Scene: Sackville gardens, some distance from the stage.
Her: “Hello! I know you!”
Lauren: “I, err, hello?”
Her: “Yes, I’ve seen you on the internet! Your blog is great!”
Lauren polishes her fingernails, and tosses her hair back.
Lauren: “Gosh, well, thank you, that’s really…”
Her: “Yes, you’re Becky, aren’t you?”
Yes, this really happened. I knew that hair was a good investment 
I think this photo best encapsulates how the weekend went.
On the one hand I’m very proud of myself for getting out there and doing something, however stressful it may have been. On the other hand, I wasn’t as sociable as I would have liked to be.
I did get to spend some quality time with a few fab girls, and it was lovely to spend some time away with Trish. Still, it wasn’t the forcibly-make-a-hundred-new-friends thing I was semi-expecting from comparison with BiCon. But BiCon is longer and very much a closed system, with all the pressure cooker atmosphere that entails. And I’m probably too old for that now
I expect this is really down to organisation; you do after all get out what you put in. Seeing how my plan to meet up with Those Fabulous People From The Internet consisted of wandering about a bit and seeing if anyone recognised me, I should consider myself lucky I met up with anyone at all. Next year I will be less scared and more organised.
We had a lovely weekend at Sparkle. More details and of course photos in a later post.
Unfortunately when we got back we found we’d been burgled. TV, laptop, SLR and Wii are all gone. Forced entry, rear window, some time Saturday.
The laptop was backed up and the insurers are so far being cooperative, so we’re not too badly upset, but you can imagine it’s not a great deal of fun. The police are not helping with my mood by telling us not to touch anything but being very slow to send the forensics team.
Sympathy comments are appreciated but by no means expected. Comments telling stories about unpleasant burglar behaviour or police uselessness will be Considered Unhelpful and deleted.
So, today it’s been six weeks since I had my ears pierced (and um, since I last posted). I’m very sorry and promise to post more frequently in future. Blame the hayfever.
I was advised to leave my ears to heal for six weeks, before changing the jewellery. So today was bound to be a big day! Curiously I find myself in possession of about a dozen pairs of earrings already, from the sensible and elegant studs T bought me, through the nice silver teardrops I bought a couple of weeks ago, to the startlingly large and jangly earrings I bought today from the £1 jewellery shop (a fine innovation; the first I’ve seen).
These earrings really are special, from the plastic “jewels” to the silvery-coated plastic frame, they’re cheap and enormous. But not quite enormous enough to violate Lauren’s Chav Earring Rule (that’s the rule that says if your earrings are resting on your shoulders, they’re Too Damn Big).
Anyway, I’ve worn four or five pairs so far today. I guess I should leave some for later, but I can hear them calling to me already…
So, after a lot of faffing and umm-ing and ah-ing, I got my ears pierced at the weekend. Most of the faffing was due to worrying how I would be perceived as a chap with two pierced ears.
Yes, that’s a silly thing to worry about. I worry too much.
Anyway, last weekend I realised that if I wanted them healed for Sparkle it was now or never, so now it was. A quick journey into Selfridge’s and a surprisingly small amount of pain later, it was done (really, compared with any of the body piercings I’ve had this hurt less than the alarm clock some mornings).
The results have been… anticlimactic. Nobody (that I haven’t talked to about it, anyway) seems even to have even noticed. In particular I would have expected something at least from my colleagues. I’m going to leave it a week and then start asking if anyone’s noticed anything different about me…
Of course in a lot of ways this is encouraging; I’m still at the baby tranny stage of assuming that when I go out dressed everyone within a 100m radius will immediately notice. It’s hardly news that people in general wander around thinking about money or football or computers or last night’s telly or anything apart from what’s in front of them, but I guess I still need to learn that.
Anyway, I have the tiniest 3mm studs. I’m really looking forward to fabulous funky chunky ‘rings, or lovely sleek shiny things, but for the time being it’s standard studs and nightly cleansing with cotton buds. Boring, but I think it’s going to be worth it.
I assume you’ve heard of the idea of the "male gaze" - the idea that in most film the camera is directed in a way that assumes the viewer is a heterosexual man?
It’s something I worry about in the photos I take of myself. While I’m not as bad as those that photograph themselves with legs apart, bottom in the air etc., I still construct the image in quite a male way I suspect. Ah well, everyone needs something to worry about.
Of course, in this one, my camera developed a male gaze on its own. I set it to focus on my face, but still my legs end up in focus. Bloody patriarchy.
Quite a number of people have left comments on some of my Flickr images saying “Love the sexy pantyhose!” or something similar.
While it’s always nice to be appreciated, even by someone of maybe… specialised tastes, I should just point out that this is incorrect. I do not wear “pantyhose”. I don’t even wear tights for that matter. I wear stockings.
Maybe it’s the vestigial HPW in me, maybe it’s the way that “pantyhose” is so determinedly unappealing a word, maybe it’s just that I find them more comfortable.
OK, it’s the vestigial HPW, if I’m going to be completely honest. But I think we should all make friends with our inner HPW.
Of course, I’m not really expecting that this post will get read by the people in question, but I’m hoping that writing it it will make me feel better…
Just back from a weekend in Barcelona.
During the weekend my friends repeatedly suggested that I use some sun block, but I refused on the basis that I have slightly dark skin anyway (well, for a white person), tan easily and generally don’t burn.
Well, it looks like my nose is peeling slightly now - it wasn’t obvious at all as a boy but as soon as some powder went on this morning it got stuck in all the cracks and made a very odd looking pattern. At least it’s not too obvious from a distance but it sure startled me.
[NB: I will post something profound one day soon, I promise...]
Fact: the lighting at my office is much brighter than the lighting in my bedroom.
Corollary: it is much harder to see left-over bits of make up and nail polish when you’re trying to take them off on Sunday night than in the office the following morning.
Quite a few years ago, when I got my left nipple pierced, a girlfriend at the time asked me if I intended to get the other one done too. When I said I didn’t know, she said: “I see. You’re trying to find your ideal topology”.
I should probably mention that she was a mathematician.
As it happens, I did get the other one done fairly quickly, and then my navel. And it rested there for a while.
But now I’m planning on getting my ears pierced - and that’s starting to make me think about the other piercings. (Hard as it may be to believe, I have basically ignored them for years.) Objectively, I’m quite bored with the nipple piercings, and given that they get in the way occasionally I should just take them out. But I tried doing that this morning and it just felt Wrong in a way that I really didn’t expect. So they’re back in now.
I think she was right all along. When I do get my ears pierced, I wonder whether then I’ll suddenly realise that those two other piercings have got to go…
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