it's a place called won't be there

I've written and deleted several posts in the last few days; it seems I am at a bit of a loss for words. I'm so angry and upset about the hurricane, but I feel like a lot of the discussion is beginning to sound like some sort of childish "who-has-the-worst-story" type of thing. Did you hear...? The administration did this? Barbara Bush said this? Did you see that picture? All of this is important, of course, and I'm certainly not belittling the spread of information. I simply don't know what to write without falling into that mode of communication, and I don't feel like doing that here.
Things are slow here, with little to do and a lot of time to do it in. A few days ago, I painted my toenails bright purple, just for kicks. Anna and I are both falling into this really terrible sleep pattern where we don't go to bed until at least two and don't fall asleep until at least 3, and then neither of us can rouse ourselves before noon most days. Tonight we're going to help set up a book sale at the LGBT library, which is conveniently only about a ten minute walk away. Last night we watched Secretary, a movie where I honestly don't really know what I felt about it. Was it good, because it showed sm in a positive light? Was it bad beccause it suggested that sm might be a good solution for self-abusers? (Actually, I recently read that sometimes controlled sm play can be helpful for abuse survivors, so maybe this isn't entirely off the mark. But maybe it is.) Was it bad because it lost its dark but powerful indifference near the end? I am annoyed that a movie that pulls so few punches in the first hour ends with a nearly totally generic "happy ending." Eh.

So, Carol Queen is really cool. We did make it into the talk tonight, and although I felt somewhat out-of-place among the mostly leather population who all seemed to know each other, it was pretty interesting. For anyone who isn't familiar, she is a doctor of sexology, a writer of fiction/erotica and nonfiction/theory, a former sex-worker, the president of Good Vibrations, and very dedicated to making it okay and safe for people to have any damn type of sex they want to. She talked about the Woodhull Foundation, a group dedicated to trying to allow people more sexual freedom by doing things like opposing oppressive legislation and compiling a list of sex "crimes" nationwide so people will know what can get them arrested in various states. She also talked about the Center for Sex and Culture, a kind of archive and space in San Francisco that she and her partner started. Then, she read from some of her own writing, some theory interspersed with what she called "smut." Some of it was leather oriented, given our location, including the beginning of her book The Leather Daddy and the Femme. She then read about a bisexual threesome, first announcing that it was a true story, and the last piece was a very disturbing sm piece about having sex with a knife blade. I kid you not. It feels odd to be alternately turned on, interested in the theory and her explanations, and freaked out by the intensity and disturbing-ness of the last story. Anyway, it was really enjoyable and I'm glad I got to see her speak again. Also, the Leather Archives has a wicked auditorium; the stage has a wooden painted cutout of a huge muscley half-naked leather man with his pants half unzipped at the back, and the auditorium itself is completely adorned with the Leather Pride flags (black and blue and, I think, white stripes with a big red heart in the corner) and more paintings of leather scenes. Hardcore, indeed.
Incidentally, I just learned how to use the links option, so sorry if I've gone a little overboard :-)

lurking in the depths of suburbia...

Tomorrow night, hopefully Anna and I are going to go here Carol Queen speak about sexual freedom and read some of her own writing. The event is going to be at the Leather Archives and Museum, which is oddly enough about a block away from our house, on the corner of a residential street. We could almost see it if we stood in front of our house. It's fairly nondescript, without even the full name on the outside; the only clue as to its contents are two flags outside with big black boots drawn on them. I'm slightly skeptical that it's actually happeneing, since I can't find any listings on any pertinent websites and I only heard about it a few days ago in a listserv email from Chicago's feminist sex-store, Early2Bed. The talk is supposed to be a whopping $25 donation, so I'm hoping they will let us in for five or ten dollars since that's all we can really afford. I guess if they won't at least it's a short walk home.

we knew it all along

This is from Lauren's blog. I agree with her, I feel totally validated in my bad habit :-)

http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=1857962005

you know what they say about the size of a man's mustache...

Things have been going much more smoothly since we stopped picking up furniture all the time. Thank god! Went to a drag show on Friday night, the first one we've seen since the random show in Kent, WA. They cost $5 before 10 and $8 after, and the shows don't begin until at least 11:15 usually, and since we're cheap we were sitting there for quite a while. However... Izzie Big, one of the co-founders and the MC for the show, came over to ask us if we wanted to go get 'transformed' (have fake facial hair put on) and we ended up talking to him for a long time, at least twenty minutes and maybe more. We talked about drag king techniques of facial hair, binding, and packing, and about how much things vary in different places in the country. For instance, Minneapolis has like 5 drag troupes while there are places like Seattle (where I would expect lots of public genderplay) that don't have any. And presentations and handling of gender are radically different depending on where you are and who's playing. Not surprising, but it was cool to hear such an experienced and well-known/traveled king talk about it. We also talked about the disbanding of the troupe, and he explained that people would still be doing stuff, and that there would likely be at least two more shows that were mostly them. Eased my mind a lot, knowing that there would still be activity, and anyway he said he felt like people were maybe becoming blase in Chicago, so maybe this will shake things up a bit.
We did end up getting transformed; Anna got what she called "a little gay mustache" like Charlie Chaplin and a little beard, and I got huge-ass sideburns. I got a lot of compliments, which was pretty funny.
Last night we tried to go to a queer political burlesque show, but failed miserably. When we got there, I swear there was a line around the block. We ended up going to a bar and playing Scattergories instead. Alas, my burlesque education will have to wait for another show.

the buffalo upstairs

The people in the apartment above us (three college girls) stay up until at least 2 every night, apparently constantly running back and forth and dropping thing and sometimes falling down. At least that's what it sounds like. The apartments are set up so that their living room is directly over our bedroom, and they kept us up last night for about hours after we went to bed. They also watched Dirty Dancing, I could hear it right through the floor. What do you do about something like this? We can't tell them to be immobile after midnight, but they are so damn loud it's amazing.
In other news... We went to the free day at the art institute on Tuesday, which was really fun. It's much nicer when you haven't paid $7, because you can relax instead of feeling like you have to see everything all at once. We are pretty much furnished, although we still need a dresser and coffee table maybe, and some end tables for the bedroom. That's about all, really. Things are calming down.

groan

Why do people ever move? It's such a terrible experience. I generally dislike packing, and I'm not a big fan of unpacking either; it never seems like I have enough drawers or surfaces to put all of my crap. And this move is worse than normal, since this is the first time I'm moving into an unfurnished apartment and I own hardly any furniture to speak of. We've spent most of the last two days shopping, picking up furniture, lifting heavy objects, and steeping carefully around the twenty or so boxes and bags in our living room.
There are a few good things, of course. My biceps are awesome right now from all the lifting. We got a whole kitchen table with six chairs, as well as a super comfy armchair with matching ottoman, all for free! Craigslist is the bomb. We're waiting for word back on other things, too, like filing cabinets and dressers and such. We also bought a cool lamp for $10 today, with four snakey heads with colored collars on the ends in blue, red, yellow and white. Very funky.
However, right now I'm super sad because the Chicago Kings, our drag king troupe, is apparently disbanding. They are still doing the monthly shows where people do individual or small group acts, but the big group productions are stopping. It's sad; that's what this troupe is kind of known for, and they are astonishingly good at it. When they all perform together, it's awesome. Anyway, I'm bummed.