A Grand Day Out

Today I had a nice time out by myself.  After the upheavals of the last few months, I've needed some alone time, and a shopping trip was the perfect excursion.

My shift at work ended at 1300, and I had previously asked my sister if she would take me to a bookstore.  There's a Borders just down the road from the hotel.  In case you haven't heard, Borders are going out of business, and everything in their stores must go.  Books and other merchandise are 50-70% off, and I decided to take advantage.  I wandered around there for about an hour, and ended up with six paperbacks (various titles from the Warhammer 40K series The Horus Heresy, two trade paperbacks (William Gibson and Charles de Lint), a three-pack of pink and black fuzzy socks and a woven black and white checked tote bag (which I bought so I wouldn't have to lug around plastic shopping bags.  My total there came to $62 and change, for merchandise which would've originally retailed for over $100.  I didn't think I was doing too bad, but I wasn't finished.

I knew my sister wasn't going to be coming back for another hour or so, so I texted her to let her know I was going to walk down the road to Governor's Square Mall.  I've only been to that mall once before, so I spent a few minutes perusing the directory posted just inside the entrance.  I walked around the upper level until I found a salon called Brow Art.  I used to get my brows waxed when I got my manicures or pedicures, but I haven't had regular salon service since just after I left my last position.

At Brow Art, they remove hair by threading.  That was somewhat like being waxed, but different.  For one thing, it hurt a little more.  The effect was nice, but I think they left my brows a little heavier than I prefer.  I can always go back and ask them to thin me out some more.

After the salon, I walked around and window-shopped a bit.  I saw lots of pretty clothes, but I was trying to save my money for other things.  I did try on a couple of pairs of heels at Payless, including a pair of those shoes that are so popular lately, with the 5.5-inch heels and a platform under the toe.  My GM runs around all day in those, and I often wonder how she does it.  I don't really want a pair of those right now (Yes I do!), but I wanted to reassure myself that I could walk in shoes like that if I wanted to.

My next port of call was GameStop.  I discovered last week that my Xbox 360 isn't dead (it only overheated), so I bought a previously-owned copy of Halo: Reach, a game which my brother hooked me on while I've been hanging out in Havana.  Using the gift card I won at the company Christmas party last year, I only had to spend $12.  Very cool.

Cruising through the center court of the mall brought me to the MAC Cosmetics kiosk.  I could have blown the rest of my paycheck there, but I held myself to just a couple of items.  When I still had a femme profile pic on Facebook, one of my new friends commented that I needed better beard cover.  I fielded several recommendations, and one I got the most often was a newer MAC product called Studio Tech Foundation.  My beard had come in a bit since I shaved this morning, but Whitney (my artist) found a patch where it was still smooth, and worked the foundation in, combined with Prep+Prime/Skin, a primer.  I've found that eye shadow stays on better if I apply primer first, so it stands to reason that the same might apply with foundation.   Under the combination of products, my beard shadow disappeared.   I've found another favorite product, I think.  It's more expensive than the drug store brands, but not as pricey as the Lancome stuff I bought a couple of years ago.  I can't wait to try it out.

I window-shopped a bit more, but my sister texted to say she was on her way, and she met me outside the entrance a few minutes later.  It was a good trip, "A Grand Day Out" (if I may steal from Wallace and Gromit).  I felt the most like myself that I have in a very long time.  I went out dressed in men's clothing, but I went wherever I wanted, enjoyed my experiences, and spent a nice couple of hours wandering around in the air conditioning.  I've got to do this more often.

What Fresh Hell Is This?

Apparently, that how Dorothy Parker answered the telephone.  Supposedly it originated when someone interrupted her train of thought, but she ended up using it as a greeting, to answer the phone or the door.  I might have to try it.

In any case, it's been a long month.  I've been banging out resumes to anyone with an open position, and so far all I've received was one response, a politely-worded "Thanks, but the position has been filled."  I'm beginning to wonder if it's time to change professions.  I've not worked in any business but hotels since 1998.  I've got no degrees, so it's mostly been one long series of working the same job over and over, with little to no hope of advancement.  I'd go back to school, but no one will finance my education until I pay off my debts, including a student loan which dates back to 1991.

My sister (ex-in-law, whatever) suggested I shift my job search south, as her husband is doing.  She suggested Panama City and Orlando (the vacation capital of America).  Both have some nice positions open, but most of the ads I saw are only taking walk-in applicants.  I don't have access to a vehicle now (Vicki sold her van), so I can't exactly drive to either place to apply.  Since I came to Florida, I've had the feeling that Tallahassee was only a way station, that I'm meant to travel further south.  Orlando, or even Miami would put me much closer to a lot of trans-friendly business and support structures, too.

If I don't find another job soon, I'll have to vacate the guest house and move back in with my sister.  She ditched the big house in December and moved her brood into a double-wide by the airport.  She's getting ready to oust a housemate next month, so I might be able to move into my own room again.

The day I lost my job, I did a little shopping.  A trip to the mall yielded a new purse from Burlington Coat Factory, and at Game Stop I found a used copy of Halo 3: ODST.  I originally wrote a little about this game back in 2009, but I sidestepped it in my anticipation of Mass Effect 2.  I haven't had much else to do in the last few weeks, and the game has eaten up lots of hours.
 
Deprived of a vehicle, I've been doing a lot of walking.  The shopping center with a Publix grocery store and my favorite nail salon is 2.8 miles from my current residence.  A Walmart SuperCenter is 3.3 miles away, in the other direction.  Daytime temps have reached the seventies, so the walking's been good.  Twice people driving by have honked their horns and waved at me, but they were traveling too fast for me to see who they were.  I suppose they might have been some people I used to work with at the hotel, but I didn't see them.  Today a dude drove by shouting something derogatory.  I didn't hear the words, but I'd know that tone anywhere.  Again, he whizzed by at 50 mph, and I have no idea what he said or why.  I just went about my business.

Holiday Greetings from Jabba the Hutt

This is actually a couple of weeks old, and it's now the day after Christmas, but I posted the Muppet version of "Carol of the Bells" last year, and I didn't think I should go another year without something holiday-themed, so I present this little gem, courtesy of Paul and Storm:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dWqthNlzoEI

On a related note, I met my niece's boyfriend's nephew yesterday. He's a little 7 month-old boy named "Jaxom", who was named for the character from Anne McCaffrey's Dragonriders of Pern series. His mother was so impressed that I knew who she named her son after. I told her I was well-versed in the "classics".

A Postcard from the Wall

I haven't been posting a lot lately, and I apologize. The truth is there hasn't been a lot to write about. I'm stuck in another of my ruts. I go to work. I come home, where I sleep, eat, read, use the internet, and play the 360. There is some variety as to what order I do those things in, but it's the same shit day in and out, and it's wearing me down again. I've been back to work about a month, and that's great, but work is only one part of what it takes to make me whole, and a lot of the rest is missing.

It's strange. On the outside, I feel fine. In fact, I feel pretty good. A couple of days ago, I stepped onto a scale for the first time in a year or more, and discovered that I'm not nearly as heavy as I thought. I'm still a little large for my size, but I'm down fifteen pounds from the last time I weighed myself, and that's no mean feat, especially for one who likes to snack as I do.

Underneath the surface, though, I'm a mass of roiling despair. You know that Nietzsche quote about gazing into the abyss? I wish I could see that. At least I'd know something was looking back at me from the black. Some days I feel as though I could end it. I've always viewed suicide as the coward's way out, and I am not a coward, but there are days when it's a chore just to get out of bed. Sometimes I just can't see the point anymore. There's just no joy in my life right now.

It's not that there's no pleasure at all. On the contrary, I've found plenty of little things to carry me along. I've been building a Youtube playlist of the songs I've heard at work. Give it a listen, and maybe you'll get a sense of the sounds of my job.

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=29B52928D441DE51

Six weeks or so ago, both of the outside cats here went into heat, and the kittens are now in the process of being farmed out. The family are keeping a couple, and one of the little critters has glommed onto me, so maybe Spot won't be an only child anymore.

I've been reading some good books lately. The latest is horror/thriller novel entitled Feed. You can read all about it here:

http://www.thefeedbook.com/

Imagine a time in which blogs take over the news from the traditional media outlets. I won't give away the plot or premise of the book, but the gist of it is that a major, civilization-ending catastrophe arises, and the traditional news sources drop the ball, leaving internet-based media to pick up the slack and keep people informed. After a time, blogs become the news medium of choice. I'd like to write something like that, but I'm having trouble keeping this up. That brings me to a logical conclusion.

I think I'm going to step back from this blog for a while. I'm not quitting. I just need to sort some things out. I called this my "Trans Blog", but lately it's become a clearing house for whatever is on my mind, and lately that's a whole lot of nothing. I'll come back when I have a better idea of what my place is here. It might be next week, or further out, but I will return.

Self Publishing Gone Hideously Awry

I saw this posted in a hobby forum under the title "Self Publishing Gone Hideously Awry". If you click through the title, it takes you to an Amazon page for a woman selling her own self-published religious tome.

What do customers ultimately buy after viewing this item?

"Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: The Classic Regency Romance - Now With Ultraviolent Zombie Mayhem!"

I'm Back On!

I'm blogging from work again! This might be a short-lived return, but I'll take it for all it's worth. This long night might not be so long after all. It's Friday night (Saturday morning, really), the weekend after Labor Day, and the hotel is DEAD. I just finished the USA Today weekend edition crossword puzzle, and all I had left to me was the next few chapters of Sam Harris' The End of Faith: Religion, Terror and the Future of Reason. It's a good, good book, but it's dry material.

Anyway, on with the blogging.

Edit: It was indeed short-lived. I forgot that there's a window of twenty minutes or so when the network resets itself. During that twenty minutes, the Internet connection doesn't interface with WebSense, and anything goes. Or it did.

God's Demon

This was originally meant to be incorporated into the previous post, but I forgot. I fell out with Christianity a long time ago, but I have always been fascinated by its mythology. The Judeo-Christian concept of the War in Heaven is gripping stuff. I first heard of it in horror movies, but information in the Bible was scarce. When I was a junior in high school, we read Milton's Paradise Lost. For all that it was Renaissance poetry, written in imitation of classics like The Iliad, it read like a steampunk science fantasy novel. The first book, dealing with Lucifer and the Fall was riveting. The second book, dealing with Adam, Eve and the Fall of Man, was less so. I haven't read it in years, nor thought of it overmuch.

Last week while I was off, I trekked over to Churchland, to visit the Book Owl used book store. I had a pile of books taking up space, and I was looking for something new (to me at least) to read. I sort of tripped over God's Demon. The book was written and published in 2007 by the artist Wayne Barlowe. Some of you might be familiar with his earlier works, Barlowe's Guide to Extraterrestrials, or his alien travelogue Expedition. A more recent work was Barlowe's Inferno, which illustrated various places and personages of Hell. God's Demon grew out of that work. Sargatanas is a Demon Major, one of the angels who sided with Lucifer against Heaven. He is cruel and terrible, all of the things a Lord of Hell is meant to be, yet secretly he yearns for redemption, to return to the Above. Eventually he foments a rebellion in Hell, promising to lead any demon or human soul back to Heaven.

This isn't a review, as such, because I haven't finished the book. I just wanted to share. A word of warning, though. It is NOT for the faint of heart. There are scenes of stomach-churning intensity. There are some illustrations on the author's website, and extrapolating from those has given me fodder for many nightmares.

I suppose a link is in order.

http://www.godsdemon.com

Lots of Stuff to Come

It's only been two days since my last post, but it feels like it's been forever. Perhaps that's because of all that's happened in those last couple of days.

Thursday, I went to see Star Trek, so there will be review. I finished reading Charles de Lint's latest, The Mystery of Grace, and that means another review. Friday night, I went to the Eye of the Beholder art show at the Hershee Bar. Today, I spent all morning and most of the afternoon helping De move.

Somewhere in the middle, I completed the campaign in Halo 3.

Lots to talk about, and I will, but I have to work tonight, and if I don't catch a little nap in the middle here, I'll be no good to anyone.

Laters.

Book Review: Gender Outlaw

I picked up Kate Bornstein's Gender Outlaw the same night that I bought the aforementioned The Kiss Murder. I've been reading all sorts of fiction in the meantime, and reading Gender Outlaw when I was between other books. It goes that way sometimes for me and non-fiction, especially if the material is deep and philosophical. Boy, was this all that and more.

I read everything I could find about being transgendered when I was a teenager. There weren't too many books, but I worked in a library, so it was easier to find them. I wish I could say I found them inspiring, but in the main they were depressing. On the other end of the spectrum were books about crossdressers, mostly written by professionals. One library branch had a series of non-fiction books by Virginia Prince, the founder of Tri-Ess, but those weren't very helpful either. There were lots of helpful tips for passing, but there was always a caveat. Ms. Prince said that all crossdressers secretly wanted to be found out, so they'd leave tell-tales to aid in their discovery. Me, I was deathly afraid of anyone finding out, and the idea of setting myself up to be very disturbing.

In the inervening years, I found a few other titles: RuPaul's Lettin' It All Hang Out and Hiding My Candy, by the Lady Chablis (as seen in Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil). When I found these I was married, or very nearly so, and the stories were entertaining, but not as helpful for someone settling into quiet domesticity. At the end of my marriage, I discovered Jennifer Finney-Boylan's She's Not There. That was the last book by or about trans people I'd read, and that was nearly six years ago.

Gender Outlaw is not like any of these other books. It is Kate Bornstein's life story, in part, but it is also a manifesto on the concept of deconstructing the concept of gender. All of my life, I have looked at things in purely a male/female sense, never dreaming that there might be any way of thinking of things. If I'm not a man, then I must be a woman, right? But if I'm not a woman either, then what am I? "AAUGH!" as Charlie Brown used to say.

I wonder if I can wrap my head around the concept. For too long I've been rooted in the idea of two genders. Some of my friends at New Life call themselves genderqueer, and imply that they are neither. Then there are Kathy and LLLLL, who prefer to use neutral pronouns in place of the conventional he/him or she/her, they use ze/hir or ze/zir. I don't typically think of myself as being old, but I may be too old for this idea. Or not.

That said, the material is thought-provoking, and in that respect I think the book does its job. I can't stand it when I read a book that doesn't tell me anything new. No worries about that here.

Book Review: The Kiss Murder

I posted a few weeks back that I had bought a book entitled The Kiss Murder, by Turkish author Mehmet Murat Somer. I wasn't familiar with the author, but the premise was intriguing, that of a drag queen detective. I was in the middle of reading a fantasy series, Joe Abercrombie's "The First Law", so I set the book aside for when I finished. I'm waiting for the library to get the last Abercrombie, so I read The Kiss Murder.

The protagonist is nameless. He works as a computer programmer/hacker by day, and it part-owner/hostess of a drag club at night. One of his girls comes to him at the club in obvious distress. When she was younger, she had an affair with someone who has since become prominent in business or government. Now someone is trying to get her to help blackmail said person, because she collected notes and photos as mementos of the affair. Then the girl turns up murdered.

What follows is twisty. I had to read up on Turkey, because I didn't know much about the country, beyond the CIA World Factbook bits. They're a secular democracy, struggling against an undercurrent of the same kind of militant Islamism that is rampant in that part of the world. That there is a small but thriving trans community in this place is pleasantly surprising. While I don't know much about Turkey, I do know clubs, and drag queens. It wasn't hard to submerge myself in this environment. All my years working on the night shift in hotels have acquainted me with cab drivers and dancers and other less savory characters.

The story doesn't so much focus on an attempt to solve the crime. It's more of an account of the lead's interaction with the events. When the end comes, it's almost anti-climactic. Don't misunderstand; I did enjoy the book. I didn't know when I bought it, but there's actually another book which precedes this one: The Prophet Murders, about someone murdering transvestites (their words, not mine). I'll have to look for that one.

Back to the Book Store

I read in USA Today this week about the US publication of a mystery by Turkish author Mehmet Murat Somer, The Kiss Murder. The protagonist is a computer programmer by day, drag queen by night. I might not have read it, but I was intrigued by an interview with the author. He said that he wanted to create a series centered around a trans character who is depicted in a positive light. I was delighted to find it in stock at a local Barnes & Noble. After my last experience, I reserved the book at the store, and I went out tonight to pick it up. I decided to have a look around the store, and I also picked up Kate Bornstein's Gender Outlaw. I'm in the middle of reading a fantasy novel right now, Joe Abercrombie's The Blade Itself, but at least I won't run out of reading material for some time.