There was no spoken word and no band, just dancing, hanging out and watching cats. The show was very well-received, much to my surprise. I mean, it is just cats, and the sound was muted, but that didn't matter. We even got some comments about specific angles and shots, which is really nice because we do try to be creative and it means people are actually paying attention. (Not that it's necessary, of course.)

3:46pm

Did you ever feel like you were going backwards?

4:25pm

Let's see. My jeans are starting to feel tight, and my hair is atrocious. My bangs are a mess. Usually I'm pretty good at trimming them myself, but I did something horribly wrong this last time and they're all out of whack. I'd go at them again right now, but the danger of screwing them up further is too great. I'll have to grow them out longer first. I'm actually in need of a cut overall; I haven't had the rest of my hair trimmed at least since last year, possibly a whole year ago. Maddy blackened it this last weekend so the color is fine, but it's getting too heavy. That's my excuse for why I can't get a ponytail to stay, anyhow. I'm trying to avoid Miguel or Anodyne in a somewhat arbitrary cost-cutting move, so I'm probably going to a local salon that charges $11 for a cut. Supporting locally owned business and all. The place in question doesn't appear to be American-owned, but hey, economics before patriotism. Economics, vanity, common sense...hell, just about everything's more important than patriotism, when you come down to it.

Looks I'll be returning to work on Wednesday, and remaining through the end of the month. Meanwhile, the half-days Maddy's been working will be ending after next week, at which point she'll have the option of going on an extended, paid leave of absence after that. Unfortunately, her job won't be secure, and when the time is up she may not be able to return. Y'know, it's just as well that I'll probably never come face-to-face with her abusive ex-husband, because if I did I'd probably take so much sheer pleasure from repeatedly kicking him square in the nuts that I'd be like the rat with the lever that stimulate the pleasure centers of the brain—if not forcibly removed, I'd eventually starve to death.

5:29pm

There's a solar eclipse right now. I am inside, meaning that I cannot view it, even though I have a paper plate and binoculars ready. Why? Because the Bad People are in the entryway, and I don't want to have anything to do with them. (They're sweeping, of all things. Hell of a time to pretend like they care.) The eclipse won't reach its maximum eclipseyness until a quarter past six, and I'm sure they'll be gone by then. I'm listening to space music, though. It's a start.

6:14pm

They went away, and I saw it. The beauty in the natural world almost makes up for the rest of it.

Speaking of regular theaters, one of the few mainstream single-screen houses in town is in danger of being torn down and replaced by a Walgreens. Because, you see, there are currently four (4) of those theaters but only fifty (50) Walgreens locations. Clearly this is an imbalance which needs to be rectified.

We also discovered that one of the few gothy stores in town without the words "Hot" or "Topic" in the name (and that's been mostly raver stuff for the last couple years anyway) no longer exists, or at least not like it once was. It's still called Shadow of the Gargoyle, but now it's beads. Nothing but beads. Beads, beads, beads, with norms behind the counter playing classic rock. It was where I'd bought Maddy a pair of black feathered wings for her 30th birthday, and we'd hoped to get our wedding dresses there. Now, if you're looking for anything other than beads, you're out of luck. And it's not like there weren't already a bunch of bead stores in town. Y'know, at least having a Walgreens nearby is useful. But is there anything more useless than another a bead store?

On the other hand, I've never seen the place so busy. Damn you, Adam Smith.

Not that I was completely slothful this week, mind you. We did make a kittypr0n episode guide. Like everything else about the show, it was mostly done for our own amusement (or reference, in this case). But that's okay.

A few dark hairs have appeared on my upper lip, and there's still a bit of light hair all over, though that's not quite as noticeable. I won't be getting zapped again until after this next round of employment, though. I've had enough for now. Indeed, I may even shave today.

Later in the evening we stole content from Disney, watching the Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs DVD which I'd borrowed from the library. I'd never seen it before, and might not have picked it up if it weren't for the fact that it was free and loaded down with extras—I'm the kind of film geek who'll watch a movie I'm otherwise not interested in just to see the supplemental material. And I was not disappointed, since I'm now armed with the knowledge that in Swedish, that most famous and calculatedly crowd-pleasing Dwarf's name is "Toker." It makes perfect sense, really. Why do you think he's called "Dopey?"

We also got the July episode of kittypr0n completed. We still have to transfer it to DVCAM for broadcast and add music, but otherwise it's done. It's an unbroken half hour (well, 27:30) of the kitties sleeping on the bed. It sounds simple, and certainly looks it, but it took a few tries to get it on tape, cuz the angle had to be right and the cats had to cooperate. Somehow, we managed to get it. (That they sleep two-thirds of the day came in handy.) I think it's going to be my favorite episode—after all, Avant-Garde was my favorite class in film school.

kittypr0n #5 was on last night. Between the flyers and a message I sent to the sfgoth-announce list, more people than ever missed it.

It looks like I'll be working again this month. Potentially for a couple days next week (pending budget approval), and definitely for the two weeks after that. Well, as "definitely" as is possible until I'm actually there. Lew said that he'd look into getting my hourly rate raised, but I'm not holding my breath, and if the net result is me not working as much it's obviously not worth the tradeoff. (Unless the raise is significant enough that I'll be getting paid more for working fewer days, but I don't see that happening.) And for as frustrating as the off-and-onniness of all this is, I'll probably make as much working two weeks this month as I would if I'd been working retail full time. It still feels like putting off the inevitable, though.

Michelle and Rocco weren't there, which was a shame, but there were a lot of familiar faces, and the vibe was very open and supportive. In spite of being held at a bar on Portero, there were no hecklers to speak of, although there was at least one drunk guy left over from the basketball game that was on the teevee earlier—I think the team with the media whore who was in the genie movie and bad video game was playing, but for the sake of my soul I try to keep as little sports stuff from entering my head as possible so I'm not going to do the necessary research to find out for sure. If I could just go into hibernation when football season began so I can keep my distance from the swine, I would. (And I'd best not get started again on that monstrosity of a corporate-branded ballpark downtown, and believe you me, it would be easy, especially after this last Friday when after making a wrong turn while driving to the bookstore I was forced to get onto 280 to head back in the right direction and got ensnarled in the traffic heading for The Big Game. I voted against the damn thing. I tried, I really did. Funny how the big economic upturn that Willie Brown had promised would happen if the park got voted into existence, didn't.) Anyway, he for the most part kept quiet, although he made odd moaning sounds every so often. I got the impression that he's a regular patron of the bar, one who won't let himself be chased away by the monthly influx of queers, and so long as nobody bothers him he won't really bother anyone else. More or less. Necessary evils and all, and drunk people are to be expected when I go into bars.

As often is the case at dyke-oriented events, there were many more F2Ms than M2Fs; there was one other besides myself, and frequently I'm the only at all. Of course, it's always possible that there are some that are passing so well I can't read them, but I'd like to think my radar's pretty good. (And, quite frankly, if I can't read someone, I don't wanna know.) While I don't doubt that it exists, I have yet to personally observe the blatant discrimination against F2Ms by the dyke community I've heard so much about. Nor, for that matter, the treatment of M2Fs as deviant males. It could just be the circles in which we've been hanging out, and Michelle did tell us that the Dyke March has issues with F2Ms joining. No matter how the surface looks, the politics are always lurking just beneath.

And, as I say, the milieu surely has a lot to do with it. I'd imagine people who get together to actually have sex rather than just talk about it (not that sex is a pervasive topic in spoken word, but it isn't an uncommon one, either) are no doubt more picky about these things. That's one of the reasons why I'm not too worried about running into Maggie anytime soon—she'd probably find it all terribly boring. She's not a Lesbian to just jabber about it, for pete's sake!

Talking about her recently published novel Godspeed, host Lynn Breedlove said her mother kept asking "Why? Why? Why did you have to tell that whole world you've done acid?" Boy, I can relate to that—or, at least, I imagine I will eventually. Lynn's response was, "Mom, all someone has to do is look at me and they can tell." At least I'm not quite there yet. (And never will be, Mom. Don't worry.) Anyway, her mother was there and actually read a piece of her own, so it's safe to say there's no hard feelings.

It turns out the club in a couple weeks doesn't have anything to with the mostly-defunct Sister Spit, though The End of the World will be playing, along with Deep-Dickollective, who were at the LGBT Center opening and whom I'm very much looking forward to seeing again. They're a queer hip-hop group (as is TEotW, to an extent—Rocco's pretty blantant about his tranniness, as well he should be—though it figures more into D/DC's music), which is far more of an anamoly than it oughta be. (Tangentially, I sincerely wish I could let the somewhat homophobic Eminem know that I'vedownloaded his new album and have no intention of buying it. I probably won't even listen to it. But I have it and he didn't get paid, meaning he has to beat the shit out of me now, and it's surely made all the more insulting by me being a faggot.) The club is also on the 16th, my birthday, and that sounds like as good a place as any to be. Dax, who shares my birthday minus seven years, offered to have a dual party for us, but with all due respect to her, this sounds like more fun. Plus it doesn't involve driving to her place in Vacaville, which is a big plus.

After the show, both flush with the success of the evening and rather hungry, we went to the Safeway down the block and got garlic bread and ice cream (Soy Delicious, in my case), went back home to eat and watch MST3K. Probably not the wisest course of action for me considering I spent much of the evening wondering what to wear when I finally read that won't make me look too fat. Some people, such as myself, never learn.

Speaking of scary things, I'm considering reading at K'vetch tonight. My face isn't quite healed yet, but that's okay. (And, wouldn't'cha know, I can already see dark hair coming back on my upper lip. Completion takes 300-400 hours on average and I'm only at 216, so it figures.) I'm also in kind of a weird place at this moment, which may or may not be all the more reason. Maddy and I had an emotionally intense night—referred to as a "fight" in some lexicons—followed by extremely bad dreams, such as my new pimp getting angry with me, not for having read me as a tranny (for which I was expecting to get beat to within an inch of my life) but because I didn't kiss him with tongue. (I was wearing a really nice coat a la Penny Lane in Almost Famous, but somehow that didn't make up for it.) At least I have a pretty good idea of what I'd be reading: a diary entry from last year about Maddy's mother forcibly drawing blood from her. Then again, that might be a bit much for the first time out. Guess I'll have to practice and see.

4:39pm

No K''vetching tonight for me, anyway. Most of the afternoon was spent coloring my hair, and I simply don't have time now to properly edit the piece (I can't read it as is) and practice. Sounds like a cheap excuse, and maybe it is, I don't know. Anyway, we'd almost called the whole thing quits, since it turns out Michelle and Rocco won't be able to make it like they'd originally planned. Michelle's presence had been a strong catalyst for Maddy working up the courage to read her writing in public at all, and when it turned out they wouldn't be able to make it there was a temptation to just not go at all, but we're going and Maddy is reading all the same. It's brave, and I'm extremely proud of her.

Ha! Get it? Because I increased the font size on this page, and...um, well, okay, it sounded funnier before I actually typed it out. Speaking of bad jokes, I apologize for the Barbara Lee reference the other day; it was practically using her name in vain. That was wrong of me.

At Maddy's insistence, I've made an Amazon Wish List. (If the link doesn't work, I'm registered as sherilyn at ossuary dot org. I didn't want to use my sfgoth address 'cuz it's really tough to get off their spam list.) My birthday is June 16. And that's all I have to say about it.

sometime after midnight

Isn't this when we're supposed to take the hallucinogens?