Exposure Is Good

You can't get more prominent coverage than this.  This is the Sunday Washington Post page 1.  Sundays are popular for "fluff" pieces: this can be written in advance, and no reporters have to work on the weekend to produce it.  But Sundays are also good because circulation is up ~ more exposure.

In the main article it sounds like the writer is being careful to balance information with family wishes for privacy.  My balance issue here is one between wanting this information to get out with the possibility that the parents might make their child's life harder by doing so.  It's not easy for you or I to judge how much information to let out about ourselves, our family, our friends.  The stakes go up when it's a child, of course.

I applaud  Ms Dvorak.  She wrote a thoughtful article, stayed away from the journalistic balance problem that pervades reporting today, where nonsense points of view are given equal weight to factual ones.  I also applaud the parents and hope they've been reading Raising My Rainbow.

A separate article on drug options for treating transgender issues was also in the paper.  I was a bit concerned when I saw that, but it's about puberty blockers and further hormone options, not something Merck created to "cure."

The video at the start of the article can be found here, and a photo gallery is here.

In other news, The Post had this article from the Associated Press.  The long-overdue headline: A decade later, researcher apologizes for study suggesting gays can go straight with therapy

It feels like a good weekend for the community.

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Thank You

I really appreciate all of your kind comments and e-mails about our recent loss.  I don't think I understood how important support is to recovery until this week.

Thank you.  I love you all.

I'm Only On #77

A reader was kind enough to point me at a British strip called The Princess.  Navigation is a bit weird ~ it took me a while to discover that the pointing fingers were their wayback machine.  (Yes, now you know something else about me.)

I was starting to worry about Sarah ~ she wore the same dress for the first 76 strips.  Now her dad finally bought her a new one.

The "up" finger will go back to the first strip:

As I said, I'm only on strip 77 but it's about Seth, a boy who's always been saying she's a girl, a princess named Sarah.  Her father is understanding and helpful; her mother ~ not so much.  I think that's changing, after a bullying incident by a boy who really likes Sarah but is very confused about it.

It's fun, it's worth reading... at least, so far.  I've mentioned my tendency to remain in motion unless an outside force acts on me, so I'll keep reading until I get to yesterday's (#258).  It's only updated twice a week, so it shouldn't take long to catch up and stay caught up.

Here's another key early strip, where she makes friends with a girl who's more boy than Sarah is:

Don't forget to click to get the big picture.

Go Sarah!

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Another Another Shopportunity

A gg friend suggested a bra for me. She owned the same style and really liked it. It's from Cacique and I have a weakness: if someone with better fashion sense than me (read: almost everyone) suggests an item from the women's side of the aisle, I go for it. I especially like this woman's style, so I went for it. The fact that she sent me a gift card to cover the cost made it irresistible.  I ordered the bras (they had a two-for-one sale) the week before my job ended.

So one morning on my week off I went down to Lane Bryant. It seems Lane Bryant, Catherine's, Fashion Bug, and some other chains are all owned by the same parent company and you can get items drop-shipped to any of those stores. The Lane Bryant is near my old office and I was hoping it would get there before I left ~ it, of course, did not.

No matter.  I picked up the package and noticed that Lane Bryant Sells Shoes.  Lane Bryant, for those who don't know, is for more full-figured ladies.  They had shoes in 11W in almost every style they sold.  Alas, I didn't really like those styles so I didn't buy, but it was nice to  see all of those shoes in my size anyway.

I also saw a nice necklace and almost-matching bracelet.  The necklace was $30 and the bracelet cost less ~ and they had a "buy one jewelry item, get one free."  I decided at the last minute to pass though.

I looked through the nearby Dress Barn and wasn't impressed with what I saw.  On the other side of Lane Bryant was a Ross Dress for Less with more dresses than any other shop I have ever been in!  They had extremely long double racks and they placed them end-to-end with a space in between, so you could escape before getting too old, I suppose.  There were three or for rows of these racks.  One entire row (both sides) was large and 12's.  If I was more comfortable with sleeveless dresses, I could have bought twenty.  Instead I found three dresses I loved, decided I'd only buy two and agonised over which one to return to the rack.

I'm happy.  It's been a good week for clothing, and I also went through some other clothes and marked more than three dresses and two bras for the clothing swap.  I am sticking to my rule: if clothes comes in, an equal amount (at least) must go out.

I'm being a good girl.

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Therapy the Ninth

Therapy was cancelled due to the death of my wife's mother early Tuesday morning.

Services will prevent my attending the congressional district convention on Saturday.  I believe I can still attend the state convention, but I lose out on this opportunity.

Another Shopportunity

I left a badge at home on my last day and I had to make a final trip to my office to return that badge.  I figured I'd use this as a chance to schmooze with a couple of the people in the office and to hit the mall and the nearby stores One More Time.

I started at the bicycle shop: my son wanted a lock for his bicycle.  From there, I went to Ulta, kind of right next door.  They offered a coupon this week, and I'm still on my lip gloss kick so I thought I'd see what they had.

What they had was busy salesladies and I didn't want to just grab something, so I left.

I went across to the mall and went into the Penney's.  They have a little Sephora area in the store and I again asked a saleslady to help me find a gloss in my shade.  She did, and I purchased a tube of Sephora "glossy gloss" in Creme Brulee.  I did as is now my habit: I told her I'm looking for gloss in my shade; I want to add shine, not colour.

From there, I went back to the Macy's.  I saw the same saleslady as last time, when I bought the pants and black skirt.  I've talked about my face blindness before, but I remembered she was slim, had long blonde hair, and a Scandinavian accent.  Once I heard her speak, I was pretty sure it was her.  I looked at the clearance racks and found a nice dress, in shades of purple and blue.  When I went to check out, she remembered me and I said "you suggested I get more colourful and here I am!"  She helped me look for a dress like the woman in front of me purchased ~ I really liked it ~ but it was also from the clearance rack and was the only one there.

There is a Payless in the mall that had a platform pump in my size, but I wasn't sure I wanted to spend $35 for them, so I didn't go back.  I did go across the street to the DSW and found nothing I liked in my size, and I went next door to the bookstore and also found nothing I liked, in my size.

At least I now have a new dress aching to be tried on. Next up: look for a place to wear it out.

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Nontransferable, Transacting, Transcript, Transcribed, Transferable, Transparency

For what it's worth, I will be going to the Virginia State Convention this year.  I was selected to be one of the people who select the four delegates who will go to the national convention.  Yes, there are more than four delegates from Virginia; the rest are chosen by elected officials and other important people, not us grassrooters.  The actual total for Virginia is 132.  Of the four, two men and two women are selected at the convention.

I actually have no idea as to what is expected of me, so I started doing a bit of research.  I found a document called 2012 Delegate Selection Rules for the Democratic National Convention.  This is a generic document that describes how each state chooses their delegates.

I expected to find a one pager or, at most, a short document.  This is, after all, just for how the states choose delegates, not for the actual convention.

It is 98 pages long.

I read past the Non-Discrimination section and the Affirmative Action section.  When I got to page 7 and rule 7, Inclusion Programs (one long paragraph), I saw the first reference to LGBT:

The Democratic National Committee recognizes that other groups of Americans in addition to those described in Rule 6 may be underrepresented in Party affairs. These groups include members of the LGBT community, people with disabilities, and youth. The National and State Parties shall adopt and implement Inclusion Programs in order to achieve the full participation of members of these and other groups in the delegate selection process and in all party affairs, as indicated by their presence in the Democratic electorate. As is already the practice in some states, State Parties may use goals to achieve these ends; however, in no event may such participation be accomplished by the use of quotas.

On page 17, in the convolutedly entitled Regulations of the Rules and Bylaws Committee section I found Regulation 4.7, Rules 5.C, 6.A, and 7.  Paragraph B reads:


Rule 7 requires State Parties to develop a plan intended to secure the full participation in the delegate selection process of LGBT Americans, people with disabilities, youth, and other groups the State Party may deem necessary, commensurate with each group’s participation in the state’s Democratic electorate.  Consistent with this rule, State Parties must take reasonable steps to determine the participation of these groups in the state’s Democratic electorate.

and paragraph C.iii. says:
A program to achieve full participation by additional under-represented groups as required under Rule 7 [Inclusion Programs, copied above], provided, however, that in lieu of a separate inclusion program, a state plan may establish goals, with methodology, and timetables for the under-represented groups identified in Rule 7 (LGBT Americans, people with disabilities, and youth), as well as other groups the State Party determines to be underrepresented.

It doesn't bother me that LGBT seems to be closely tied to "and people with disabilities."  At least they didn't write "and people with other disabilities." 

They're trying hard to list under-represented groups so they can maybe someday possibly get them off the list of underrepresented groups.  It bothers me more that we're in an "underrepresented group" list.

I did a search through the document for "trans."  The results of that search is the subject of today's post.

We have a long way to go.

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