Suddenly I'm Miss Farrah Fawcett from TV

Welcome, We love you, We hate you, We love you

I'm too shell-shocked to write a blistering commentary on whatever seedy activites I've been engaging in recently. Eh. But I can't help but think that if I force myself to start typing, some inevitable anecdote or memory will come spilling out.

Would you confess if we asked that you nurture the urge to declare that it’s time to settle down with a man of your own?

My sense of time is all fucked up and really shitty (like Prodigy's attitude). I forgot all about Real World and other fun tv shows last night. I keep forgetting to set my alarm at night and consequently that I must go to work the next. I forget that it's already July and in about one week I'm going on vacation. Sometimes I even forget that it's 2002. I can't believe it's been 10 years since Bill Clinton got elected and before that when I taped the newspaper profiles of all the candidates on the back of my bedroom door. I studied all the information and decided my personal favorite was Paul Tsongas. But damn if I can remember exactly why. He later dropped out because of health issues -- I remember hearing the news while watching tv in the middle of the night in a stranger's guest room in upstate New York. I was on a church choir trip.

Shut your mouth, try not to panic

I do well with travelling because I did it so much as a teenager, often "by myself", which means with a large group of other teenagers and counselor chaperones. But no family or close friends were there, and since I wasn't terribly popular, I often functioned on my own. If I forgot pajamas or lost my toothbrush or ran out of money, I learned how to problem solve out of sheer shame and embarassment and unwillingness to appear vulnerable and uncool in front of anyone else. I'm still really good at travelling and problem-solving, but more because I'm experienced and prepared and laidback.

Give’em what they want, what they want to see and you could be a big star, you could go far

I'm also still motivated by shame and fear of appearing to not 'be together'. It's part of the reason why I rarely ask for directions (though that's also motivated by my belief that I'm never truly lost, paired with the sense of adventure and desire to find the answer on my own. Seriously. I sometimes don't ask for directions for the same reason why I don't want someone to tell me the answer to a brainteaser -- I want to figure it out myself). And the only reason any task ever gets accomplished at work is because I don't want to be perceived as dumb or incapable. I don't have true personal motivation to complete the tasks.

We know your music but of course we'd never buy it, it’s too fake man

I'm obsessed with the idea of having words tattooed on my body. I nearly freaked when I saw the Memento and he took off his shirt. I was probably drooling and staring and creaming myself all at the same time. But most of my words are too fleeting, so I end up dealing in images. People often suggest I get japanese characters of words, but not only does that seem inappropriate since I have not cultural connection to the language, but also it defeats the purpose of having the words. I want people around me to be able to read it easily. I'm just not sure what I want to tell them yet.

I wanted to say something, Oh shut your mouth

Maybe I'll just have someone write "I'm trans" on my back, just like in the pride parade on Sunday.

Call me Norma Rae. But not.

I work for a non-profit. A non-profit who does good work I can stand behind and generally be proud of my affiliation with the organization. A pretty well-known non-profit, at least within the civil rights and queer community, though heavily misunderstood and underestimated. The pay is decent, but not great. But I don't mind too much because I can do things like wear sandals and shorts, get 4 weeks of vacation plus sick time per year, transition on the job, have a mohawk, and work with groundbreaking genius attorneys. And normally, it's an organization that if a holiday falls on a Thursday or a Tuesday, they generally throw in the Friday or Monday as a gift of a paid holiday. This year, they did NOT do this with July 4th, because the holiday fell very close to our "Day After Pride" paid holiday - instead they offered us the 'choice' of taking the day after pride OR taking off July 5th. Headquarters selected Friday. Our office selected Monday. I figured if I worked on Friday it would be quiet and boring and a near holiday.

I was slightly irked by their lack of generosity, but you can't really be mad at someone for not giving you something they're under no obligation to offer.

Another nicety of the office is that generally the day before a holiday or holiday weekend, they close the offices early, usually we'll get a call around noon saying we can go home at 3 pm. It's 3:45 and we haven't gotten that call yet. So as a silent protest, I decided to stop working at 3 pm. Sure, you may wonder whether I generally do work after 3 pm anyway, but yes, I sometimes do. In fact my current pattern is to get the most work done between 3 and 5 because it makes the latter half of the workday go faster. But not today. Today I'm cleaning out my e-mailbox and losing tournament games online.

I'm also drinking an iced mocha from Starbucks. I pretty much hate Starbucks. Partly for political and economic reason, but possibly more because I generally hate the clientale. I always got a creeped out feeling about the place, before I even learned about the whole free-trade coffee issues as well as the whole mass corporate takeover of every mall, town and city in America. I sometimes use political reasons as an excuse as to why I just feel weird going there. Plus, I only think they're coffee is okay. I'm more of a diner coffee drinker -- a good strong cup of folgers with some half-and-half can please me.

But my co-worker went out for coffee treats and offered to pay, so I decided to get one -- hey, it's not my money going to them. I learned this trick from Geek Friend who used to eat my cheetos and drink my Pepsi during class breaks of our sculpture class. She wouldn't use her money to support Pepsicola, but she would take a swig of the one my money purchased. Interesting theory.

She's probably found her way into Seattle now. I'll miss seeing her around. When my other Lesbian Friends moved out to Seattle I could sort of pretend they were still around but we just hadn't called each other in awhile (even though I used to have lunch with one of them a couple times a month). But now I can't really keep up the charade. I miss them a lot and need to find a way to Seattle sometime very soon so I can visit all of them. Geek Friend, if you're reading this, you need to get a livejournal NOW.