Suicide is painless. It brings on many changes....

 

How many of you remember this scene from M*A*S*H?  It is a classic.  The character in the center intends to commit suicide because he has suffered his first ever case of erectile dysfunction.  The song, "Suicide is Painless" has been called "the stupidest song ever written".  Although Robert Altman made only $70,000 for directing M*A*S*H, his son made $1,000,000 for having co-written the song.

Why do I bring up this song?

Recently, I was in a Zoom meeting with some friends, and I start reciting the lyrics to this song. Unfortunately, I touched a raw nerve with one of these friends, as I did not know that her mom had committed suicide. The other friends on the Zoom meeting understood where I was going, and didn't pay it much mind. But I knew that I touched a third rail with this friend.

One of the things I learned years ago from watching George Carlin in Peekskill was that a good comedian's banter may offend some people unintentionally.  I had done just that in my Zoom meeting.  Although I was able to recover and apologize, I now know this person's sore point from which she has never recovered.  Given the other things I know about her, I can understand how she has lived her life without falling in love with (or being loved by) someone nice.

As much as I can bitch and moan about things, I can still consider myself lucky.  Both of my parents died of "typical" causes (Mom from heart disease, and Dad from the Coronavirus), and not "unnatural" causes (such as a car accident or suicide).  My wife died of cancer.  Had she lived, I don't know if I could have taken the chance on going out in this world as Marian.

Listen, I'd like to know a secret.

 

Yesterday, I was presented with a mystery that I haven't yet solved.  Someone left a box containing this plate in front of my door.  But I have absolutely no clue as to who dropped this plate at my door. 

Could this plate have been given to me by my secret pen pal from my "Ambles" group? If so, why didn't she/he have identified herself/himself as "Your Secret Pen Pal" and left me a card telling me that this is a gift to me?  (I've mentioned my love for trains in the past, and this gift could have come from a member of our "Secret Pen Pal" group.) As much as this is a possibility, it breaks the rules of our group.  We are not supposed to be giving each other a gift of value - even though these collectors plates have little resale value.  So, I've ruled out my secret pen pal for now.

The next person I thought of is someone who I doubt would give me the time of day, much less a "collector's place."  My most recent ex-girlfriend is emptying out a house in preparation to move into smaller living quarters.  We have not been in contact since summer, and I see no reason why she'd bother to risk seeing me to drop this off.  In addition, without a note to say who gifted me this plate, this couldn't be a peace offering which would tell me that she'd like to bury the hatchet.  (Last we were in contact, I'm sure that she'd prefer to bury the hatchet in my back. So assuming that this gift was from her doesn't make sense.)

The last person that I thought might have dropped this plate off is my former cruise partner.  She has even less interest in renewing a friendship, nor would she have collected plates with a railroading theme.  Given that we likely would have strangled each other if we were in the same place again, I think that she is also someone who should be ruled out for having put this plate in front of my door.

If the person who gave me this gift reads this blog, I want to say thank you.  But I wish you would let me know who you are, just to know whether you want to attempt to be friends again.

 

Was it an accident?

 

Like many of my readers, I use Google Voice for both texting and for making phone calls from selected devices. But, for the most part, I use it as a pass through service, so that my friends can call me and not need to know whether I am picking up on my land line or cell phone.  So, I was very surprised to find out that someone had dialed my number.

A while back, I had a nasty separation from a friend who was once close to me, as if she was a sister.  Sadly, due to circumstances I won't mention again, we haven't been in contact for over a year.  So I was very surprised to see the following missed call in Google Voice:

(Name Hidden for Privacy)
Missed Call
Fri, Nov 6, 2020, 9:11 PM

Although I seriously doubt that she'd want to call me after a year of being out of contact, I figure that I'd take the opportunity to send her a birthday card and to remove her from my blocked caller list.  

Will she call back, or try to contact me via other means?  Who knows.  But I will be extremely careful if she wants to rebuild a friendship.  She very well could have been a catalyst in my ex-girlfriend's decision to break up with me.  And if so, I don't want her in a position to cause me any more problems.

 

How do I maintain my schedule?

 

At this point, I'd like to keep my readers up to date on what's going on in my dating life.  For the most part, I've been seeing two ladies, and have had a hard time making a decision between the two.  The woman known as MH has largely gone by the wayside, as I think she has made enough excuses to signal that I am not dating material.  But that's OK, as I couldn't juggle schedules enough to see more than two women on a regular basis.  Yet, this doesn't mean that I won't consider seeing a new woman.

Before I met my last girlfriend, I stumbled into one of the women who I regularly met in a women's meetup group on OK Cupid.  Recently, she swiped right on my ad where I'm in a masculine presentation.  So I responded to her.  If she were to be interested in me, I'd have to reveal myself quickly. But this person is not someone I'm really interested in meeting right now.

Recently, I swiped right on a retired woman lawyer's ad who lives Manhattan.  She seems like a person who would normally be out of my league.  But we'll see what happens when I see her this week.  As much as I don't need more complications in my life, I figure that I should see what chemistry could exist between us before I make the hard decision choosing between FL and FH.

You'll note that I haven't written too much about these two ladies.  Both know about me going out in the world as Marian.  But FH has yet to encounter my feminine presentation in person.  Given that she lives with an adult daughter, I'm not sure how much of an emotional risk she's willing to take.  FL, on the other hand, seems to be willing to take a risk.  However, she is juggling too many things in her life, and I can't be sure that there will be room for me as things settle down.  

I'll keep my readers informed as things develop....

 

 

 

 

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Quick - Find me a 5th Grader!

 

The older I get, the more I find people who are totally uncomfortable with technology. It never ceases to amaze me how well the old joke fits with these people:

"It's so easy, that a 5th grader could understand it.  Quick - Find me a 5th grader!"

And yes,what comes naturally to me is so awfully impossible for some people....

- - - - - -

The other day, one of the two women I've been dating wants to buy a computer to do her work remotely.  So we run over to the local Micro Center to pick up a new computer, and then install it.  Everything is running well until we have to set up the computer on the home network - and then things go sour.  She has left all the technology decisions to her daughter, and her daughter is nowhere around to tell us the password/passphrase used to authenticate us on the home router. As a result, we can't complete setting up the computer.

Last night, she tries to reach me while I'm at work, to figure out how to connect the software she needs to perform her business tasks. Not only is she having a hard time installing the Chrome browser, but she is having conflicts due to Microsoft trying to force her to use its Edge browser and cloud services as part of the standard Windows-10 setup.  So I agree to drive down after work to help her get her software running - and this means that I will need to do a quick change from female to male presentation before going to see her.

I'll bet that whatever problem I find will be relatively simple for me to fix.  And I'll bet that she gets in the way of me fixing it, as she will be nervous due to not understanding what's going on.  If I can't fix it, I'll let her know.  But it's likely an easy problem to resolve, and I feel confident that I can get her up and running before she works with her first client.

.

 

 

 

 

 

Aftermath of an election.

 

By the time you read this entry, the presidential election will have ended for us in New York State. We are lucky to be a state where the results will likely not be contested, as I'd hate for us to have our own version of Florida's screwed up 2000 election.  This doesn't mean that the election will be over for this country.  I expect that GOP operatives will contest the vote in most of the "Battleground States", and that we'll have a daily dose of agita from upsetting news being reported about these states' elections.

The final results of this election will affect our community. If Trump/Pence is declared the winner, I expect a full assault on the rights of the LGBTIQ community.  At first, malevolent actions at the Federal level may not affect us in the "Blue States". However, as court cases are brought to the Supreme Court, we may see Federal cases affect rights recognized at the State level.  Since Abortion is the most visible target, I expect that we will be the first target the social conservatives plan to aim for.  Transgender people will likely be at the top of the list, as many of us are relatively easy to spot, given years of "testosterone poisoning".  Even with plastic surgery to make our bodies look more feminine, our bone structure will often give us away.  Once we have lost our rights, I expect that they will go after the gay/lesbian community. Although gays/lesbians can hide in the woodwork, they will not be able to play the "don't ask / don't tell" game for long.  Only after the LGBTIQ community has lost its rights will the "conservatives" go after women as a whole, first going after a woman's right to control her own body, and then taking away many of the rights women have gained in the past 100 years. If you don't think this can happen, look at what happened in Qatar when a dead baby was found in their airport's women's room - at least 10 women were held for a forced "medical" exam to verify that none of these women was the mother of the abandoned corpse. Hardly any coverage of this took place in the mainstream press.  Could you imagine how you'd feel if it was your daughter that had to go through this humiliating process?  Of course, our current president had nothing to say about this event.

I expect that this will be a heatedly contested election.  We've already seen groups of Trump supporters in their trucks blocking people on line (in California) from getting to their polling place.  Since this is a district which tends to support Republicans, they are likely harming their own cause. Although both sides perceive threats to their ways of life, it seems like Trump's supporters have more to lose emotionally.  I find it interesting that these people are flying the biggest flags, performing the most annoying stunts (such as blocking the Westbound Tappan Zee Bridge), and doing the most dangerous things (such as running their powerboats in an unsafe manner, causing some to capsize in the wake of bigger boats) - all to gain the attention of people who might otherwise ignore their feelings.  They bask in the reflected glow of their "fearless" leader.  And they fear that they may have been duped by this con man.  So they shout "look at me, I have something important to say too" - even when they have nothing worthwhile to say.  It reminds me of the old Jerry Springer show, where an inarticulate person is bested by someone more articulate (not saying much about either person, given the show) and gives up saying "whatever." Unfortunately, Trump supporters will not go quietly into the night the way Springer's guests often went.

Hopefully, we will have a peaceful transfer of power in January.  If not, I feel sorry for our country.  I plan to make sure that I know how to use firearms just in case....

 

 

 

 

 

Friendships

 

One of the problems of the pandemic is that it is much harder to socialize, much less meet with people in a social setting.  Yes, Zoom Meetings do help.  But they are no substitute for in-person get-togethers where people mingle with each other and have one on one conversations while participating in the group meeting.

All of my in-person meetup groups have suspended their in-person meetings until the worst of the pandemic is over. A couple of groups have met virtually. But it's hard to get excited these days about seeing images of 5-10 people on a screen and having to "fight" for conversation space.  (I can only imagine how it went with the group I was blackballed from by my ex, but that's another story.) Yet, I still get excited when I can meet people in person - and hope that the weather stays mild enough for a long while, so that these people feel comfortable in getting together for lunch or dinner.

One of these people I've met in person is a woman from my Thursday Night Gaming group.  The pandemic has kept us from meeting, save for 3 in-person outdoor meetings on the front lawn of the host and hostess of our weekly gatherings. Yet, the two of us have met for outdoor lunches, and for walks along the rail trail.  Given how the two of us talk, she sees me as another female, and this is fine with me.  (I wonder how she'd react if she were to meet me as a male.  Could she deal with my bi-gendered nature?  It's not worth the risk to a friendship to find out.)  Hopefully, we'll develop a deeper friendship over time.  She's the type of person I'd want as a friend - sane, sober, and level headed.

Another person I'd like to develop a closer friendship with is a woman I met via OK Cupid.  She had just started to get intimate with a nice man, but found my profile interesting enough to want to get to know me.  (She lives near Kingston, NY, and has encountered my ex in a professional setting.)  So far, we have gotten together a couple of times, and we are looking to get together again next week for both lunch and another rail trail walk.  

Now that the winter is coming on, and people much more reluctant to meet in person, I'm hoping that the network of friendships/acquaintances I've been able to develop will help keep me sane during the pandemic related hibernation we will soon endure.  And I hope that my readers will also be able to get through the next few months without going bonkers....

 

Good Luck!