Martine Rothblatt

 If you missed the story, the highest paid female business executive in the United States is Martine Rothblatt. She earns $38 million-a-year as head of United Therapeutics,  married parent-of-four and underwent SRS in 1994. Now she has been named top in New York Magazine's list of the 200 most successful entrepreneurs - one of just 11 women on the list.

I wrote at the time I hadn't had much of an opportunity to read about the expected backlash to all of this but Cyrsti's Condo regular Jen Smith did:

There were a couple of links on this, and I read some of the comments on one of them. There were a bunch of negative ones, but there were few that were "battling back" :-)

Just seeing a trans person in such a powerful position, dominated by older males mostly, is what I though was the real takeaway. I guess she made her money before transitioning. But rather than fade into privacy after transition, she kept going with her career fully in the public eye. 

It's just so encouraging to hear and read about things like this in the press.

Indeed Jen! and thanks!  One of the links which caught my attention came from the always topical en/gender blog from Helen Boyd  (here's an excerpt which should get your attention!)   

I (Helen) just LOVE that, the idea (finally!) that trans is perhaps an ASSET, that it implies an individual’s ability not just to be self-made, but to be determined. Overall, interesting article about a highly eccentric person – eccentric because she’s rich, natch – and some passing mention of cyborgs and AI and the robot she made of her wife.

Follow the link to read more!

Biggest Fear?

I know many of you are deep in the closet and I remember completely the pain and paranoia it creates.  The problems of near misses and discoveries are legendary.

Of course I have my own, and many of you have commented here in Cyrsti's Condo about yours, but here is one classic.   From an acquaintance of mine years ago, who just happened to open the door to the wrong person when he was cross dressed.

I am going to switch pronouns now and say she was able to cross dress extremely well into an attractive classy woman.  She also was single and her house was pretty much a central "meet-up" point for a group of individuals I knew who spanned the full spectrum from an admirer or two to transsexual women.

As she told the story, a couple of friends from our group were due at her house at a certain time.  As the time came, the doorbell rang and when she opened the door it wasn't the expected friends at all.  The person outside was one of her male co-workers!  When he saw her, he got this little grin on his face and asked for his male friends name.  Even though her mind was exploding at the moment, our cross dressing friend said she managed not to lose her cool and said they were going out later and he had just ran up to the store.

Fortunately, this was in the mid 80's back in a time when his career could have been totally ruined by being outed at all-but he wasn't.  Instead, in the very intensive male job he worked at everyone wanted to know who the new hottie he was dating was.

Even though he had the benefit of appearance when he cross dressed, he said he was always careful to see who was at the door before he opened it.  No matter when it was.

I'm going to try to come up with a "best of" list of my screw ups in a later Cyrsti's Condo post!

Cyrsti's Condo "OOOPSS!"

The only caption I could put on this unnamed cross dresser picture is....

"I worked soooo long on my perfect makeup job and the wife and kids came home early!" Dammit!

Maybe I can use the old womanless beauty pageant story at the VFW?

Cyrsti's Condo - "Star Gazing."

It's time again kids (as we do every week) to look at our Friskyscopes! If you are a Libra, as I am- get ready to NOT be a meek and quiet little baby girl this week:


(September 23-October 22): Stop the complaining and the wondering why, because this is a time when positive ideas and thoughts can propel you ahead. Don’t be shy about using force in how you present yourself, because you can’t be too aggressive now — especially verbally. While you still will be in just-about-arm’s reach of your goal, be proud of the progress you will make this week.

Cool!!!! Now that is my kind of "scope" and now here is my "guest" sign of the week. It was a tough decision this week picking you Capricorns! :



(December 22-January 19): You’re going to hear a lot of sob stories and excuses now. Prepare for the wave of bullshit to come in like a tsunami. However, since you know it is on its way, you will be prepared to view it all as a comedy and be amused at the many ways people try to shock you and wrongly assume you are more naive than you appear.


For more-go here!~

Cyrsti's Condo "Cover Girl" of the Day

Our feature cover today is the Vietnamese Mtf transgender woman Khanh-Chi-Lam!

Cyrsti's Condo Potty Ads

Back in the day, there was a decal of some sort which fit on the back of your potty lid of a wonderfully derelict old man with a bib, knife and fork staring down into the toilet-presumably waiting for a meal.  I am not talking about that guy.

What I am talking about is the picture of an ad I saw in a women's restroom of a busy sports bar Saturday night.  Excuse the quality because I was trying to go and get out.  The subject matter is women and their testosterone.  Look, I know both human binary sexes need "T", I had just never seen the "cure" advertised for women like that.


Maybe the "side effects" are in the "fine print" we don't see? Something like when you begin to start to shave your mustache every morning, develop a lower voice than your hubby and bigger bi-ceps. Discontinue use?

Here I "Is!"

Math has never been one of my strength's but it seems to me I have spent a couple of days away from Cyrsti's Condo which may have been a record for me since I started the Condo.

The simple answer to why is, life got in the way.  I headed down to Cincinnati to spend the weekend with Liz and my car had yet another malfunction- this time with the brakes. Over the past three months it has decided it has wanted nothing to do with holding fluids...oil, power steering and now brakes.  It's now getting past the point of diminishing returns.

Buying a car right now for me ranks right up there with digging my own grave, jumping into it and shoveling the dirt in on top of me- myself.

But (and I hate this saying) it is what it is.  Dammit!

On the bright side, I have plenty to chat about with all of you seeing as my life is nothing but a blog post anyhow.  Starting with this headline:

The highest-paid female CEO in America used to be a man. (from the New York Post)

Martine Rothblatt, 59 — who founded the $5 billion pharmaceutical firm United Therapeutics and also co-founded Sirius — had sex reassignment surgery in 1994.

“I can’t claim that what I have achieved is equivalent to what a woman has achieved. For the first half of my life, I was male,” Rothblatt, who has four kids and is still married to her wife of more than 30 years, told New York Magazine.

Rothblatt made $38 million last year as head of United Therapeutics, which she launched to create medicine for her daughter, who suffers from primary pulmonary hypertension.

First of all I haven't even had the chance to read any of the reaction to this "Jerry Springer" style headline.  But, then again it did come from the "New York Post." 

After a good night's sleep I will get back to you with it in the morning! (Tuesday)

Cyrsti's Condo "First Timer's?"

Clearly this "Holmes Community College" student in Goodman, Mississippi has never shaved all the hair off his body or rocked those heels ever before this womanless pageant?  (wink wink!)

Two Spirits

Every once once in a while, I happen across an article which goes into an ancient culture's belief in the "two spirits" gender identity.  In fact the acceptance of transgender people was common in many indigenous communities to the point they assumed the role of "shaman's"

My latest "discovery" comes from the New York Times and is called: Two Spirits in the Venezuelan Jungle By Jake Naughton  — Here is an excerpt:
A chance encounter with an anthropologist in Caracas led Álvaro Laiz to Venezuela’s remote eastern edge, where an indigenous people known as the Warao have lived for millenniums. Mr. Laiz was intrigued when he heard about transgender women the Warao called “tida wena,” or, twisted women, because he had been working on a global project about transgender identities in nomadic and indigenous populations. “For me it’s about identity,” Mr. Laiz said. “The kind of things that make you the way you are.” Like other women, the tida wena tended to the home, cooked and cared for children and elders. They also participated in the harvest of important crops, like the ocumo chino, a starchy tuber. Historically, tida wena were sometimes the second or third wives of polygamous men. They also occasionally performed the role of shaman — the Warao are deeply rooted in the shamanist tradition — and tida wena in particular are thought to possess two spirits, bringing them closer to the ancestor spirits that roam the jungle.

When ever I read of the number of cultures who embraced  the "Twin Spirits" (it's estimated to be documented in 130 American Indian tribes alone)  individuals, I'm at once shocked, saddened and frustrated at the lack of understanding we face in the modern world.  Even more so when you consider the bitter in fighting in our own community.

If you are interested in researching any of this, follow the link above, or search the subject on line.  It is very enlightening!

One person who I know has always researched the Twin Spirits subject in depth is a regular visitor to Cyrsti's Condo.  His name is Don and he is in the midst of medical issues. I hope you all can take a second to pass along some positive vibes to Don, from what ever spirit you worship.  Thanks!!!