smuggling sand out of the camp. I was told about shaving chocolate bars into wormy porridge to make it easier to eat, and how the prisoners ended up stronger and healthier than the guards, who were given porridge without worms, and therefore without protein. I was told all sorts of things.
I'm not sure if this hero worship is what contributed to the child of a pair of hippies ending up sitting in a coffee shop in a Marine field jacket and Israeli combat boots writing a comic about sky pirates and the british airship navy. However, it has been remarked that I was born for Military Chic. And I know that this pisses off my parents to no end.
My mother sat down in front of the troop trains and protested at ports. My father can be seen flashing a peace sign in his highschool graduation photo. I myself am an anti-military, hardcore pacifist.
And yet I love to look the part of the tired nam vet. I look considerably better in olive drab and russet brown than I do in tie-dye, and my favourite bag is a medic satchel. I am tall and have shoulders that would fit better on someone six inches taller. I hate looking like a hippie. I do not fit in the aesthetic that they have cultivated. Long hair doesn't really look right at this point, tie-dye just makes me look like I got caught in a holi celebration, ripped clothing looks... awkward... and sandals... just no.
But about the boots.
I have been searching for the prefect boots for years. I think I finally found them. Black, nine-eyelets, shined so bright you can practically see your reflection in it, and I love them. Among other things, they complete my look. Beyond that, they're waterproof, warm, full of traction, and make me feel like my grandfather is smiling at me.
At some point, I think I have to make a comic out of my grandfather's stories, if I can delve back to when I was eight and remember them.
Now, I have a long and glorious history of being the only child/grandchild/etc. interested in the things that my family has to pass down. As the only child interested in hearing his stories, I was given a wealth of knowledge and fascinating adventure stories. I was told about smuggling sand out of the camp. I was told about shaving chocolate bars into wormy porridge to make it easier to eat, and how the prisoners ended up stronger and healthier than the guards, who were given porridge without worms, and therefore without protein. I was told all sorts of things.
I'm not sure if this hero worship is what contributed to the child of a pair of hippies ending up sitting in a coffee shop in a Marine field jacket and Israeli combat boots writing a comic about sky pirates and the british airship navy. However, it has been remarked that I was born for Military Chic. And I know that this pisses off my parents to no end.
My mother sat down in front of the troop trains and protested at ports. My father can be seen flashing a peace sign in his highschool graduation photo. I myself am an anti-military, hardcore pacifist.
And yet I love to look the part of the tired nam vet. I look considerably better in olive drab and russet brown than I do in tie-dye, and my favourite bag is a medic satchel. I am tall and have shoulders that would fit better on someone six inches taller. I hate looking like a hippie. I do not fit in the aesthetic that they have cultivated. Long hair doesn't really look right at this point, tie-dye just makes me look like I got caught in a holi celebration, ripped clothing looks... awkward... and sandals... just no.
But about the boots.
I have been searching for the prefect boots for years. I think I finally found them. Black, nine-eyelets, shined so bright you can practically see your reflection in it, and I love them. Among other things, they complete my look. Beyond that, they're waterproof, warm, full of traction, and make me feel like my grandfather is smiling at me.
At some point, I think I have to make a comic out of my grandfather's stories, if I can delve back to when I was eight and remember them.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)