BEIGE ACCENTS & GRAY INTONATIONS

 FRIENDSTERS & FRIENDSTRESSIXES,

Join me in a chorus of halluluiah for the bounty of srtwork you are about to receive!! I’m so excited to present to you new ART called:

1. NO GRAYS IN SIGHT

2. NO BEIGES IN SIGHT

3. RUFUS & INGRID REACH A PEACE AGREEMENT RE: THEIR SINCERE APPRECIAYION FOR EACH OTHERS CULTURE

It has been about a month & a half since I checked in with you all, my spies, my lookers!! I loved you & missed youthe whole time though, trust me. Believe me.

I have SO much to catch you upon.  SO MUCH in fact, that I probably will NOT cover it all today. IN FACT, i may just leave you with an outline of what to expect to read about in futurre blofs.

1. TRANS/DETRANS UPDATES

a. seeing fewer FtMtF detransitioners telling their stories online

b. seeing more content from MtFtM detransitioners, but not a whole lot

c. seeing lots more comedic content from trans/gay folks. Netflix better be handing out comedy money to the queers that’s all I be saying.

d. this is all going in the direction I had hoped it would. I have found my foothold in the belief that while trans & nonbinary may be “trending’ for a few more minutes, and that not everyone who experiences gender “discomfort” needs to medically transition, there will not be a return to the days where gender is just assigned & accepted without question.

2. AKATHISIA UPDATES

a. along with trans/detrans shit, I also continue to do research on akathisia

b. I have found out lots of interesting, shocking stuff

c. I will share it with you soon

d. but here is a little tidbit: I know Robin Williams died form akathisia not Lewy Body Dementia

e. also…I have had akathisia 2 times. Recently in 2021, but also in 2014. I will explain the hows & whys in a futturre blog

NO GRAYS IN SIGHT (Aug 2022)

3. MY OWN PHARNACEUTICAL UPDATES

a. because I’m a person who values my big fat electric brain, I’ve always been against pills/pharmaceuticals/antidepressants/etc…

b. but due to circumstances that sometimes happen, I found myself having to take such drugs a few years ago 

c. now it is time to reevaluate what my big fat brain does & doesn’t need from big pharma

d. as you can probably tell by all the exclamation points & misspellings, I did a quick taper off the Seroquel in June. It went well. No real side effects, except INSOMNIA. 

e. SEROQUEL is a magical drug. But like all magical drugs it is VERY dangerous if you take it for too long. I was advised by the doctor who put me on it to taper off as soon as I felt I could.

f. I REALLY enjoyed the sleep that SEROQUEL allowed me to have. As a lifelong insomniac, that was a real TREAT. and the dreams!! The gorgeous Seroquel dreams…  so vivid & complex… ALAS!!!

g. it’s back to being awake at all hours. 

h. in August I have been doing a much slower taper off duloxetine (Cymbalta). Cymbalta is an SSRI, so it is not magical, just effective. Whatever part it played in regulating my dopamine levels back in 2021, I am grateful for. But I really, really hate SSRIs as a personal rule.

i. no one ever told me to taper off the Cymbalta but I am going to anyway, so I can see if I really need anymore.

j. so far, I have experienced a terrible 2-day migraine, nausea, & an edgy temperament bordering on rage occasionally

k. I experinced ZERO rage in the year & half I was on SEROQUEL & Cymbalta. It was nice. I’m using CBD oil to manage the edgeness. It works pretty well.

l. I am really hoping the edgy temperament is due to the taper, not a sign of how things are gonna be. Because really… I have no real thing to be rageful about…anymore…

m. OR DO I?

4. POETRY UPDATE

a. my poetry carrer is going well. i am so close to being famous I can almost tongue-sense it. 

b. I sent out a bunch of subs late last year, and early this year and got lots of REJECTIONS and several acceptances too

c. But I’m about to embark on 2 YUGE poetry endeavors

d. First I start working on a chapbbok or even manuscript length chronicle of what happened during & after my last psychic safari (SHAMANISTIC FIGHT CLUB)

e. YOU ALL read the streams of consciousness that accompanied SHAMANISTIC FIGHT CLUB. I know you did.

f. and you think I’m a spiritual narcissist for daring to have such an adventure while you didn’t/weren’t able to 

g. it’s okay…I can see you all & know that you are spiritual narcissists too. We all are kind of. It’s just natural to think you have spoken to god & that he wants you to tell everyone else what he said, I mean we all do it, right??? RIGHT?

h. Actullya that’s not what happened to me.. Haaha. Ha. Ha. So stop being jealous. Just try having your own spiritual adventure when you can.

i. On top of all that…on top of writing about a spirituall narcissism that possesses us all , I will be weaving the tale of my chronic cyberstalker…

j. YES I HAD ONE FOR MANY YEARS(& probably still do, I just haven’t checked in awhile)

h. But I have never spoken of it aloud, or in print, because…even though I can be a very enraged weirdo, I’m also kind of a wuss when it comes to dealing with … err…ummm…. direct, head-on confrontation w/ someone who is harassing me for reasons unknown…

i. anyway… the cyberstalking took a dark, invasive turn in the summer of ’20 and we were forced to reckon with it

j. we had to decide what action we could/would/should take

k. it nearly tore us apart

l. the stress of it all caused me to seek help in the form of a new medication called Abilify. This is the drug that gave me akathisia for 3 months.

m. pardon me while I connect these dots … … … 

n. yway… I hope I can convey what an absolutely horrific confluence of events led us to our happy hobbity home in beautiful jasper Indiana.

NO BEIGE IN SIGHT (Aug 2022)

o. The other YUGE poetry endeavor I’m about to embark on is a thorough inquest into the works of BUKOWSKI. I have read some of his work. enjoyed it well enough. But I need to know why he is the most revered & emulated poet amongst well… … … white dudes.

p. Expect my full, unredacted findings here in The Octopus’s Diarrhea Garden

*. MY VERY OWN GENDER TRANSITION

a. I have 2 words for my 7th year on testosterone: ARM ACNE

b. don’t woryy I’m not gunna detranstion over it, jeez…

c. Autoandrophilia is the fire!

d. Can y’all believe I been on T for 7 years???!!! I can.

6. QUINTETLETS

a. the quintuplets names are ELOISE, ANAWEN, INGRID, IMOGENE, and ISABEL

b. their buns are PORTUGAL, ATTICUS, RUFUS, FLORA , and DORA

c. respectively

7. ART UPDATES

a. I love doing art, but god...it has been a lifelong learning adventure!!!!!!

b. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

c. the first 2 artworks were based on sketches I found in my akathias ia notebook. It is akathisia art.

d. [I also found some writing I did from that time period, which I had dismissed as garbage-ranting, but actually captures the experience pretty well. I’l share it with yall in a futurre blog]

e. ennyway… I’m taking a few months oof art to woork on pooetry

f. I hope you can handle that.

RUFUS & INGRID REACH A PEACE AGREEMENT RE: THEIR SINCERE APPRECIATION FOR EACH OTHERSES CULTURE

8. LET’S SEE…WHAT ELSE CAN I TELL YOU??

a. I guess that about covers it for now!!

b. Stay well & I’ll see you next ime… in The Octopud Litterboxery 

DOTS!! and Dash

HEY GUYS!!   HEY FRIENDS!!   HEY PEOPLE!!!

After five decades of planeting with you ,You’d think I would know your preferred nouns by now. But I don’t.  You’re still the mystifying organism known as Humanitor. 

But it’s okay—I misclassify myself on occasion too. I’m one of you & though less mysterious than you I’m still not fully solved.

*****

It’s not the New year (new Decade) yet, but I’m desperate for change so I’m going to elasticize a bit

past Thanksgiving to the knowledge that the Internet (and social networking) was the strangest & most magical & also least wholesome experience I could’ve ever imagined in my life;

I think in 2009 I proclaimed Facebook “more enchanting than attending one’s own funeral” and I meant it. it was a blast and it was more entertaining than television, or my real introverted life before the extronet;

for me being alive on the internet was more lively than going to a party in real life. and that’s…not as sad as it sounds, it’s hard to see people having fun in real life when I’d rather be home writing reading singing or just about anything.

So this has been quite an enlightening, evolutionary, revolutionary decade we’ve spent together & I think we’ll look back at it & pat ourselves on the back for being such brave magicians.

The Gentoos perform their own version of The Crying Game

***************** BUT WAIT

I haven’t written enough about being trans here, and I apologize.  When I started this momentous portion of my life, I thought it would be more newsworthy : ))

But my change has not been as drastic as the younger (& same age as me, in fact all other trans guys I’ve seen) and it has puzzled me, and my friends, and my doctors. But I changed more this year than in the first 3 years on T combined. I’m finally at a plateau I can live with without wanting to murder the person in the mirror.  I love my post-post-post modern pubescence!!!!

I never expected to be Aquaman, and yet I felt like him at times this& last year. My T was high then, but it’s high now. I never, never, ever understood the female hormone cycle, no matter how many times I read about it in Cosmo or a doctor explained it w/ charts & all. I just never got which fluid was in the beaker at which time of month. And why it had to affect me so much [??]  I know that’s problematic, but I hope you understand. 

Anyway, I’ve never been good with hormones. They’re like little foreign languages flowing through my endocrine system.

I feel pretty good gender-wise, though.  And that’s something to be Thankful for as we bypass all the turkey talk.

The Gentoo Emperors — Teduardo, IO Pine, Cayden Haydenson, and Susie G (full biographies to come)

I’ve finally come to terms with the fact that sometime in 2014 my brain broke and its probably not going to return to the way it was. I’ve adjusted to a different level of foreboding that tells me something absolutely catastrophic is going to happen all the time. It took five years to calibrate my new levels of foreboding w/ PKD-approved reality. But…

…I’m still not sure something catastrophic hasn’t already happened???!!!?? 

Anyway, I tried to fix this many ways, including yoga, fitness, all the healthy stuff that I was told to do by well meaning folks

and then had to feel like a huge failure when I couldn’t live without medication any longer.  (I no longer feel bad about this—I’m old and brains go bad.) I just worry about my liver now. But let’s not start a hypochon-CON.

I’ve had a good life and I know for sure there are enough good people out there, even if I can’t talk to them regularly.

Pixel gets in on the act

THIS YEAR…I did what I’ve wanted to do since 11-8-16. I lost hope in people. I gave up on life. I know, I know…I’m a rich, crazy, asshole who can do something like that…that’s partially true…but a little exaggerated : )) Anyway, I wouldn’t recommend it if you have many real world commitments…it’s a feral adventure…and be sure to have the support of angels (living and other) around you. 

I had to unconsciously face some conscious [biases?/terrors?/glitches?/some of which were not even my own] and that sounds so easy but nothing was labeled and all the pie was in uncharted territory,

the soft innards leaking past the tinfoil...mmmm, pie.

There is no 14-year-old girl here. Nor any mama. Your dumb pie will land on the wall way above my head.                                        

No papa bear eating toast, but there was a jaguar spotted swimming across the channel.

Misuse my words and treat them as you would my torso when you thought it was yours

and it may be funny but I hope it’s also a big load off your…

…..

…..

….

shoulders.  [There are no puns here! Only double thrusts and ironic jabs; so sharpen or grow up]

Muchi gratz to Matt Groening for learnin' me to draw a proper bun!

******************AND THIS!!!

I’ve always known what everyone wants to know (as soon they get away from you & with their friends) is all the sexual stuff.  I encourage everyone to do their own research on the effects of testosterone & estrogen  [freud missed 

the boat when 

he didn’t guess it could flip over]

I was going to do a thing on transitioning bathrooms, but it wasn’t very exciting. I never was a fan of public restrooms, even as a lady. And let me tell you, no matter how strongly you identify as male, the women’s restroom is a luxury you give up when you pass too well as a guy. The lack of privacy is a bit alarming, speaking as a human of either gender who is accustomed to stalls or peeing in a cup in my car : )) But I think the most bizarre bathroom experience was running into my brothers in there at a wedding! I quickly ducked into a stall so I hope it wasn’t as awkward for them, but thank fuck that stall was open : O

Usually men’s restrooms are darker and quieter than women’s. That’s nice. But women’s rooms smell better! That’s about all the bathroom data I could gather. I hope that was entertaining enough for you.

WRONG!!!!!!

With the help of colorful dots, medication and Eeeyore, I feel better than I did when I decided to give up hope on people (March-ish). I think the pendulum will strike a less vertiginous balance, though I’m not sure it’s done swinging in all directions…

…which is to say I’m still 115% for Free Speech. Especially for artists and whistleblowers. I had to wrestle with my own peanut gallery of voices with the question of someone’s right to incite violence using hate speech, after the Australian guy went to NZ and shot up a bunch of Muslims and then claimed prominent world leader DT’s rhetoric as his inspiration,

[ I wish I knew more about clauses and addendums about gagging potential dictators. Did we not clausify this stuff after WW2—what was the verdict on Free Speech then?]

Can he shoot someone on 5th Avenue and get away with it? The only thing I see in my perfectly conscious and wide awake mind is YES.  And that’s not a the Tiptree-approved reality I saw myself growing ripe in.

Anyway, I know there is a faction of free speech activists who defend it just so they can get away w/ promoting their hateful nationalist racist sexist agendas. 

I hope this is not us, Miss Question Mark/

                                 Madame Asterisk!   << misgendering someone else is kinda fun!

************ IN CONCOLLUSION

Are you wondering why I keep talking about the internet and the social networks in the past tense? As if they are something I enjoyed at one time, but not so much here and now?  Well, I’m bout to deliver a premature new years resolution for the whole decade of the 20s — yay The Twenties! Let’s all be Dadaists together (or separately)—

My resolution is to be on the internet less! I’ve gotten down from a steady 77% to a nice comfortable 44%. But I’m gonna crank it all the way down to 11%. 

An 11% internet life is all I can handle from now on : )) and that includes this blog too! 11% Octopus, I hope you understand. I am thrilled to have reconnected & known so many new people (esp writers). But now I shall go have my Syd Barrett years, so don’t be surprised to see a fat old bald guy growing roses in the garden next time you stop by!

************Post Script Re: DOTS

Hey GuyFriendPeoples, you know I don’t do much art that’s pretty. It’s just not what inspires me. But I want you to know I was making the most beautiful dot portrait of the view from our cottage on Siesta Key. It was turning out quite nicely, but…

…the art gods demanded a sacrifice out of the calypso blue   So I ripped up my landscape &

kicked my own ass

& everyone was happy

I will try to recreate the landscape sometime in the Spring. Now is too soon.

***********Post-post Script re: 8

This summer I found out I had an 8th sibling. Along with my 2 natural born sibs, my 2 long lost step-sibs, and my 2 younger adopted sibs, there was a sister born before my parents met in college. It was treated as a huge secret & swept under the rug, but I knew from a young age that my family was a very secretive unit, so I wasn’t surprised to find out five decades later that there were even more secrets than I’d figured out on my own. I haven’t met her yet. But I have no doubt she will be more welcome in our family than I ever was.

And so it goes.

I'm Not Dumb I'm Counter-intelligent

I always wanted to be an asshole. It's sad but true. I always wanted to be that guy who feels entitled to strut around like he's God's gift.

More recently I've yearned to be the internet version of that guy--the Troll. The one who feels entitled to instigate and antagonize because he's just that confident he will come out on top if any sort of intellectual showdown breaks out. 

The rooster who feels entitled to wake the world.

Now I'm afraid I will become one of those rooster-guys if my T-levels ever get past the 400 mark.

I went to the T-Doctor yesterday and she asked why my voice hasn't changed yet. My voice has gotten kinda scratchy & raspy but not deep. She thought it didn't seem right. So after my next injection and blood work, she's going to see about increasing my dose.

I'm writing today just to keep my beloved blog active. Not because I have anything to say. Certainly not because I have done any artwork lately. I know you all are CLAMORING for The Adventures of Shelter Cat & Trust Fund Baby…

…but my brain is operating in strange ways these days. My brain used to be this quick-flickering always turned-on thing. Now my brain works at a slower, more deliberate pace. And it's definitely turned on by things other than lyrical phrases and clairvoyant images.

Shelter Cat & Trust Fund Baby are the best of friends.

They go for walks in their wealthy gated community.

They find things on their walks.

They misinterpret what these things are and hilarity ensues. Their naivete is priceless.

I've written the script for the first episode. But I haven't found the will or concentration to sit down and draw it.

***********Speaking of Penises,

How did we go from the 20-oughts

To the 20-tens? 

I know history moves in little backward crescents, then surges forward in larger arcs

But the back pedaling of the past 2 years has been atrocious

It is the first time in my life that I would use the word

FAITH

To describe what I'm feeling rather than HOPE

I have (secular, humane) faith that the world will move forward again

Because I can't find hope anywhere inside me

And I guarantee you, I guarantee 

My dick is smaller than yours but I'm still grateful for what I have

I miss 2004 -- 2008

The Bush years, which made the Reagan years look like Utopian bliss, are looking

Very peachy under Trump's fluorescent-brassy-gumboesque lighting

*******************If we're not talking about penises

Then no one is listening.

So, what can I say about it?

I'm afraid to die in the public restroom

When I was a girl, a sad angry little strumpet

In my black skirts & flannel shirts

With my long ebony locks & privileged goth complexion

I would go in the Men's room without blinking

Without caring who saw me or who I saw

It was usually fine. Usually no one saw & if they did

They laughed, or corrected me "This is the MEN'S room, hon"

Once a guy got angry though

"Hey!!!! Get outta here!!! You don't belong in here!!!!"

Crouching over his pissing dick, making me wonder if he had warts or

Some deformity ...

That was at Denny's.

And I did belong in there. It was 1993.

But now???????? Now that Transgender is on everyone's radar

And I'm not using the Men's room ironically

I know the rules have changed

And I could be slandered, or killed, or worse PREACHED at.

I think we should have separate restrooms for Pooping & Peeing

Not for Men & Women  

Nothing I hate more--besides violence & terrorism--

Than someone farting & shitting away right next to me in the public loo

Women don't have dicks. They suck. Yeah, they suck OUR dicks. Bro!!! Women deserve to pay more for health care. They deserve a tampon tax. They don't have dicks. How do they live with themselves??

I don't know, man.

Is this a poem? Yeah let's call it poetry!!!!

This is poetry of the highest artistic merit. 

Yurrr Majesty.

Starbucks on Beneva & Bee Ridge, FUCK YOU!! You are poorly laid out and the most uncivil engineering I've ever tried to navigate. What the fuck am I doing here?? Oh, TAXES. Hopefully not death.

What if I dropped a PUSSY bomb? Would riots break out? Would our faces contort in plasmatic disbelief? Let's try it…

Oh no…I can't…too gross….just kidding…

PUSSY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

>^..^

=========> dickretaliation

(*) chocolatestarfish exit plan