Ow, Ow, Ow, and again I say “OW!”

Cryosurgery sucks bigtime. Liquid nitrogen is so not my friend. Fortunately, it’s even less the friend of the virus that decided that the bottom of my foot was a good home for a few years, but now it needs to expand. And, hey, it sucks less than last time. Plus they’re giving me anti-viral cream to smear on the warts, so I can go 2 months before I need to come back in again. Woohoo =)

However, in case any of you ever find warts on your body, in any location, get them treated, right away. It’ll suck, but it’ll suck a whole lot less than cryosurgery on 5 times as many spots.

Nothing too deep or insightful today

Just finished lifting & aerobic exercise. I kinda like this sort of workout. It means I can workout like 3 times a week, cover both bases, and still have most of my nights pretty open. Of course, this was over lunch, but I have to get it in before they take the liquid N2 to the bottom of my feet, later this afternoon. Tends to kill my desire to do aerobic activity. =)

Hopefully this will be the last time they have to freeze the cluster of three little warts so close together. The overlapping megablister makes walking very unpleasant. Biking was doable last time, awkward, but not painful. We shall see what we shall see.

transcontinental bike plans

Originally, I thought this was a really out-there plan, and it sounded like alot of fun. Now it seems alot less out there, and even more like something I want to do. It would be late june – late august 2003. I’d be doing it by myself (though tardis has offered to semi-accompany: he’d be touring via motorcycle, and leap-frogging me the whole way.)

I’m thinking I’ll most likely do a fairly circuitous route (provincetown – boston – burlington vt – ithaca ny – cleveland – chicago – madison wi – minneapolis – denver co – santa fe – phoenix – san diego – san francisco.) over roughly 2 months (possibly a couple of extra days).

Continue reading “transcontinental bike plans”

Sunday Afternoon Nausea (aka, Saturday Night Fever)

So, I went to see Saturday Night Fever this (technically yesterday) afternoon. Free tickets, handed over by someone who had already purchased them but couldn’t make it. It kinda blew. I mean, the dancing was cool to watch, but the backdrop was somewhere between dead boring and actively annoying. Tom and I left during intermission. I intend to thank my benefactor politely, but I don’t know what I was thinking =)

Matthew Shephard Show

A friend invited me to go watch the matthew shephard story at his friend’s
place. I did, and it was an okay made for tv film, despite being incredibly
preachy, and uncompromisingly biased. It got me thinking on several topics.
It portrays anti-gay violence pretty graphicly for television. It was
unabashedly pro-death-penalty until the very end. And, as always, it raised
questions regarding media attention towards this particular incident.

I’ve never been on the recieving end of any anti-gay violence. I’ve had a
couple of driveby slurs shouted at me. I’ve lost a couple of friends over
being gay, but only a couple. I’ve been very careful and a little lucky. In
the past year, a friend of a friend was shot leaving a gay bar, another in
similar circumstances fought back against his assailants and ended up being
permanently impaired when, as he was fighting them back, he grabbed onto one of
them as they drove off. Both are alive. A straight man hugged a male friend
of his outside a bar in chicago and was severely beaten by cops from that bar.
He too is alive (and suing). A lesbian whom I never knew, who worked at a gay
bar in pittsburgh I’ve been to many a time was burned alive in her car. She is
not.

Anti-gay violence happens. As with any violence, it is wrong. It affects a
person, and a community to know that it could happen to us, for no reason other
than stepping out of a familiar place at the wrong time, or showing affection
to a loved one. It didn’t start or end with Matthew Shephard.

There is no conclusive evidence that the death penalty works as a deterant, but
there is conclusive evidence that many people that have been sentenced to death
are innocent. Given the error inherent in the judicial process, I am
unambiguously opposed to it. And yet, even in the truly unambiguous case, such
as (to the nearest of my knowledge) McKinney, we ought to stop them. Does that
mean kill them? It’s not the only way to accomplish the goal. And I think
there are better options.

There have been a large number of possible victims to select from when it comes
to who the media turned into the poster child for anti-gay violence. One
wonders why they chose Matthew Shephard. Could it be because he was the
archetypal gay man? Physically less than imposing, into theater, pretty, etc.
How about the gay men who fought back? Why did it wait until this particular
example to bring the matter to light?

Need for Affirmation

I just got back from San Francisco. I had a great time with some friends out there.

During the trip, I was hanging out with a friend of mine at his place. We were gossipping about what a friend said about a friend, and I brought up a concept bandied about among the local set of friends. This group calls it the matrix (I’ve heard other terms for the same thing from different social circles. I’ve heard it called “the web of shame”, “the snowflake” , and even “the organic molecule”.)

Basically, it’s a way of showing who has slept with whom, blah, blah, blah. On the merest mention of it, my friend, whom I admire greatly, made a noise of disgust. I asked him why, and he said something to the effect of “I’m sure [redacted] is a great guy, but the way some people use this sort of thing to feel better about themselves…” and I can’t remember anything else he said, because that spun my brain off along a totally different avenue.

It’s something I have done, generally decreasingly over the last few years, but it dominated my social interaction with at least three people in the bay area, and influenced several others. It wasn’t about an insatiable sex drive (mine’s actually pretty tame). It’s not about social status, I will talk about it with my friends, but I tell them everything, especially the embarrassing stuff.

I suppose it could be Mark’s boredom theory, but making an ass out myself isn’t terribly entertaining. Especially when it generates all this conflict: I blew a night of sleep, later I all but ran back to the place I was staying where I sat on the floor with my back against the door, in the dark, wracking my brain to figure out what I was doing wrong, where I screwed up, why I am losing a game I care about, a game I’ve been working at and care about, something so many people seem to have working with no such internal conflict.

I feel like most of my life is really pulling together. I’m into my classes. I like my work (not love, but that’s more than I could have said a year ago.) I think public policy is a direction that’ll work for me. I’m healthy. I have great friends. I have a boyfriend, or at least a decent approximation of such, and he’s a great guy, intelligent, attractive, athletic, sweet, and patient. And yet, I’m not really happy. Am I chasing unicorns?

When I was asked by this cute little film student what I needed for a happy life, my answer came with no hesitation. All I needed then, and all I need now is “purpose”. I need something to do. Something with meaning. Something that matters.