It's been three years. I can't believe it.

I was so wrapped up in what I was doing, or not doing, that I completely missed the fact that about a week ago, I passed the three year marker.

I would just like to say that whilst the course of my three years hasn't run smoothly all the time, on the whole, it's been a blast and I'm looking forward to the next three.

I will eventually get round to writing the rest of Second Sight and others, so hang on to your gaffes and panties coz it looks like I'm in for the long haul.

Hi everyone. Just a quick note to assure those of you interested that I haven't given up on Maiden by Decree. Far from it, actually. I have the next chapter plotted out, just need to rouse my sleeping muse (I think Phoebe is nursing a monumental hangover after visiting Bek Corvin's muse for a month) and get the energy to actually sit at the keyboard and write.

This just in: Cats are EVIL! According to a rescent BBC news story, researchers at the University of Sussex have made new discoveries regarding the multitude of methods by which cats manipulate humans. For more on this story, see here.

This is not in reference to a certain manipulator in my household that likes to nibble on me while I try to sleep...

When I was being used and abused, you were there to help
When I was lonely, you were there to keep me company
When I needed a laugh, you were there to tell me a joke
When I needed to cry, you were there with a shoulder to lend
When I was feeling depressed, you were there to cheer me up
When I needed a hug, you were there with your arms open wide
When I was suicidal, you were there to keep me alive
And while I’m all of this, you are always there

What a wonderful interview by a wonderful person and activist for transgender acceptance! Good Morning America ("GMA") is a workday morning news-magazine show in the U.S. with a large viewership. It's great to see such a sympathetic interview on this, the Transgender Day of Remembrance.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGr8vl0vlfg

It was plain to me, why not the Ref? Will the Frogs get away with it? I am waiting for the men to all get to it.

Where is that famous Irish ire and and taste for blood?

Have I been decieved, are these boys disappointingly civilized?

Gwen

Thanks to the recent refreshing of The Prodigal, the story received many new hits and comments, and that has caused me to consider writing a prequel. Keeping in mind that this is likely to be a rather dark and violent tale, would anyone be interested in such a thing? I will probably go through with it anyway, but I'm interested in knowing the interest level.

Also, look for something featuring Bree in the next few hours. I've just finished a short piece for the Transgender Day of Remembrance and I'll be posting it soon.

For all of you kindly folk who have been supportive. I posted Rememberance of My Birth as my way of acknowledging the day but also to remember that Andrea would likely not exist at all but for the love of my sister and how I believe God used the devotion of a little boy to protect his best friend. We survived brutality and pain, and grew up, maybe marred and damaged, but never alone and never without love. That continues today as I face the implications and aftermath of that pain, but not without hope and certainly not without friends like yourself.

My apologies for my lack of voting.

I am currently experiencing problems with Firefox 3.5 as all of a sudden, it decided that certain elements of websites would not be accessible to me. Amongst those, is the ability to vote.

I get the little pointy finger and all and I can click--it's just that nothing happens.

I have been using Firefox now for well over two years and thought it was the mutts nuts, but now, it just seems to be letting the side down.

Of course, I have written to Mozilla and have received the usual explanation - nothing.

After a long absence while it was being polished and updated I have now brought back Rebekkah DeMere's long and wonderful masterpiece, "The Eight Dragon's Trilogy" with new illustrations and easy reading online of the complete books as well as text versions for easy download to handheld devices or just those that prefer the simple text without all the graphics. Below is one of the cover's and intro by your's truly to give you a little taste of this fascinating tale for either you first time readers or simply those who want to go back and reread this excellent adventure.

I just now went to check on Air Force Sweetheart, but it seems to have been pulled for some reason. Does anyone know why?

Right after the first of this year, I was so out of money, and nearly starving that I began to contemplate being a Prostitute. It might not have been so bad, because I have a really strong desire to be sexual with others, but my previous journeys into dating had me giving a couple abortive and poorly executed blow jobs, and then the plops would simply zip up and flee. It left me feeling bereft, used and extremely ashamed of my conduct. So, it was that months of near starvation really altered things for me.

Intellectually I know that the number of votes, comments, and hits have no direct correlation to the quality of the writing. Good pieces go unnoticed. Badly written pieces sometimes hit all the right buttons. But in my heart I would love to be elected homcoming queen. Caring what others think of you is called sanity.

Here is something to do with that left over turkey from Thanksgiving. Something different that the usual turkey sandwiches, turkey casserole, turkey tetrazzini, etc.

If you happened to go the ham route at Thanksgiving, all the better because the original recipe calls for ham, but Turkey, or even chicken can be substituted for the meat portion of this recipe.

My mom, whom I stole this from, actually called them "Tacos" but they are more like Taquitos.

Ok, here it is. The recipe below is for two dozen or so, but you can adjust to make more or less.

You will need:

Ho hum, another group of scientists have "discovered" that humanity is polluting the environment with lots of "gender bending" chemicals (i.e. estrogens or others with similar effects), which are apparently "feminising boys". No big surprise there - this kind of story 'does the rounds' every now and again. The novelty this time appears to be that the research is apparently endorsed by the EU, and it's reported in The Guardian rather than the Daily Wail (whose columnists would no doubt have had a veritable orgy of doomsday prophesying...)

Hi everyone. I've justed posted another couple of chapters of A GIRL CAN BUT DREAM to my site.
http://tanyastales.yolasite.com/wip---a-girl-can-but-dream--...
Tanya

A number of readers are saying that I should start finishing off Changes as it appears to be coming to a natural end, as certain threads are closing or have closed. Others have said that I should go into book 2 or some sort of sequel as there are a lot of things unfinished.

I tried the book 2 methods for Working Girl and Home Alone and while they were appreciated, I always felt that the edge had been knocked off the readers appetite.

Since I have volunteered to do editing to assist authors, I thought I should supply my credentials. My career spans both management assignments in the IT area of a large corporation and university teaching in a school of business. I have written four books: one on statistics, one on data base principles, one on information resource management and one on cooking (a 200 recipe collection that keeps expanding). I am a self taught speed reader and a compulsive editor.

We're driving into Manhattan on Monday, and we'd appreciate your prayers. My wife, as adorable as the day we met and fell in love, is dealing with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Fibromyalgia and has been diagnosed with Chronic Epstein-Barr (where Mononeucleosis arises), and will be seeing an Infectious Disease specialist.

We are now about 1/2 way through the time alloted to the November Gift challange, and as of the last I counted there are 15 stories.

If you haven't read them, I strongly urge you all to go out and check them out. There are quite a few that are exceptional.

Some will make you laugh, others will make you cry, some will get you mad... in short the full gammut of emotion is to be found there...

Then make sure to send a thank you to Erin, because it was her idea.

Hugs,

Kristy

Carla Ann's thoughts on being an oxymoron made me think of something I wrote years ago. Here it is:

WARNING: IF YOU DON'T GET DOONESBURY THEN YOU NEEDN'T BOTHER READING THIS PIECE!

I went back and clarified a couple of things in my story "The Letter" Someone pointed out that they thought the car crash was suicide, so I went back and added a more detailed explanation.

Part 3 of Second chance is now up!

Check out http://tanyastales.yolasite.com/wip---second-chance-part-3.php

I always knew that this day would come, I just never expected it to happen so soon, You see for a little over three weeks now i have been taking Oscar one of our two much loved cats to the vets for treatment for a lump in his neck, Right from the start of his treatment we were under no illusions, It was pointed out from the start by the vet the most likely diagnosis was cancer and the prognosis was not good, Nonetheless we felt we had to give him a chance, After all the vet could be wrong!

Hey all,

Why did I publish "The Calm of My Stream" when I said I was going to wait until the next chapter of The Center comes out?

I just got a really good opportunity to take part in an anthology that's going to be published by an actual publishing company that you don't have to pay. It's not the big time, but I have an opportunity to get my foot in the door of mainstream fiction, that you can actually buy online or in your local bookstore.

So, I'm concentrating on that this week. No Center this week unless I run into a major block on the paid-for writing.

• Surgery may allow women to grow breasts
• Successfully done on pigs
• Could revolutionise cosmetic surgery

“The breakthrough could also could also completely revolutionise the cosmetic surgery industry by allowing women to grow bigger natural breasts.”

“If the human trials follow the pigs’ success, the new procedure will result in breasts that look and feel perfectly natural — because they are perfectly natural.”

So I've made my decisions and now that it is time to begin implementing them, I'm really quite scared, much more so than I had hoped or thought I might be. I look at myself and think I really must be quite the coward, to have pushed myself to almost dying just because I couldn't stand the thought of losing love, when that isn't even a certainty. I mean, I'm truthfully not changing from the person he fell in love with, I've been the same way the whole time.

For those who have been following the November story challenge, I would like to remind everyone of the story "That's Enough", by Jan S., written in 2007.

I think this story fits the story challenge criteria beautifully. It's not a long story, and well worth reading.

Another thank you, Jan for creating it.

Hugs
Carla Ann

THANK YOU TO ALL WHO HAVE SERVED THIS COUNTRY IN THE MILITARY.

YOU HAVE SERVED AND BY DOING SO PROTECTED OUR LIBERTIES AND OUR FREEDOM AND PROTECTED US FROM OUR ENEMIES.

RAMI

Okay. Last evening I got home from hospital. I really don't foresee any kind of issues functioning with this situation of my left arm in a cast and sling... except when I try to sleep.

So painful... Hard to position... argh.

I will be available on Skype (delayra.edeyn) if folks wanna hear what happened, and I'mm gonna try to resume stuff here and elsewhere online.

So...sleepy...

I had been following her progress for some time, through FFS, job changes, etc and I thought she was going to have her surgery last month. It appears now that all her entries on You Tube are removed or access is prevented. Has anyone else been following her? Does anyone know what happened?

Portia

don't lie and say you will love me forever, forever lost
dont lie and say we will be together forever, forever gone
forever doesnt last, forever and ever
what happened to the promises? forever...

First of all I would like to thank everyone who read my recent efforts about the life of Cynthia Lewis (An Incremental Journey, Cynthia and the Reluctant Girlfriend, Cynthia and the Dumpster Diver). It has been particularly gratifying to see how many readers took my advice and read the first two stories in the series and voted on them. I just wish there had been more comments, constructive or otherwise.

but I feel it's leading me to yet another bout of non-communicative time. The last time this happened it took a year or so for me to get back "in the groove." Maybe part of it is post SCC letdown, maybe part of it is there are so many bad things happening to so many of us and I know there isn't a damn thing I can do to help. I know I do feel very helpless and dejected about that. I know, I KNOW! I shouldn't...but that knowledge doesn't translate to feeling any better about it.

Hopefully, anyway! I've posted part 6 of The Watcher, at last! There's a link at the bottom for Venus Cursed! #112, as I always do, but since #112 isn't done yet, it won't work. I'm hoping I might have that up sometime today, too, but we'll see.

Since my last two blogs have been all whiney, I thought I'd post something a little more positive. Especially since I'm feeling a little more positive! I wanted to thank everyone again who commented on my last blog entry or sent PMs. I really appreciated it! ^_^

I am within a week of the completion of this part of the story. This will end book one. I will post it after it is edited.

I need a rest with this story. I think there will be more but the story is dragging long, if you know what I mean.

Paula

There is a new Coke Zero commercial that spoofs an old Cke commercial.

In the original, a boy hands a coke to Meam Joe Greene who after drinking it, gives the boy his jersey.

In the spoof, the hair crazy player from the Head & Shoulders commercial gets a Coke Zero, but Coke officials try to intervene.

It's a fun commercial

Okay, it's been too long.

I know.

I'm about two thirds through the latest and perhaps last chapter of Witch's Tarot, which I hope to have finished fairly soon, but I am at one of those points that needs to be right or the whole thing will fall apart. So it's a case of taking it step by step to ensure all the 'i's' are dotted and the 't's' are crossed.

My intention is to provide a feature-length bumper episode here that will possibly round everything off, so those interested, please be patient, I'll get there.

I just thought I would let all of you know that my stories: "A Prayer Answered" and "The House Fire" have been edited and are now available here.

A special thanks go out to Michelle B. and Stanman for there efforts in editing these for me. I thank them will all my heart.

I am currently working on "The House Fire CH 2."

My hero Super Dave is back. He will have a Spike-tacular stunt show November 17. Here is a link to the show.

http://www.spike.com/show/34318

Paula

But, then, I guess it's not supposed to be, is it?

I've been thinking about all the hard work and time that Erin and Sephrena put in on this site, as well as just what the purpose is of our little BigCloset. I say "our" with deliberation. The people who read and write here may not own this site, but it is a home of sorts for us. It is a place that we may come to express a side of ourselves that many in the greater community do not want to hear about. It is a refuge and a bastion, a source of respite and strength.

Or at least it should be.

Exactly 404 years ago, a soldier and explosives expert attempted one of the most audacious terrorist plots ever.

His plan was to destroy the UK's House of Lords during State Opening, during which the building would contain the entire parliament and the King. As we all know, various events conspired to disrupt the plan and arrest Guy before he lit the fuse.

Hired as a man, fired as a woman

I especially loved this quote:
Her boss, Georgia Legislative Counsel Sewell Brumby, saw it differently.

“It makes me think about things I don’t like to think about, particularly at work … I think it’s unsettling to think of someone dressed in women’s clothing with male sexual organs inside that clothing,” said Brumby, in a deposition taken May 11th in U.S. District Court in Atlanta.