I'd briefly considered not going to work today, but I don't want to use up all my sick days so quickly, and what's more, there was a big staff meeting I didn't want to miss. It was the unveiling (or, if the email could be believed, the unvailing) of the new structure of the company. My job is secure, as is everyone else's; it's just going to change, is all. At worst, I'll become a hardcore data-entry monkey. Which will suck in a lot of ways, but I'll still be getting paid twice as much to do a much cushier job than I had in Sausalito under The Bad Man. Officer Dave is running interference for me, however, and doing what he can before moving onto his other pastures to make sure that I'll actually have work which use my Mad Webmonkey Skillz, such as they are.

I'll also be getting my first performance review, after being with Nekkid Sore for going on ten months. Damn. If it feels to me like I started during another lifetime entirely, it because I did.

Keeping my fingers crossed for a raise, of course. Just goes to show that I didn't really learn my lesson from CNET; I've never quite abandoned the theory that one of the reasons they laid me off was because I got too expensive, and if I hadn't accepted every raise they gave me (and whooboy, were they extravagant in the way that only the dot-com bubble could allow), they wouldn't have shitcanned me. Which is silly, of course. But it's hard to shake. More realistically, I did my taxes last night. As I suspected would be the case, I owe for the first time, roughly five-sixths of a month's rent. So, yeah, cash influx would be a happy thing.

Which reminds me, while in the Haight last Saturday I went into Fluevog. Feeling lucky, I suppose. Almost got lucky, but not quite. Currently on sale is a style of boot, the Hughes, very similiar to my beloved, battered, and very unavailable Luckys. As I've bitched about before, the closest equivalent to my current/old pair is the Lucky Stud, which is really quite expensive. Not that the Hughes is cheap, but I can almost justify it. I tried it on, though, and it just didn't work. I could tell that the sole was too thin for the literally daily wear and tear I'd be putting them through, and perhaps because they were specifically a women's cut, even my proper size was still a smidgen too narrow for my big wide clown feet. Then there's the texture. I don't need my boots to be pre-cracked; I'll do a good enough job myself, thank you very much. So, still no new boots.

In case you're wondering why boots for daily wear, it goes like this: I'm tall, taller than I'd like to be. If I was a genetic girl it wouldn't be a problem (not as much, anyway), but as a tranny, I tend to feel like it's a giveaway. So, I've found that wearing tall boots helps me feel like my height is...equalized, for want of a better word. I know that long legs are supposed to be considered an asset, but I feel like in my case they just make it obvious that my body is out of proportion. It's how my brain works, okay? Ergo, boots.

Although I'm still icky and gross, Vash braved the Hot Zone, bringing me cold medicine and fresh veggies. She also made what she calls her "death tea," including lemon, garlic, ginger and hot peppers. Pretty damn good, actually, and I'm not a tea drinker by nature. Best of all, she'd just come from an appointment at the cosmetology institute. She now has bright red streaks in her hair, and it looks really good on her. As most things do.

I was half-expecting to be asked to hide my dead Vectrex machine on eyesore grounds, but wasn't. As Sister Edith pointed out, it's not like I'm playing pr0n on it, so there's no problem. If there was Vectrex pr0n, however, it would probably look like this.

My cold has returned with a minor vengeance. What better way to enjoy the gorgeous weather than with congestion, a runny nose and an achey body? Fun.

5:40pm

The girls forced to work in cribs had a different lifestyle altogether awaiting them. They were not treated as humans. More often than not they were terribly abused, earned no money of their own, and were forced to work in the most dismal of conditions. Some cribs were little more than a prison cell with narrow doors and small, barred windows. The girls, called "sing song girls" were locked in and spent the day half-dressed trying to attract a customer's attention. They would call out from the doorway, "Two bittee lookee, flo bitteee feelee, six bittee, doee." If the girl did not bring in enough money she was beaten. These girls rarely left their dismal crib. The life span of a crib girl lasted about six years unless they were rescued by concerned social reformers. Because they lived a life with little hope or future, many of the girls ended their lives with narcotics or suicide.

Narcotic addiction and harsh living conditions made Chinese crib girls look far older than their years. Most did not live to be twenty, and by the time they were twenty they were washed up. When they became too unattractive to be of use, they were taken to a small room where they were given the choice of suicide by narcotic overdose or starvation. If found still alive, they were murdered. Their deaths, which appeared to be suicide, were not investigated, as they were considered expendable.

More.

I had a great show lined up, too:

Durtro - "Abbatoir" - Abbatoir 4 - mp3.com
Sutcliffe Jugend - "I Came Only to See Your Death" - We Spit On Their Graves - Come Organisation
Angelo Badalamenti - "The Pink Room" - Twin Peaks Fire Walk With Me - Warner Bros.
Sheila Chandra - "ABoneCroneDrone 7" - This Sentence is True - Narada
The Conet Project - "Faders" - Recordings of Shortwave Numbers Stations - Irdial
Robert Rich - "Circle Unwound" - Echo of Small Things - Soundscape Productions
Kurt Swinghammer - "Bloodletting" - Ginger Snaps II: Unleashed - n/a
Nurse With Wound - "Alas, The Madonna Functions" - Peyrere (coll.) - n/a
Marilyn Manson - "Kill House" - Killer Wasps - n/a
WFMU - "Segment 3 - Northern Michigan Radio 08-23-01 (910 to 1060 AM)" - Beware of the Blog - n/a
Bear McCreary - "Main Title (UK Version)" - Battlestar Galactica Season One - La-La Land
Sleep Research Facility - "C-Deck" - Nostromo - Cold Spring
Lunar Bastard of Thong - "Approached Cautiously By Cannibals, Then Eaten Without Warning" - Lunar Bastard of Thong - n/a
White Winged Moth - "Scratch(ed) Music" - Mort Aux Vaches - Staalplaat
Tyler Bates - "See You In Hell" - The Devil's Rejects - La-La Land

The only thing I'm really disappointed aobut is that I was looking forward to combining the WFMU thing (a slow scan of the AM band from a high altitude where signals from hundreds of miles away can be picked up; the mp3 is downloadable from the link, and I highly recommend it) with CHML 900 AM in Hamilton, Ontario's live netcast of old radio shows, as well as mixing in the last twelve minute of the first act of the Orson Welles broadcast of War of the Worlds. That would have been hella cool. Maybe some other time.

In any event, Vash was with me, and it just meant we got to head back to my place sooner rather than later. Not tragic at all.

What cracks me up is that we're talking about Marlena's, of all places. It's not like we invaded a straight bar. Hell, it's probably the closest thing this City still has to a drag bar. (Divas is more of a tranny hooker meat market than a drag bar per se, though it's friendly to non-working girls.) Hell, the walls are lined with potraits of past Imperial Empresses—not to mention a picture of Emperor Norton right next to Absolute Empress I, The Widow Norton—but yesterday you wouldn't have guessed otherwise.

The Empress page I linked to above is really neat. Reba and Cristal were quite the hotties, weren't they? I'm very glad I was born when I was (''83 would have been even better than '73, but beggars and choosers, huh?), and I so would not have wanted to deal with being queer and/or trans around the middle of the century, but pictures from before the eighties fascinate me. Like the ones in Harry Benjamin's book. The before and after pictures—hell, the before and during pictures are in such stark contrast to each other, and I'm a bit of a sucker for the hair and fashions, even though I can't really envision myself in the them now.

But how wonderful it must have seemed at the time, when there's such a division between the genders? These days, the lines are so much more blurred to begin with; my hair was already long as a boy (longer than it tends to be now. in fact), and I seldom wear dresses or skirts, which would have been absolutely required back then, both because of social customs in general and to convince the Powers That Be that I was "serious about it." Heck, I don't wear a bra nor are my ears pierced (don't wanna, and don't wanna) and I think I've more than proved by now that I'm real enough, thank you very much.

1:50pm

Speaking of reality, I must admit being proud that I've never needed to reference fictional characters to describe myself. I actually know who I am, which helps.

What fascinated me about the show is how seriously some of the contestants were taking it. We're talking about the frickin' Gong Show, people. I mean, okay, it's been off the air for a zillion years and I only even barely remember when it was originally on, but between Confessions of a Dangerous Mind and The Game Show Network and just paying attention, it ain't too difficult to figure out what's going on. Some acts didn't want the judges (read: me) to see them rehearsing before the show, as though it could possibly make a difference. A few people even accused me of "cheating" because I was in the audience on Friday night. I pointed out to them that I'm judging on three consecutive Saturdays, so by their logic, I'm "cheating" on those first two Saturdays by seeing the show before the third. There was generally a pause followed by a grudging agreement.

The gong didn't get used as much as one might expect, and I think I know why. The San Francisco performance community is highly tolerant of outré, idiosyncratic acts, the sort of thing which in another time and place (say, Hollywood in the late seventies) would be considered simply bad. As a result, I think we're less likely to gong someone. But gong we will, and whoeey, some people were not happy about it. There's one person in particular whom I'm fairly certain will never forgive me. It makes me wonder, is there someone out there still holding a grudge against Phyllis Diller or Rip Taylor for gonging them? Is there a failed entertainer somewhere in L.A. who was never able to watch M*A*S*H again because his brilliant career was cut short by Jamie Farr?

2:57pm

A whole bunch of clips from the original Gong Show can be found on iFilm, if you're so inclined.

11:08pm

The sound was bad, the audience was largely uninterested, and I was a lot more nervous (and stoned) than I would have liked, but I'd like to think I didn't completely flop at Marlena's. Close to it, but I still got a few laughs. (They count, even though they were from Sister Edith and Sister Mable.) Perhaps unsurprisingly, I felt more comfortable later at Bad Movie Night.

Well, He's In His Early Twenties. I Put Up With A Lot More Shit From People When I Was That Age Than I Do Now.

same here. hell, i put up a with a lot more shit when i was thirty than i do now.

But Pitufina, You're Only Thirty-Two.

i know. these last couple of years have been really rough.

Super busy-week coming up. Retool tonight, dinner with Vash and my niece tomorrow night, an art opening on Friday at which Vash not only has work showing but will also be reading, The Gong Show on Saturday, and then a near double-booking of Bad Movie Night and a comedy show for the Transgender Law Center, put on by the Sisters. I only got confirmation about the comedy show today, and provided I go on during the first hour or so, I should be able to make it to The Dark Room on time. The really scary part is that it's being promoted as a standup comedy show, and I feel like I should try to be off-book for it, not actually reading from the page or doing my usual stuff. I'm doing more and more off-the-cuff comedy lately (Bad Movie Night and The Gong Show being the most obvious examples) and I feel like I do a pretty good job of it during readings or while hosting shows, so I think I can come up with five or ten minutes of funny material which doesn't suck. I hope.

Meanwhile, my last show on Pirate Cat Radio is officially this Monday, though I'm already off the schedule. Change is life is change is life is change.

12:25pm

Speaking of life, I wonder what his is like these days. I'm guessing it involves alcoholism, domestic violence and an empty voting record. Not to suggest that ostentatious patriots don't tend to vote, even though, um, they don't.