Happy Leap Day!

Even a shop open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week is closed for 6 hours a year!

One of our earth years (a complete orbit around the sun) does not take an exact number of days (one complete spin of the earth on its axis). It takes 365.2422 days, give or take.

The leap year was introduced by Julius Caesar in 46BC, to make the calendar tidier. The extra day every fourth year made the average year 365.25 days long. This was still about 12 minutes longer than the solar year, which you can get away with on the short term, but in 1267 a monk called Roger Bacon noticed that the calendar had slipped nine days in the 13 intervening centuries.

It then took the church until 1582 to accept that it was celebrating Easter on the wrong week. That year Pope Gregory XIII adjusted the calendar, introducing the system we go by today: every fourth year is a leap year, unless it is divisible by 100 and not by 400. This makes the year 365.2425 days, which is still a little under 26 seconds too long, but nothing to fret about. (Unless you live more than 1,000 years, and even then, it's only about 10 hours.)

As a one off, Gregory's reform also skipped the 10 days they had gained since Caesar's time, jumping from 4 to 15 October 1582. It is said that this provoked demonstrations from people demanding their stolen days back.

This gives me pause... what would happen if the Pope said that tomorrow would really be April 1st... While people might not fear the time has been subtracted from their lives (I hope), they might protest wages lost from their bank account. Since life is real and money isn't, we might not have progressed so much after all.

Gets My Goat!

I'm disgusted to even show this. In fact, I'm not... you're just going to have to click to see this photo of Afghans playing Buzkashi in Kabul.

Buzkashi... doesn't sound that offensive...

Buzkashi, or "goat dragging", is played with two teams of horsemen competing to throw a decapitated goat into a scoring circle.

Wha-wha-what?

Get these people some Polo equipment, or at least a soccer ball! Good god, throwing headless goats... as a game?

I don't get American rodeo sport events either. In fact, I don't really get men at all. This is what too much testosterone will do! An otherwise sensible human being throwing dead goats for fun.

I suppose if you're a rancher this might be a useful skill... for those times when you have to gather and burn the dead from a nearby village slain by your local Taliban... oh, did I just say that out loud?

Stating the (not-so) Obvious

Apparently, to the eyes of the 'normals' there isn't much difference between the people in the above photos. At the risk of stating the obvious, please allow me to state the obvious.

Transsexuals: These are the transgendered ladies in the left column... you would not think of them as men. They look and act like normal women, and think of themselves as women.

Transvestites and Cross-Dressers: The are the straight men in the middle column. You would think of them as dudes in a dress. They don't look or act like women, and they don't think of themselves as women. For various reasons, they just like wearing women's clothes - often with a wig. (The top one is a famous comedian, Eddie Izzard, bonus cool points if you knew that - the man's a genius!)

Drag Queens: These are the gay men in the the right column, usually provocatively dressed, and in a wig. You might think of them as women, you might not. They might look like women, but even if they don't, they act as an exaggeration of an (their) ideal woman. They don't think of themselves as women, but as gay men.

What to make of all this?

Well, since only transsexuals think of themselves as women, they are the only ones who might elect to undergo SRS (Sexual Reassignment Surgery) and they all take hormones. Since they consider themselves woman, if they are into men, they don't think of themselves as gay (because they're a woman...women are into men.) Most people think I'm 'straight' because I've never been with a guy, but I would consider myself more like a gay woman than a straight man.

In reality... I no longer see 'gender' as a 'requirement' (or barrier) for a soul mate. In fact, the labels 'gay' and 'straight' are meaningless to me... I'm into minds and personalities.

If all the labels confuse you, why not check out my earlier post on the Four Dimensions of Gender?

The Psychology of Parasites

We have learned so much about humans and human behavior by studying the behavior of other animals like us (and unlike us). But I wonder, what can we learn by studying the behavior (and evolutionary traits) of the single-celled life forms, bacteria, and parasitic organisms of which we ourselves are comprised?

(You did know you are a compound life form, right? What you perceive as your body is really just a complex ecosystem sustaining many different and exotic forms of life. Cool, eh?)

So I've recently read Parasite Rex, a book given to me by my dear friend Aosof from the Royal Society. He gave it to me a while ago, after he met Mr. Zimmer (it's his job to do that sort of thing), but I've only just been able to read it. Meeting him must have been some experience! This book is a eukaryote's and prokaryote's eye view of life... and it is AMAZING!

Imagine this... you are a complete "animal," yet you are too small to be see with a human's unaided eye (click the book cover). In other words, a white blood cell could kick your ass. Yet, in your world, you could be drifting along in a ocean (really just a river) and follow a cloud of urine upstream and into the body of some animal where you'd get into the kidneys and then bloodstream where you are now free to completely roam around the body until you find a new place to call home, perhaps the intestines, where you could be assured of a steady supply of food with no competition or threats.

Yeah, there's life like that. Pretty amazing little creature, eh? In his book, Carl describes this and other more exotic life forms that can actually manipulate the behaviors of their hosts! Seriously, it's a script right out of an Alien movie, except it's real life.

Some of these creatures can build hard shells around them (cysts) for when then environment gets too rough... no water, food, wrong temperature, etc. These cysts can survive for many, many years, even through unprotected space travel. Really neat!

Whether human or microscopic creature, we both have the same basic needs... to find food and shelter. So my point is... what lessons can we learn from studying creatures like that and applying their successful strategies to the macro world? We are just now using this knowledge to create better cures for diseases, but are there non-medicinal lessons to be learned as well?

Gone, But Not Forgotten

Before I was conscious, I was communicating.
I knew not what I said, but said what I knew.
Now, remnants of those converstations are being preserved,
Scanning letters from pen-pals, and some men-pals,
Like an archeologist preserving old bones.

The ebb and flow of friends, reduced to just memories.
Emma, Tuomas, Severine, M. Columbier too,
Brian, Melissa, Jana, Holly, I remember you.
Though I was just a passing shadow on your screen of life,
Your words were kept, your friendship never dies.

Sometimes we're rich, and sometimes lean, but sometime inbetween we'll meet again.

Your daily inspiration...

In death, time ceases to have meaning; all laws of physics become irrelevant.

Death is the opposite of time.

What dies? Certainly not the body; it just falls into its constituent parts of water and chemicals. That's just mere transformation, not destruction. What of the mind though?

What dies is merely the identity of the collection of parts we call a person. We enter this world naked, we leave it naked; once we understand who that someone is, death no longer bothers us. Nor does time.

Over-educated, Over-worked, Under-paid and Under-appreciated

My niece is dropping out of school at 15. My friend has two kids- neither one with any high school education. How can I assure someone that an education is important?

That may sound silly coming from me, but consider I've taken 85 courses at three different universities, excelled at nearly all of them, and yet... what do I have to show for it? I can make more money selling my body than I can selling my mind. Not that my body is all that... but that's the point!

So how can I assure someone that an education is important when my own has failed to bear fruit? How can I defend the institution I'm from when I can make more money as a whore?

If not money, then what about culture? Well, I can't relate to my family because they watch network TV sitcoms instead of reading books; education didn't help there either.

The only reason I could come up with was because an education is required to do X. But... what if 23 years later, turns out X really isn't what you want to do?

Two Kinds of Violence...

Did you realize that not all violence is created equal?

The difference between watching violence in a movie and in the news is very subtle, but very, very significant.

Consider watching, say, an explosion, or a car crash...
In a movie, the violence is fake. No one really dies.
But watch the same thing on the news, and you're watching someone die.

There's a difference, and whether or not you can feel it, there's a difference on your soul!

Consider that next time they show an event where someone (or many people) dies over and over and over and over and over and over and over.

Your daily perspective...

You are what you eat... you know this right?

In the same way that the food you consume provides the building blocks your body needs to function (grow, fight germs, heal, etc.) so too does the media you consume provide the building blocks for your mind.

Seriously.

So what's you're media diet? As an example, consider music.

A person who consumes media content rich in classical music will have a different life outlook than one with a diet rich in pop, or rock, or rap, or heavy metal, or even jazz. (I love music; I'm not making value judgments here, just making facts.)

Works for video too. A person who watches too much violence not only becomes more desensitized to it (over-exposure to anything desensitizes) but they, over time, will develop violent tendencies.

Nonsense, you say... I watched Bugs and Daffy cause (and suffer) lots of violence, and it didn't effect me! Well, that wasn't violence, that was humor. Think about it... Pulp fiction is (supposed to be) violent... Bugs Bunny is (supposed to be) funny. When the bomb blows up Mr. Coyote, his face is all blackened and his hair blown back. That's funny. If it showed his guts flying through the air and blood everywhere, that's violent. Family Guy drives this point home in a spoof where Elmer shoots Bugs. Instead of the normal "cartoon violence, " we see graphic images of Bugs writhing in pain, disemboweled, with Elmer standing over him, delivering a final neck break.

I'm uneasy about making violence funny, too. There's just too damn much of it, especially to be used as a vehicle for entertainment. Shrug. Maybe it's just a symptom.

Well, hear me now, believe me later, but it's for the same reason why brainwashing works. Constant, repeated exposure alters behavior.
Constant, repeated exposure alters behavior.
Keep that in mind next time you pan through the TV guide!

Short Attention Span Theatre

I'm a bit shocked at the quickness in which Americans tend to forget, and at the same time (and for the same reasons), concerned about this election turning into Political Pop Idol.

Possible causes?

• Too much media prevents long term retention of any of it.
• The media is hyped (and hyping) uncontrollably
• Americans are so numb, they need actually need the hype to notice/care
• Americans are so hooked on drama, they need to interject it into everyday life

Well, don't forget, you are what you eat!

Plain Jane

Today marks a significant point during my transition: today, I went out with no makeup and plain clothes and was treated like a genetic girl! Yay!!!

To put it in other terms, when I first started trying, I hardly ever passed as genetic girl (GG)... I looked like a boy in girl's clothes. That was over a decade ago.

When I'm done transitioning, I expect to always pass as a GG.

So, today, I'm somewhere between 0% and 100%. Most people now see (and treat) me as a woman, but every now and then someones sees me as a boy (but even then, they still treat me as the woman they first saw! :)

This is new! Just within the past year, I finally started passing as a GG! Before that, if I was ignored, I'd pass, but when scrutinized... no. You can imagine how happy it made me to finally pass under a closer look!

Makeup (until recently) was essential, for I have pale skin and dark hair. But, after nearly two years of laser hair removal treatments, I finally have a 24 hour shelf life!

Also, learning to do my hair helped a lot! (Thanks Judith and the girls at Cortex!)

It honestly makes me as happy to pass as GG as it did finishing my Ph.D.! (It also felt just as traumatic getting there!)

So today I'm still not as confident as I want to be... I don't bring attention to myself yet, but after today, that seems closer than ever!

Music ... Food for the Geek

I'm so excited to have just rediscovered a large library of music (250+ hours) that I have not heard for nearly 20 years! Not just any music, mind you, but music that deeply inspired my own compositional style!

Wanna hear for yourself? Okay, check out the following two links, but don't worry about the graphics or what they are, I'll explain that later... for now, just listen to the music.

• Unreal
• Second Reality

Perhaps an explanation is in order? First some context on the music. Nearly 20 years ago, while in college, I was writing music for video games. This was a significant challenge for me because I was used to composing music using MIDI sequencers and synthesizers. In video games, the computer became the instrument.

Recall that this is before .mp3s and before the comparatively huge resources computers have now... back then, most computer programs were under 1.44Mb (they fit on a floppy disk) and most computers had, if you were lucky, 1/2 Mb of RAM available for everything... the operating system, the program, and the music. A typical mp3 is six times that large!

So, making music on a PC, or making a PC make music, was tricky business! When I started we only had four 'voices' where a voice could be a sampled recording. Again, there wasn't mp3 compression back then, so the samples had to be TINY (and recorded at awful quality) or you wouldn't have enough memory to play it. When I stopped (because grad school got too hard), we had 16-track editors, but again, you didn't have much memory to work with.

That first link above? Just four voices! The second one? Eight.

But what about the video? Have you ever heard of the PC Demo scene? The idea, back then, was to show off the processing power of the mighty 386. Again, this was waaay before today's quad and dual-core Pentiums. Your mobile phone is probably faster now. Amigas were doing it for a while, and they would have parties where groups of kids (programmers) would write these elaborate presentations filled with (then) mind-blowing graphics and animations ... you know ... things never before seen on a computer? That kind of stuff. As a young college student learning advanced math, computer architecture, and assembly programming, I was instantly hooked.

You had to be clued in to find them... this was before the Web. They were mostly European-based parties. And since it was a party, attended by people who were into real-life discos, the music had to rock as well.

It was all incredibly synergistic... listening to that music, watching the computer do animation tricks I'd never seen before, while at the same time gaining the knowledge needed to understand how they were built. It was also my first exposure to Rave/Trance/Dance/Electronica music, and I didn't know what to make of it. I couldn't break it down like songs on the radio because it was mostly effect-based, but I fell in love with it. I searched out every composer in the scene, every demo, and I saved those tiny music files. It was my first data-harvesting experience.

You know I save (and organize) everything digital, right?

So now, nearly 20 years later, imagine my surprise when I realized that the same mp3 player I've been using since that time (Winamp) plays all those files! With its help, I've now taken those 400 songs and turned them into mp3s! Listening to them is like a comforting reunion with an old friend... I'm filled with the energy and joy I once had... before the gender dysphoria set in... before life got complicated.

I can't wait to see the effect that consuming all this music will have on my composing! :)

Send me an email if you want a copy! (Oh, as an example of how tiny the sound files had to be... all 4,543 songs are less than 972 MB as originals; as mp3s, they are 16 GB! That's a 16-to-1 reduction over MP3s, which are themselves 10-to-1 reductions of CD-quality audio!)

Fast food, faster buildings...

I can't keep up! You've heard me complain that all Muncie has is fast-food restaurants, right?

Tell me if this makes sense.

TacoBell builds a new building, three blocks away from their old one. They then close the old one and leave the building decrepit.

Bob Evans does the same thing, but they build their building in the parking lot and then tear town their old one.

Then another TacoBell store on the other side of town does the same thing.

This is what you get if you believe in things like "the economy" ... madness!

And, just for fun...

There is a new restaurant opened up ... on the building it says, "Authentic Mexican," and on the same sign underneath, "We sell Gyros!"

Since when did the Mediterranean become a part of Mexico?

I thank God everyday the only sushi restaurant within 50 miles of me (itself just one mile away) is also the highest quality sushi restaurant I've seen. It's the only place I eat out at in this town.

Trans... not gender! Transcoding! (Resolution #4)

Our life is frittered away by detail. Simplify, simplify.” — Henry David Thoreau

Been going through a lot of old media lately, converting most of it to a common format. At this very second, there's one computer busy burning DVDs to disk (275 down, approx. 200 to go), one computer converting VHS tapes to mpg files (56 down, 18 to go), and one converting paper to jpg files. That's going to take a while. I mean, once the books are done, then there's the sheet music, and then all of the folders and papers from 10th grade through 23rd grade. (I'm not kidding!) That's the easy part... scanning the books is what I'm not looking forward to.

Fortunately, all CDs were converted long ago as was most video and photographs.

Why do this? If not just to simplify my environment and reduce entropy (dissolve it, actually), then think of space... right now what non-digital media I have occupies two bookshelves, a filing cabinet, and three boxes. I could reduce all of that down - with no loss in quality- to something the size of a deck of cards.

I don't even want to think of the work saved in moving just one more time.

It's all part of a larger plan for a happy life:

Step one, eliminate non-essential material goods. Toys, gadgets, knick-knacks, clothes, everything not needed, and everything which doesn't do something in the simplest way.

Step two, digitize personal media.

The result? Light living! It's scary at first, but is freeing at the same time.

In case you're curious, all together, everything will fit on three stackable, 1-terabyte drives, altogether about as large as a shoebox. Not bad for every photo, CD, DVD, book, notebook, VHS tape, cassette, and CD-ROM I've ever owned, ay? Still, I look forward to 10 terabytes in your pocket, or better yet, on a chip! :)

197 DVDs to go...
16 VHS tapes to go...
172 Books to go...
13 years of school notes to go...

My First Day In London; My First Protest

This day in herstory...
My first sightseeing day in London, February 15, 2003. I take the tube from the Queensbury area and alight at the Westminster exit and find myself immersed in the above... and below!

You remember the "Million Man" march on Washington? This was 5 times larger, and I unwittingly popped up from underground right in the middle of it!

My first day outside America, and already I'm an activist!