sundries

[rm]

Okay, Team Internet, here's another one: snufflesdbear has a friend who just lost their house in a fire. I've seen the news stories on this and have additional information I've been asked not to share, that compels me to post this. Take a look at the post and see if you have any help you can offer in the area.

The nomination period for a new award for authors' blogs is open. Anyone can nominate. vua reannon.

Coming Out -- The Epic. Yes. This. Totally. Cab drivers. Shop clerks. Can I be gay and still get what I want? And the way it can get tied up in our other -isms at the end of the piece -- I wish the writing had been a little more deft there, but I think it's a true thing that I often see where I have to work on my own biases because of who I'm concerned about outing myself to. via andrewducker.

The Washington Post is defending its front page publication of a photo of a gay couple kissing as equal marriage rights come to DC.

Also in the region, the new attorney general of Virginia has been aggressively working to remove the limited protections LGBTQ peopel currently have in that state. Scary stuff.

Forgot who I found this through, but Australia allows issuance of identity papers with N instead of M or F gender identity.

A badly written article about a sex study that perpetuates the belief that women don't really like or want sex, at least not as much as men do. Many of the quoted individuals try to explain reasons for the results regarding female sexuality including culture bias and training, so that's good. But the whole thrust of the piece still ticked me off.

Alexander McQueen's final collection has a lot of amazing stuff in it.

OMG, Corey Haim has died.

So last night, having watched the first episode of Buffy, season 4, we started watching Angel season 1. Now the first two episodes of Angel aren't great, but it was disturbing how much the show felt more comfortable to me. I've been loving the hell out of Buffy but even in its sucky first episodes and featuring a main character I don't even like Angel suits me so much better it's a little bizarre. Also, underground lair? broods on rooftops? really? That was a little funny.

That said, I've gotten to the point with both Angel and Buffy where I just look over at Patty sometimes and say "rapetastic plotline #873."

Last night we also, after going to one of our favorite restaurants, stopped in at New York's newest gluten-free bakery, Tu-Lu's. Go. Go there now. The cupcakes are about a billion times better than at Babycakes and since they use sugar instead of agave nectar, the icing is the texture you expect -- which is to say red velvet cupcake with cream cheese icing = heaven. NOW NOW NOW, people. SO GOOD.

Patty heads back to Ohio for about ten days as of tomorrow. And I will be lonely, but we're booking London tonight and it will be well and truly spring when she returns.

Comments

[nicoli-dominn.livejournal.com]

The lead and title of the article about sex drive was certainly off-putting! However, I think some good points were raised, especially where doctors are concerned. I keep hearing all over the place that while doctors are all too happy to prescribe Viagra to a man with ED and find ways to bring back his sex drive, far too many women's sex drives are totally ignored, especially once they hit menopause. I can't even think of a pill that's been invented to boost female sex drive, and there are very few products to counteract dryness in the vaginal/cervix area. I've also heard that many doctors simply don't address female sex drive, even after a woman has undergone an operation or treatment that effects how her sex organs function or how her hormone levels change.

Of course, this is all hearsay, so I don't have hard facts. It's just that hearing this sort of thing publicized is not a big surprise for me.

-----

That article on coming out hit a personal note for me, especially since I'm living in a completely new part of the US and I'm still meeting new people. One problem I neglected to consider when I moved down here was the fact that I'm both gender-fluid and bisexual, and there are several things about telling new people about myself that make it really hard. For one thing, for all that Nashville is supposed to be the liberal part of Tennessee (and it is!), it's nothing compared to Boston. Most people outside of the groups focused on LGBTQ rights and community are squeamish about, if not outright offended by, the possibility that I might be anything other than straight. The fact that most times I'm seen with my male fiance further leads people to expect that I'm straight, even among LGBTQ circles, and it doesn't even occur to me to bring it up unless it's pertinent. And I have my own insecurities about vocalizing the fact that I'm not a cisgendered woman, even if I appear to be. I don't identify as the opposite gender or my gender, just something in between (or neither), and other people couldn't see that unless I told them. I'm never sure when it's safe: when there's a risk of driving off a potential connection, or when the person will just be taken aback for a few second and then choose to get over it. Of course, if they're driven off, logic follows that they wouldn't have been a very good friend or connection in the first place, but being that I'm insecure, I don't very much like finding out. What it all boils down to is cowardice...I'm still working on it. Good piece, though.

[weirdquark]

and it doesn't even occur to me to bring it up unless it's pertinent.

This is about where I've always been, which is why I'm in the strange and amusing position of not having been out at work when I lived in the Boston area (I didn't really talk about my personal life at work unless someone asked, and mostly I wasn't dating anyone at all, so I would talk about doing things with friends -- during the time I actually had a girlfriend, the only time something came up was when a co-worker complimented my haircut, and I could say, 'thanks, my girlfriend cut it for me.') but I'm out now that I've moved to Texas because my roommate got a job down here and I'm listed as her partner in her contract (because they offer job getting help to spouses and partners of faculty.) And on the one hand, my roommate is my roommate and not my girlfriend. On the other hand, 'partner' would be a perfectly fine description of our relationship (because we (and several other long-time friends) intend to continue living together for the foreseeable future) except 'partner' feels misleading, and it's not like I'm straight. We introduce ourselves as roommates, and I never know who is assuming that we're being subtle and who is assuming that we do mean roommates.

So I'm left wondering what and how much I should tell people, because while I'm perfectly happy to tell people if the subject comes up that I'll date men or women, if there's a man or a woman that I find interesting, or that I don't think gender is binary and I have modes of gender presentation that I consider male drag and modes of gender presentation that I consider female drag -- unless you're talking about gender and sexuality -- how do you bring that up? (And really, I think it's more important to be out in Texas, and I've actually joined GLBT groups down here, which is something that I never got around to doing anywhere else, because I think it's important to be visibly an ally, whether or not you're also visibly queer.)