The rantings of many.

Mother loses custody for treating daughter as a girl.

This country is fucked. It'd probably be better off as a parking lot now.

I can't stand to look at myself. My body is that much of an eyesore to me... it's misshapen, deformed, just WRONG.

After three years on hormones, however, the sensations are a lot different than before. Though I can't stand to look at it, exploring it on a tactile level is a different experience... feeling the sensations, noting what happens when i lightly touch one place, or grab another place roughly. It's mind-blowing at times. I can't stand the way it appears still - too masculine in places, overweight, scarred... but at least it's starting to feel less like something that should just be tossed out with the bathwater, and more like something that has some potential for salvage.

Sound's working now. Just had to use the correct modprobe. Now, if I could just get a GUI music player to work without crashing once it sees deoxys's music folder...

Also, is anyone going to get me that iBook for my birthday or not? :P

I still can't get the sound to work properly in any program on it except mplayer. Anything else, it skips in place and won't move forward, then proceeds to almost freeze up on top of it all. (ThinkPad 600 running PLD Linux and using alsa for sound. Can't easily change distros because I don't want to mess up the wireless, which does still work...)

I want to be able to use a GUI program once in a damned while to play music on the thing, but I'm close to saying "fuck it" and putting Win2k on the fucking thing.

Tomorrow (local) is our birthday... the single most depressing day of the year, even more so than Mother's Day and 4 November combined.

I'm getting some rum. I just want to black the entire fucking day out.

Hypocrisy is alive and well, thank you very much.

*groan* If I were a Baptist, I'd tell this loser to get the fuck out of my religion.

...Aaaaaaand, on an unrelated note, Mountain Dew is a poor substitute for coffee.

So, what does one do when one needs to get somewhere, but cannot use third gear without making the car die?

You skip the gear and go straight from second to fourth. Hopefully that will keep the car alive long enough for that tax refund to come in so we can look at getting it fixed.

If I have to see one more post about a trans-kid complaining that their parent won't let them explore their true gender, I'll lose it.

If they won't let you, FORCE THE ISSUE! Gah!

If it's causing you that much angst, if it's making you feel that crappy, then DO something about it! You have to realize this - if your parents did that to their cisgendered kid, they could be put away for child abuse. The fact that you're trans shouldn't make it different, but it does. Unless you stand up for yourself, that is.

It's either that, or continue to suffer the trauma of being forced into that role like I did. I stayed silent, and I suffered because of it. I don't really want to see any more people have to grow up through that trauma like that, and that's why I'm so emphatic in saying this.

No one else will pave the way for you. There is no beaten path for you to follow, and no one will show you the way, but there IS a path out there, you just have to make it yourself. You have to face your fears, because what's out there is what scares you the most.

You have to have the courage to walk.

(From The Guy's Guide to Geek Girls, V2.0)

"Voyager got it right: a woman's place IS in the Captain's chair. Or in Engineering. Or anywhere else that requires her to use her brain instead of just being a 'nurturing figure.'"

That made my day.

http://www.nwcn.com/statenews/washington/stories/NW_020507WABinitiative957SW.546c6a4d.html

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politics/2003558717_nokids06m.html

On the one hand - HA! On the other, that'd inadvertently screw hetero couples with a trans- or otherwise sterile/infertile person involved.

So, my opinion's mixed.

(Note - this is in the petition stage, and likely has no real chance of making a ballot. Still... I thought it kinda newsworthy.)

Yes, we're bringing back the recipes.

This is a very quick and simple recipe for a quick snack or a finger food for a small gathering. The recipe is meat-free, and if you use the right sauce and cheese substitute, it can be made vegan as well.

Ingredients:

15 medium-sized mushrooms (either whole or just the caps)
3 level tablespoons pesto sauce (there's the sour)
1/4 cup Italian cheese blend, shredded


Preparation:

Preheat oven (conventional or toaster) to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

Remove stems from mushrooms, leave the caps intact.

Place the caps on a cookie sheet lined with aluminum foil. Fill level with pesto sauce, then top with the cheese blend. Cover loosely with aluminum foil.

Place in oven and cook for 10 minutes. Serve immediately.

Remove and serve. Serves three as a snack.

Hooray for feeling like garbage.

I'm not sure whether I want to sleep, eat or get drunk.

...And does anybody read the comic anymore? We're losing motivation.

Car's not fixed after all. I've managed to narrow it down to either a fuel pump or fuel filter. Neither of which any of us know how to fix.

It got so bad, Tara's frustration over it, that I had to take over a split-second before she smashed out one of the car's windows with her elbow. When she gets like that... the only thing I can do is forcibly take over. *sigh* As it is, I couldn't stop the impact completely, and a crack appeared across it.

Also, there's no water here again. This is obscene. I can't afford to get a new pump for this place. I can't bathe, I'm barely even able to shave my face in the morning. Cold water doesn't work, neither does heating it beforehand on the stove, it simply lubricates without relaxing the hair, resulting in a metric fuckton of facial cuts. Next time, I'm just running a fucking cigarette lighter over it. It'll hurt less and cause less scarring than trying to shave without running scalding water.

1) Tell you why I friended you

2) Associate you with a song/movie

3) Tell a random fact about you

4) Tell a first memory about you

5) Associate you with an animal/fruit

6) Ask something I've always wanted to know about you

7) Show you my favourite user pic of yours

In return, you MUST spread this disease in your LJ

....bloody comment already so we can infect you. >.<

I can't focus on anything right now except sleeping. It's too cold to draw, and there's too many people around when it's warm. I need my privacy. On top of that, there's no suitable place to draw in this room.

I'm so far behind, I don't know what to do... and now my hands are freezing. Bleh.

It's getting cluttered, and to be honest, I can't remember why we added half of you.

Mutual friends won't be purged, but I'm going to be clearing the rest out eventually.

Whoever wants to stay, comment.

So, right now, I'm patched into Denver's WiFi. But, tell me... what point is having a connection that you can't SSH, IRC or Jabber from?!

I'm in Louisiana at the moment, between Covington and Madisonville to be clearer, at a coffeehouse leeching off the wireless to be exact.

The bus trip was largely uneventful, except last night. I got into Houston, went outside of the bus station for a cigarette, and got harassed right off the bat, half due to me being trans, half due to being (originally) from the New Orleans area. Ack. I don't need that at one in the morning, THANK YOU. Plus, the day before, I had to suffer a hellish 6 hour layover in Denver with no wireless, and 4 hours today in Baton Rouge. On the way back, I'll be stuck in Denver for 7 1/2 hours. Hopefully, I can find a place to leech wireless from by then.

Let me just say, however, that southern Louisiana has become a fucking CESSPOOL. The health nazis have taken hold big fucking time. I'm lucky to be able to smoke in my (grandmother's) own CAR! Damn! I'd love to teach those motherfuckers what happens when you try to legislate common sense... pity no one here I know has bail money.

Just as well, it's too late to save this place now. An army of Ray Nagin clones in the Legislature couldn't turn this place around.

Ok, besides my ranting... my grandmother's OK, so are the kids, for the most part. My little sister is starting to fall HARD into the "dumb, helpless girl" stereotype, and my little brother has no common sense whatsoever and is showing violent traits. (Just like all the men in my family.) Also, her house is starting to fall apart. the yard is a disaster. The water barely works. The toilet just doesn't. I wish there was more I could do for them, I'm really worried, but I've got a budding life of my own back in Ridgway. I can't leave that behind. Yet. *sigh*

Not. OK. Need to cry, need to be held. Want to do worse, but I'm not about to give in to that urge like the others.

You know... our cat just came up to the door, deciding she wanted to come in.

I opened the door. She bolted. Don't have time for this. She can bloody stay outside today.

Off to work.