OMG! You are killing me!!!!

First Monika, Stana, Janie and now Michelleliana!
You simply have to read her "Top Ten Reasons Middle Age Transition Doesn't  Suck!!!! (here)
I'm not worthy!!!!!!!

Classic Female Impersonation History

Ephemeral recently ran a post featuring famous cross dressers.
The post featured one of the all time popular female impersonators and dare I say actresses of his era Julian Eltinge.
Here's an excerpt:
"All but forgotten today, Julian Eltinge was one of the highest paid actors in the early 1900s.

His shtick: He played all his roles in drag.

But unlike most drag queens, who present a caricature of a woman, Eltinge was a “gender illusionist” pretending, with a wink, to actually be a woman." and of course you can go here for more!

A Fantastic Collection

Stana of Femulate fame has done it again.
Check this fantastic collection on men cross dressing as women on the small and big screen by going here.

Just Another Look Boys!

Utopia?

I read posts here and there on the idea of a genderless society. A place where a person is totally free to express their mental gender at will.

In fact Michellelianna recently did her own take on the subject  and you can read it here.
The easy answer of course is clothes don't make the transgender or transsexual woman or man. We all know it's much deeper than that. 
Indirectly my "BFF" took the subject another step when I confided in her my dissatisfaction with my recent male exploits. Basically she asked when was I going to start dressing more completely female as I approach 6 months into HRT.
Good question.  In my current lifestyle, I'm just me without the pronouns. Very little body hair, painted nails and all. I basically run errands in a few of the same places all the time. Since going into semi retirement, I created my own little gender cocoon rather than an utopia. With my thin shaped brows, pony tail and clear nail polish I'm far from being androgynous- yet. Just being me is great for me but the world awaits. You know how the real world wrecks utopia! Dammit!
However I still have a utopian plan for the near future. I call it "hormones phase II".
As I have written a number of times, coming up soon is the big next visit to my "prescribing" doc.  I started on a minimum dose of a form of estrogen and had it doubled a couple months later.  Now I want it doubled again.
So by this fall, I can see me developing a nice little makeup routine in the morning of eye makeup and lip gloss-everyday. Then we will see how my utopia is working for the general public.
Quite truthfully, I don't see how an androgyny phase will work in at all with my utopia if I have a choice. Obviously, I would prefer to be seen as feminine as possible. Some would say I have done some of this a little backward with the amount of time I've spent in a feminine lifestyle without hormones and such. The transformation as you know isn't always the easiest and I will gladly accept any help I can get!
We will see. As with any utopian idea, problems will exist. Those of you who have gone through this process know the ups and downs unique to each one of us.
I can only say I'm surely not expecting any Shangri-la but a plan is very reassuring even if it's not utopian.

I Couldn't Help Myself!

Another look at Maria Roman...it's Monika's fault.
Not to be selfish...go here for more!

The Breakfast of Non Champions

 From Legislative Queery:

Growing up there were two breakfast cereals available at our house: Kellogg's Corn Flakes and Cheerios. The two options were so ubiquitous on the breakfast tables of my youth that to this day I can't stand to eat either. But I may have to find a way to stomach Cheerios again after the taurus-shaped staple's parent couple, General Mills, came out against a proposed ban on marriage equality in its home state of Minnesota this week.

In contrast, the other purveyor of the processed grains of my youthful mornings, Kellogg's, has pulled its advertizing from the Teen Nick series "Degrassi" over story lines involving transgender youth. "Degrassi" is a long running Canadian television series that since 1979 has taken on a number of difficult teen issues including abortion, drug use, racism, gay teens and eating disorders. But apparently the existence of transgender teenagers is a step too far for Kellogg's.

The ad pulling comes after pressure from the hate group The American Family Association, which characterizes the portrayal of trans teens as promoting "bizarre sexual role-playing with transvestism, [and] homosexuality."

I went right out and outed my Kellogg's to the trash.

Trans Wreck Part Deux

Thanks for all the response!
Some of you have emailed me having not unraveled the Google process to comment here. I think you have to have a Google account of some sorts?
Janie, who I will post her comment in a bit-I had to establish a "Wordpress" account to comment on your blog. These are times I wish I was more computer literate.
No I didn't derail, back to the Wreck and Janie's comment:

"I do believe there are girls out there who transition for the wrong reasons. It is an awfully big decision to make in one's life and unfortunately the gatekeepers do not really properly restrict the availability of hormones and SRS to those for whom it is needed. I expect that profits and politics are the chief reasons for this. There is a line than needs to be walked between not being unduly restrictive with transsexuals who need these things and preventing those who don't from making a big mistake. If what you say about this woman is correct, someone in the system should have told her, "No." It is so hard for us to understand ourselves sometimes and we need others to do their job."

First and foremost I agree.  One word can describe one trans girl's dilemma: "Thailand".
Back in the day a transgender woman had to live a year as a female before a reputable clinic in this country would do the SRS surgery. Now the standards are cash and slash.
Right or wrong, I don't make any value judgement on any of this. I have a hard enough time with my own life.
BUT! I do wonder sometimes when I see a show where a person still living as a man is shown shopping for a feminine wardrobe before heading for SRS in Thailand. With the hormones he still looks as a effeminate man and after the surgeries he does look as an attractive middle aged woman. Wonderful but I still wonder if he got to live as a woman enough to make such a crucial decision.
We all have to know looks are just a gateway to a "jenderjump". The world is different. I've spent two years now writing about it!
As a group we are no different than any other culture. We make mistakes too.
What separates us is we seem to take such pleasure on feeding on our own.
Cross dresser, transgender or transsexual; a trans wreck is never pleasant but never should be a cause to attack others. 

"Trans Wreck"

I have used the term "trans wreck" to describe a couple of not so great examples of people taking the gender race a little too far.
Now before some of you bring out the sticks to bust me, here is my only disclaimer:
As I have said many times some of the most vicious, mean and vindictive people I have ran across in my life have been fully changed transsexual women. Connect the dots if you must and I have. I figure they are frustrated at making a major mistake with their life and want to take it out on others. They are my dots and I connected them.
So, onto my example.
Years ago, when I started to come out of the closet I started to attend some transgendered meetings around the area.
One person in particular was the "queen of the hop" (no pun intended) She was very attractive, stylish and accomplished. She was friendly but sort of "held court" with like minded and other attractive girls at the meeting. I marveled at how similar trans and genetic females socialized.
I maintained contact over the years very loosely with her and several others in the group. She wasn't the first to start to indicate this girl thing was more than a weekend hobby.
As two of the others began to seriously transition, sure you could see the difference but more importantly you could feel the difference in them. They exuded female somehow.
With her however she continued to be the prettiest girl in the room but I never felt the female in her.
Sadly I thought she was just the prettiest guy in the room and was engaged in a real ego battle of one upmanship. Hey! Look what I got! Hormones! How about you?
Life went on and she went under the knife for SRS and I lost track on purpose.
I felt she didn't want to be associated with just a transgendered girl fighting to find herself. I have to say that was only my feeling and of course she may have felt different. However, I do have a friend who stayed in contact for awhile and that became very consistent with her.  Certainly, if we didn't have the will or money to go the SRS route then we weren't worthy.
The last I have heard she is pretty lonely. Sad if it is true.
That's my "trans wreck" story and I believe it's true others go the same route and become mean and vindictive?
Another problem I see is some of the same transsexuals I read about are the first to say gender does not have any thing to do with genitals but they are the first to hold it against you if you say you feel female no matter what's between your legs?
More on that and the whole topic later.