Not Anonymous

I know.

I don't even know what I have to say. All my little thoughts are scattered throughout the day on twitter, sitting on my ass and actually writing something coherent is kinda overwhelming.

So what's the what?

I'm still at my all-damn-day-job. Which pretty much my life, eating up my time and brain.

I got promoted! In this job I've been at for nearly two years, I didn't think I had the ambition or the guts to actually try to climb the corporate latter, but here I am.

Still living at home.

I've made friends and lost some friends over the past few months. I need to clean up this place a little, cobwebs everywhere, icons that don't reflect my life or my interests, bios that are two years out of date.

Everything is strange.

I feel strange.

But I'm here.

I figured you'd all be interested to know that I grew up.

I went up a cup size and went down in band size. This because I've been wearing the wrong size bra for who knows how long. I went up from a C to a D and down from an (European sizing) 85 to a 75. For the first time in years my bras feel snug and aren't poking into me.

Who knew!?

Well, apparently lots of people, because more than once when my girl friends and I discussed the topic of bras, which was kind of often, seeing as many of us are busty and bras over a certain size are fucking expensive and can only be found in "speciality size underwear shops" which another post for a different day.

*deep breath*

In any event, I decided to use the holiday coupons I got from work to buy new bras. I also decided I'd ask what size I should wear. The staffer took one look at me and said sternly. "You're a 75D." And I was all, um, okay, let me try them on.

Which I did.

It was a hallelujah moment, let me tell you.

I bought four new, beautiful bras last week and I've had the chance to wear two of them so far.

One of them creaks.

Like an old floorboard. No really, when I move my shoulders, it sounds like I need oiling. Which is what my boss said to me when she asked me, "Are you creaking?" I mean, she called me the Tin-Man!

It was a source of great amusement at work, where we are very casual, and people found my bewilderment rather funny.

But what's really extraordinary is that other people have mentioned this happening to them too! That this is apparently something that happens when you have a bigger bust.

( Cut for body image issues and internalised fatphobia )

Also, regardless of what size you are, you can enjoy Busty Girl Comics!

My week was long and felt rather endless.

I let myself sleep in this morning, I still snuggled under the duvet for about two hours before I felt the need to extract myself from covers.

I feel like my life consists of work, brain melting, and sleeping.

I miss the days where I could write long meandering posts about whatever came to mind, but there seems to be a real effort involved in doing this now. The effort it worth it, and I wonder if it really is because I have less time during the week, or because I'm more careful with my words these days.

Yeah, I also sniggered when I re-read the line above.

I'm almost positive my picture is next to the phrase "puts foot-in-mouth" on more than one occasion. Although work has somewhat restrained me, the casual atmosphere does not help much.

Yes, work is pretty much all I do. I went to one roller derby training and haven't been back since because work fucking eats my life. I know it's about getting my priorities straight and managing my time better, but suddenly the job has become a career.

I still don't know how to deal with that mindset when I'm laziest person alive. I've been doing this for nearly a year, and I don't want my life to just be about work.

I suspect it's the fact that my commute there and back to my room in my parents house has something to do with it.

I'm anxious about moving out, especially to the city (we are suburbia), not because I don't like the city. I love the city and would love to live there. It's just that I'm very seriously considering emigrating at some point over the next five years (and yeah, I need to start getting my shit together for that to actually happen) and living on my own (and roommates, the studio apartment dream died long ago) will eat up my finances.

At this point I have no expenditures and I very rarely spend my money on frivolous shit, which is a funny thing to write when I'm in the market for a new laptop and am planning a holiday in June.

Context is everything.

First of all, to everyone who commented, sent me emails, pm's, etc. Thank you.

Thank you.

You are all wonderful and I'm so lucky to have you in my life one way or another.

As you may have heard there is a ceasefire. I'm still extremely nervous as I do not think it will last long, nor do I consider my nation's memory strong or long enough to remind ourselves that our current government brought rockets to the centre of the country and brought bus bombs back from the past.

The occupation, of course, remains and will not be moved at this time, no matter how much violence and damage it puts us through (Israeli and Palestinian).

Despite the ceasefire I didn't go to the office today, but rather spent my entire day working from home. I finished working but moments ago, technically still the 22nd of November, so my work didn't slide into the weekend. Whew.

I didn't go because I was anxious and because there was traffic that would have kept me and my co-workers who live in the same city stuck on the highways into Tel-Aviv for about 2 and a half hours.

Oy.

So I worked and faffed from home.

I'm rather pleased, but for a totally different reason. The reason being I'm going away for the weekend with friends! We'd planned this long weekend (took a day off and everything) over a month ago and god, I need this. I need this weekend like burning, I just need to clear my head, get away and regroup.

My hypervigilance was way out of whack this week. I have other thoughts about that, but that's for another day, I feel.

Right now I need to unwind from my long, long day of work and prepare for my long weekend ahead, which will be full of friends, puppies and rain!

Plus my laptop, there shall be some writing done!

This week had been so hellish, I don't even know where to begin.

( So I'll start at the beginning )

That was my week. I'm so glad it's over.

*Pokes head*

Hi.

I slept for 10 hours.

I'm still feeling pretty wiped. It was a very long weekend. I've been put on the weekend roster at work and will now be working the weekend about once every two months. Crazy.

I woke up about an hour ago and it's going to be the most stressful Holiday ever.

Shana Tova, by the way.

Thankfully, we're not having people over today or tomorrow, but we are on Tuesday, which is when I also have to go up to my apartment for the last time ever and get my desk top computer (and desk) and just, be rid of that fucking time and money suck.

I'm working again tomorrow, because the holiday needs to be dealt with as well and I decided to get my duties over and done with as fast as possible.

None of the above really makes sense unless you know what I work at and what I do, huh?

Meh.

I have my lecture on fanfiction and bisexaulity to write and I really don't feel like it, but I promised and it should be fun, at the end of the day to sit around and talk fandom with a bunch of other queers.

This paper, Queer as Folk and the Trouble with Slash, from the most recent issue of Transformative Works and Cultures is probably the best queer critique of slash. Ever.

Just to give you a taste, this is what the author, Kyra Hunting, writes in her conclusion:

[I]t is not enough to acknowledge that fan fiction and slash are not necessarily subversive. We cannot ignore the conservative potential of the exchange between canon and fanon. This is particularly imperative in cases where canonical texts have their own political goals. The ways that fan fiction can actively work to reinscribe normative or traditional values onto works that struggle with or resist these values are important sites of analysis.

This paper was written for me in mind, no doubt! Well, for other lovers and participators in slash who don't take it at face value.

I suspect that in a few issues there will be a paper about the queerbaiting phenomenon now making the waves due to Teen Wolf and the heartbreak that will occur with that.

And no, please don't tell me I need to watch the show. Others have tried. I'm over teenaged drama, angst and Alpha/Omega dynamics.

I'm honestly psyched about the fact that the season premier of Hawaii Five-0 falls on Yom Kippur eve, because that means I have no work that day and can watch and be fannish at my leisure!

Pardon me, I have to go and be Jewish.

Today I was complacent.

I was too confident, thought myself too smart and now things will never be the same. For me, at least. I doubt anyone else will give this as much thought.

Part of my job is to watch videos.

A lot of these videos are sexist, cater to rape culture and just plain offensive to my sensibilities. I am not shy about saying this, after all, just because I have to work with the material doesn't mean I have to like it.

One of my co-workers (we'll call her [The Heterosexist]) tried to convince me of the merit of the obnoxious humour that is found in these videos. I said, just because something is funny (and your mileage may vary rather widely!) doesn't make it inoffensive. Especially videos that are about how to "get a man" and tips of "how to kiss", all of which, as you can imagine, are sexist, cater to rape culture and are just plain offensive to my sensibilities.

The conversation evolved from talking about these "how to" guides for dating, to actual woes about dating. Two co-workers (including [The Heterosexist]) complained, as women who are socialising often do, about the dearth of men to date, how they didn't like strong women, how they didn't like older women, how they didn't like women who took initiative, etc.

I, jokingly, suggested that there was a remedy for this. That would be to not date men.

A different co-worker (we'll call her [Laid Back]) replied that the lesbian option was becoming more and more appealing. I said, one just needs to try hard enough *wink-wink nudge-nudge*

Now, because I work in an extremely liberal and casual office, because I work with a boss who has said the word "sexism" seriously, because I work on a majority woman team, because two of the three men with whom I work are gay; I felt safe enough to be casual and jokey about this aspect of my life, seeing as everyone else was being casual and jokey about that aspect of their lives as well.

Never fucking again.

[The Heterosexist], in light of what I said and how [Laid Back] replied, decided to share the fact that she knows she's not lesbian because when a woman hit on her she had to quit the class they studied in together.

Yes.

[The Heterosexist] went on to say that this woman treated her like she was her "boyfriend", went with her to the bus, took her to meet her friends. When a third co-worker (we'll call her [The Comedienne]) asked why she didn't just say she wasn't interested, [The Heterosexist] said this lesbian woman wouldn't take no for an answer, that she just kept hanging around her.

Considering she said she didn't know how to handle a woman hitting on her, I'm disinclined to believe her regarding how she interpreted the behaviour of this woman.

[The Comedienne] asked if she felt this woman was harassing her, [The Heterosexist] she wasn't sure, just that she was annoyed by her. [The Comedienne] said that would make a great comedy, about the lesbian who couldn't take a hint.

As you can imagine, I was feeling my blood boil and I ended up saying: "I think we have enough predatory gay stereotypes we have to deal with."

Call me Mel, the conversation killer.

The thing is, she clearly thought she was sharing a funny anecdote about Lesbians because the topic came up. Never mind that she has an ostensibly lesbian co-worker (me) and she was clearly uncomfortable with the implication that if she didn't date men she might be, god for-fucking-bid, considered one, because otherwise she'd be one of those pathetic women who were hung up on straight women who clearly would never ever ever want to date another woman.

I'm sure she thinks she has no problem with gay people. She's not bothered by it. Unless it's implied that this is something that can actually touch her.

Well, I shan't be so cavalier like I was today. I was stupid to think I could be.

And what burns the most is that one of my gay co-workers (let's call him [The Assimilationist]) said the whole situation was funny, that it would make great comedy.

Nice to see where his loyalties lie.

For fuck's sake.

I really, really wanted to post another "Meta on Commute" tonight.

But I'm not going to.

I arrived home from work at ten. I arrived at work this morning at half past nine.

I can barely see the screen in front of me. I am at that point where I can only make vague hand gestures and flop tiredly on flat (yet soft) surfaces.

The worst thing is that I will be working these hours tomorrow as well, because I'm taking a day off on Thursday. Christ, no one told me it was such hard work to have a holiday.

And it's not like I'm even taking a day off because I feel like having a long weekend. If only! I'd get a chance to write, something I'll have to sequester myself into my room on Friday and Saturday. Damn in, I need to get this story done, it is meant to be a gift!

Yeah, so my day off is going to be a nightmare one way or another. You see, I've decided to schlep my ass to Jerusalem (a city towards which my feelings are not wholly positive) in order to participate in the annual Pride/Memorial march. Not only am I participating, I'm going to be an usher there. I've never been an usher at any kind of political event in my life. Well, apparently this includes interacting with the police (a segment of the population that has never made me feel particularly safe, not as a woman and certainly not as a gay woman with political opinions that are considered wrong by many and dissident by others).

So yeah. Fun times.

At least I'll see friends, allies and have a place to crash, considering my sister and her family make their home in that city.

Trigger Warning: Frank discussion of sexual harassment, breach of body autonomy and dealing with the above

Last week, on my way to work, ( I was sexually harassed on the bus. Details regarding the incident and dealing with it under the cut )

ETA: Cutting due to request. I'm sorry any of you were harmed by reading this.

Okay so life sucks, no arguments there.

Thank you, everyone, for your lovely comments and sympathies, they were a great help to me during my twelve hour crying jag. I thought I was cried out, but I find myself leaking every now and then.

Amidst the horribleness that was yesterday, I received a phone call.

As you know, I have had many a trial the past few months, what with health, death, plumbing and unemployment issues making me wonder if I was ever going to catch a motherfucking break.

About a month ago I had a job interview at a big company where a friend of mine works and he handed my resume over to his boss.

Yada, yada, yada.

I got the job. I'll be starting at the end of the month.

Yay.

So, yeah. I'm pleased about that, am kind of bummed that I got the call just as the decision to put Wish to sleep was being made so I really had to put a whole lot of false cheer in my voice for my now-new-boss.

I'm now counting the my left over free time as holiday and arrangement making time.