1/3 less serious than other blogs and tastes great!

I've just started reading Cohn-Head: A No-holds-barred Account of Breaking Into the Boys’ Club, by ESPN's Linda Cohn. I've always liked her work, and her book looks fascinating...

Good times past, present with J. Geils Band That was one show I wish I'd been able to take in, reunited at the new House of Blues on Lansdowne Street...

Finally recovered after a week of sheer misery against the spread; the previous week was far and away my worst of the season. My own fault (as well as the fault of more than a few poor performances!) as I should have pulled back on my wagering as I didn't have the time to spend on it that I normally have/make time to do... fortunately yesterday and today pulled me back up... still ahead enuf for the season, but last week was painful... In a somewhat similar vein, I have gotten quite behind in responding to calls, messages, emails, etc... forgive me! I'm trying to catch up...

Steroids: they're not just for A-Rod anymore?! Better beauty thru chemistry... I've stated my thoughts on this before, but briefly; whether it is for athletic performance enhancement, appearance enhancement, mood enhancement, whatever, adults should to be free to choose what substances they wish to ingest, inject, inhale, whatever, with the following caveat: if you run into trouble- health, financial, or otherwise- as a result of your choice, you should not expect your fellow citizens, via our tax dollars, to bail you out. (A good caveat for a lotta things actually.) My enjoyment of a game, a film, whatever, is not diminished one bit because someone may be "enhanced." If they think they can earn $50 million and are willing to risk dying by age 50, that's their choice, and more power to them. Professional sports haven't been clean in decades- amphetamines, anyone? Should we put an * next to baseball records from the 50's, 60', and 70's achieved late in the season, as they may have been amphetamine-fueled? Models have always taken measures, including pharmaceutical ones, to maintain/enhance their appearances. The music industry has seldom been a haven of good, clean living. While alcohol has always been my mood enhancer of choice, it's simply by preference, convenience, and acculturation, snorting, smoking, shooting holding little appeal for me; I make no moral distinction between alcohol, tobacco, marijuana, cocaine, heroin, or pharmaceuticals. Kellie= pro choice!

"Never thought about tomorrow/Seemed like a long time to come/How could I be so blind, baby/Not to see you were the one..."

Perpetual 35-ness?

I came across this article earlier this week. While dealing primarily with women's fashions (bear with me, guys!) it included the following, thought-provoking, passage: What the women in the advertising campaign have in common, and what Liz Claiborne is hoping resonates with consumers, is what the company’s executives call “perpetual 35-ness.” In other words, the notion that in most women’s minds (if not their bodies) they are all 35. That is the age, Mr. Mizrahi said, when women are “perfectly ripe”: old enough to feel independent and confident, but not so old that they feel, er, old.
I think there is quite a bit to this, and it's something I've pondered for awhile the whole idea of our mental age as opposed to out chronological age, how old we feel mentally, emotionally, even physically as opposed to how old we are according to the calendar. Being- ahem- a few years chronologically beyond 35 (waaaahhhh!) nevertheless I hafta admit to feeling close to 35- maybe 37! All kidding aside, it really does seem the age I feel, in mindset as well as body, as opposed to being a few years older than that. Owing perhaps to when I finally came to terms with my transgenderism, when I became able to present a- hopefully!- reasonably realistic female image (there was a time when I was considerably larger than I've been the last many years now) and began to go out and live and do things as a woman, all of that roughly coincided with my early/mid 30's, so for me personally that is the age I identify with as the "prime" if you will, of my feminine life. My mindset and attitudes are largely those of a mid 30-something woman, physically I feel that energetic and vital as well, while being acutely aware of the need to take care of/do all I can to keep aging at a minimum. But more to the piece itself, I believe that is around an age many women (beyond 35!) aspire to and see as their best year/s, for the reasons the piece suggests, maturity yet youthful enough to still indulge, independence and confidence, no longer a "girl" yet hardly matronly or middle-aged, still in the game to use a different analogy but mature enuf to know the rules, and how to use them to best advantage. I know many women, GG as well as TG, to whom this whole idea of perpetual 35-ness fits; the first to come to mind is my sister (who is a few years older than I.) The whole concept of mental age is an interesting one, how old we feel vs. how old we are, how our mental ages change may over time (f'rinstance- for many years, in my teens and into college, I felt older mentally and emotionally than I was, perhaps due to my interests, activities, hobbies, friends/crowd we hung with, possibly even birth order, being the youngest of three; then for a long time late 20's seemed to be my default mental age, and, as I indicated above, for a few years now mid 30's.) Anyway, an interesting topic, at least to me...

"Show a little faith, there's magic in the night/You ain't a beauty but hey you're alright..."

Everybody Needs Somebody To Love, Rolling Stones (I luv this version! And yeah, I'm bored!)

I'm so glad to be here tonight and I'm so glad to be home. And I believe I've got a message for every woman and every man here tonight that ever needed somebody to love Someone to stay with them all the time, when they're up and when they're down.You know, sometimes you get what you want And then you go and lose what you have And I believe every woman and every man here tonight listen to my song And it save the whole world. Listen to me.

Everybody wants somebody
Everybody wants somebody to love
Someone to love
Someone to kiss
Sometime to miss, now
Someone to squeeze
Someone to please
And I need you you you
I need you you you
I need you you you
I need you you you

Oh, sometimes I feel like
I feel a little sad inside
My baby mistreats me
And I kinda get a little little mad

I need you you you
To see me through, babe
When the sun go down
Ain't nobody else around
That's when I need you baby
That's when I say I love you
That's when I say I love you
Let me hear you say yeah
Let me hear you say yeah
Let me hear you say yeah
Let me hear you say yeah

I need you you you you
Somebody to see me through, baby
I need you you you
I need you you you
I need you you you

When the sun goes down
Ain't nobody else around
That's when I'm all by myself
That's when I need your lovin' darlin'
That's when I need you so bad
You're the one I really need bad

I need you
To see me through baby
In the morning time too
When the sun goes down
Ain't nobody else around
I need your lovin' so bad

Everybody needs somebody to love
I'm not afraid to be by myself but I just need to be somebody to love
All the time
All the time
All the time
All the time
All the time, babe
I said all the time, babe
I said all the time, babe
I need you
I need your lovin' so bad
Let me hear you say yeah
Let me hear you say yeah
Let me hear you say yeah, yeah, yeah
Let me hear you say yeah
Yeah, I need you baby so bad bad bad, bad bad, bad bad bad bad

I need you
I need you you you
I need your lovin' babe
I need your lovin' darlin'
Everybody needs somebody
Everybody needs somebody
Everybody needs somebody
Yeah, yeah yeah
Everybody needs somebody
Everybody needs somebody
Everybody needs somebody else
You gotta need too, baby
See you through
Gotta be two to see it thru...

More brain droppings...

I'm currently reading Sibylle Barrasso's Dark Waters; yeah, I'm a sucker for set-in-Boston detective/police/mystery novels...

ESPN's Doris Burke does a great job doing college basketball games. I know some folks are sometimes put-off by women doing men's sports; she does a great job! She knows the game and is able to articulate her knowledge credibly... Linda Cohn is another pro, albeit as in-studio anchor... It's great to see competent, professional, and- yes- attractive- women succeeding as more than simply eye-candy in sports media...


Beer of the evening- Bar Harbor's Cadillac Mountain Stout: very stylish and inviting... sounds like me (shure, Kel!)

Pithy thought of the day: "No rain= no rainbow."

I came across this the other day: Dick Cheney: The Most Pro-Gay Vice President in History Food for thought for the legions of self-appointed "leaders" of the LGBT community, given the stances our current President (whom most breathlessly supported) has on LGBT issues (opposed to same-sex marriage, the entire Rick Warren kerfuffle, back-tracking on repeal of DADT...and unlike a Vice President, the President sets the agenda.) Someone 'splain to me again why, particularly on LGBT issues, Obama was preferred and endorsed by the LGBT "establishment"? And whatever other quarrels and criticisms folks may have had of Cheney, his views on gays certainly are ones to applaud. Fair-minded folks will. Strident partisans lack that capacity. And this brings me to a further observation. Whatever open-mindedness Cheney has on this is undoubtedly due to his daughter. By all accounts Mary Cheney is someone who happens to be lesbian, neither closeted nor confrontational. She simply lives her life, her sexuality being but one part of her totality. She doesn't hide it, nor does she wear it on her sleeve 24/7. She, and her family, seem more focused on what they share than where they differ. This all gets back to my notion that, whether we are transgender, or gay, lesbian, straight, or Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, or of other- or no- faith, Republican or Democrat or other/none, of whatever race or ethnicity, and while we can and should accept all of these, none of these alone ought to define the totality of who we are as unique individuals, nor should we let one aspect completely define ourselves. It is so limiting. Mary Cheney is more than solely Dick and Lynne Cheney's "lesbian" daughter; similarly, we should aspire to be more than solely the transgender neighbor/co-worker/family member/friend/etc...

"She can lead you to love/She can take you or leave you/She can ask for the truth/But she'll never believe you..."

Because blogging doesn't have to be a deadly serious endeavor...

Virginia Postrel's DeepGlamour.net is a great blog!

Why are cars named only after places out west? Jeep Laredo. Hyundai Santa Fe and Tucson. Toyota Tacoma. GMC Sierra and Denali. Kia Sedona. Suzuki Reno... you know the drill. How 'bout Jeep Newark? Hyundai Cranston and Brockton? Toyota Trenton? GMC Berkshire and Mount Washington? Kia Southie? Suzuki Roxbury? Where's the love?!

The other day I read that author Stephen King, while promoting a new book, took time to bash fellow author Stephenie Meyer (Twilight.) I'm not much of a fan of the whole goth/horror/vampire genre anyway, but King came off as very petty, very small, a jerk really. Why do that? Obviously Meyer's book has been successful, why not simply congratulate her success, or else just not address it, or her, period? Why go out of your way to be critical of someone else's work and success? Again, it makes King appear small and petty and insecure...

A friend of mine recently got hired for and started a new job (yes, in this economy!) Congrats Dee- knock 'em dead! Another friend of mine- and his lady friend- are on a trip... to Africa! That oughta be a trip!

This song always creeped me out; it makes me think of some 30-year old guy leaning against his Camaro at the local dairy bar scoping out the sophomore "talent"...

Does anyone get better, more iconic, movie lines than Clint Eastwood? From the whole "You've gotta ask yourself a question- 'do I feel lucky'? Well do ya, punk?" of Dirty Harry (I could do a whole entry on that film alone!), "When you hang a man, you better look at him" (Hang 'Em High) "Go ahead, make my day" (Sudden Impact) "Improvise. Adapt. Overcome" (Heartbreak Ridge) "Girlie, tough ain't enough" (Million Dollar Baby) to the current "I fix things. That's what I do" of Gran Torino and many, many more...

I have three versions of The Loco-Motion on my player: Kylie's, the original with Little Eva, and Grand Funk's...

A light slate of games tonite: Marquette, and two Ivy League games... $till doing well for the season...

Gotta get my hair done again soon. While in some ways it's flattering to be "miss'ed" while en drab, it can also be a lil unsettling. But more, it just needs a lil shape again...

"Everybody's doing a brand new dance now..."

Study: Women With Prominent Chins More Likely to Cheat
Hmmm... wondering where we might fit in on this, given our- generally- more pronounced facial features... A few money quotes:
According to the study, larger chins on women are often caused by high levels of the male hormone testosterone, which is present in all women, but usually in lower amounts.
Makes sense from a transgender POV...
The hormone, which increases sexual assertiveness in men, may do the same in some women, the researchers said. also increases sexual assertiveness in a woman, a tendency more commonly attributed to males.
If true, sounds like something many men might appreciate!
Researchers also had men rate the women on their desirability as a life partner. The men found the women were more masculine features less desirable.
Not so good from a transgender POV...

For more see here

"She blinded me with science..."

I've had people on occasion comment to me that I don't talk much about myself. To some extent it's true- not because I don't like talking about me, things in my life, things of importance to me, but simply because I'm usually not a shameless self-promoter, nor (I believe) excessively self-centered; I'm fully aware that the world does not revolve around me. Nor do I believe that we need to expose every facet of our lives to everyone, particularly in a public forum such as this. Plus I'm interested in the lives of others and hence by default usually steer conversation toward them, their lives, etc... I believe those are a good traits, good attitudes to possess. But if/when people ask, I'm usually more-than-willing to tell, and obviously the better I know someone, or the more one-on-one the venue of conversation, the more forthcoming I am.

What gets frustrating are two things, and I can think of a few people in my life to whom they apply; when I do make my usual effort to talk about or discuss issues important to them and they seldom-if-ever reciprocate and occasionally initiate conversation about and toward things in my life, and also when I do pro-actively speak of and share things going on with me and my life, the good and the bad, the sublime and the serious and they take and show no interest. I don't get that. To me it simply seems natural, the thing you do toward a friend, if not out of genuine interest or concern at least out of reciprocity and appreciation of and for the interest and concern I've freely extended, or if for nothing else out of simple good manners.

And of course, these people stand out because they are- fortunately- the exceptions rather than the rule when it comes to friends. Most of the people I know- including many of you reading this!- are good, solid, caring people, folks I'm honored to have and know as friends. I probably should show greater appreciation for you rather than giving grease to the squeaky wheels... and yeah, I'm probably jes feelin' a lil too bitchy; maybe it's the estrogen...

Some Super Bowl last night, huh? A lot closer than I expected it to be (dammit- I had the Steelers -6.5!) I heard someone say that the Steelers scored the go-ahead/winning touchdown with the same amount of time left as the Jersey Giants did last year, to beat my Patriots (and end their undefeated season- hadda get a Pats reference in there somehow!) My friend Larry in Pittsburgh I'm sure is happy today... I usually don't pay a whole lot of attention, but the ads this Super Bowl seemed weak, none really stood out.

For the record- this winter still sucks!

"Way down below the ocean/Where I wanna be, she may be..."