Galactica

Thanks to all of those who recommended that I give Battlestar Galactica another go. I've just finished the DVD of Season 1 and really enjoyed it. So thanks again.

Now I have to wait for Sky to screen season 2.. apparently this may not be until January... Still I can work through my Babylon 5 DVD's until then...

And if anyone else needs a reason to watch BSG, then the image below may help ;)

Ramblings

Sitting around today waiting for a builder to come round and give me a quote on a few little bits of work that need doing to the outside of the house before we get it on the market...

Kind of a weird mood today... think the increasingly dark mornings are getting to me already ;) Noticed that bloody Tescos have already got all their xmas decorations and stuff on sale in September! Get this, they are selling Mince Pies that have an Eat By date of 31st October! How stupid is that?

We seem to always be living too far ahead... Back to School stuff goes on sale before the kids have even broken up.. Summer clothes are on sale in December and if you want to buy anything in July for a summer holiday you are stuffed because its all jumpers and big coats. What happened to selling stuff to people at the time they actually want to buy it? Bah.

Here's something that tickled my fancy this week. Had a friend send me this link... Enjoy some Karaoke for the Deaf.

Wondering what the hell Uri Gellar is on about here. Apparently everything hinges around the number 11... important people in history have 11 letters in their name, crap like that. Note Uri Gellar has only 9 letters so he's screwed. (also note Joanna Angel has 11 letters, as does The UK Angels!)

Oh well.. better go do something constructive this morning....

Killer Dolphins

Now this is a classic:

"It may be the oddest tale to emerge from the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Armed dolphins, trained by the US military to shoot terrorists and pinpoint spies underwater, may be missing in the Gulf of Mexico."

Read more here.

Wiki Meme

Becky had a great idea for a blog post. Post the first 5 random articles that you get from Wikipedia. and write a little about how it relates to you. You can see her post here.

1. Lakeshore East :I have been to North America three times. Once to Vancouver/Calgary, once to New York/Boston and once when I worked in Summer Camp in New Hampshire. I have never been to Chicago, although I have watched the Blues Brothers many times. Not sure if that counts or not ;)

2. Byron Allen : Never heard of this comedian before. No idea who he is. A lot of old-school US comics leave me cold- I never really liked Eddie Murphy for example.. although I did like Robin Williams at his height. My favourite comedians are Eddie Izzard (natch), Billy Connolly and Bill Bailey.

3. The USS Remembrance is a fictional boat in an alternative reality series. The Wikipedia article mentions the HMS Ark Royal, which is a boat my Grandad served on during WWII. He was on it when it sank off the coast of Malta in 1941 but escaped unhurt.

4. Litomerice : The Czech republic is somewhere else I would really like to go sometime. I have heard a lot of nice things about Prague and would love to visit.

5. Longitudinal wave : As a former Science teacher I used to love demonstrating longitudinal and Transverse waves using a slinky spring along the floor of the classroom or even in a long corridor. Great fun. Although untangling a tangled slinky was an artform in itself...

Children's names

From the BBC site yesterday: Children's names 'spell trouble'

"According to the website, names which get a negative response from teacher include those with hyphens, like Bobbi-Jo, ordinary names with unusual spellings such as Kloe or K'tee, Kristopher, Jayne, Gyaike and Chevaughn, plus the various spellings of Jordon."

(and thats another interesting spelling of Siobhan - eh Siobhan ;)

I can agree with this up to a point. When I was teaching there were certain names you knew were going to be trouble.. more often than not. For me it was usually Lewis... I always had problem kids called Lewis. I remember once having a year 7 class with two Lewis's in there and both were little shits.

And then there was Troy.. and Beau (both boys) - you just knew they were going to be a pain.

And as I said on Wyndhams blog last week.. I knew I was in trouble when a kid came into the group I was teaching the other week called La Chique.... Oh Boy...

I don't pre-judge as such. I am willing to give them all an equal break at the start. They just happen to be little turds more often than not.

I was wondering if you could draw up a similar list for trannies. Different I guess because you can choose your own name.. but I think every name tells a story of some sort. Maybe that's a post for another day...

Woot!

Gave the postman a hernia this morning. Babylon 5 DVD seasons 1 - 5 arrived this morning.

Strangely the picture didn't show up on the blog... how odd.

Also - thanks for suggesting Battlestar Galactica.. I bought the Season 1 DVD this week and have watched the first 4 episodes. It's not bad... and I am quite enjoying it so far.

Warcraft Virus

Now this article is pretty interesting (well it is to me!) Apparently in World of Warcraft they had introduced a special zone for high level characters where one of the damage effects of the Boss mob was a disease that could kill charactes. The disease effects would be removed once you left the zone, so it was contained.

Some players somehow managed to infect a "pet"(usually a summoned creature) and when they left the zone the disease was not removed from the pet... so it "broke out" into the rest of the world. Players and NPCs were spreading this disease like wildfire and many player characters were dying because of it.

Now this is very interesting on a few levels. Firstly that something like this can spread in a way not intended by the developers in the first place and secondly that it made news on the BBC website. Which shows how big these kind of games are nowadays.

In Everquest we had a Live Event recently where a plague hit the city. The effects were not fatal - they just made your character turn green, get covered with boils, and sneeze a lot. The effects were just annoying. And they could spread very quickly between players. Luckily my healer could perform short term heals against it. There was then a world quest to find a cure and rid the city of this disease. Which was interesting... but on the whole most people were pretty pissed off with the plague while it lasted. I can only imagine how livid people would be if their players died.

Oh.. and you can have a 7 day free trial of EverQuest2 if anyone is interested. Click here to find out more.

Word Up

So thats an I or is it an L? **squints harder** Then an M.. or maybe thats an R and an N close together... no it's an M... I think..?

I am of course talking about Word verification. I was going to write about this before - but forgot. Lana and Stephs comments yesterday reminded me to get something done.

Word Verification is very handy - it has put a stop to all that annoying automated comment spam that I occasionally got on my blog. Which is a Good Thing (tm).

But I seem to have so much trouble doing the damn thing. I spend a few minutes diligently decifering the code.. and then get it wrong. Argh! And the worrying thing is that is when I am sober... I have no chance when I have had a few drinks.. which is probably a Good Thing (tm) too.

I have similar problems with my online bank. To get in it asks me not for my whole password, but for letters 1, 4, and 6 for example.. I have to write it down and work it out to get in successfully.. which is not very secure when you think about it. Every time I try and do it in my head I end up getting it wrong.

It's some kind of mental block I have I guess... I realised a long time ago that I would have no chance as a contestant on the Krypton Factor!

Tranny Spotting pt 2

After the great response to my last Tranny Spotters Guide... and some fantastic additions in the comments.. Here are a few more that I missed (please note any similarity to any trannys living or dead is purely coincidental. For the full disclaimer click here)

Ms Paranoia - Has spent so long fighting for her rights she has forgotten a) that sometimes she might be wrong and b) other people have rights too. Any request to ease up on her rants are met with allegations that everyone is against her.

Miss Commercial - Has a website that sells tranny items. Has joined every mailing list going. Any request by a member for information about the best makeup, wigs, boobs, combine harvesters etc is met with a plug to go visit her site.

Mr Admirer - For some reason has missed the 15 messages on the sign up screen that the club is only for Tgirls and not for admirers. Profile will invariably mention that he is looking for a tgirl for hot sex. There is a 50% chance that there will be a pic attached to his profile and another 50% chance that aforementioned pic will be of his willy.

Miss Intoxicated - Normally posts very late at night often fuelled by a bottle of red wine. Posts are usually stream of consciousness rants about their day, their clothes, their partner, how drunk they are, how wacky they are, what they are wearing etc. Punctuation is optional, even line breaks are rarely used.

Miss Adventure - Thinks that the entire mailing list wants to read every minutiae of their life on a daily basis. Their every shopping expedition, trip to the vet, bowel movement is documented and sent to anyone and everyone.

Ms CanIjustsay - The flame war has ended. All parties have retired to their respective corners while the moderators pick through the smouldering rubble having finally regained control. Members sit around in a daze and catch their breath. After a few days of calm a message appears..... "I know the moderators said this thread was closed, but can I just say one more thing..." aaargh!

The 100 Minute Bible

Today saw the launch of the new 100 minute bible in which the whole of the bible is condensed into a much shorter version which can be read in 1 hr 40 mins. I guess it's aimed at those with a short attention span.. and readers of the Da Vinci Code.

Why stop there? They should take a leaf out of the "Mini Adventure" adverts that were running last year:

"Son of God is born. Dies. Comes Back to Life. The End.... it's a mini adventure..."

Would that work?

Bursting the Bubble

I'm sure you get these kind of emails too.. the ones that show an unbelievable image.. or maybe a stark warning about a certain company. It's usually crossposted to mutual friends and people you've never heard of. You know these people are all going to forward this message on to their friends and on and on...

Like this one: See through-skirts in Japan that a friend of mine posted to a mailing list of mine the other day.

It takes me 1 minute to check on Snopes.com and see that it's fake. And I usually tell them so. Is that wrong? Part of me feels like a real killjoy.. they send me these things going "hey cool look at this" and I usually reply with "Nice.. but fake"

I think it't the teacher in me that hates to see misinformation continuing to be spread. It is just me that does this? Maybe they know its fake but spread it anyway, but a lot of people seem to buy into it. I'm not against the spreading of humerous images... but please don't try and pretend they are real.

It's like these really cutesy email chain letters - "send to 10 of your friends or a kitten will die" kind of things that you can guarantee will end at my inbox. I just refuse to send the bloody things on.

And virus warnings... Some people just continue to perpetuate the same damn rumours round and round the net. Again it takes 1 minute to check on Symantec and realise that its a hoax.

What is it about some people who just seem to take anything that appears in their inbox at face value. Immediately believe it and almost fall over themselves in sending it to their entire address book to warn them of this new threat that will crash the entire internet.

Its calculated that about 20% of all email messages are Spam. I reckon another 20% must be chain letters and urban legends....

Plums

Plums, originally uploaded by Jo Angel.

Just a test. 02 seemed to have changed their internet settings.

Birmingham: It's Not Shit

Having spent 4 years as a student in the city of Birmingham, and having had a great time, I find myself constantly defending the city against people who's only view of it has been as they've driven over Spaghetti Junction. Now I am aided by this website: Birmingham: It's Not Shit

I read about this site on the BBC website who featured the amazing video: Telly Savalas Looks at Birmingham shot sometime in the early 80's. Quality stuff.. Public information broadcasting at its best...



I have a real soft spot for Birmingham. Unfortunately I've not yet been back to see the new Bullring that replaced the awful monstrosity that was the old Bullring shopping centre.. now that was one bit I won't be sad to see go.. I can still remember the horrible smell from the meat market stalls at the bottom of the shopping area that used to pervade the whole area.

Support or Pressure?

Thanks to everyone for their thoughts on the Slippery Slope post. Those were just my personal opinions, but its interesting to see a lot of the readership share those thoughts too.

One comment by Jo Harris interested me;

"One of the reasons I left the Angels for a while was a feeling that everyone was always encouraging me to take the 'next step' in some way. And if I didn't want to take it, well that was probably because I was new to it all, in denial, or scared...or all three and I should somehow get over all that and 'move forward'.

I know exactly what she means, I just hadn't really thought about it in this way. This is slightly different to the slippery slope, and I guess kinda ties in with the whole Tranny Checklist post I made a while back.

There does seem to be a lot of peer pressure in the tranny community - girls who have been out for a long time may think that they are being encouraging in trying to get new girls out to Transmission or Angelic.. I never really considered how intimidating that can be.

It's all about finding your comfort zone. The Angels was originally a space for a group of (already out) tranny friends to keep in touch with each other. It then morphed into a support group for trannies and trying to promote a positive image of trannies to others. As new girls joined.. often very hesitant and unsure about themselves.. they were welcomed by others. Many had a desire to get out and party, others just wanted to find themselves and communicate with other trannies.

For many girls their dressing will never amount to anything more than putting on their stash of clothes at home when the wife/family are out for a few hours. Or dressing in a hotel room when away on a business trip. Does this make them any less of a tranny than the one flouncing down Oxford Street on a busy Saturday? Of course it doesn't.

We've tried to help girls who do want to make their first steps out with events like the Debutantes Ball every year.. but I wonder how many girls have been dragged out by well meaning friends before they are really ready... or are being made to feel really guilty that by not going out they are somehow missing out on something.

Its all about reaching a personal comfort zone. For some that's dressing at home. For others its bungee jumping in full ballgown (joke)... As experienced trannies we are there for guidance and support, but we should never turn that into pressure....

The Slippery Slope?

There is a rule of Tgirl discussions (real or online) that when a tranny mentions that they are just a Tranny (TV) and have no intention of going further (TS) there is invariable a wise and sage TS who will pipe up with; "Ah.....Well you say that now.. But that was how I started.. and look at me now....It's a slippery slope you see."

Which, frankly, is bollocks.

This kind of shite was also put across by Russell Reid in his talk at Sparkle.. that somehow all transvestites are on some inevitable slide towards gender reassignment. This kind of talk does nothing to calm the fears of partners of TV's, one of their major issues being that they feel that their marriage is inevitably doomed.

I am at the TV end of the whole tranny spectrum. I enjoy wearing womens clothes and the sensation of dressing up. As a bloke I am quite drab and really like the whole transformation process and all it entails. But at the end of the day I am a bloke in a dress. I have no illusions that I pass in any way... and I have no desire to do that day in and day out.

I enjoy being a bloke too.. I don't dress girly very often.. just a few times a month maybe..

((as an aside there is something about TG chatrooms that everyone thinks you sit at the PC in full regalia... often you are asked 'R U Dressed?' to which I would love to reply.. 'yeah, boxers and a tshirt? You?'.. I have this vision of all these people dressed to the nines in full ballgowns and stuff merely to sit at a desk and type things like "What R U wearing?" to other girls.....))

I am comfortable in my trannyness. I know where my limits lie and I know that in no uncertain terms can I be described as being a female trapped inside the body of a bloke... ((although it does look like one is trying to get out, but thats just my beer belly which I really am trying to lose))

Now that's not to say I wouldn't love to be a girl for a short while. It would seem to me to be the dream holiday... but I would want to do it properly.. I don't want to be a TS woman, I would want to be a real (XX) woman... And as we all know that aint gonna happen... Would be a fun week though, but at the end of it I would still want to be back to be being me...

Like a lot of holiday destinations.. they are nice for a short while, but I wouldn't want to live there. It's the day to day normality that makes you appreciate a special holiday.

So what entitles someone else, on my behalf, to decide that I am somehow inevitably destined to end up wanting to fill my body with chemicals and have my willy cut off? That may be how you feel.. but not me.. and please don't tell me how I feel or think. There is nothing worse than an evangelical tranny.

So please don't go on about a slippery slope. I am very happy to stand up and say "I am a tranny".. but I will stay like this thankyouverymuch.

Google Ads

So I signed up for Google ads. I added them to my site, and also to the Angels site that I manage and run. So far its brought in $50 in 16 days which is pretty good.

What made me laugh today is the advert that is being displayed on the Angels site. The Google ad's are tailored to match the words on the page. So gender changers are almost correct I guess.

Panic Buying?

The queue stretches halfway down the road. Frantic people, desparately waiting.... hoping they can get served before it all runs out. One's heard a rumour that stocks are running low. Trying to justify to themselves that this is not panic buying, just being "safe", making sure that they don't get left high and dry. You can never be too sure can you?

Nope. Not the local petrol station.. but the off-licence down the road from Freddie Flintoff.

Gerald/Geraldine

This is quite cute

http://www.arthurdepins.com/gerafilm.htm

Cricket

Rolf Harris, Kylie Minogue, Dame Edna Everage, Skippy, Mrs Mangel,
Nellie Melba. Can you hear me? Your boys took one hell of a beating!

Never let it be said that I would let a bandwagon pass me by. Having
moaned about the cricket a few months back I am happy to stand
corrected.

Like many other non-cricket fans I have found myself drawn to the TV
coverage as each match was finely balanced. And I will admit I was
rather excited by it all. Something I never thought I'd say.

So well done to the English cricket team, they've given us something to
cheer about after the godawful performance of the football team.

Leeroy

This came out of a conversation on Saturday with Siobhan and Becky about Online RPG's and Second Life/Everquest. I mentioned a funny video clip and said I'd send Siobhan the link. But thought it might be easier to put it here.

It shows just how much careful planning and coordination can go into a big online battle. And then there is Leeroy... :)

http://www.ifilm.com/ifilmdetail/2671154?htv=12

Party Party

OK - what can I say about this night out that hasn't already been said...

Not much really. Becky and Siobhan have covered most of it. So I wont spend too long blogging that.. You've probably read it already.

This weekend was the Roses ReParty 50 party... to celebrate 50 editions of Repartee Magazine. Thanks should go to Bella Jay and Martine for organising such a top night.

Memories of the evening...

1) Meeting up with lots of good friends again, some like Lora I haven't seen for ages
2) Meeting some new ones like Fionas two friends.
3) Siobhan finally getting her trance bubble
4) Three drunken trannies haranguing a Vodaphone guy in a kilt outside a petrol station on the walk back to the hotel.. "He's wearing a skirt..." "Thats just not natural"..."Some people just don't make an effort" etc etc...
5) A nice little club, although rather hot club. Having food carried around by girls dressed as maids was a nice touch.
6) Some corporate buggers buying up all the parking in the street and making it a sod to get taxis anywhere near the club.

Not a memory of the evening as I dont remember doing this at all.. I just found the pic on my camera this afternoon when unloading my photos.. This is Siobhan asleep on the bed having crashed out about 3am.... with a little decoration.

Sorry honey ;)

Tranny Spotters Guide

The Tranny community is wide and varied. From my five years in charge of The Angels internet group you get a feel for the basic tranny types. So here, to be taken with a large pinch of salt, are my observations of the various species of online Tranny. You may have spotted some of these yourself...

Ms Shy and Retiring - they tentatively join online groups, lurk for a while, then get spooked by something and delete their entire online presence never to return.

Ms Exothermic - They join and then proceed to explode onto the group with a flurry of posts before burning themselves out and vanishing.

Ms Seenit Doneit - Nothing is new, everything has been discussed before. They will even go to great lengths to drag out the urls or quotes of past discussions of the topic. Will often manage to strangle any new thread at birth.

Ms Demanding - Only ever post to ask for someone to make them look like a girl. Never make conversation. They own no clothes, makeup nor wig yet expect complete strangers to leap to their aid. In the rare cases that they actually arrange to meet someone they rarely go through with it.

Ms Cryptic - Posts infrequently, normally in capitals with no punctuation. Nobody really knows what the question is... Uses a keyboard that seems to have Caps Lock stuck down and some keys missing - writes things like "ANYONE IN LONDON 2MORROW" Often related to Ms Demanding.

Ms Drama Queen - Everything is a crisis, every criticism a personal attack. Always seems to be on a one-tranny crusade to shake up the TG Scene

Ms Tranny on the Edge - Seems to be permanently on the verge of jacking it all in and leaving the scene. A close relation of Ms Drama Queen they are racked by turmoil. Always have a pile of bin bags at hand for easy purging.

Ms Activist - Always fighting a cause - things like the Bounty adverts send them into apoplexy. Heaven help someone who posts something that goes against the "party line"

Ms Lurker - Joins an online group.... and..... erm.... well... lurks.

Ms Bungee - A relative of Ms Shy and Retiring - They join.. then leave.. then join.. then leave.. then join. Act like they have got their knicker elastic caught in the door.

There are more, but I shall save them for another time. If you want me, I shall be hiding inside a rather nice concrete bunker....

The Sonic Meme Experiment

I've been passed this sonic meme baton from Becky today. Ive never been the best music reviewer in the world but here goes... I'm more of an album than a song person, so here are the 5 albums I've been listening to in my car CD changer this week.

KT Tunstall - Eye to the Telescope
First heard of this album when the Mercury Award Nominees were announced. Virgin started playing "Other Side of the World" which I liked, so I thought I would give the album a go. KT has a very versatile voice which she uses to good effect on this album. Fave track: Suddenly I See

Athlete - Tourist
Bought this album for my wife on the strength of "Wires" that had been playing on the radio for a few weeks. Pretty standard brit band fare, but done very well. Wires is a great song, a very moving track once you know the back story behind it. It's all about watching his premature baby son in an incubator... which is kinda strange when watch them at festivals and the crowd is happily singing along to it like its a cheery song. (Kinda like those people who have Hotel California as their song at weddings without realising its all about a brothel) Fave track: Wires

Garbage - Bleed Like Me
Always been a fan of Garbage - they should always feature highly on any tranny's music list. This album shows them back on top form. Shirley Manson is always great to listen to. Fave track: Bad Boyfriend

Soundgarden - Superunknown
I've always been a bit of a grunge fan - I loved Pearl Jam, Nirvana etc when I was a student in the early ninetees. Soundgarden didn't get as much press as the other Seattle bands but they were up there with the best of them. Chris Cornell has an amazing voice, and they wrote some killer tracks. I saw them support Guns and Roses at Wembley in 90 (or was it 91) and they were excellent. Fave track: Spoonman

Counting Crows - Live Across a Wire
I've loved Counting Crows ever since I first head Mr Jones back in late 93. I had just started teaching practice and my partner in school was a Mr Jones (It was weird getting into that teacher habit of calling friends Mr This or Ms That in school....) August and Everything After was an amazing debut album and I have loved all their work since. I've seen them in concert twice - once at the Cambridge Corn Exchange and once at the Royal Albert Hall. This live double album has one disc from thier VH1 unplugged acoustic set... the acoustic Mr Jones is amazing.. and also one disk live from New York. The live version of Round Here turns what was already a great song into an amazing epic pulling in a few bits from other songs. My wife takes the piss as this album rarely leaves my CD changer (In the end I had to copy it so she could have access rights to it too) Fave track: Round Here (Live)

So those are my thoughts on the tunes currently being (badly) sung along to in my car this week.

So over to you - Lana, Connie, Emily, Karol and Rachel???

Bandwagons are for jumping on

Ok.. so I may live to regret this, but this morning I downloaded Second Life

Gonna take some getting used to, a lot of it is kinda similar to the way Everquest works.. but in other ways its quite different.Flying is fun though. And I bumped into Siobhan and Becky. So look out for Joanna Rainbow on your travels... Click here to find out more

Now seeing how my post on Transmission generated a whole host of comments about SL, maybe after this post we can discuss something tranny-related.. ;)

The Tranny Season

It's getting dark just after 8pm and the temperature is slightly kinder to wig wearers - it must be the start of the Tranny Season again.

Wasn't sure if I was going to make this months TX as I am going to the big Roses Party next weekend as well.. but I thought what the hell and decided to go along. I haven't been out since Sparkle after all.

Was a good night. Caught up with a lot of friends I have not seen for a while... I won't do a long namecheck - but it was good to meet you all again ;)

I managed to take a few more photos than I usually do - I've uploaded them to Flickr. The usual shout goes out for anyone who took pics of me - please send me a copy.

Ended up in the toilets at one point with the gorgeous-but-slightly-under-the-weather Jodie Lynn (get well soon honey) and the also-gorgeous-Laura Handbag taking photos. You can see one below. I can't believe I have all these pics of me with a gorgeous blonde and I can't show them to my friends :( Gonna have to get one us with me in boy mode so just I can have some kind of bragging rights ;)

Had a great night and was a good warm up for next weekends big event. Should be a top night, and a veritable bloggers convention if everyone who's said they are going makes it there.

Surreal Games and Ads

Following on from the Bugs game I posted yesterday (sorry Steph!) I was sent a link to this rather surreal game today. A kinda slow-burn puzzle solving pointy clicky kind of game. Very cool graphics too.

A slight change to the blog template today - I've finally succumbed to the lure of easy cash and put some Google ads down the side of the page. Not sure if the banner is too big, but will see how it goes. With 5000 visitors a week to my Dress up Doll page it seemed silly not to try and make a few quid of the back of it. I did once have a Click Cash account that made me a little beer money about two years back.. but it kinda fizzled out. Not expecting miracles, but a few quid here and there would be very much appreciated :)