Advent Blog: The End

Have a fabulous Christmas.

I've made it to the end of my little experiment, there's nothing like a deadline to make you fill in a blank white box. It's led to me posting as much in the past month than over the previous two years.

Thanks for reading.

Fraught

In some homes this time of year can be stressful and fraught with others having arguments or worse while others are cuddled up watching people having a miserable time on Eastenders. Don't keep it all in, there are many people out there who can help.

Man In a Dress

I am relatively new to the Kardashian/ Jenner media circus mainly because I don't watch/ listen/ read those kinds of outlets, however the transition of Caitlin Jenner led to coverage in the sorts of media I do stumble upon. The latest "man in a dress" comments to Time magazine and subsequent apology show that while she has raised awareness of being trans, she should not be treated as a speaker for all trans people.

Then I'm X

In my forthcoming benign dictatorship I am going to make trans critics who use any variation on the "if they're a man/ woman than I'm X" a crime punishable by a swift whack using a hardback copy of the Bumper book of tired, trite and tedious criticisms with the option of being made to be X forever.

Junk In Your Trunk

A certain festival in Australia has merited comment for its trans exclusion policies regarding pre op M to F trans, again it all seems to boil down to genitals. It's sad to have to keep mentioning that what "junks in your trunks" doesn't make your gender and above all its none of your business.

Elsewhere I got past my first and only Christmas 'do', a touch of enforced frivolity and average food but not the boredom fest I feared.

Have a good weekend.

The Not So Bad Photographer

I was trying to find a photo of myself in tights to illustrate (or possibly to de-illustrate) the last post and it was several years ago, badly lit and a hint of red eye possibly to coordinate with my tights. At the risk of reciting trans cliché #1142 I don't take as many photos of myself as I once did but the ones I do take are hopefully  better partly because the cameras better and partly practice. Perhaps the magical (and mythical) 10,000 hour rule.

Colourful Tights

Included in the things this blog likes its, jaffa cakes, that video of William Shatner singing Rocket Man, dresses with pockets, The Simpsons (seasons 1 - 9), black tights and colourful tights.

Why are colourful tights a good thing?

1. They add some colour to a black dress/ outfit.
2. The right colour can enhance a pastoral coloured outfit.
3. It brightens up a winter outfit. 

Pain Killers

The pain relief brand Nurofen has been in the news recently after being found guilty in Australia of misleading consumers by selling products for specific ailments(for back pain, period pain etc)at a higher price despite being identical. Alongside the deeply unethical marketing of ripping off consumers in pain it also makes the claim that it is better than standard painkillers, which is one of the complaints the ASA in the UK are investigating. Generic paracetamol and ibuprofen products are around 80% cheaper than branded products and are subject to the same regulatory testing.

It is also worth pointing out a recent study in the US revealed that nearly doctors and pharmacists surveyed take generic, unbranded products when they need pain relief.

Soft Play

For reasons I don't quite understand I ended up being the "adult" taking my nieces and nephew to a indoor soft play centre. Given the alternative was to trail round a damp retail park and queueing being surrounded by hundreds of noisy kids running about really didn't seem that bad. My main job was to look after a two year old who figured out how to walk early, started running soon after and has barely stopped since. 

At this point I had to take my shoes off and realised that I didn't pick the best pair I could find, instead doing what I usually do which is putting on the first matching pair I could find and feeling terribly self conscious about it that afternoon.

Black Tights and Dazzling Dresses

Hello, I still haven't bought my metallic dress mainly after realising that I'm running out of storage space, by the time I find a time to wear it, the style will have long since fallen out of fashion and if I did someone else would probably be wearing the same thing resulting in a tense but dazzling stand off. I haven't bought a Christmas jumper either, though that's because I've put it on my list of trends that need to die alongside cupcake chic, keep calm merchandise and that a retailers Christmas ad is an event to be previewed and given acres of comment.

Talking of fashion I saw pieces on black tights, including The Guardian website a few months ago, about a socially acceptable time to start wearing and suggesting not wearing them was to do with wealth and age. Total nonsense of course black tights can be worn all year round and there are good reasons for doing so, they can complement an outfit, hide blemishes or the fact they're a bit hairy and hides your knickers.

Care Of Trans Prisoners

After the death of two transgender prisoners a review into their care in England and Wales has been announced, my understanding of the current rules is that inmates are assigned according to the legal sex on their birth certificate, however it can be based on who you identify as.

My concern is that both were placed in all male prisons despite strong evidence to the contrary that even the most gender blind person couldn't ignore and how did the decision process or lack of leed to what seems to me a strange decision.

Still On About Toilets

Toilets are not sexy, there's a suggestion in popular culture that sex in a bathroom is a great thing. It's supposed to be passionate and impulsive and while they are good things any amore would surely be killed looking at even the best maintained loo. Especially a airplane loo where there's clear evidence someone can't exercise hose control and there's barely enough room for one person to move about let alone two.

Advent Blog: Day 8

I have eventually fixed the toilet seat.

Suffering from the lurgy and a deadline to prepare for hence the shortness.

The Wobbley Seat of Time

 Hello

There are things that need doing but if they're not done right away get tolerated for a long time. For example writing a new blog entry after a self imposed weekend hiatus. The clock on my phone, which had replaced a watch as my personal timepiece several handsets ago, was five to six minutes fast, all it took was to go into settings, scroll down to date and time then spool back five minutes and press OK. A task that takes you longer to read then for me to do and yet I left it so long I got used to it. Another is the slightly wobbly toilet seat which we lived with here for an incredible amount of time so long the chance a male Ashley Madison subscriber might have come across the profile of a genuine female user increases from impossible to very very unlikely.

Advent Blog: Day Four

I grew up in the death throws of the old or classic run of Doctor Who and Mel was the first companion I remember before leaving to be replaced by the fabulous Ace. I leave this super cut of Bonnie Langford screaming, hopefully to be heard in Albert Square soon.

Advent Blog: Day Three

To answer yesterday's question, I can hear the reply "try working in a shop over Christmas". Which is fair enough, I have worked in a shop but never in one which played the same small number of tracks constantly for as much as two months.

Advent Blog: Day Two

Too early to start the sleigh list?

Advent Blog: Day One

Welcome to December and the first of my advent blogs. In what seems like a good idea now I will post every weekday between now and Christmas. Yes I've kinda coped out a little by giving myself the weekend off but much like the calendar at work, I'll open three windows on Monday.

I've seen others attempt this and they tend to tail off half way though and I may be about to find out why. If you have any ideas about what I should post please leave a message below, or to put it another way, HELP!

Proteins

November, the month where a constant flurry of leaves fall on the path, especially shortly after you've swept the last downfall. Most of the nearby trees have shead, though there's one stubbornly grasping on to most of its leaves refusing to acknowledge the seasons changed.
So analysis revealed a number of vegetarian sausages had meat in them which probably makes them more meaty than many actual sausages. Personally i've always hated sausages even when I ate meat and never see the point of trying to make vegetarian foods look like ersatz meat.
If only I had a pound everytime someone asked me a question about protein as if it's only in meat. Well I wouldn't have a lot, but more than enough to fill a basket with good protein rich foods.

Gummy Bears

Hello, its certainly feeling autumnal, I'm currently still ignoring the message on the corner of my screen to get Windows 10, but bless them for thinking Cortana is a selling point. The tomato plant produced a half decent crop despite being left outside to face the worst the west country summer could throw at it. I may get overconfident next year and grow strawberries. Also I've found gelatin free gummy bears, so its all great here.

I haven’t had the opportunity to go out much recently and when it has arisen I’ve been far too tired and run down to do anything about it. So the nearest there’s been these past two months is going though my wardrobe seeing what styles work on me and checking it still fits. I’ve also weeded a few items into my everyday wardrobe which as well as giving me extra choice, helps ease dysphoria.

My Greatest Weakness

Hello, how are you?

What is your greatest weakness?

How on earth do you answer a question like that? Well the textbook answer would be to describe how you had a weakness but overcame it. Another way would be the pat "well I work too hard" or make them regret asking and start listing them one by one. I suspect they really don't want to know your weakness much like that time you were asked how you were doing and spent 20 minutes talking about your hay feever and allergies, while they looked increasingly desperate to move away while making the mental note never to ask you anything ever again. It's hard for most people to admit any vulnerability even if they recognise them. My personal wall is quite sturdy but it has its weak points and I'm going to do my best not to tell someone whose going to have a position of authority over me.

So what's the point? You'll have to ask the asker.

Charity Bin

Hello, being busy, which is not a bad thing.

I'm also a year older and a year further away from partying long into the night, although come to think of it, I never was that person. So what to do on an idle Saturday night, lie on the settee and eat a cheesecake while searching for a good film on tv or try on a few dresses and outfits. They all still fit, though not all work on me and have been moved on to a charity bin. They were not expensive purchases more Primark than premium and its good to have a regular check, if only to give the wardrobe breathing space.

One big story was Vanity Fair deciding to put a 65 year old, from some programme I don't watch, on their cover, for some reason this kept a lot of trans commentators in work and lets hope it leads to many more older people, especially women, becoming more visible on magazine covers not just those they mocked up themselves.

May

We are already into May, daylight in the evening and spring cleaning. So for the first time in a while the desk I'm writing on was not cluttered with assorted leads, bits of paper, cups and dozens of totally random things. I've also been going through my email in-boxes deleting things like old Amazon receipts from the mid 2000's (did I really pay that much for a 4gb memory stick). I also found some old photos I squirreled away and thought were lost to time. Including some early photo's of me in a blond wig (so cliché, I know), and my first time out, which I've written about before, to drift into trans cliche #427, I don't take as many pictures as I did.

Also at the moment its hard to move without running into a senior politician paying some visit into town, along with the resulting delays and obstructions. Both seats in this town are marginal constituencies meaning locals have a disproportionate influence in who governs Britain, so God help the rest of Britain. Not that Swindonians have been using this opportunity, being more likely to moan about the long delays it causes. It's not as though they'd be able to get anywhere near them if they did.

Personally I've already made up my mind and sent away my postal vote, not out of any love for them, more out of dislike for the other lot.

Face\Off

Seeing the Facebook ads, I'm not sure who they're trying to get on-board, surely we've reached peak Facebook and those who haven't, will never have an account much like those few remaining people who don't have a mobile phone wear the fact that they don't have a mobile like a badge of pride.

Visiting again recently I'm reminded of all the things that bug me about the site, the constant prompting to spill out your life history, interests and location. The fact it insists it knows what news it wants to show on its feed better than you. That it wants you to treat brands as friends. I consider Coca-Cola a very successful company over many years that sells many brands including a sticky sugary liquid which also comes in a cherry variety I like, alongside very well storied anti union practises and environmental abuses. Not a friend I want to have a interaction with.

Admittedly most of these complaints could be targeted at any social media site or social media in general. I add finally, so as not to appear that I'm some grumpy middle aged person, recently I saw a video about parents of trans children using social media for help, advice and support and I could pick on many other examples.

Coate

After my body has finished every fevery, ache and my nose discharges the last of what has felt like litres of snot. I took a walk round Coate on the eastern edge of town. Unlike my friend my choice of footwear wasn't entirely suitable for the muddy areas not entirely wrong like the individual who attempted to climb a mountain in a pair of flip flops but I could have chosen better. That said it's a perfectly delightful walk anytime of the year.

 

These days the only creatures on the diving board are birds, nobody has been allowed to leap off for many years because of safety though some have tried since especially during a heat wave, I presume thats the reason for the small wall added at the bottom. Its a listed building as an example of inter war diving platforms and a recognisable landmark.

There Should Be Some Bad Pun Involving Breasts Here

It was 30 years ago BBC One were showing Miss United Kingdom presented by Tom O'Connor, soon afterwards the incoming controller Michael Grade dropped all beauty contests from the channel recognising the nation's tastes had changed and BBC television had to modernise with it. Today the nation's tastes have moved away from topless photographs of women compared to the days when beauty contests attracted big ratings on British TV and Page Three in The Sun became so wildly popular even The Daily Mirror briefly introduced its own version.

Long suffering readers of this blog may remember I wrote about the anti Page Three campaign a few years ago, and my opinion hasn't changed it seems only to remain out of stubbornness. Nor is it anti feminist to defend Page Three. Although some seek to dismiss opponents with valid points of topless photos by using words like feminazi I feel like giving up and changing my mind. There should be a special version of Godwins law which not only means your argument is lost but a hand comes out the screen and slaps you. I would like to call it Lucy's law, because I'm egotistical like that.

Resolutions Without Snappy Titles

As I've previously noted January is a rotten time to make resolutions. In this north Atlantic island it still is dark and gloomy for the majority of the day instead of people taking a dry January, presumably after feeling guilty about the previous month how about a sensible amount, possibly within recommended alcohol intake guidelines December and January. Though I'd probably have to slim it down to a catchy two words. The same goes for getting fit. My resolutions are continuations of resolutions I made last year.

• Don't make any resolutions in January.
• Don't feed trolls especially responding to anything Katie Hopkins says (I wish the local paper would do the same).
• Only share or retweet when you've watched or read the thing. I frequently come across many who I  suspect don't.
• Celebrate sensible amount, possibly within recommended alcohol intake guidelines December and January. (still haven't come up with a snappier title).
• Stick to pay as you go gym facilities as you're never going to use a membership often enough for it to be cost effective and then there's the pain of having to cancel the contract.

RIP

Over the Christmas holidays came the sad news of the death of the Rev. Carol Stone, around the turn of the millennium she attracted local and then national attention for being the first vicar to transition and then return to the job. The Swindon Advertiser at the time carried a few quotes critical from a conservative Anglican group but those within the parish were almost all supportive of someone who had only been posted there only a few years earlier. Certainly being within the area I can recall the gossip but also the support and an circling of the wagons to protect her from all the media interest. Over the years apart from marrying and christening my relatives, she added a neighboring parish and became a respected figure across the town. It is a tragic and all too early loss to community life across Swindon and especially to her family.

MMXV

Time to get the 2015 segment in the right hand column up and running, not to mention start to my efforts to post more than I did last year.

A happy new year to all my readers.

Now where are those hoverboards?