Boston Area, Sisters, and Tiffany Club of New England

For the first time in what seems like a long time, I was headed back for Boston! Boston is definitely near the top of my favorite cities list. I know some cool places to hang out, and have friends in the Sisters of Boston and Sisters of Worcester groups.
I usually try and get early morning flights so that I arrive where ever I’m going in the early afternoon, but my last few flights have left in the afternoon and I find I kind of like it. Since I’ve started doing a lot of my flights “dressed”, having the flight leave around noon allows me to wait until my wife and daughter leave for work/school and THEN get ready. Beats the snot outta getting up at 3AM to get ready and make a 6 AM flight.
So I decided to wear my new Needless Mark Ups skirt (Neiman Marcus Last Call) and a salmon top. At the last second I decided to throw a white belt on it but I spent all day trying to decide if I should wear the belt or not. It came off and on probably half a dozens times as I changed my mind through the day. My wife later confirmed looking at the pics that she thought it was a mistake and said if I was gonna wear any belt, it should have been a darker one. Oh well, can’t get it right every time! LOL


As you can see from the pics, we are in the process of painting the living area of our house so it’s sort of a mess.
Got to the Austin airport and have to admit I was a bit nervous as this was the first time I was going to try and fly dressed with an airline other than Delta. I was flying with JetBlue this time and had actually asked them last week if they would be cool with it, but I was still afraid that even though one person had told it would be fine, another might refuse to allow it. The worry was for nothing though as everything went smoothly and they treated me well. Going through security, the female TSA agent decided to pick on me a little. She looked at my ID (my male drivers license), then my ticket, then me, smiled.
“Nope, that is clearly NOT you!”. She was grinning from ear to ear so I was fairly sure she was teasing.
“Yeah, I know. I clean up pretty nice huh?” I replied and batted my eyes in an exaggerated fashion. She busted up laughing and handed my license and ticket back to me.
“You have a nice flight!” she said, and waved me through.
OK, I’ve gotta tell you – JetBlue ROCKS! Yes, they have three seats side by side, but they give you more leg room than the other airlines, AND each seat has it’s own TV! Add to that the facts that they fly direct Austin to Boston and their luggage folks are fast to get it to the luggage belt, and you have makings for my new favorite airline.
Got to Boston a bit after 5PM, found my luggage already circling the belt when I got there, so I was quickly on the way to the rental car and then my hotel in Peabody MA.


The guy that checked me in to the Holiday Inn was not rude or anything, but you could tell he wasn’t exactly amused with me. Took my bags to the room and was headed back out of the hotel through the lobby when I walked past a man standing there. As I walked past he looked right at me and smiled.
“Hello!” he said, as I walked by.
“Hi,” I smiled and replied, still walking because I was already gonna be late for my meeting with the Tiffany Club of New England.
“Fine day isn’t it?” he continues as I’m just walking out the door. I looked back at him but kept walking.
“So far so good!” I said. I get about 10 feet out the door when I hear his voice again. He followed me outside!
“Are you staying here?” he asked. Knowing I’m already going to be late for my meeting, I slowed but didn’t stop. It kind of freaks me out that he followed me outside.
Does he really think I’m a female? If so, is he gonna freak when he figures out I’m not?
“Yes, I am staying here”.
“Are you coming back tonight?”
“Probably, but pretty late.”
“Well, would you like to maybe get a drink or something?”
“Thank you, but I don’t think so” I replied as I approached my car.
“Oh, I’m sorry!” he said, “I didn’t see your wedding ring!”
“That’s all right,” I said, even though he has definitely made me nervous. “No worries!”
He gave a small wave and then returned to the hotel lobby.
You know, it tore me up for the next few days if I had handled that well, or if I was rude to him. When I spoke to my wife about it tonight, she tells me that I did exactly the right thing. The only thing she might have done differently was to return to the very public lobby when she realized that he was following her outside. I don’t know, I’m still worried that I was rude and didn’t handle that with any grace at all.
I got to the Tiffany Club of New England a bit late, but not too bad considering there wasn’t much I could do about my travel time to get there. Rita Bertrand had invited me when she found out I would be there that night. She is a class act, and a real neat lady! I have met her a few times before have truly enjoyed the time I’ve spent chatting with her.
I met a lot of ladies there and they treated me just like one of the club – one of the family! Do you know what that means to me when I spend so much time alone and so far from home? It was great to feel like part of the group. I met around a dozen folks there and have to admit I suck when it comes to remembering names, so there is no way I can provide them all here. (I hope they will forgive me when they see this!)
After the meeting, a few of us went to a local club for a drink or two. When we got there, there were two tables full of GG’s having a great time – lots of laughter and talking. As far as I could tell, not one of them looked twice in our direction. (Not sure if that is good or bad?)

I’ll give you the names I’ve got! Starting on the left is John (The owner of the Glamour Boutique) , a great guy and a huge advocate for transgender folks, Rita Bertrand , Myself, and
Paula Howard . The last girl on the right was very nice, and drop dead gorgeous, but like I said, I suck and can’t recall her name! (I'm SO sorry!)
Day 2
Day two got off to a rough start. The instrument I was here to work on is obsolete, and hasn’t been made in more than half a decade. It was made by company mine bought years ago, and most of the people that knew anything about it did not come along when their company was bought. Including myself, there are only three people in my entire company that even know what this machine is, and the other two are the software guy, and a PHD who is now the manager for an entire product line. If I can’t fix it, there is no place to fall back to, no back up and punt plan, no guru to call to come bail me out.
There are no drawings, no schematics, no theory of operation . . . I’ve got nothing but the info stuck in my head and what I’d been able to figure out about the beast over the years.
Suffice it to say that working on this antique scares the hell outta me!
I had to replace a number of gold plated optical mirrors and when I was done, I couldn’t get the system aligned. I spent hours trying to figure out why I couldn’t find the image I needed in the optics. I tweaked the darn alignment so many times that I got blisters on my finger tips! Finally, I sat back on my tool box looking at the thing in disgust when the answer struck me.
“Nah,” I said to myself, while I looked at the only two mirrors that can be put in backwards. “Even I couldn’t be stupid enough to do that could I?”
I pulled up some pictures I had taken of one of these tools and found that I HAD been that stupid, and HAD mixed up the only two mirrors that could be put in wrong – literally backwards. Corrected my goof and had the system up and running in about 10 minutes!
On the way back to the hotel, I stumbled across a thrift store and stopped to shop it. I found a long dark blue skirt with white stripes and bought it. I liked it so much I almost wore it that night, but decided to stick with the red skirt I had brought with me.

I got back to the hotel and started to get ready. This night I planned to meet with the Sisters if Worcester for their weekly get together at Club Blu.
I had traded emails with Sally, Rita , Kristen , and Caroline , friends of mine in the area and also members of Sisters. They were all going to be there tonight as well, so it looked like it was going to be a fun one! I got a call from Sally and invited her to get ready in my hotel room. She arrived, we fought for mirror space, and eventually got ready!

Got to Club Blu and found a lot of folks already there. There had been some question if Rita and Kristen might make it so I was relieved to see them both there. All in all, I think we counted something like 18 TG’s there. This includes Mike, who is FTM, and a damn nice guy too!
Kristen brought her beautiful 12 string guitar!

We knew that Dee, the lady that runs the Karaoke there, usually also brings her guitars, and so we had hoped to maybe play a song or two together. Unfortunately, Dee did not bring her guitars so that plan fell through. Kristen and I tried to sneak off to the back room to play with her guitar but quickly discovered that was a mistake! Someone had ordered a bunch of Pizzas, had them set up I in that room, and so EVERYONE wound up there. We handed the guitar back and forth and tried to wake up dead brain cells and get a song or two out! Kristen kept claiming that she couldn’t remember anything – she fibbed! She played very well and I enjoyed listening to her. When she was playing, you could hear at least half a dozen folks singing along. Eventually someone got the bright idea to get a few pictures of everyone together:

Everyone returned to the main room where the karaoke was going on. There was a young African American girl singing and she was AWESOME! She was so good, it took a few moments for everyone entering the room to realize that this was NOT a recording we were listening to, and was actually the Karaoke!
Kristen and I did a song together. She played “Tequila Sunrise” and I sang. I’ve played and sang that song for over 20 years, so you would think we would be safe . . . and you would have been wrong! I forgot the darn words part way through! I guess that maybe not having a guitar in my hands sort of threw me (that’s my excuse and I’m sticking with it!) I felt so bad for Kristen, she had to do her part playing the guitar AND try and whisper the words to me to get me back on track! Sorry Kristen!
She was kind enough to loan me her guitar for a couple of songs. I didn’t butcher them too bad, but I don’t think I exactly wowed anyone either! LoL
Sally spent a good half an hour sitting on the pool table, reading through the karaoke book, trying to find a song and get the guts up to sing it. I took her pic just so I could pick on her later about being a fraidy cat!

Some misc pictures of the night:
Caroline (on the right) and her girl friend Courtney:

Paula:

Ashley:

I was having a ball, but had an hour drive to get back to my hotel, and then had to be at the airport early in the morning, so I headed out at midnight. By the time I got to the hotel, cleaned up, and in my bed, it was after 2AM. Since I had to be up at 4AM, I was not exactly thrilled! Lol
So here is a pic entering Boston at around 530AM in the morning on the way to the airport. Tired. Bushed. Getting way too old for this stuff . . .

Detroit City

So once again I’ve gone to Detroit. This was a last second trip with no advance warning to repair failed instruments with two large customers of ours. Well, I was on the fence up until the last second as to if I should fly “dressed” or not but ultimately decided I didn’t want to have to get up at 3:30AM to get ready for catching the flight. I suppose it’s a good thing I didn’t because after arriving at 6:30 AM for my 8:30 AM flight I was informed it had been canceled! I didn’t get out of Austin to Atlanta until 1130AM, and then my flight from Atlanta to Detroit was delayed. Before it was all over, I spent about 14 hours traveling and would have looked like hell had I done it as Kim.
Well, got to Detroit and had a little fashion show and photo shoot. I’ve bought a lot of little odds and ends lately and this was my first chance to see how the “whole package” looked.
The first outfit I tried on was a skirt and red knit blouse that I got at Beads and Baubles in Austin. The top was so cute on the hanger and looked so awful on me that I deleted the pictures and so no, you don’t get see it.
I have looked at this purple blouse in JC Penny in at least three different malls but finally decided to grab it. Here I matched it with a skirt I bought at a consignment store in Austin (I Think it was Beads and Baubles). I include the pictures just to show you that I DO make fashion mistakes, cause this looks awful. The skirt hugs me too tight in the hip area which is undesirable when your wearing hip pads as it makes them obvious. The skirt is a bust but I’ll keep the top. I think maybe it would look best doing he layering thing with another blouse under it – any advice?

The next outfit I tried is a long black “professional” type skirt that I bought at a thrift store more than a year ago but have never worn. I matched it with a cute little black top that has lace around the neck line. I think this outfit is a winner and will be wearing it when it gets a little cooler outside.

Same top, but different skirt. My wife and I were shopping at Goodwill last week and she found this skirt and brought it to me. I LOVE it. Not too long, not too short, and it’s light, cute, and flouncy. I decided I will wear this on my second night here.

 

For my first night out here though, I wanted to wear a new skirt I bought at Neiman Marcus Last Call. It’s kind of short, and has a cross hatch pattern to it that shines and glitters as it moves. The thing had a price tag on it showing that it had originally sold for over $200 but was now in it’s last sale for $60. That’s still a lot of money in my book, considering that much of my wardrobe is from Thrift and consignment stores, but I loved the skirt and decided to go for it. When I bought it, I had thought it would go well with a large number of purple tops I have, including the new one I just bought, but I think I was mistaken.

On the advice of my fashion adviser (my wife) I had also brought along one of my favorite salmon colored tops. I really wasn’t sure it would work, but as usual she was right. The salmon color highlights the cross hatch threading in the skirt and I think it looks terrific. Loved it and so wore it out!

As has become my habit in Detroit, I headed for the Motor City Casino. The bad news is I got greedy and wound up loosing $20. I find this particularly annoying as early on I had been up $40 and should have had the sense to bail out. The problem is, it was early in the night and I didn’t want to head back to the hotel after only 45 minutes. So, spent a couple of hours playing video poker, lost my $20, and was heading out when I heard what I thought sounded like a live band. When I investigated I found there WAS a band there and so stopped to listen. I think their name was Mem Shannon and these folks were out of New Orleans and were great. I swear, the front man looked and sounded just like BB King. I took a couple of videos to get some sound bites for my blog but the sound quality really sucks.
As I’m sitting there listening to this, a guy walks up to me, crosses his arms, and gives me an exaggerated frown. As this was more or less my own posture, he was clearly poking fun at me. When I started to laugh he walked up and asked me if I wanted to dance! Umm, I don’t dance . . EVER, but it was way cool to be asked. I listened to the blues for a couple of hours and then headed for the hotel.

Day Two
Normally I wouldn’t mention who the customer is because I think that might cross the line into something my company might have a reason to yell about if they ever do stumble across my blog and figure out what I’ve been up to in my off hours. The problem is, how can I brag that I just got to see the 2010 Mustang if I don’t tell you I was at Ford?! LOL
As a lot of you probably know if you’ve read my blog and posts, I’ve got a 1967 Mustang – the fifth or sixth classic Mustang I’ve owned in my life, so I clearly have soft spot for the car. While we were fixing his instrument, I kept dropping the hint that it sure would be cool to see the newest model and he obliged by letting us peek in the window of the environmental testing chamber they had it in. Purty cool stuff! Literally – the chamber was at 20 degrees F. J
Well, got their instrument up and running very quickly but sort of dragged it out to get the engineer traveling with me some hands on experience. Even letting him stumble through our awful procedures to do the repair, we were still done shortly after lunch. It was killing me! This could have been an entire afternoon out shopping but here I was stuck with the new guy. This got me to thinking about things and so I took a hard look inside myself and decided that I have been a jerk. I had really made no serious effort to be sociable with this poor guy because I’d rather have my time to be Kim than socialize with a peer. Decided I didn’t like this about myself and so asked him if he might want to take a trip to the Casino with me and maybe check out the band they were going to have that night, and he agreed. We spent a couple of hours at the hotel going through documents and procedures so that we didn’t have to feel guilty about screwing off the entire afternoon and then headed to the Casino at about 3. He likes to play roulette and I like to play video poker, so we separated pretty quick. About 40 minutes later I’m down another $20 when he walks up, and says he just won $50 and is ready to go as soon as I am. Cool! HE is giving ME the bums rush to separate, and it’s still early!
Got back the hotel, got dressed, and headed back to the Casino again. This time not with my heart set on gambling, but just wanting to see what that nights band might sound like.

 
 I stopped at the bar / lounge and went to order a drink. As I’m standing at the bar, I notice the couple sitting next to me whispering and glancing my way, so I listen to see if I can hear them. Clearly I’ve missed the start of the conversation, but given their whispering and furtive glances my way, you don’t have to be a detective to figure it out.
“I’m telling you it is,” he says. She glances my way and quickly looks away.
“Uh uh, no way!” she replies. I turned and looked away from them, but am still trying to hear.
“It is too!” he says, “Just look at her . . “ and the noise in the lounge drowned out the rest of his words.
“No freaking (not the word she used) way!” she replied again. I got my drink and turned in time to see them both looking directly at me. What the hell, might as well have fun with it, so I looked them both in the eye, winked at them, and went and found a table to listen to the band. According to the Casino's schedule, this band was called the Bomb Squad. Problem is, I looked up their web site and they look nothing like the band I saw so I'm not sure the name is right. They were not just good, they were incredible! They started off with Motown hits of the 60’s and nailed everyone of them. As the gamblers heard the quality, people started filling the lounge and soon people were dancing and shouting encouraging the band. Besides the realy awesome music, they had to ladies singing up front and one these women was built . . . umm . . exceptionally well, and OMG could she dance and move. I’ve never seen anyone live (not on TV or movies) that could move like this woman. I’d swear her hips must have been mounted on ball bearings, because this lady moved like a professional belly dancer. She always had the brightest smile on her face and you just couldn’t help grinning when she looked your way . . and she looked my way a lot! Watching her dance was so much fun, I would have stayed just for that. As usual, this sort of thing fills me with conflicting feelings and emotions. On the one hand, I am filled with envy, and wish like hell I could look and move like her. On the other hand, believe it or not, I have all the same interests in attractive women that most men have.
The band took a break and so I hit the poker machine again . . . and promptly lost another $20. This sucks! I had started to feel like the Casino was my personal ATM because I usually walked out with more than I walked in with, but not this trip!
Heard the band start up again, so I returned to the lounge. Went to the bar first to order a drink and while I’m standing there waiting for it, a guy built like a wrestler points at my bangles.
“Aren’t those heavy?” he says, clearly joking with me. The place was kind of loud and so at first I wasn’t sure I’d heard him and gave him that “huh?” look.
“Aren’t all those bracelets heavy? How can you lift your arms?” he asks with a huge smile.
“Nah, their cute and fun,” I told him, as I got my drink from the bartender “You should try it some time!”. He must have had too much to drink, because he thought that was hilarious.
The bands second set was hits from the 70’s, and yes this included some disco. Most of the crowd was about my age, and we all ATE IT UP! Lol I listened the rest of this wet, watching the lady with the perfect figure doing impossible things with her hips, and then called it a night.
Day 3
My third day was all work and no play. Our next customer was a 2 hour drive north ot Detroit, and by the time we made the round trip, refurbished the customers instrument, and got dinner, it was about 9 PM and far too late to consider getting ready and going out.
All in all, a pleasant trip!

Chicago and Peoria Illinois

So this was a two part journey – working fist in Chicago Illinois for a couple of days and then driving down to Peoria for the rest of the week. Still traveling with the new engineer I'm training but this is turning out to be not much of a problem. He is a very likeable guy but seems to have absolutely no interest in hanging out after work. He also prefers a different hotel chain than the Holiday Inn that I prefer to stay with and so we are staying at different hotels. I literally couldn't have asked for this to work out any better! All kidding aside, I am starting to wonder if he has his own reasons for wanting privacy. As I said, he is very likeable and easy to talk to and he has already commented on my nails. He said he used to keep his long too. When the conversation led to discussion of how I am fairly confident in my manhood, he want on to say that he used to wear a "man purse" until he wore it out. Wouldn't that be funny if he and I stumble in to each other some night in the same club. LoL

I have this wedding dress that I bought probably 8 years ago. It's beautiful but is huge and takes up a lot of valuable closet space for something that I'm never going to get to wear anywhere. Add to that the fact that the dress doesn't fit and I decided to take it with me, take some pics, and get rid of it. Yes, I know it LOOKS like it fits here but the zipper is not all of the way up and it's torn from my prior attempts to fit my size 14 behind in to the size 12 dress.

So Chicago turned out to be pretty cool. Someone online turned me on to the fact that Hunters does Karaoke on Monday nights and so I decided to check it out. I wore a new skirt that I think is cute and flirty and tried a couple of different tops. Decided the teal really didn't suite my skin very well and so went with the blue instead.

As luck would have it, I arrived just in time to see half a dozen people putting away guitars! Damn damn damn, I just missed either a band or a jam session – I was mad as hell. Stuck around for the Karaoke and was pleasantly surprised to hear that the majority of the people were really good and so it was a pleasure. Of course we're talking about a Monday night so there weren't many Tgirls out and about. There was one other Tgirl there – very young, skinny, and cute (the bitch! lol) with a huge head of curly blond hair. At least twice I said hello as I walked by her or she walked by me. Either she didn't hear me, or doesn't care to talk to ugly old cross dressers because she didn't even bother to smile back. Oh well . . .



Drove down to Peoria on Wednesday. After we got done doing some training on our software, the other engineer headed out for his hotel and I was free! Got cleaned up and headed out for some shopping.

I hit up a Goodwill right next to the hotel and found nothing of interest there and headed to Kohls. I was shopping through the shoes when this young lady loudly says "Oh no! I can't believe this happening to me!" I glanced her way and she took that as an invitation to start a conversation with me.

"I've got to go to a funeral tomorrow and they don't have the shoes I wanted in my size!"

I said something stupid along the lines of I was sorry to hear about that. She sighed and continued looking for the perfect she for her skirt. A moment later she walked up to me and asked:

"Do you mind if I ask you a question?" I figured we were about to get into a discussion about transgender and told her "Sure, go for it!"  She held up a black skirt with white dots she was carrying and a pair of black pumps with much larger white dots with red four inch heels.

"Do you think these work together?" I was floored. I thought she was going to ask me about being a cross dresser but instead she treated me as another woman and asked for my fashion advice. I almost teared up! LOL.

I told her "I really don't think so, and the four inch red heels might send the wrong message at a funeral. We both laughed, she said thanks, and then off she went. Sigh . . .



Finished shopping and headed for the "Elbo Room" – a karaoke bar there in Peoria. It is a "straight" place, but very popular with young people and the medical folks from the surrounding hospitals and is really a very friendly place. I had a ball singing and listening to others. A few folks really made an impression with me and so I asked if I might take their pictures.


This is the bartender there. She is attentive and friendly lady and gorgeous. I love her sense of style too as every time I've been there she is wearing cute blouses that I want!

This is the lady that ran the Karaoke. She is just cute and adorable and very easy to chat with.

 This is another patron and singer. I took her picture because she sings VERY well, is cute and a bit different, AND I loved her dress. LOL

Cute Critter Moment

As you read this, keep in mind my daughter does NOT know I wear dresses.
Last night I was putting my (almost) 5 year old daughter Audrey to bed and was reading her favorite book to her - Cinderella. My daughter is a MAJOR girly girl and she adores frilly dresses like those that Cinderella and the other Disney princesses wear.
For those of you that are out there thinking "Oh that poor girl! She has a cross dresser for a father and he's making her wear that stuff" I give you my word I had nothing to do with her preferences in this regard. She came by her love of that stuff all on her own despite my not encouraging it, and my wife being a major Tom Boy.
So anyway, in this book, Cinderella gets married and they have a wonderful drawing of her in her beautiful wedding dress. My daughter looks up at me.
"I wish I had a beautiful dress like that!" she says with a wistful look on her face.
"You will someday sweetheart," I tell her, "That's a wedding gown and someday when you are much older, you will get married and you will have your own wedding gown."
She thinks for a moment and then asks "Did Mommy wear a wedding gown when you got married?"
"Yes, she did" I responded.
"Did YOU wear a wedding dress too Poppa?" she asks with not a hint of humor or sarcasm.
"No little one, I did not wear a wedding dress" I told her, probably with a bit of a wistful tone of voice myself now.
"Why not Poppa?" she asked.
"Because baby, some grown up made a silly rule that boys aren't supposed to wear dresses" I replied.
"Why not?" she asked, sounding just a little indignant that someone would just arbitrarily decide boys could not enjoy something she loves so much.
"I don't know why little one, but people would make fun of me if I wore a dress. It's kind of unfair huh?"
"Yeah, thats not fair Poppa, but you can still wear a dress in the house if you want to." She paused for just a moment as if a thought had struck her.
"But not MY dresses Poppa. They are TOO small for you!"
I laughed so hard I almost cried!

Still In Indianapolis!

I am traveling with an engineer my company has just hired so that I can provide him with OJT but so far that is working out well. It seems that he prefers a different hotel chain than the Holiday Inn where I like to stay, so I am at one place and he is at another. So the odd thing is that even though I could have gone out, I just couldn’t drum up any enthusiasm for doing so on my second night there. I just stayed in the hotel and played my guitar.












The third and last day there, things came together so that we were done with our work fairly early. Since he drove to Indy, he was able to head for home early, and I was free to get dressed and go out!






I started by going to a new Goodwill by the Castleton Square mall. Didn’t find anything that struck my fancy there so I headed into the mall itself.

Started by going through Macy’s (my favorite department store) and didn’t find anything I wanted bad enough there so I walked down to Von Maur. You know those little kiosks that they have in the malls? As a male, they never ever bother me, or try to get my attention. When I’m “dressed” though, they always just about attack me.
“Excuse me ma’am, can I talk to you a second?”
“Excuse me ma’am, can I show you something?”
“Excuse me ma’am, would you like a free sample?”
You know what? It’s a pain in the backside! You tell them quite clearly “No thank, I’m not interested” and they just keep yapping like you hadn’t said anything. Do they treat all women like this, or is it only cross dressers they act so aggressively with?
Cruised Von Maur a bit but didn’t find anything I wanted bad enough to pay their prices for so I went and listened to their piano player. The guy was just awesome so I took a little but of video just to get the sound. Sorry, my new camera apparently doesn’t do audio real well.

So as I’m walking back up the mall to Macy’s where I parked my car, I notice a couple in their 30’s sitting on a bench about 20 yards away and they are watching me like hawks, not even trying to act like they aren’t staring. Sometimes this bothers me, sometimes it amuses me. This time it amused me so I gave them my best smile and winked at them. They both broke out into huge grins. She slapped him on the shoulder and I saw her mouth “See, I TOLD you so!” to him.

Went to dinner at my favorite restaurant – English Ivy’s. As I’ve said before, this place is just great. Comfortable, awesome food, and very friendly. Had a great meal and then headed to a place one of the ladies at the Holiday Inn was kind enough to tell me about – Greg’s “Our Place”. I’d have to admit it didn’t do much for me. The music was really not what I enjoy, and it had pretty much only guys in it. I don’t have any interest in yacking with guys, so I called it a night.

Indianapolis July 2008

Uggghhhh!!!
So today I got up at 3:30AM so I could take my 8:20AM flight from Austin to Indianapolis “dressed”. I’ve already been notified by email that I’ve received free upgrades to first class and so life looks pretty good. Everything is running ahead of schedule and I’m on the way to the Airport at 5:30!


When I get to the Austin Airport, the first thing I see is that the security line is so long it’s unreal. Austin is a relatively small airport and very rarely has lines long enough to be concerned about. That’s OK though, ‘cause I always get to the airport about two hours before my flights just so that I don’t have to worry about little things like this, so I go to check in with Delta. I get to the counter and am informed that due to some sort of weather problem in Atlanta, my flight has been canceled. No worries though, “since you’re here early, we can put you on standby for a flight that leaves at 7AM.”
Sounded pretty good so I accepted and checked my bags – then things got interesting. I was there plenty early enough to make it through any line in time for my 8:20 flight, but now all of a sudden I’m in a huge line, it’s 6:30 AM, and I’m trying to catch a 7AM flight. As you can imagine I’m sweating bullets but finally get through the line.



As I get to the gate they are boarding the last group . . and there are no seats for stand by passengers. Delta moves me to American, who has a flight leaving Austin to DFW at 11AM . . . oh goody. THAT flight ends up delayed and doesn’t leave until 1130! By the time I get off the plane and on to the airports tram for my next gate it is 1PM. Guess what time my connection from DFW to Indianapolis was supposed to take off? You guessed it – 1 PM. So it is now past the time my flight from DFW was supposed to take off but I ran for it anyway just in case it was late too. Folks, if you have never had the pleasure of running through an airport in 3 inch stiletto heels, consider yourself lucky. It’s no where near as much fun as you might think watching Pamela Anderson do it on TV.
As I’m running/speed walking to the gate, knowing full well it should have left already, I’m starting to consider things.

• I’ve checked all my guy clothes.
• First flight canceled, failed to get standby for second flight, then moved to another airline. What’s the odds my bag with my clothes is actually going to get there?
• I have no guy clothes. What am I going to do if there are no more flights from DFW to Indy tonight and I have to stay the night in DFW?
• I don’t have all of my make up, so if I had to stay the night, catching a flight tomorrow “dressed” is going to present significant problems as well.
• What if I DO get to Indy and my clothes don’t?

As I approach my gate, I see that the gate area is empty and so my heart sinks.
“Damn, damn, damn – what have I gotten myself into?”
I get to the CSR at the gate and hand him my ticket and tell him:
“It looks like I’ve missed my connection. Can you get me another flight?”
He takes a look at my ticket and hands it back.
“You didn’t miss it yet, it was delayed 10 minutes and was gate changed to four gates down”.
I snatched my ticket and started running again. I got to the new gate just as they were removing the door stop to close the door. At this point they often wont let you board anyway, but they did let me on. I get to my seat, heart pounding, perspiration dripping down my face, and smelling like I’ve just come from the gym. I am the ultimate in grace, beauty, and olfactory sweetness – NOT. As I’m falling into my seat, almost over come with relief that I’m not going to have to figure out how to get along in DFW for the night with no car, hotel, or clothes, I note that the two seats next to mine have two teenage girls who are both just kind of staring at me. I gave them my best smile and said “Phew! I barely caught the plane!”
No joke, they both just stared at me for about 30 seconds (which is longer than you might think) as if trying to figure out if they really ought to be speaking with someone like me. Finally the one right next to me says “Yeah, I know the feeling. We’ve been traveling sine 3AM”. So there I sit, frantically fanning myself with my ticket, feeling terribly embarrassed about my appearance and the way I smell after that run across the airport when I hear angels singing. Yeah I know, y’all think I’m nuts but I swear I was sitting on this airplane, exhausted from anxiety and running, and with perspiration running down my nose, when I hear two beautiful voices singing in harmony. It took a moment for my brain to stop spinning enough for me to realize that it was the two girls sitting next to me. They had leaned toward each other, and with their heads touching they were softly singing in flawless harmony. I was just stunned! Anyone that has spent any time singing knows that there is a world of difference between two people just singing together, and two people singing harmony together. This was just awesome. They sang three of four songs and I finally got the chance to ask them about it. Turns out they are part of a church group traveling from California to Indianapolis to perform. Despite their initial hesitation, these two young ladies chatted with me off and on for the whole trip.
Oh, and when I got to Indianapolis? My bags were waiting for me at the Delta office and all was well with world.
Y’all might want to throw me outta the cross dresser’s club for this, but I don’t think I want to ever wear my pretty little three inch stiletto sandals for 16 hours again.
Ouch . . .

Last Night I went to Sleep in Detroit City

So on 7 July I flew to Detroit “dressed” again. You know what’s funny about it? Having conquered that particular mountain (flying dressed) it has now grown a bit boring. All I got out of flying dressed this time was a very early start to my morning (3:30 AM) so that I could get ready. It didn’t really excite me or fulfill any particular emotional need in me this time. I just took a flight . . . as a woman.

 This time I wore one of what I’ve come to think of as my “comfort/confidence” outfits. Once a year or so I manage to find an outfit that I feel is a perfect outfit with just the right skirt, blouse, and shoes. This is one of them that I like the best.

In this picture I am sitting on my monster suitcase

The only thing that happened of note was when I went to put my bags on the rental car shuttle bus. To put it in perspective you need to realize that I carry at least two heavy bags with me – a 50 Lb tool box I need for my job, and a large 50 Lb suite case to carry a weeks worth of clothes for two people. 

 So while wearing my pretty skirt and heels I started to lift these two large and heavy bags up onto the bus when two gentlemen both jumped up and took them for me. I never got the chance to object or decline their help so I gave them my heart felt thanks in the softest voice I’ve got and sat down with a really odd combination of feelings.

• Embarrassment because my intent in visiting the world as Kim is obviously NOT to fool kind hearted and well mannered men into doing my heavy lifting for me.
• Concern because I wonder how they are going to react if they realize what I am and feel I’ve abused their chivalry.
• Joy and satisfaction that I clearly was presenting well and being accepted as I had hoped.

Oh, I also played what I’ve come to think of as “The Name Game” with the driver.
“What’s your last name hun?” he asks me, and so I give it to him in my softest voice.
My last name is fairly unique in the US, common in Canada, but I’ve never yet met another person in the US with my last name, and yet . . .
He looks down the list twice, going right past my last name because it’s pretty clear I can’t be Matt XXX. So he looks up at me again.
“What’s your first name?” he asks.
“Matthew,” I said, giving him my best “the cat’s outta the bag” smile. I swear I’m not making this up, he looks at me and asks again.
“I’m sorry, what was it?”
“Matthew,” I repeated again.
“Ahhh, I see!” he says, clearly having just had an epiphany.
On the way off the bus, one of the gentlemen that helped me onto it offered to take one of my bags off for me. I thanked him and assured him that I had lots of practice at it and would be just fine.




My Second Day

I decided to go to the Motor City Casino in Detroit. On the way there I saw the Oakwood mall off of the freeway and decided to go shopping at Macy’s. As I was shopping I noticed a woman in a very conservative suit and I sort of thought she seemed a little pensive. It took me a second to realize why – she was a crossdresser! I might be wrong, but I’m almost positive. All things considered, I figure it’s a heck of a compliment to her that I’m not positive considering how many TG’s I’ve met and interacted with. We made eye contact for just a moment and both of us looked away pretty quickly and went our own ways. I didn’t stop to talk to her because I wasn’t sure she was one of us and even if she was, I didn’t want to blow her confidence by letting her know I had read her. Walked through Macy’s and didn’t see anything that met all the requirements:

• I can afford it
• It would look good on me
• I want it bad enough to buy it

Got to the Motor City Casino and played the video poker machine. I put in $20 and played for a couple of hours. I was almost out of credits when I got a good hand and won about $70! I took my winnings and went to the Casino’s bar where I ordered a drink and then got suckered into playing the video poker games they have on the bar. I put in $5 and was down to about $2 when the screen went blank on me. They called maintenance (or what ever they call the folks that come fix them) and the lady walks up all smiles.
“What are you doing breaking our machines?” she asks with a huge smile.
“Breaking your machine my butt!” I told her, “I just won $10 Million on that damn thing when it decided to crash to save you guys from having to pay me!”
I’d be willing to bet she hears that a dozen times a day, but maybe not from a cross dresser because she had a pretty good laugh at it. They got the machine back up and running and I had a whopping $1.75 in it. Oh well . . . I still left the casino with about $40 more than I entered it with!



My Third Day


My last night in the area I went shopping at another mall in Waterford and again didn’t find anything,
so I headed back to the Casino. Been there about an hour and a half and am just short of having lost my self imposed limit of $40. It struck me that if I lived around a Casino, I’d probably be one of those people that you see there with their hair all wild, dirty clothes, blood shot eyes, banging away at the slots while desperately hoping for a big win. I’ve got $3 left of the $40 I was willing to loose when the slot machine graced me with $150 win. I may not be the sharpest tool in the shed, but I was smart enough to take the money and run. Would you believe I had two gentlemen open doors for me on the way out?
The evening was still fairly young so I went to GiGi’s, a Detroit hang out known for being very friendly to Tgirls. I got there at about 9:15 PM and the place was pretty much empty. The bartender told me they were going to have a drag show at 11. I asked her if the performers were likely to be the only Tgirls there, or if there were usually some in the crowd too. She said sometimes there were a few, but mostly only on Fridays and Saturdays. Well, my hotel was about an hours drive from there, and I don’t care for drag shows. If there probably weren’t going to be any local girls to meet and BS with it just wasn’t going to be worth the late night for me, so I headed out.