The following is Grover's Adventures in Hospital Land thus far:

Tuesday, May 19:
Grover finished walking the dog at around 10:30 AM, and had some shoulder pain. Thinking it was just muscle pain due to weather changes, he took some Tylenol. However, the pain did not go away after 30 minutes and his fingertips started feeling numb.

A TMC advertisement mentioned ten(10) movies to show to someone who didn't know old movies. It didn't mention any specific movie. So I made my own list:

From the Guardian a story about how one parish convinced a diocese to put a proposal to the General Synod of the Church of England about renaming ceremonies for transgender Christians. While I'm unlikely to consider it as an unbeliever, I welcome what looks like the slightest movement of progress for those who do, and I wish Blackburn Diocese good luck with their motion.

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/may/21/proposal-for-...

Grover's wife, Paula, just called to update me on his condition. He seems in good spirits although weak and, of course, being bored in the hospital and unable to access the internet since the hospital appaarently will not allow contact with Top Shelf.

She told me how much all your good wishes/prayers/good vibes mean to them both. She said that you can contact them through their facebook pages. I will, of course, continue to be a go-between, keeping you all informed on Grover's surgery and progress back to health.

So, I was listening to a podcast from the new NPR series, "Invisibilia" and on one episode they describe a condition which causes a the sufferer to mentally switch genders at whim. They even interview a Trans person who initially suffers from it and they are repulsed by the body in the mirror after a shower to the point of nausea, because it did not match who they are mentally at that time.

They actually start to transition to make themselves more androgynous, only to find their switch stops flipping and they seem 'Locked' into their new gender and finish the transition.

I havent heard anybody mention it, so I wanted to let people know that JennaFl has passed away according to Facebook.

My condolances and prayers go out to her family and friends

what writing like this was for me.

Crap! Sit down at the laptop and a couple of hours later 5 or 6 thousand words come out!

It's cool and all, and it is the way the first 10 chapters came into being, but damn it's tiring.

But that has my draft of Chapter 16 done. Now to go back and edit it all.

But, glad to see my muse has returned for a while.

Well, it finally happened. My worst nightmare. As I have proudly proclaimed for a while. I'm quite confident in being out and about in my neighborhood and around town.

Tuesday, week before last, I was sent to get birdseed (and some other things) at Bi-mart after work. This time, I opted to stop by the house and change into appropriate clothing and not appear there in my overly masculine work uniform.

Sweet flying spaghetti monster, I thought I'd never have to deal with this again. Especially not from one of our own.

As I was making my way home from my monthly transgender support group meeting, I ended up behind someone obviously transgender herself--someone vaguely familiar.

It turns out she lives in the same apartment complex I do. After years of being the only transgender tenant, apparently I have company.

I finally did it. I acquired pure capsaicin crystals. And I then tried them. Not straight mind you. You can actually put all the pure capsaicin crystals you want in your mouth. They're not water soluble and require a fat or oil to dissolve so saliva won't work. The stuff came with a tiny bottle of glycerine which I did mix them into and try.

Not as hot as I thought it would be. The previous highest scoville unit thing I had was this 4.4 million sauce. The 16 mil is hotter, but it doesn't seem by much.

Some of the ladies thought it was Halloween??? I swear some of those outfits made me physically shudder. Only way I would ever be caught in many of those dresses I looked at was if I was dead. Has everyone forgot what class is or is shock the new normal? Looking at a few of the ladies caught in the background I saw many who still had the idea what a woman should wear to an evening event.

Another article from the Guardian about guns. Everyone, should by now, know how opposed I am to them but there are some interesting statistics, especially the increased risk of injury or death to women if guns are kept in the home.

For those interested: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/18/gun-violence-wa...

Please keep the responses civil.

As those of you who engage in the Great Waste Of Time known as Facebook may already be aware, today marks my completion of another lap around the sun - not that I feel any different to yesterday or appreciably older. Just an ordinary day at work attempting to make sense of a pile of social care data, hoping to massage it into shape by the end of the week ready for the annual government return.

For those that are still interested I've uploaded the epub for Battle For Earth:Infiltration. You can grab it from the outline page or download it directly from this link. As with Battle for Earth: Resistance if you want the pdf I will send it to you via email. Just send me a PM with your email addy and I'll get it sent out.

Hi All;

Sometime ago, I pulled down my story Drew's Meltdown. It is a Gaby fanfic. It takes place during/after Gaby's Trip to America. And, it's more of an alternative look - a "what might have happened" if you will.

Now that The Unusual Clownfish is coming to an end---at least the first part of it, I want to move onto something different. For a while now I've been teasing the possibility of starting a new universe and now I think its time to do so.

I'm going to be taking a foray into a superhero universe. I don't have all the specific details of it fully hammered out but I'm hoping to get the first story up and done as soon as I polish off the last 3 chapters of Clownfish Part One.

I see that my approach to storytelling is welcome here and for that I'm glad. I prefer a lighthearted approach to issues related to gender identity and sexuality but by no means do I think they are frivolous. Sometimes a series of light touches is the best way to explore difficult subjects. On top of that I do enjoy making people smile once in a while.

I just got a phone call from my church. They would like to use my "Dear God" poem in a newspaper they hand out around downtown Edmonton, or possibly something original, if I can do it in the next couple of days.

Needless to say, I'm honored ...

UFB

http://www.greenvillegazette.com/michelle-duggar-claims-all-...

SMDH

I am afraid I need an editor. I haven't heard from mine in almost 2 months. I really hope he is alright, the editing is secondary. He is or was a member here.

Doppler Press has had some nice success to start off. Heather O'Malley's 300 Rains, Lana Lee's Suit Yourself and Sue Brown's Soccer Girl have all hit best seller status. Katie Leone just published Worth Fighting For and that is doing okay for us too. But there are things that the Big Closet community can do to really help not only increase our visibility on Amazon, but drive traffic (more readers for all our authors and perhaps a few new authors to post stories to boot) to the site.

Okay folks

here are the details as they stand

Dates 3/4/5 July 2015
Location Dorchester

programme tbc

Friday evening - meal in Dorchester
Saturday - optional cycle ride (non riders can drive of course!) to Weymouth/Portland followed by Gaby readings and evening meal
Sunday - visit to Yeovilton Air Museum, lunch with Gaby readings before departure.

There is a wide variety of accommodation in the area

Will be a little slow with stories. Little brother planned it well but got found before he could succeed. Gaybashing is the root cause. I am not in a stable position at the moment. I will update when I can.

So I recently got the chance to meet Maria Bellow during the book tour for her new book "WHATEVER... Love is Love" and thought I'd share my experience. I just recently posted it to my rarely-updated WordPress blog.

-Piper

It was brought to my attention that I had managed to forget to post the final part of a story - A Girl can but Dream

It is now posted here, and of course is still available on Amazon.com in Kindle format.

I was sitting in a writer's group a couple weeks ago talking about writing TG content out of stories I plan to publish. Surprisingly, it was the consensus of the group is that TG stigma is all but gone. And, it seems that the general public wants to know more about being TG and Intersex. I do not know how Amazon is doing it, and what choices there are but most of the group felt that publishing these stories in General Public is acceptable.

Well, today I wanted to share a dream I had during my move.

In the dream, at first I found myself in a classroom, and a drill instructer of a teacher was making a boy parade in front of the class because he had come to school previously in ripped pants. We were to sacastically applaud the fact that today he had chosen to wear pants without a rip in them.

Then I looked down at myself, and at first I thought I was wearing red pajamas, so I thought I would be next to be humilated, but the instructor ignored me, and instead clapped his hands together.

Just a quick note. Since I couldn't post this on facebook, I'm posting it here..

Piper,
Happy Mother's Day! Thanks for making my day special, and being an awesome meme to our little ninja.

I love you more than ice cream!

Xoxo

Amy

Transgender people have it rough when it comes to finding love and acceptance. They are often marginalized, trivialized, or victimized. It is a shame that transgender people are bullied, but it is even more alarming when that bullying comes from within the community.

I just want to say that I'm encouraged and discouraged both by recent discussions of unpubbing stories, kudos, criticism and the like.

I've demoted two blogs concerned with those subjects off the front page, not because they were unimportant but because I felt that they were both beginning to attract comments that some people could feel were unfriendly.

In general, people are trying to say things they think are encouraging or helpful but I've been doing this for fifteen years and I have a sense of when something is being said that can too easily be misinterpreted. So....

Got some serious stride done for the contest story and a whole bunch of other things and did like 20,000 words in like three days.

I’ve reached a new milestone – YEAH
 

Real life has really slapped me upside the head lately.

Virtually everything mechanical that I own, or use, has broken down in the last month. My wheelchair, my digital camera, my landline phone, and incredibly, my refrigerator. Luckily, I had very little food to lose--thanks to the foresight of the state of Wisconsin, my laughably meager food-stamp pittance pretty much ensured I wouldn't be able to stock the refrigerator with much anyway.

There are certain advantages to living in an apartment building, however, the most important of which being I (thank goodness!) don't have to hunt for a replacement refrigerator--the apartment management takes care of that. Medicaid took care of the chair, and for the moment I'm relying solely on my cell phone.

Therefore, I can get back to what would normally be my main concern. Namely, writing.

So... I'm angry. Those of you who know me, probably know I have anger issues. I joke about it and say I'm Irish (which I am) and that I've got the stereotypical temper (which I do). I have a hard time getting past anger. I don't forgive easily. I hold grudges. Maybe I'm being petty. I don't know, and I just don't care.

This is why I'm leaving BCTS. For how long? I don't know. Maybe for good, maybe not.

I am nearing completion of Worth Fighting for and was hoping for feed back. First, what do you think of the cover?

Does it intrigue anyone?

Well, those who've followed my stories for the last several years are probably aware that I often provide pdf and epub versions of my stories for folks to download here on bigcloset. Unfortunately, I won't be able to provide PDF documents this time around as the file sizes are much too large (bigcloset has a max file upload size of 2 mb). I could reduce them by producing inferior images or removing from the images from pdf altogether, but that's something I very am very keen on doing. If anyone is interested in a pdf download I am willing to send them a copy of the file.

Julia says some very interesting things about her life and her transition as well as being trans and open about it.

http://theheroines.blogspot.com/2014/05/interview-with-julia...

Catherine Linda Michel

Well, according to my account feature, I've been here for "5 years 12 months", so I guess its happy anniversary to me?

I am very grateful I found this place. Its given me a chance to read good stories by great authors, to try my hand at writing myself, and to make some wonderful friends who I cherish.

My thanks to Erin, Piper, and all those who work behind the scenes to keep this place going.

An article caught my eye that reminds me that someone has always been there before.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/may/04/transge...

Whether it's Bruce Jenner or the Chevalier d'Eon matters not. Journalists will swarm like bees to honey ( I was going to type 'flies to..' but decided it wasn't polite).

Its been a long haul I know but today, finally you get the last Gaby chapter of this book, Alpine Maid, here on BC!

There will be a short hiatus in posting but normal service will resume shortly.

Has anyone else actually listened to the lyrics for Disney's 'Let it go' and thought that it would make a great TG anthem?

As a silly competition idea does anyone have any other suggestions for an off the wall TG anthem ( e.g. Rodney Atkins "If you're goin' through Hell")?

P.S. First place will automatically go to Andrea as she does this all the time! :)

For those who don't know, I'm fat. I mean really, really fat. I used to be fat when I was in high school, but I'm way beyond that now. When I won districts my senior year the newspaper read "slimmer heavyweight wins title". I thought the article was about someone else because I was at the high end of the weight class at 275lbs. But the article was about me and was littered with fat jokes and how I struggled keeping under 275. Oh, how I wish I weighed that now. Instead, I am 615lbs. God I wish that was a typo. But it is a fact of life.

For those of you that have read my recent submission of a Bikini Beach story. I want to apologize for it. Not for the story itself, but for the grammatical errors that are littered throughout the story. To be honest the story wasn't ready for prime time.

Even though I had caught some items before and even 'revised' it. It still does not meet certain standards and I rushed it. And for that I'm sorry.

Years ago, I wore Suntan Garter style stockings and then they became unavailable. Recently I bought 6 pair from Stocking Store.com and wore the first set today, with my blue suit and 3" heels.

I don't like pantihose because the hips and waist are too tight and they are so hot that I get claustrophobic. Self stay ups, either don't stay up or make painful welts on my thighs.

Well, once again my anxiety was far greater than a situation required.

My landlord not only didn't comment on the name on my lease, he came down and helped me set up my mom's computer for her.

I continue to be amazed at the forbarance, tolerance, and grace I have received in this journey ...

I noticed a strange behaviour yesterday, the number of 'reads' for one of my stories differed from the total hit for the same story on the 'my stories' page.

This morning, Chapter 11 of Unaccounted Gains 3 has 491 reads on the front page and 699 in My Stories (the same number is shown within the story itself). So, why would the front page counter differ? I'm also pretty sure this is not related to my account having checked a few others.

Shiraz

Hi everyone. I've been MIA for a while. Not sure if anyone noticed, but for those who have, I'm still around. Sometimes I just lurk in the shadows while sorting through some of life's challenges. All is well, and have overcome some hurdles in my absence. Drop by and say hi, let me know how all of you are doing, would love to catch up with some of you.

Love Megan.

Probably doesn't mean much to anyone else on here, but 9 years seems like a lot. Been here 9 years and been in love with someone on here for just about eight years....

Well it makes me happy, I hope my online lover feels the same....

{{Hugs}} to All