The general indifference to Chapter 2 of 'The Van ...' has been quite deafening. I have therefore decided to discontinue it. At least as a TG/TV tale. I still think there is mileage in the idea and am toying with rewriting and perhaps posting in on Fictioneer in due course. I enjoy writing and, if other commitments permit, that is perhaps the way forward for me.

Here's a little tease:

I've been thinking about a sequel in my head...I think it'll be called How to Become of Hero or some such nonsense. It'll take place a few months later with the Green Arrow trying her hardest to fight crime and finding that she doesn't really know what she's doing. She'll end up taking hero lessons, all the while investigating who hired Merlyn and dodging a deadly assassin with her in his sights. There's also the issue of high school, boys (Roy?) and trying to fit into a world she knows nothing about (girlhood).

I saw this news article on Spanish dad's and breast feeding leave! Whatever next? Heres the link ...

www.madeformums.com/mums-and-dads/dads-in-spain-entitled-to-...

This is a true halloween story that happened to me and my family the first halloween after we arrived in England in 1953.
We were living in Cambridge, in a house that had been built in 1863, per the date etched into a stone, above the front door on the second floor. The house was a three story house, and did indeed look old.

I had to make my morning fritatta with no eggs in the house this morning.

Been out for a run last night, my first real big hill route since my ankle tendon decided to complain in May. Only 4 or 5 miles and the legs still remember what I forced them to do.
Still good it is good to be able to go out even if I am about 25% slower. I do hope my speed and endurance recovers soon as I am now looking forward to which races I might do. Edale skyline next year is favourite at the mo

My Nanay aka mother-in-law suffered two ischemic strokes last Saturday. At first we thought Nanay may recover from them, but beginning Tuesday she started sliding badly. An MRI today showed Nanay's brain to have more damage than first diagnosed. Nanay is all but gone now.

Had a very sad moment with my daughter tonight. She sometimes slips and uses female pronouns for me, and she actually wondered out loud today why she does that. It took every bit of self control I possessed not to tell her why I think she does it. I am breaking apart here.

Another entry so soon!

I've been thinking about how "he" was not only a facade - and I am speaking only for myself on that - because "he" had a presence in this world, an influence, a purpose. "He" was still never the real me, of course, make no mistake there. However, there was a reason for "him" to exist. There were things "he" did that affected other people, like songs "he" wrote and stories "he" wrote and things "he" did. "He" had a very real and very valuable purpose in this world.

And thank God that's over with. lol

I had asked a number of you to pray for for brother Jeff. It is with Deeppest sorrow I share with you that at sometime around 2:30 this morning PST my brothher died.

While rough around the edges Jeff absolutely addoredd me growing up. I was his big brother. Please keep the family in your prayers. This has been a horrid shock to the whole family. He was 44 years old.

Well the end is almost upon us, part 239 of the Gaby saga is now up for you to read at http://www.maddybell.com/Gaby279.htm.

Enjoy

Maddy

Today we say goodbye to Hazel, my aunt and godmother. It's going to be tough on me, so I don't know what sort of state I shall be in later and therefore can't comment on whether or not I'll be able to do the next episode of Bike.

Apologies for last night, but I went to pay my personal respects and it took quite a lot out of me. Today, I am next of kin and presumably leading the mourning. I'm presenting a celebration of Hazel's life which I hope won't be too depressing, after all she had a wicked sense of humour and very dirty laugh. I shall try and remember both in the days ahead.

It's been a rough few months. My wife of 36 years passed in mid-June after a 9 years of being bed-ridden during which I was her primary caregiver. She had MS with complications and we both knew the outcome. Still, it took a lot out of me. We'd been dating since high school, 41 years ago, and I've never done anything as an adult without taking her into consideration, especially during her illness. While I miss her, she's in a better place waiting for me. She told me she'd be waiting for me but that I should take my time.

I have just had a ’phone call from Angharad to ask me to warn all you Bikefans that EAFOAB Part 1128 might not appear on BC tonight. Her ex-partner and their daughter are arriving by train during the evening for her Aunt's funeral tomorrow, so she will probably be unable to find time to write it.

She said not to rule it out completely, but that it was highly unlikely that she will find time tonight.

Gabi

For what it's worth, I'll be taking down the "body" of several of my short stories in the next few weeks. They're the non-TG stories and I've another place I may be sharing them, and I'd prefer people NOT be able to find my work here (yet) when they read them (If anyone does).

I dont know if its because i have been working too much or what, but it feels like my creative well has run dry. I hope this doesnt last.

So I just finished the rough draft on a Halloween-themed story. Like Becoming Robin this is seated very much in the Sweet / Sentimental category. Unlike Robin this isn't a novel-going-on-serial :-P

It's an actual, real-live short story, from me, the Queen of babbling endlessly. Can you believe it? ^_^

Well whatever the glitch was the site is now updated so you can now access more fanfics, Peaches and Gaby as well as details of some book buying offers (there is an extension to this coming weekend on the short offer!)

enjoy

Maddy

Despite living in the city, I spent Saturday helping a neighbor cut down several dead trees. This was after two days of indulging myself in front of the computer comfortably dressed in a skirt and blouse. Each time I fired up the chain saw this tune ran through my head:

I'm a lumberjack and I'm OK...

You know the rest!

For months I have been looking for a story, it starts with a man who has an ability to use his mind in a supernatural manner.

Later we see him helping out some older ladies when their car broke down. In turn he becomes friends with the family.

In turn he starts going out with the daughter who unbenknown to him is a witch. She in turn gives him an opportunity to experience what it is like to be a girl through a temporary body swap.

If Nikki Araguz loses, any Transfolk in Texas will be effectively de-transitioned. This is scary, this is not scare tactics, this is important, folks.

Fictionmania seems to have disappeared again, at least for me. I can't raise it on the link from this site or by googling direct.

Is it just me and something I'm doing wrong or has anybody else experienced the same problem?

Joanne

Ok, life intrudes on my ability to continue at the pace I would like to write at. If I wasn't currently running 12 credit hours (about 36 hours of work per week) and had a 40 hour per week job, I might be able to spend the 28 hours a week it takes me to keep producing TGL daily.

Tonight my family will eating food from a recipe passed down from my parents to me. Unfortunately the children aren't so crazy about we're having(Dad can we go to Lindburgers instead?). So what is the meal?

Tuna Casserole

The ingredients three cans of tuna fish
One can campbell's cream of mushroom soup
One pound ziti macaroni
butter
milk
bread crumbs

The meal takes 55 minutes in the oven at 350F

So I am excited right now because an Agent wanted to see my sample chapters!! Woot!!

For some unknown reason this weeks update despite being uploaded to the server isn't appearing. I have no power over this, i'm not getting any replies to my webmeister queries and my geek squad aren't talking either.

I quite enjoy doing the site but maybe it's outlived its usefulness so if i can't get it sorted by the weekend i'm taking a break from the updates until further notice.

I'm just sitting here, taking a break from processing apples to dry. Got the first batch going now, and have decided that slicing them in 1/4 thickness is high risk for me; almost cut a finger off twice!

Just thought I'd introduce myself. I'm Rachael Ross or just plain rache. I've been writing for awhile and I don't really have a preference for subject matter, it's all good. I use a lot of pen names and for TG/TS stories I generally like to use "T.S.Severe" and she's one of my many alter-egos (the one who dresses better than the rest of me) ...Uhhh, let's see. I have a website hosted by ASSTR at:

http://www1.asstr.org/~rache/index.htm

I've just discovered my recent Chapter 7 post is sans single quotes. Fixing requires reading the entire story as HTML... *whimper*

If anyone can suggest the preferred way to get text (containing italics) from RoughDraft (MS rich text) into "Create Content", I would appreciated it; as my way seems to require multiple editing passes.

update: Some partial search-and-replace fixes have been done, but I know there's more to do. I'll give it another pass tonight.

another update: I think I've got them all. Ouch. :)

Pardon me if this story resembles a Rube Goldberg contraption but...

Around the 4th of July I went out to the garage to get something and discovered the neighborhood stray cat had decided to have her kittens on top of our camping gear. Not wanting a new batch of strays in the neighborhood I took the kittens inside, firmly intending to give them away or call the ASPCA or something.

The story I'm trying to find basically goes like this:

undercover detective type about a TG that is living in a railroad shack on a trestle when he finds a bunch of suitcases and personal effects from a murdered woman then takes her place to solve her murder, she was an insurance co. investigator, looking into a bunch of deaths that end up being caused by a funeral home wacko and his crazy Post-op bitch that are running a sex club and killing people to make snuff films of the murders

Any help would be appreciated.

Thank you,
Rachel Anne

As I began to plan out what I am now calling "Monsters in the Dark" I thought I would be including it as chapter 13 of Through Death:Rebirth

There are two problems with that idea, however. While it does provide some necessary background information to Earth₄, it isn't a direct part of the story, or I should say, it isn't part of this story.

I have pictures-images to add to Captain Comet, but don't know how to translate them into html code. please help

I recently purchased some Avon products from: www.youravon.com/peggyhicks and I find that I am very pleased with them. I met Peggy at The Southern Comfort Conference last year and I found her very understanding about us TG/TS/CD/whatever folks, and she is VERY discrete, respecting our need for secrecy/privacy.

I know (hey, I hope!) some of you are waiting for the next chapter in UA, but my editor wants me to wait until I finish the story. It'll be awhile, but chapter 2 is almost complete, 3&4 are just about ready for edit and I'm still working on 5. I'll try to convince Angela that they can be submitted soon, but she's working on making me a better author, something that isn't really easy, but I can see it happening. Ultimately, you get a better story, and that is worth a lot to me. Please accept my apologies, I shouldn't have submitted the first chapter yet, but I did. My mistake.

Well, I am really up against some hard choices. I let slip my trans status to a couple of co-workers, and I had a amazing response - My blood pressure, which was high, dropped, and my cluster headache went away. Then today, as I had to go back into hiding, the headache came back and my bp went back up. So I finally realize the truth - i either live honestly, and suffer the consequences, or I keep myself in the closet, and risk a serious health problem. Pray I make the wisest choice.

Too sick to talk about it.

- Erin

I am away from tomorrow for a few days, to a rocky place in the sun. I have just about finished the story, and will post the other episodes on my return. May I suggest for anyone reading my tale that they read my other one as well. Thank you for your patience.

Since some of you liked the other 500 word story I wrote for a local radio competition I suppose I may as well post the second one (the competition allowed 2 entries per person). This isn't a tear jerker but may raise a wry smile.

Love in the slow lane

John self-consciously fingered the red carnation in the buttonhole of his sports jacket. He wasn’t used to it, not sports jackets nor buttonholes nor the flowers that go in them. He searched the tables in the Motorway café. Then he saw her sitting alone reading The Spectator, and walked nervously over.

I have just had a ’phone call from Angharad to say that her Aunt (who had lived with her since 1987) died this afternoon at the age of 83. She had been unwell for a number of days.

Ang says that she might not be able to post an a chapter of EAFOAB tonight, it very much depends how she feels. She hopes everyone will understand if she doesn't get "the muse" this evening. I don't know if she will be on her ’puter this evening, but you could PM her, or PM me and I will pass on any messages when she ’phones me later.

Gabi

I wrote this piece a few years ago for a story competition. The brief was a love story in no more than 500 words not including the title. I don't think it justifies a proper posting but it may amuse a few of you.

A Woman’s Life and Love

Yesterday while shopping I saw something new to me, Lycra boots. In reality a pair of high heels with thigh high hose kinda built in. So unable to help myself I did some surfing for them today. While on amazon I found this review and got a nice laugh.

Amazon review:

"If you come into the NFL dressed the way that she is dressed you are just asking for it."
-- Fox NFL analyst Brian Baldinger on Ines Sainz sexual harassment charges.

This is a sad story. A post op TS murdered by her brothers, in a country that trumpets they have no gays because they are required to have sex changes. Note the length of sentence handed out, and the attitude of the father. However, murder of TG and TS folks in the US and other "western" countries are often due, at their most basic, to some male thinking is reputation has been besmirched by him being attracted or having sex with a TS/TG. Not so different in motive, I think, but increasingly different in the way the crime is seen by law. Doesn't help the victim though....

Today, I baked bread. ^__^ One loaf of wheaten bran bread, one of a rye-buckwheat country pumpernickel, and two of very, very complicated Russian black bread that's almost as good (but still different from) the bread I remember from Sankt-Peterburg. That's all. Nothing earth-shattering. Just a free day, and a plan to bake, and a few hours of effort, and I have product that I'd have to pay $25-30 US for at market (assuming I could find a market here that would actually >make< these, especially the black bread). ^__^ moderately #happy

Liz

I was sick on Monday, and then my birthday was Tuesday. I was still getting better, but my wife decided to take me out to Sushi. Strangely, it sat better on my stomach than anything else had in about 48 hours.

If you were wondering what that scream was you heard about an hour ago, it was me.

See at that point I realized that I left (hopefully) the flashdrive with all my stories on it, in my computer at work. At least I hope that's where it is.

As a result the next part of my little story will not be posted until Monday.

Insert your favorite dirty word here {_____}

"I don't know who or what you are anymore."

It's a line from the movie, "Judge Dredd". Hershey's apartment's been trashed, the whole Judicial system's turned upside down, etc. and she thinks Dredd's a part of it. But it was the most appropriate quote I could think of to properly convey how I feel right now