I hate punk rock.

Actually, that's not true; I kind of like punk rock, sometimes. What I hate are people who love punk rock. There has never been a genre of anything that has made more people confused about what art is capable of doing, and they all refuse to shut up about it.

A few years ago, one of my favorite humans of all time died from bone cancer. A few hours after the funeral, I found myself in a conversation with someone who was as depressed as I was and almost as drunk. But--in order to avoid talking about our friend, probably--we started talking about pop music, and this guy kept saying, "Punk rock saved my life." He said it like four times in ten minutes. "When I was in high school." he insisted, "punk totally saved my life. If not for that music, I wouldn't be here today. Punk rock saved my life, man."

I have heard those exact words said thousand of times by hundreds of people, and none of them are ever joking. They exist in a culture of certainty. They want to believe what they are saying so much. They want to believe that this sentiment is literally true. And all I could do while I listened to this dude tell me how punk rock saved his life was think, Wow. Why did my friend waste all that time going to chemotherapy? I guess we should have just played him a bunch of shitty Black Flag records.

— Chuck Klosterman, Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs, p. 165

The experiment continues: I haven't washed my hair since January 28. (Conveniently if entirely coincidentally, it was the morning of the sfgate Bad Movie Night slideshow shoot.) I've showered plenty since then, of course, made simple thanks to the elastic marvel known as a "shower cap." My hair's actually holding up quite well, and is more manageable than when I shampoo it regularly. I've been brushing it out every couple of days to (theoretically) prevent dreadlocking, and of course will shampoo and condition again. Just, for now, I want to see what it does if I more or less leave it be.

Stil haven't had Rachel put in the Switchblade Symphony extensions yet. I hope to have them by June, if at all; but the main obstacle has been the money issue, both the initial outlay and the maintenance. I've been considering just doing the real thing. Not neglectlocks, mind you—that's too goddamned hippie—but having my actual hair done professionally done. I believe that's within Rachel's expertise, and it would be a hell of a lot less expensive. It's scary because of the quasi-permanence; once they're there, they're there until I cut them off, which, to my understanding, requires cutting my hair super-short. That's when the scare factor goes off the charts. Short hair does not work with this body or this face. Period. Bad bad bad if I want people to parse me as female.

And, of course, it's bad and inethical and culturally insensitive—indeed, in the queer lit scene, it's one of the few things I can think of which in which the phrase "politically incorrect" is applicable—but I find that doesn't bother me so much. What, I'm worried about losing elitist cred in this town? That happened quite a while ago, kthxbye.

Jezebel wasn't there, the first one she's missed in a while. She won't be back in the foreseeable future, nor will we be seeing each other beyond randomly crossing paths. We reached an impasse, and I cut the cord. (As The Ex, Maddy, and Collette will all testify, I'm quite the accomplished cord-cutter. I may not do it the right way, but by gum, it gets cut.) Nobody's right or wrong; we just have different, incompatible needs. She's a good person, and I hope we can be friends after the personal dust has settled.

Meanwhile, I haven't seen Vash since Valentine's Day. She's still immersed in her art project and will be until the show itself opens a week from Wednesday, so I'm not expecting to see her until this Friday at the earliest, or more likely Saturday for NakedSword's GayVN afterparty. I'll certainly be keeping busy between now and then. On top of everything else (like acting in an episode on the first weekend), I've been asked to do a commercial for the third weekend of The Twilight Zone. That's a nearly a month away and I already have a pretty good idea of what I'm going to do, so I think I'll be all right.

8:18pm

Met Mistress Eva Destruction from Temple of Atonement tonight. Hit it off quite well. Can't say I'm surprised, since Sister Edith brought us together. Good energy in both directions, and she seems intrigued by the possibilities with me. We're getting together at Bondage a Go Go on Wednesday night to see what happens, how we work together. I think it's going to be good.

9:00pm

Speaking of meeting people, by virtue of unknowingly being at the right place at the right time (the dance floor of Divas at about half past one in the morning), Friday night I met and hung out with Kelly Michaels, my favoritest tranny pr0n star ever. It was like meeting Danielle back in '02 in that I hadn't been sure before that she was still alive, and I was in total gushing fangirl mode. I told her, among other things, that she was an early aesthetic influence on me, which is true enough. As I wrote in '97 about the first time I dressed as a girl in public, with the StopAIDS Drag Outreach Team:

Then again, "style" was something I was sorely lacking. I don't say this to be self-deprecating, but rather as a simple fact. I was just myself. I didn't have the mental energy necessary to adopt any kind of persona, if you will. And that's not necessarily a bad thing, I guess, but what better time to have a little fun? Something else to work on; I guess if I had a role model in that regard, it'd be Kelly Michaels. If you don't know who she is, imagine a Madonna impersonator with a very noticeable southern twang.

Embeth pointed me towards a friend of hers on Tribe. I contacted him and told him that Embeth sent me, and I'm looking for a rope bondage top. His response:

Hi, Sherilyn. Yes, I am indeed a rope bondage fan. You can't see much of my work on Tribe, but you can see more here: [his Flickr page, consisting entirely of pictures of rope bondage models] I do like your profile. Whereabouts are you?

A few minutes later, I send another message:

I'm a pre-op m2f transsexual. Hope that isn't a dealbreaker...

Given the reaction I've encounter to my not-genetic-girl status thus far in this context, I figure I might as well get it out in the open now.

As well I should have, it turns out:

I thought perhaps that might be the case. No, it's not a deal-breaker. Though I don't know a lot about the sort of play you're looking for.

Well, sure, because I hadn't been completely up front about the fact that rope bondage was the kind of play I was looking for, had I? My (hopefully) diplomatic response:

Well, like I said before--looking at your FlickTures, my immediate reaction is, "Yes, like that. Exactly." That's the sort of play I want to do. I want to be a bondage model, like them. That I'm a tranny means I'm probably a bit bigger on average, but then again, [the somewhat heavy-set girl on his Flickr page] doesn't look especially waiflike, either. Me being pre-op (I've been on hormones since '98) shouldn't be a problem aesthetically or practically; my penis is very small, more like a glorified clit...

Meanwhile, Sister Edith has introduced me to a trans-friendly female domme from Temple of Atonement (I went to a party of theirs at the Porn Palace last October) who does rope bondage, among other things. We're getting together in meatspace tomorrow to talk. Though my expectations remain firmly under my heel, my hopes are considerably higher.

sometime after midnight

phases and stages
circles and cycles
scenes that we've all seen before
lemme tell ya some more...

This was the first Saturday in some time which I didn't get any writing done. Feels kinda weird, but it's nice to take a break now and again.

He turned to me said: can you please tell her not to? I had a hunch that I was going to be on her side, whatever it was. I replied: tell her not to do what? Gina said: i'm trying to get a lift to the power exchange. business is too slow out here. The fellow implored me: tell her not to go there. it isn't safe.

Oh, for pete's sake. Dude was telling a streetwalker, arguably the riskiest form of sex work, not to go the Power Exchange because it "isn't safe." Even if I wasn't already aware of the joint's notch-below-pondscum reputation, it would have been hilarious. Not attempting to stifle my laugh, I said: i go to there all the time. i'm a regular. i love it. if i wasn't standing here right now, that's probably where i'd be. The guy's face dropped. but it's not— I continued: it's perfectly safe there, safer than here. He insisted: no, it isn't. bad things happen there. Uh-huh. I turned to Gina and said: do you want a lift to the p.e.? i'm parked up on franklin. The guy threw up his hands in frustration. Gina said: oh, would you? that'd be great. I brought the car around, and Gina and I drove to the Power Exchange, where nothing nonconsensual happened to either of us.

Before going to dinner, I gave myself my first solo estrogen injection. Vash was there for moral support and such, but I did the mechanics myself, as I will from here on out. Assuming I'm able to find a new doctor who'll continue prescribing the liquid stuff, anyway.

Sometimes, though, I wonder if anyone will ever notice that I'm doing it.

No Power Exchange last night. Between the weather and my persistent sadness of late, I just wasn't feeling up to it. There's no telling what I missed—the most interesting nights tend to be the ones where I've had to drag myself out of the house—but it doesn't really matter. There is no such thing as destiny. Things just happen. Sometimes you're in the right place, sometimes you aren't. Last night, the right place felt like at the Black Light District eating Chinese food with Jezebel and watching Idiocracy.

There's plenty of Cure on the laptop. That should help.

1:23pm

The title is "In the Shadow of the Valley," and it's gonna hurt me.

2:09pm

Awww. Someone tried to make a Wikipedia entry about me. It was declined for copyright reasons, but still, that's so sweet.

sometime after midnight

This evening at Bad Movie Night (Dune, I wasn't hosting, just there to enjoy), an obvious newcomer asked me if I my name was Michael. See? It never ends.