Ever drifting away...

I was going to start this entry off with saying I was about to contradict something I said in the last one... but, the entry in question is just not there. WTF? Either the interwebs ate it or I somehow forgot to actually post it after writing it up. So, moving on...

One of the major problems with my life is that I have far too many combined interests and potential interests, and have had insufficient time and opportunity to devote to even *one* of them. So most of my life has been instead devoted to trying to get myself into a position where I have the ability to do at least some of the things I want, and coming up with ways to combine interests so I can more easily do most of them when I have the chance. Okay, that's a bit of a lie, that's only been a secondary devotion, the primary one being trying to financially support my mother while finding ways to obscure or bend reality so that she can live with the comfort that she's on the track to eventually making the world a better place. Despite the fact that, so far, she's accomplished nothing but destroying the lives of everyone around her, and at the rate she's going her plans won't really get much of anywhere until long after the end of her probable lifespan. Because not having that comfort makes her crazy. You don't want to see her when she's crazy. But aside from that.

Anyway, just before Thanksgiving I think I found a way to combine nearly every interest I've ever had into a single goal: a concept which I call "intentional culture". It would take half a book to fully explain why and how I came up with that idea (as it is a lifetime cumulation of various learnings and creative ideas). So I'll just try to nutshell what I mean by it: it's sort of like an Intentional_Community, except it doesn't necessarily involve trying to build a specific community, and sort of like an evangelical religion, except it doesn't necessarily endorse any particular religious practices. Basically, it's to create a new, essentially fictional way of life, and then try to recruit people with the intent of making it real and hopefully permanent.

Why attempt such a thing? One of the strengths and hallmarks of humanity is diversity of culture. That diversity is slowly going bye-bye. Most of the world's cultures don't easily take in outsiders who didn't grow up in it, if at all. But they're losing the younger generations to larger, more dominant cultures, often by force. This has always happened, but since the 15th century it's been happening at an ever-increasing pace, and largely to a generic "western culture" which is becoming increasingly homogenized. Look, I'm all for creating an international auxillary language (like Esperanto, except not sucky) or letting English or some other language evolve into one naturally, so you can easily communicate with anyone in the world. There just isn't normally much point in doing so if there's eventually only one language and a few semi-identical cultures. So, one way to avoid that stagnation is to create new ones. Also, as someone pointed out the first time I mentioned the term, much of the common peoples in western or westernized societies already live in a sort of "intentional culture" to varying degrees - but that culture is indirectly created and pushed upon them by elites who don't even live in it. (Note: I said *indirectly*. And possibly not even deliberately. I'm not espousing any conspiracy theories here.)

Of course, that doesn't change the fact that the idea is still batcrap insane on some levels. Finding people who want to alienate themselves from their own culture (or are already alienated but not socially dysfunctional) for the sake of a new one, which will probably not even become fully established in their lifetimes, and to get them to follow the vision of the creator(s) without breaking up into squabbling factions that have different ideas on how to "improve" said vision... any attempt is probably almost doomed from the start. But then again, thanks to my mother, I've become something of an expert at making the impossible happen... but too bad that also thanks to her it's always been a very petty sort of impossible, akin to magically transforming cheese sandwiches into chicken salad ones because she's mildly lactose intolerant. And doesn't want another sandwich, it absolutely must be *this* one, just changed so it was never made of cheese. So if I'm going to engage in insanity anyway, it might as well be something grander, doesn't involve repeatedly sacrificing my long-term future for the sake of one person's short-term comfort, and do it with people who don't make every step much harder than it needs to be.

And if it fails, well, at least I've tried something, and I would build it so that I could still salvage something decent for myself from the ruins in case it does. Or maybe I won't even get it off the ground, but at least I'll still (probably) meet strange and interesting people just by trying. Who knows what the future might bring after that. So... if anyone's reading, it looks like I might eventually reboot this journal yet again, and use it for a different purpose, but I'll probably keep most of the "intentional culture" stuff on another site.

One of the earlier versions of this blog was called "I don't understand people", which was basically about how some emotions, concepts, and cultural conventions I can mostly understand on a purely intellectual level, but I still don't seem to "get them" because they may be beyond my capability to directly experience. I bring this up because I have encountered articles on the concept of "uncanny valley" which seems to have come up an awful lot lately in the things I've been reading. This isn't something new or something I've never heard of before. For those who don't know about it, it's basically the idea that the more human something looks, the more favorably we respond to it, but when it gets to the point where something looks almost human but off in some significant way, it's like OMG my eyes kill it! For those who have heard of it before, you may safely ignore the preceding sentence.  :-p  I mention this because the "uncanny valley" does not seem to be an effect which I am capable of experiencing. Whether near-human aliens or monsters, clowns, furries, the latest non-cartoony CGI animations which still aren't completely realistic-looking, or robots with not-quite natural movements and silicone skin, it doesn't bother me any. An example of the latter was when I saw a short online video of a vocaloid performing - basically, it's a japanese singing robot. Most of the comments seemed to be about how creeped out people were from having seen it. I found that reaction to be rather amusing.

Then again, when I see a close-up image of a bug's head I don't see a freaky alien, and in fact I find some bugs to be rather cute. And it's hard for me to see a monster in anything based solely on appearance. This suggests that my "visual repulsiveness filters" or whatever are broken. I'm not sure if that's a good or a bad thing.

Okay. Very soon now I'm going to finish up this whole "extended profile" thing and all that stuff which was *supposed* to have been taken care of by the end of summer. I mean it this time. I could be working on the rest of this right now, but instead I choose to tell my audience (which can probably be counted on the fingers of one hand) what I've done lately for enjoyment now that I have more time to spare.

First I went to the Hump! film festival. This was a collection of very short adult films (1.5 to 5 minutes each) shot by amateur filmmakers in Portland and Seattle. I took a chance on this even though I hate porn - it's really boring - but since the watchwords here were non-commercial and creativity, I was hoping that the people would find ways of making it not boring. And I wasn't disappointed. Two people having sex on a streetcar. ("Yes, we ended up being busted by a transit cop.") A faked Larry King interview of a woman giving a blowjob. A book-themed interracial BDSM scene. Bizarre made-up sex acts. (The "Carrie" - menstrual blood bukkake.) A really creepy masturbation scene set in a filthy metal chamber. A dance scene which everyone wore nothing but golden high heels - including the male dancer. A goofy parody of both religion and commercial porn. And much more. Straight, gay, lesbian, hardcore, softcore, artistic, wacky, everything. Don't know if it's my thing either, but I live for new experiences, so I'm glad I went.

Second, I went to a nudist swim event - after-hours at an athletic club held a few times during the colder half of the year. It's been a few years since I've done that. It's not a good social environment for me because I can't get my hearing aids wet... not that the last remaining one works all that well anymore... but I like swimming, and wearing clothing for the purpose of swimming is idiotic. (See my section on being a nudist for more information on my views on this subject.)

Third, now that I have high-speed internet, I decided to make use of it by downloading a couple of "fansub" anime series (fansub meaning unofficially subtitled by fans)... I'm not going to get into an ethics discussion right now and just say that some people don't consider it piracy if you delete it or buy the officially released version once it becomes available in your country. (Some anime producers don't mind because if a fansub becomes popular, it proves they can make more money off of it from overseas licensing.) Anyway, the point of this was to try doing a marathon viewing of series which I had never heard of and knew nothing about prior to watching it. Because I'm insane. And anime because the japanese are at least slightly lacking in the sanity department as well.

The first one I chose was "Chocotto Sister". This turned out to be a touching family story about a boy who wishes for a younger sister, and then gets one delivered to him by Santa several years later. And a bit of comedy now and then because she is essentially a cultural blank slate and doesn't know or understand japanese culture. But she does end up very much enriching the lives of most of the people around her. And then they went and made the series family-unfriendly by throwing in occasional out-of-place adult stuff and "no, they did not just go there" moments. Really, I'm wondering who this was made for. Nowhere else have I seen what could easily be a G-rated family drama suddenly jump to "drunken lesbian rapists are funny" for no good reason. (No, not the younger sister in question, fortunately...) Those wacky Japanese.

Also speaking of lesbians, the main character of my second choice, "Maria Holic", coincidentally turned out to be one. ("Maria-sama" is the Japanese name for the Virgin Mary, and this takes place in a Catholic all-girls school.) She gets so intensely in lust thinking about other girls that it results in explosive nosebleeds. And somehow, they do this with even less nudity or direct references to sex than "Chocotto sister". Despite this, she's not trying to get anyone in the sack, just to find her "true love". Another character is a cross-dressing boy who acts like a natural (if somewhat sadistic) girl rather than the hapless pervert, nervous wreck about being discovered, or exaggerated feminine stereotype you'd expect in something like this. He has a maid who follows him everywhere and obeys all his orders without hesitation, but is verbally abusive to everyone, him included. And the story itself - well, there is no real story. But there is rampant fourth-wall breaking, subtle parodies of how not to make an episode (or do a cliffhanger), random trivia overload, annoying the audience is taken to an art form, realistic consequences are shown for unrealistic gag cliches, expanded alaria, and just general random weirdness. Despite being a shorter series, this was actually much harder to marathon, because, well, even if you enjoy it, hours of nonstop insanity and audience screw is really wearing.

Tomorrow is Halloween. I don't have any real plans, probably just watch a horror movie or two like I always do. Despite that I already watched too much recently. Eventually I plan to go out and attend halloween parties or celebrations. Not this time, though.

The only reason why I thought I'd write this is because it might give some people a bit of insight to my personality and/or thought process.

At the time of writing, my mother is now in college. She's having a problem with her chemistry class - a requirement for the degree she's working towards, but likely to be completely irrelevant to the kind of thing she hopes to use that degree for - because she doesn't remember algebra very well (hasn't used it since high school) and wants me to tutor her. Isn't there supposed to be some sort of entry test to screen for that kind of knowledge gap? Some comments from my first tutor session:

"I can think of several different ways to solve that problem. Not having taken the class or read the book, I'm not sure which one they expect you to use on that sort of thing as a general principle."

"I've never been one to solve things dogmatically. As long as you have all the information, understand what it means, know what type of answer you're supposed to arrive at, and have some way of getting there, does it really matter how you do it if the answer is correct?"

"Okay, I understand having to round off to the most significant digit in scientific experimentation in general, but for the purposes of this problem it seems insane. This is a well-established procedure for which that level of accuracy is very easy - any actual deviation from the calculated answer would be less than one-tenth, so 12.5 would be a very accurate and useful solution. The only practical reason why you'd want to round it off to 10 would be if you got the data from someone you suspected to be so grotesquely incompetent that you'd be more productive trying to get them fired than doing their math!"

Okay, time to get on track here. Let's finally start looking for friends and lovers and whatnot! ...Er, not really. Just because I have a bit more time and money for myself doesn't mean I can just jump into it. Technically I could, but there's a lot of other stuff that would be a good idea to take care of first. No, I'm not stalling, I swear! ;-)  So in case anybody's reading this before It's all done, I'm going to make a checklist here and X them off when I get done with them. Hopefully it won't take too long - I'm going to set a deadline of "by the end of summer".


[   ]  Pay off the rest of my debts. If you read "My Mother and My Life" parts 1 & 2, you know what I'm talking about.

[   ]  Get a camera. Much of my searching for people will be done online, and pictures are pretty much mandatory these days.

[   ]  Lose 30 lbs. Partly to be a bit more presentable for a camera, obviously. But there was a time period when were were living partly off food bank stuff. Since my mother's diet is medically restricted, I ended up with most of the high-calorie junk. Went up to 180, and haven't lost any since. I'd like to go back to what I consider to be my "normal" weight, which is around 150.

[   ]  Try one last time to get financial help to get those hearing aids replaced. I'm assuming it won't work as usual. If it doesn't, I'm not going to worry about it for awhile, because I'm not going to devote all my spare time for the next few years just to raise the money necessary to deal with that.

[   ]  Get more practice dealing with strangers on a personal level. I haven't done much of that since my hearing aids became pretty much useless, so it's not going to be easy.

[   ]  Finish this journal, or at least the important "about me"-type entries. The reason for this should be obvious if you read the intro.


There are a few other things that I plan to try to do first as well, but they're lower priority and not really that vital to the process of getting out to meet others, so I won't sweat it if I can't get them done soon for whatever reason.

I promised myself that I would only do two of these, but apparently that's not happening. There's at least one more thing I should probably mention at some point: Our conversations. This should give an idea how little I like dealing with her (and by extension, with my current life). Below is a couple of recent conversations about important issues. These are not at all what we actually said. This is because 1.) I don't recall every single thing word-for-word, 2.) Even if I did, her side of it tends to be meandering semi-rants which often go off subject, and 3.) A lot of our conversations (these included, especially the first one) would require long explanations because they're heavy on oblique inside references and conversational shorthands which would probably make little sense to an outsider. So instead, I will basically summarize in plain English what I was trying to say, and my best interpretation of her responses. As you can see below, either we are communicating very poorly, or else she is unreasonable and possibly insane.

Semi-recently:
Her: You will do a lot of heavy physical labor on my behalf this thursday because I am incapable of doing it myself.
Me: I don't have time for that on thursday, plus the weather is forecasted to be really hot that day. If it's really that important, I have time on wednesday, and it'll be much cooler.
Her: No, I have a massage appointment on wednesday, and a doctor's appointment on friday, and it must be done by friday afternoon, and I must be present while you are doing it because I am a control freak. Thursday it is.
Me: Your massage appointment isn't until late afternoon. I can make time early that day.
Her: I will be picking up books I reserved at the library then.
Me: You can do that thursday.
Her: Absolutely not! I made the plans already, and changing plans is a violation of my comfort level. Therefore it is impossible.
Me: Or I could simply not do it. Thursday I will be doing some short-term work for someone, it will take hours.
Her: Don't you dare. Cancel it.
Me: I will lose a lot of money if I do that. I would have to deduct it from the allowance I give you next month.
Her: [Long angry rant about how her immediate needs and comfort trump everything] Do you understand?!
Me: I understand what you are saying, but I don't agree with it.
Her: If you understand it, then you know you have no choice. [Leaves]
[In the end, I did do it, but only on friday after her appointment. She was not happy about that.]

Yesterday:
Me: I need you to look at these papers for a minute.
Her: Why are you showing me the phone bill?! Are you trying to hurt me?!
Me: What the hell?
Her: I need to relax and not be concerned about financial things. That's your job.
Me: There are some expensive long distance calls on here. I need to know if you...
Her: Don't talk to me about it ever again or I will scream at you and break stuff!
[What she actually said was "I don't want to talk about it!" with a particular tone of voice and look on her face, that, from personal experience, would result in about 75-80% chance of her going berserk if I pushed her on the subject, whether then or later.]

She's not  like that most of the time, as she can be quite pleasant as long as there are no important issues involved... usually. Today she was pissed because I wouldn't give her extra money this month so she can go see an Indigo Girls concert. Well, okay, maybe it's important to her on some level, but you know what I mean. I swear sometimes that she's a six-year-old teenager trapped in an adult body, if that makes any sense.

(It is helpful to read part 1 first, but probably not necessary.)

A quick summary of the events which have made it hard to find time to finish the things I was going to write here, thus the near-hiatus for the past few months. My grandfather died, leaving my mother some money. She was living off of that for a few months, While I was paying off the credit-card debts that were racked up trying to keep her needs met. Also, we moved to a much cheaper place. I reminded her to spend that money carefully and responsibly more than once, and to tell me when that money was getting low. She did neither. So when it ran out and she started begging for more, I was disappointed but not surprised. I didn't have enough left to get us both through the month, but at least there was still the credit card... which was suddenly cut off. (Specifically, my limit was reduced to $500 when I still had $496 debt left on it...) I found out that this was because my father, who co-signed it and has probably forgotten of its existence, had declared bankruptcy. I apparently can't fix that until his name is severed from it, which is going to be really hard because I can't do it without him and have no idea where the hell he is. I managed to get my mother to take back a few of the things she bought, but she's been needing more than usual and I had no credit margin to work with, so it's been a really rough three months.

Now for the future: My mother appears to be going through a semi-late midlife crisis. Part of it is because she recently realized that she's only about a decade away from retirement age, and has gotten absolutely nowhere in her life. The rest is speculation on my part based on conversations we've had over time... it seems like all of the "borrowing" money from people (and credit companies, she also filed bankruptcy before we lived together) that was never paid back, all the imposing on people in ways that were never made up for or reciprocated, and all the inconveniencing of family and friends to the point where she has alienated nearly everyone... was "justified" by the fact that she has a special destiny that will help to make the world a better place, and taking whatever she needed would help her get there. Then she will be able to make up for all that, and more, once that destiny is achieved. Well, if that's the case, then she really doesn't want it to have been all for nothing - you can't justify the means with an end that was never reached. As of late, she has finally been trying some things that probably should have been tried first - but has been highly resistant to all these years because she doesn't like the idea of considering herself to be "poor" or "needy" or "disabled" or whatever other negative label might apply, only to find that a few things that might really have helped are no longer possible. Sigh. Now we're down to one last thing (well, last thing either of us can think of, short of my somehow getting rich and creating a business for her, like that's going to happen) - get her a freaking college education already. So we're trying to get her a student loan. We won't know if the application goes through for awhile. If that doesn't work, then that's basically it. I'm not going to desperately struggle for years to put her through college because I don't know if the jobs will be there, or if she'll be able to keep one if there are any. And I'm not paying off the loan if she gets one either. She's basically on her own after this, whether she gets into college or not.

Well, not entirely, because she'll still have a free room. And a fixed allowance, barely enough to meet her needs under normal circumstances, as long as she lacks regular income. (The latter is a relatively new thing; in the past I simply paid for her needs directly.) Once the credit bills are paid off, which will be fairly soon, I'm cutting down my workload so that I'll have time to get out and do things with other people; to have friends and a real life for the first time in over a decade. If she needs any extra money for whatever reason she'll have to look elsewhere (and good luck with that), because I usually won't have it and won't easily be able to pay off a debt if I run one up again. This will be possible now only because we moved to a much cheaper place. I've given up on her, and while I'm not going to just throw her out on the streets, I'm also not going to suffer on her behalf any longer. Another year or so of that and I'm probably going to break, and then we'd both be screwed.

When I try to talk about my myself, I usually end up talking about my mother's life far more than is probably healthy. This is because my own life pretty much involves keeping her alive and off the streets; I don't really have anything else to talk about. So while I will try to keep her out of the other entries as much as possible, the situation does have a very large effect on who I am today and probably should be discussed at some point.

If you're not interested in reading a long history, go ahead and skip to part 2.

Flash back to 1996. I was in my early 20s, thing were going fairly decently for me, though not perfectly; I had plans for a very specific kind of life, (different from the plans I have now) and a very generous timetable of sub-goals which would get me there by 2005 at the latest, and hopefully much sooner. My younger brother was living with me because he wasn't at all getting along with our father and I lived less than 2 blocks from his high school. He graduated and then moved away to attend an university. So I was looking for a new roommate, when I was contacted by my mother, who needed a place to live. She was living with and supported by a niece of hers who I never knew existed, because her medical problems and difficulty finding long-term employment had driven her to bankruptcy. It wasn't working out very well. In the end, I moved near her, got to meet a long-lost cousin, and made the agreement that we would stay together only long enough for her to get her life together.

After a few years of this, it became blatantly obvious that things were not getting any better. I was sacrificing tremendously to keep her needs met, but her health was not improving. During the times when she had one, her jobs were temporary, or else she would get fired (based on what little I could gather, apparently for constantly disobey orders and acting like she knew better than her bosses) or else she would get hospitalized and have to quit. Nor was she easy to get along with; if she wanted something, you damn well pay attention and meet those wants right then, no matter how inconvenient it is for you, or else things are going to become a lot more inconvenient for you. And when she didn't want anything, you damn well better stay out of her way and leave no obvious signs that you exist, or else... and then gave no real consideration to the other person's wants or needs even if she knew what they were. I use past tense because she's gotten better over time, and during my childhood she was even worse - back then she also acted like that just by telling other people the way she thought things should be, they would magically gain the ability to rewrite reality to her whim and get pissed at them when they wouldn't do it. Getting back on track, I tried to push really hard in a change in the way things were. It was very difficult to get any sort of cooperation. She kept insisting that she'd have everything fixed "in a few months" and that I just had to be patient. Then out of the blue one of her old boyfriends called and said he wanted to move somewhere new; since she was the only one he knew that lived far away, he thought of staying with us for awhile to check out our area. This lead to some actual negotiation and discussion. The three of us would live together for a few months, he would help out with her expenses, and if possible the two of them would move out somewhere together, and I would get my own life again. I knew him before, and he was a well-off freelance photographer, so what could go wrong?

As it turns out, plenty. The whole thing was a lie. He was only an amateur photographer with expensive professional equipment; he never worked a day in his life at photography or anything else. He was well-off because his parents died long ago and left him a fortune, a fortune which was now gone. He was forced to move because he was being evicted. And he moved in with us because he had terminal lung cancer and wanted to spend his last days with the only woman he ever really loved. It made the situation even worse. I put up with it in part because it's hard to refuse a dying person's last wish, even if that wish involved deception; and part because being with him made my mother happy, and I hoped that improving her mental well-being would somehow help with her physical problems. (No such luck.) His last days turned into last years, stubbornly clinging to life, forcing them to "borrow" a lot of money from various family and friends as I could not support them both. I put borrow in quotes because they promised to pay it back eventually, but it never happened and probably never will. Towards the very end, they started spending money that we *really* didn't have going on trips and nearly made us homeless in the process. And his death itself was a really screwed-up story that I'm not going to get into right now. Sigh.

I gave my mother some time to grieve, and then tried to force the situation again. More stubborn refusal. I threatened to move and leave her with no resources. Didn't take it seriously, until I found a cool poly pagan family to live with - about 200 miles away. She backpedaled, and promised to get work and stick with it until things seriously improved. She did, and managed to stick with a job for two years - but it made her health much worse, and she was hospitalized several times. In the meantime... my father. He's about as bad as my mother but in entirely different ways; unlike her, his emotional and mental problems started out lesser (or at least, less visible) and got worse over time. I tried to help him best I could during this period, because this was the first time in his life he had ever asked me for anything. It was hard because he lived around 300 miles away. Ultimately it did no good; he turned into a crazy cat person (kept picking up strays), lived in squalor and stench, and then one day just disappeared. Nobody knows where he went. One semi-good thing that came out of it was that I had been unable to get credit for use during an emergency in the past; I was able to get him to co-sign a credit card so I could have one finally.

After those two years, my mother was getting hospitalized nearly every month, she was suffering from frequent emotional breakdowns and psychotic episodes at home, and finally quit. Unfortunately her health had deteriorated to the point where her medical expenses were unaffordable without her extra income; I had to use the credit card to rack up a considerable debt. She decided that the only way to go from this point was self-employment. Let's see, no startup funds, refusal to do the basic research and instead made stuff up as she went along, declaring sound business practices to be "immoral"... yep, doomed. Even if she had done something halfway feasible, I would have had to take a lot of time away from my own work to be consultant, troubleshooter, and general laborer for her, because she would refuse to do research or learn how to do the "hard stuff" when there's someone else around who can do it instead, which would end up with about the same amount of work for me, more work for her, and at best only slightly higher combined income and probably not even that. Double sigh.

Later, I finally convinced her to try to apply for disability. She has been refusing for years because "thinking of myself as disabled would make me sicker. I want to get better, not worse." She's finally come around to realizing that if it's possible to get better at all, it'll take some very expensive help which I will probably never be able to provide, and nobody else will help anymore. Unfortunately, it doesn't work. She has no clearly diagnosable conditions. She has a ton of chronic problems that are not that serious on their own; none are disabling or clearly linked as symptoms of any known condition generally considered disabling. Yet together, they make it very difficult to function normally. Even sympathetic doctors can't come up with something we can give the government agencies. Fibromyg-whatsis Fibromyalgia [corrected later] has been sometimes suggested as at least part of it, but extensive tests have mostly ruled that out.

That's how we ended up where we are now. Next up: a hopefully shorter look at my current life and how things will probably go if nothing really changes.

I seem to have been "friended" by a few random strangers here on Livejournal ever since the latest reboot of this journal. I'm not sure why, because it's not like I'm likely to have anything of interest to refer back to repeatedly once it's finished (as this is meant to be an extended personal profile, basically). But it's evidence that at least a few people actually read this, unlike journals version one through three. Dealing with signifcant financial problems have put me on hiatus, but I will hopefully get around to finishing this soon. Damn parents are like 6-year-olds armed with nuclear hand grenades. Okay, exaggeration obviously, but I'm tired of cleaning up their messes so that they don't screw up everyone else's lives (including mine) even worse. At least my mother seems to be starting to listen for once when I lecture her about responsibility, though it seems to be more because she's going through a "mid-life crisis" about a decade late than anything else.

But here's a random positive note for anyone who expects me to write something resembling a blog or journal or whatever. Don't get used to it... Cooking is one of the few outlets I have for creativity, since I don't have time or opportunity for much else. So, new experimental recipe today. First I started out with what I call "slow-fries". Basically, I slice up yellow potatoes and fry them in a mix of olive oil, water, and a little salt. The water keeps the oil from absorbing too much heat and becoming "damaged" (chemically changed so that it becomes unhealthy), which takes them a lot longer to cook; but slow-cooking under lower heat also keeps in the flavor and nutrients. Has to be stirred a lot, though, and you need to keep the water from boiling off. The result is something that, in my opinion, tastes better than french fries (no need for condiments, even!), is far healthier, but lacks the crispy texture... well, two outta three ain't bad. Anyway, that's not the recipe, just one of the ingredients. This time, I cut them into small chunks instead of strips. When the fries were almost done, I continued "parboil-frying" them along with chopped tomatoes and onions. Then when those were almost done, I mixed them into some refried beans (out of a can, I prefer not to use premade stuff usually, but refried beans are too much of a bother) and spiced it with chili pepper and paprika, then cooked it all for a bit longer. The result was very good; not quite gourmet level, but enough to make it again in the future. Oh, and in case it's not obvious to the non-chefs in the audience, I've found that high-quality cooking is partly a matter of timing. Different ingredients optimally cook at different rates, so if you want things to come out their best, throwing everything together in the pan at once is usually not a good idea. So, that's all yer gitten today, folks.

On and off, over a two-year period, I used this journal for various things. However, I never had time to keep it up for long, and there is no evidence that anyone ever read it anyway. So this time, I will be turning it into an extended profile of sorts. Since I frequently have little time to get to know people at all, this can be something to refer people to if I'm trying to get to know them online.

And if you're reading this for exactly that purpose, welcome! Feel free to read any or all of these entries in any order that you like. And if you're not, then... um... what are you doing here?

Currently - Portland, Oregon, USA. However, I don't really have any roots here, or anywhere else for that matter. I've lived over most of the pacific coast, from Bellingham, WA at the north end and San Francisco, CA at the south end. When I was younger, my parents moved all the time (staying at one place anywhere from 5 to 18 months), and as an adult, I found myself moving every 2-3 years for practical reasons. And my relatives, the handful who are still alive anyway, have become scattered all over the country. And in many of the places where I have lived I barely saw any of the area, or knew anyone while I was there. So I don't really have a "home" anywhere.

I aim to change that soon. Might as well start somewhere around where I am already, since it seems a decent enough area and I'm probably going to be stuck here for awhile anyway. There are some problems, though, but you'll figure them out from some of later entries.

Specifically, I consider my self to be a male-to-female transsexual. I was born with a male body, still have it actually. I'd very much rather have a female one. I've been trying to work toward that since I was 16. (At the time of writing, I am now 34.) I did make a little progress in my 20s. But since I've been dirt poor all my life, and I've been desperately struggling to keep myself and certain other people alive and off the streets, I don't know if it will ever happen. But I won't stop trying, if given the opportunities.

But anyway, it's not quite that simple. With me, nothing ever really is. I'm probably mildly bigendered as well. A bigendered person is someone who identifies as both male and female and (usually) wishes they could be both at different times. Basically, if I had the ability to magically change into whatever I wanted to, whenever I wanted to, I would probably choose to be female about 70% of the time, male 20% of the time, and "other" 10% of the time just for variety - neuter, hermaphrodite, nonhuman, whatever. As such, though I identify as female, I don't hate having a male body. I can live with it if I have to. It just feels wrong to have one all the damn time.

If you're reading this in sequence, you'll note in later entries that I'm not very much like a stereotypical transgendered person. Or for that matter, a stereotypical anything.

Technically, I have "profound hearing loss", but I can hear fairly well if I have two hearing aids. Unfortunately, I have only one right now, and it is really old and doesn't work too well. I have tried applying for financial aid a number of times over the years, but I have been turned down every single time. I have barely any money. They cost around $2000. Without them, I am functionally deaf for most purposes. This makes it really hard to get to know new people.

I wasn't born that way. When I was 4, I came down with menigitis. I lost part of my hearing, eyesight, and had trouble walking for awhile afterwards. Eventually my eyes recovered completely (I'm pretty much the only one in my family who doesn't wear glasses at least part of the time!), and so did my legs. My ears, however, got a bit worse over time.

I never learned sign language. Okay, fine, I picked up a little bit. But that's not really saying anything, since I picked up a little bit of about 50 other languages. (This is not an exaggeration.) I never needed it. I became an expert lipreader very quickly, without any training - just picked it up naturally somehow. That combined with the use of hearing aids overcame most of the disadvantages of being near-deaf. But now I sort of need sign language, but I don't have time to learn it. Aargh.

Oh, as things currently are, I don't have too much trouble understanding people if they're exceptionally clear speakers or I'm familiar with them. It's becoming familiar with people that's a bit of a problem.

More specifically, out of the BDSM spectrum, I am into D/S (Domination & Submission) primarily, B/D (Bondage & Discipline) secondarily, and S/M (Sadism & Masochism) only minorly. Oh, and I'm bi. Now, it's possible that I might be wrong. After all, I don't have any experience with BDSM of any kind, and I've yet to have sex with a woman. (I've done it a few times with men.) But as I'm reasonably sure as you can get without having had experience in such things.

As far as D/s is concerned, I really want to have control of some kind over other people. As the least dominant person in a family of hyper-dominants, I get frustrated at being treated as the bottom of the pecking order no matter what I do. And then a lot of people outside the family seem to conclude from my fairly feminine demeanor that I would make an excellent doormat. I'm sick of having to constantly beat it into people's heads (family or otherwise) that I prefer to take charge and don't take crap from anyone. Nnnrk. So, I would like to eventually get into a relationship where the other person will actually listen to what I say sometimes. And not have to fight them every step of the way to be able to accomplish anything. Even better, a master / slave type relationship where I am the master and what I say goes by default. I'm fairly dominant anyway, but that would probably very much relieve the frustration I feel about dealing with other people to actually have reliable control for once.

That doesn't mean that I just want to boss people around. There are ways to control people and have them actually respect you for it. I'd rather have respect than control if it came down to that. Just because I want a slave doesn't mean that I'd also be a slavedriver.

As for the other stuff, well, bondage and discipline seem fairly sexy to me, but I don't need it (in a fetish sense). I'm fairly neutral toward S&M; I might do it occasionally with someone who was interested in it, but I'm not especially interested in it myself.

I can't say for sure, of course. I have yet to have even one lasting relationship. This is not for lack of trying; due to various constraints, I have like one date every two years. This journal is part of the process that I am doing to try and change that. But anyway, I am reasonably certain as one can be with no experience, that I am not the monogamous type. That doesn't mean that I would cheat if I ended up settling for a strictly monogamous relationship and then found someone else later. I'm too honorable and heard too many horror stories to risk that. (Or so I'd like to think. Of course, nobody can tell for sure unless they face the temptation...) But if I had my way, I would be living in a multi-adult household where all of us have some sort of romantic relationship with some or all of the others. More traditional poly where you have more than one lover who has no relationship (and little contact with) any of the others is also fine, but not quite ideal. If you've also read the previous entry about BDSM, you might guess that the absolute best relationship for me would be to have a harem of slaves of both sexes who are also at least somewhat involved with each other. 'Cuz I'm the queen, baby!

Well, anyway, I don't really understand jealousy. I can't imagine feeling anything like it. I can imagine getting irritated because someone promised to spend time with me but keeps blowing it off to be with someone else, but that's probably not the same thing - I'd feel the same if they were, say, going off to throw rocks in a pond by themselves or something. I can also imagine feeling envious of someone for having something (or someone) that I hoped for myself, but I don't seem very inclined to do so. This is probably because, unlike most people, when someone does something that appears bad, I tend to consider mostly the best possible reasons why they would have done so, while at the same time keeping a neutral attitude, assuming nothing. This would tend to defuse the unreasonable negativity towards others that forms part of the basis of jealousy (assuming my limited understanding of it is anywhere near correct, anyway).

Now add in the fact that I think that love should be shared among people, and that sharing it among more than one lover wouldn't diminish it (any more than having more than one friend or more than one child doesn't make you love them any less), and that life is too short and too limited to confine oneself to just one person, and that I would give up sex forever if it was the only way I could have a loving relationship, and... hopefully you get the picture.

I do not consider nudity to be inherently sexual. Sure, I might stare a bit if I saw a naked person walking down the streets. This is because this is not a normal sight. I would also stare a bit if I saw someone with a pink mohawk. I would stare a lot if I saw a zebra eating my lawn, because I'm not in the wilds of africa and don't have a lawn!

Nor am an an exhibitionist. I am fairly apathetic about who does or doesn't see me naked. Not so much that I would risk being arrested, or offending someone who I know would be offended, because either could cause trouble for me in the future. But it does not in any way bother me to be seen naked.

I've been to nude beaches and nudist resorts. There is little-to-no gawking at such places, and definitely no sexual activities. Sometimes there are even children present.

I'm not against clothing. It's just sometimes, clothing is uncomfortable or seems somehow inappropriate.

I don't understand the attitude of "OMG I just saw someone naked who doesn't look like a supermodel! My eyes need to be washed out with acid!!!" I personally don't find supermodels attractive. They look more like malnourished mannequins than real people. But whether supermodel, attractive, plain, or ugly, people somehow look more human to me without clothing than with them. I can't really explain it.

So, all else being equal, I would prefer to be around those who are comfortable with casual nudity than those who aren't.

Umm... what're those again? I vaguely recall having had some sort of fascination with astronomy as a child, but I seem to have misplaced it.

No, not really. I do have plenty of interests. It's just that I've never really had time to explore most of them very much or do much of anything with most of them. So here is an alphabetical list of them, and a brief comment on each:

Art: I do have some artistic talent, but sadly never really developed it much. I do enjoy both the creation and appreciation of art when I get the chance.

Cartoons / Comics: And these are another form of art, basically a visual story. I tend more towards Japanese ones (i.e. anime and manga) largely because American ones tend to be about superheroes (not really my thing, or at least not the way they usually do it) or for meant for children (good once in awhile, but not all the time) or meant for "mature adults" (read: immature adults).

Cooking: I've been cooking homemade meals since I was 10 and fairly regularly since I was 15. I like experimenting with ingredients.

Gardening: Growing my own food, mainly.

Linguistics: I'm interested in languages in general, and hope to create at least one full-fledged language of my own someday that sees actual use in the real world. Because I'm crazy. Also, I can read French and Japanese fairly well, but haven't had the practice to really speak them. And at least a few words in about 50 other languages. [Edit: several months after this was originally posted, I got around to actually counting them. Including English, the actual number is 44. Close enough.]

Medical Science / Biotech: I occasionally follow the state of these subjects partly because I hope to someday get my hearing back, fully change sex beyond what is possible today, and live to be several hundred.

Politics: I follow US and world affairs on occasion to get a fair warning of potential upcoming political or economic disasters. And also, sign online petitions for causes I support, for all the good that probably does.

Same-sex Romance: Hetero romances usually don't grab me much for some reason, though there have been some exceptions. I tend more toward F/F romances, mainly because I identify as female, but M/M or even Transgender/Either is also good.

Sci-Fi / Fantasy: This world's boring. I need an escape sometimes. I am not a rabid series fan of any sort (such as a trekker) however.

Sexuality: Mostly the social and political aspects of sexuality, not porn.

Survival: My parents barely fed me growing up, so I ended up gathering edible wild plants (and occasionally, insects) for myself. Still do, from time to time, to save a bit on food costs. Also, I'm slightly paranoid about the possible collapse of civilization, thanks to my exposure to politics.

Transhumanism: I follow this subject mostly because it's a good source information on Medical Science and Biotech that I wouldn't know to look for otherwise. I'm not entirely into a lot of the philosophies involved, though.

World Traveling: Well, I would if I could.

...Aside from all this, I'm also into doing anything I haven't done before simply for the experience of having done it, even if I probably won't like the experience itself all that much - though that just means I probably won't be doing it again.

Note that occasionally more than one thing is listed, because in that case it's hard to choose just one.

Actor:  Harrison Ford (back when I cared about such things)
Adornments:  Necklaces and Collars
Anime:  Kashimashi - Girl Meets Girl
Annoyance:  see confusion
Beverage:  A mix of green tea and white grape juice
Beverage [alcoholic]:  Umeshu
Bird:  Penguin
Building:  Tower
Clothing:  Nudity
Colors:  Yellow and Purple
Computer:  Commodore Amiga (back when they existed)
Confusion:  see annoyance
Country:  Umm... France?
Family Film:  The Goonies
Fast Food:  None, it all tastes like crap
Flower:  Daisy
Herb/Spice:  Garlic
Humor:  Situational joke
Ice cream flavor:  French Vanilla
Invertebrates:  Spiders and Butterflies, also maybe Dragonflies and Lobsters
Jewelry:  Necklaces, body piercings (mainly rings)
Joke:  Situational humor
Number:  Four
Nut:  Pecan
Pet-type Animal:  Rabbit
Pokemon:  Mew (And no, I've never actually played the game)
Qrflgl:  Huh?
Scientists [20th Century]:  Albert Einstein and Alan Turing
Sci-Fi Movie:  Aliens
Sex Acts:  Ask me when I've had more experience.
Sorting Method:  Alphabetical
TV Show:  Buffy the Vampire Slayer (or at least it was back when I actually watched TV)
Vehicle:  Anything except cars or trucks
Video Game:  Alpha Centauri

[More to add later...]

Two subjects, which you should apparently never discuss. Yet a truly complete profile would never be without them. So here.

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I am not a member of any established religion. I wasn't even aware that the concept of "religion" existed until my teens. Over time, I have developed my own philosophy. Atheists and agnostics would both probably consider me one of them. I call myself a "zen nihilist", a term which I made up, so if that's the name of any real-world philosophy I have no connection to it. Actually, I should probably check that right now.

[Later, after checking with Google] Not really, it appears that some people consider "zen" to be a semi-nihilist philosophy, and a few people appear to have their own made-up use of the term, but there probably isn't anything specific established under that name, so I'll stick with it. So what do I mean by "zen nihilism", anyway? Well, I'm not sure if there's a simple manner which it can be explained, so I'll give an example. If I were to write a book or text detailing it, it would be full of 'wisdom' like this: "The reason why 'what is the meaning of life?' has never been satisfactorily answered is because it is an inherently nonsensical and pointless question. Much like asking 'what color is north?' or 'what does division by zero taste like?'. It's not even 'life has no meaning' because that would mean something in itself. The problem is that the question assumes that 'meaning' is a quality which exists independently of any observer, and 'life' possesses that quality. In reality, 'meaning' is a process which exists *only* in the mind of an observer. And even if it were not, there is no reason to believe that 'life' would possess 'meaning' beyond  the dictionary definition of the term, or that 'meaning' could be measured in any useful way - aside from some people's desire that it be so."

Got that? Yes? No? Okay, if you need something closer to sound-bite level, try out this: "I do not care whether or not any supernatural deities exist, because it does not matter either way." If you're wondering 'why not?' it would take a whole 'nother paragraph to explain, which would defeat the point of having a short quote. In case someone thinks that this is all negative, or existence-denying, then there's much more to it than that. Because if you are in any way a functional human being, then the world has meaning to you, and you have meaning to yourself, and that should be a good enough reason to better yourself and the world if you are able.

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Politics... rrghplkt. I'm not even sure where I fall on the political spectrum, but I do know that neither major party represents my interests. I do believe that government should avoid unnecessary expenses, focus on paying off any debts when they exist and avoid accumulating debts when possible. I also believe in the personal freedom to do whatever you want as long as it harms no one other than yourself (tricky to judge or define, as it's technically possible to harm others indirectly when you harm yourself, but I do believe that in principle). If it stopped there, then that would put me squarely in the Libertarian camp. But I find them far too darwinistic for my tastes. So...

In order to explain the rest of it, I must first note that there are two basic types of freedoms. The first, known as 'negative' or 'passive' freedom, is pretty much what I already mentioned, though a bit broader: the right to do as one desires without interference from others. The second is 'positive' or 'active' freedom, which is the actual capability to do whatever it is that you desire. The two sometimes conflict: compulsatory education, for example, promotes active freedom - directly by teaching you how to do a wide variety of things you might want to do, and indirectly because some of those things are possible only with a well-educated population. But it also infringes upon one's passive freedom, because some people might choose not to get an education if it weren't compulsatory. I also believe that government should take a very significant role in 'active' freedom - by eliminating common obstacles to people being able to enjoy their rights - homelesness, hunger, sickness, disability, discrimmination, illiteracy, crime, whatever - and provide everything people need to get by just well enough that they don't have to focus on mere physical survival above all else when things go wrong. And that this doesn't count as an "unnecessary" expense. This is a very Socialist thing, which is pretty much the polar opposite of Libertarian.

So what else is there? Liberal? Maybe, as they do have some things in common with both Libertarians and Socialists, but traditionally Liberals have done a lot of throwing tax dollars at the marketplace in ways that seem ridiculous and unfair (100 billion in tax breaks to keep MegaCorp from moving to Swaziland? Paying farmers subsidies because the food distributors conspire to pay them less than it costs to grow the crops?) So probably not. (Most people who call themselves "Liberals" would not agree to this, but that's what their politicians tend to do here in the U.S.) Conservative? Maybe, as the classical conservative philosophy of non-interence in other cultures and preserving the environment is appealing. But there's currently no conservatives of the classical sense in power - the Republican party is a hodge-podge of Libertarians, Theocrats, and Authitorarians; and even classical conservatives tend to be too culturally backwards-looking for my tastes. As for the Theocrats and Authitorarians, I have just two words: Absolutely not.

So I'm either a confused moderate of some stripe, or else a radical idealist who wants to have their cake and eat it too.

Everything here applies to both men and women (as well as any TG person, in the off chance it happens this way) where applicable. Even if it sounds kind of weird for a specific gender.

Personality: I actually have very little idea in this regard. Sure, if I succeed in getting an owner/slave relationship, then someone who is obedient, but that goes almost without saying. (Almost. There are people who like bratty slaves. I'm not one of them.) And in general, someone who is willing to work out any issues, not someone who just ignores them or demands that it's their way, period, end of question, I'm not listening lalala! But I have very little experience dealing with people who are pleasant or sane to any real degree, so best I can say is anyone who's not like them. Oh wait, can't believe I almost forgot. Prefer someone who would be blatantly honest with me. You can't hurt my feelings easily and I forgive easily if one is honest. And I easily recognize and don't hold it against someone if they are unconsciously lashing out at something that I had nothing to do with. But I find attempts to "spare" my feelings to be irritating, at best.

Physical appearance: This is going to be a long list. But don't think I'm shallow, seeking someone who meets my ideas of physical perfection - these are just general preferences, I wouldn't rule anyone out unless they're the exact opposite of pretty much everything here.

Age: Around my age, plus or minus about five years. At the time of writing, that would be 29-39.
Body type: Basically anything fairly average is fine. Slim, slightly chunky, or athletic is good. Obese, anorexic waif, or steroid pusher is not.
Face: Androgynous looks best, and little to no facial hair.
Size: Close to my size, plus or minus a few inches. I'm 5'10.
Scalp Hair: Short hair, crew cut, or balding isn't my thing. Long hair is best, the longer the better. For some reason completely bald or mohawk can also be interesting.
Body Hair: None. This includes minimal to no pubic hair. This is not because I like a "prepubescent" look (which I do not, and a 30+ year-old doesn't at all look that way anyway) but because I am hypersensitive to touch, and don't like the way body hair feels. Also, a fairly hairy person reminds me of furries, which I am not into.
Bust Size: Average size is actually least interesting. Smaller is better. Bigger is also better. Well, to a point, the very largest-busted porn stars look a bit too big. At least in terms of appearance, real or fake doesn't matter.
Penis size: Anything from a bit smaller than average to significantly above average in length, and not excessively thick or thin.
Physical Markings: A scar, beauty mark, unique tattoo, etc. which makes someone stand out also makes them seem a bit attractive. Even if it was obviously not deliberate. As long as it's not excessive, anyway - being completely covered with scars or burn marks or tattoos or whatever is a bit much.
Piercings: In my opinion piercings also enhance someone's appearance, again as long as it's not excessive. Ring-shaped ones in the ears and/or nipples are my favorite.

I was inspired to post this by something I read in another blog. Some people might find me a bit creepy or disturbing on occasion in part because I don't do it in any meaningful sense.

When I was a child, my parents would swear excessively on occasion, even around (or to) children, especially if they'd been drinking. (Note: weren't really alcoholics, just tended to drink too much on the occasions where they did.) Because I hated them and wanted to be as little like them as possible, I resolved to never use such language. Since then I have loosened up that restriction, and aren't bothered when anyone else uses them, but they're not a normal part of my vocabulary because I have no particular need for them. And on the very rare occasions when I do use them (so far, only when quoting someone or something) I do so with zero invective force. If I did ever have a good reason to use such words, for example "Why don't we go somewhere and fuck?" I would probably end up saying it with the exact same tone as if I ways saying "I'm going out to buy some milk, would you like to go with me?" or the like. They're just words, and not particularly useful or meaningful ones (under ordinary circumstances) as far as I'm concerned.

It's not just in terms of words, but also behavior in general. What happens if I stub my toe or something? Usually, nothing, which my mother finds a bit disturbing. Or if it's really bad, a bit of distressed-sounding gibberish. ("Nrrglf!") Same with an unpleasant surprise.

How about if people treat me like crap? Again, usually nothing (if you count ignoring them as "nothing"). I have virtually no standards or expectations for how other people act, especially random strangers. And even if I'm not in a good mood I usually don't hold anything against them any more than I would hold anything against a leaf that just blew into my face. It's insignificant and not worth the bother. Some exceptions: if someone is deliberately and persistently causing problems, I suggest that if they did become significant and worth the bother, then it'll be time for the annoying insect to go squish. (I haven't ever phrased it like that, it's just the general tone I used. The actual words were subtle but psychotic-sounding threats that seemed appropriate under the circumstances.)  Or if they're going to make things much worse for me if they don't stop what they're doing immediately, then I put on my best "angry jungle cat" face and growl at them. Things like that. From what I've seen and experienced, scaring people is more effective than yelling at them or cussing them out, in part because they usually respond with avoiding you instead of angry arguments.

Note, however, that if I ever "owned" any BDSM subs/slaves I *would* have standards and expectations for their behavior and would probably act very differently. Exactly how, I'm not quite sure yet.