The Never Ending Journey

                     

I might be wrong, but I’m pretty sure that this was the longest non-stop trip I’ve ever been on for my company. By the time I finally got around to starting to write my blog, I had to go back and look at the photos I’d taken just to remind myself where my trip had started off at and where I’d been! I have had some good times on this trip, but quite frankly I’m ready to go home.

As y’all know, because I keep telling ya over and over again, I’ve suddenly taken a liking to dresses. The good news is that they appear to flatter me for the first time in my life.
The bad news is, I’ve gone overboard and have been buying them everywhere I can find a good deal on them. I’ve found at least three of them in the last two weeks with price tags well over $100, but on sale for only $20 and $25. Each one, when taken on it’s own merits was a hell of a deal and you would no doubt be inclined to pat me on the back and say “What an awesome shopper you are!”, but when you add them all up, I’ve gone overboard and spent a lot more money recently than I should have.

As I was packing my suitcase, my six year old daughter shoves the bedroom door wide open and waltzes in like she owns the joint, and of course catching me just as I’m packing away a pink nightgown.
“Young’un, aren’t you supposed to knock if the door is closed?!” I asked her, trying to remind her that it was inappropriate to barge through a closed door, but also trying not to freak on her just because she has caught me doing something I’d rather she hadn’t.
“Oh, sorry daddy, I forgot.” She said, trying to look apologetic but failing miserably.
“Sorry my butt! Git on back out the door and knock this time!” I scolded her, while pointing back out to the hallway. With an almost teenager style huff, she spun around and closed the door behind her. In a second I hear the soft sound of little knuckles knocking on the door. By now I have closed the suitcase lid so she wont see any of the other interesting things that I have packed.
“Come in!” I called out to her.
With no hesitation at all, she walks in and immediately she verbally pins me to the wall.
“So why are you taking momma’s pretty night gown with you?” she asks me very calmly, much as she might speak if she were asking me what time it was. This is at least the fourth time my daughter has point blank asked me things like this, and I’m pretty sure that I’m gonna have to have a talk with her soon, but I aint ready just yet.
“Maybe I just want to have something of Momma’s with me when I’m all alone critter!” I told her.
“Oh! Hold on, I’ll be right back!” and off she sprints out the door, returning less than a minute later with one of her favorite stuffed animals.
“Here daddy, now you can have something of mine to cuddle with.” She tells me while holding it out to me. I picked her up and hugged her, and told her she was the sweetest person I know, and that I loved the idea, but that her stuffed animal was way too big for me to take with me. Not to be deterred, she went to her room again and brought back a little critter with pink and white stripes. THIS one would fit in my bag just fine . . .


At least according to the pics on my flickr site, my trip started off with my going to the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland to do preventative maintenance on three instruments there. For this flight, I chose one of my newest finds – a very 1970’s sort of hippie dress. I knew the moment that I saw this dress in Goodwill for about $10 that it just had to go home with me. I was sure it would look great on me and I was not disappointed! It occurred to me later though that I should have worn my piece sign ear rings – that would have just really topped off the whole 70’s concept! Oh well, maybe next time!
For shoes, I was wearing some serious platform sandals that I had just purchased a couple of days ago. I had actually been shopping with my wife, daughter, and future daughter-in-law when I found them. The cute thing is, my daughter in law found some that were very similar in appearance, and with a stiletto just as high as mine, so we spent the next couple of days threatening to steal each others shoes. When I was planning my outfits for this trip, she more or less dared me to wear them on the flight, and since I was leaning that way anyway . . .





On the first leg of my flight, I sat in coach. Coach or not, as a frequent flier I get to be one of the first people to board the aircraft, and so I was sitting there reading my book when a woman and her two daughters, toddler and infant, took the seats in front of me. The poor woman was really struggling trying to herd her toddler, carry the infant and their things, and get them all sorted and stored with out dropping anything critical, like, oh, say the baby for instance. I’ve long since become jaded enough that I no longer offer to help women that carry huge carry on bags on the aircraft, but this sort of thing is completely different. This is a woman struggling to do what has to be done to get her and her children from one point to another and not just a woman too silly to pack reasonably and in too big a hurry to check her bags. Anyway, I stood and helped her get her carry on stored away and soon she was seated.
“Thank you SO much!” she almost gasped, trying to turn around and look at me through the gap in the seats.
“Your very welcome! You know, you’re a very brave woman. I’ve traveled with one of my young children before – I just can’t imagine trying it with two of them!” I told her with a grin. She laughed and we spoke a couple of minutes, but of course her attention was soon entirely taken by trying to keep her children seated. About mid way through the boarding process, two older women stopped at the seats the mother and children were sitting in. They kept looking at their tickets, the seat marker, the mother and children, their tickets, over and over. I’d seen this dance enough to know what was coming next.
“Excuse me, but I think your in our seats.” One of the older women tells the mother. Of course this launches a flurry of ticket examinations and comparisons, and in a moment they agree that the mother and her children are in the wrong seats, and were supposed to be on the other side of the isle. Rather than simply agree to sit in each others assigned seats, the mother collects all of her things from under the seats, grabs the baby, herds the toddler, and after five minutes of effort she and her children are now seated in the same row, but on the other side of the isle. She caught me looking at her and shaking my head, and gave me the “what could I do?” shrug. Thing really got comical about 10 minutes later though, when the flight attendant comes up to the mother.
“Ma’am, I’m so sorry, but there aren’t enough oxygen masks on that side of the aircraft for all three of you.” She tells her. Then she looks across the isle at the two older women that had forced the poor woman to move.
“Ladies, I’m sorry but I’m going to have to ask you to please exchange seats with this lady and her children.” Having said this, the flight attendant then started helping them all to shuffle their things. It was all I could do to keep from laughing at the sheer silliness of it all. Just as they closed the door to the aircraft, I reached up and tapped the mother on the shoulder to get her attention.
“They were just kidding – you need to move back to the other side of the isle now!” I told her with a smile. To my surprise, three or four people seated around us busted up laughing – I thought I had spoken only loud enough for her to hear.

On the next leg of my trip, I had received an upgrade to first class, and I was pleased to find myself sitting next to an attractive and friendly woman about my own age. We chatted about everything and about nothing while people boarded the airplane.
“I’m just waiting for my boss to walk by, because boy is he gonna be pissed!” she said with delighted look.
“Oh, let me guess! You got an upgrade and he didn’t?” I asked her.
“Yup!” she said with a laugh.
I had fully intended to pay attention to see the fun as her boss had to walk past her to coach seats, but I got caught up in the movie on my IPOD and forgot all about it. I remembered it though, when the doors were closed and they tell you to turn off your electronics.
“So, did your boss see you?” I asked her with a grin.
“He sure did. I made sure he saw me!”
“And was he pissed?”
“He was, especially when he saw that I was sitting next to a hottie like you!”
I had taken a drink of my coffee as she was speaking, and I literally choked on it when she said this.
“Your sweet . .”  .. ..   “. . but I haven’t been even close to ‘hot’ in a long time.” I sputtered out between coughs and chokes from the coffee that had just filled my nose. Of course, that compliment made her my new best friend and we chatted about places where we had been for most of the flight.

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The following day was a long work day, and so all I did after work was to take my customer to dinner. It seems his wife was off visiting her sick mother and so he was also doing the bachelor thing.

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The next day I was done fairly early and so I got cleaned up and went out to see “The Expendables”. Oh my God . . .  
Talk about graphic and unapologetic violence! They pulled no punches and shied away from showing nothing. Gotta tell the truth though, it was a bit of fun. My only major disappointment was that Arnold played only a cameo roll – he was only on screen for about two minutes. 



Shortly after I got out of the movies I received a call from my manager telling me that one of our major customers in Manassas VA has a problem with a system I installed only a few weeks ago. It has a touch screen on it, and it appears that our system allows the user to calibrate the touch screen so badly that it can’t be used anymore. Brilliant! When you screw it up that bad, you can no longer enter the password that lets you calibrate it again. Oops. Anyway, the factory was sending the parts to the customer and he was gonna install them, but my boss wanted me to change my flights and stay reasonably local just in case I had to head that way and help them out. Well, when I started pricing things out, it turned out that I could save my company almost a thousand dollars by just staying the entire weekend in Philadelphia. You see I had a repair to do there the following week anyway, so I could save them the cost of an entire round trip flight bringing me back to the same area next week. I stayed in Maryland for the next day, just to be a couple of hours closer to Manassas in case I had to head that way. I was immensely relieved when I received notice that the customer had installed the new components and the system was up running. That meant that I got to head North to Philadelphia Friday!

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Just my luck, Friday morning I awoke to discover that I was sick with a cold. It wasn’t a complete shock as my customer had stated that he had just gotten over one, and his wife was still sick. Still, it just didn’t seem fair! I had plans to meet with my friends Sophie and Jennyand was sort of looking forward to an entire weekend to have fun in Philly as Kim, and now I was gonna spend it sick! I went ahead and made the drive “pretty” though, thinking that if I got any sicker as the days went on, this might be my last chance.



When I got to my hotel in King Of Prussia PA, it was still quite early and so I unpacked and headed across the street to the King of Prussia mall. For those of you that haven’t been there, it is a very nice and very large mall. I had only packed for a three day trip and now it was turning into a week and a half or more, so I looked for a couple of outfits and for some more sensible shoes. I did indeed find a couple of awesome deals on dresses – one at Macy’s and one at JC Penny. Both dresses had tags on them showing that had originally sold for over $100 and I got one for $20 and one for $27 – SCORE!  Next I started looking for some more reasonable shoes. Let’s face it, the 5 inch stilettos I had worn on a lark and a dare were not exactly what I had expected to be stuck wearing for a week and a half. I had brought a couple of other pairs, but they were almost as bad, one with 3.5 inch heels and the other with 4 inch stilettos. I often check the sales racks in Macy’s, but surprisingly, not only did I not find anything I could afford, but I didn’t even see anything I particularly liked, so I made my way through the rest of the mall. At the end of my shopping I entered the 9 West shoe store where I found two drop dead gorgeous young women working in an otherwise empty store. I looked around for a moment and didn’t see anything that I couldn’t live without, so I turned to leave.
“Thank you!” I tossed over my shoulder.
“Hey?!” one of them calls out to me, so I turned to look at her.
“We like your shoes!” she says with a huge grin.
“Thanks! So do I, but they aren’t exactly practical for mall walking huh?” I told them with a laugh.
“Maybe not, but they sure are cute!”
“And looking cute is what it’s all about, isn’t it?” I replied as I continued back out in to the mall with a wave.
I don’t know if it was just me, the fact that I was sick, or maybe the silly shoes I was wearing, but I just didn’t feel confident and felt like everyone was staring at me. Pretty quick, and long before I had explored the entire mall, I decided to call it a day and returned to my room and went back to being a caterpillar. I was just gonna lay around the room but I got a call from Sophie offering to meet for a coffee or a beer, and since there was a Hooters bar more or less in my hotels parking lot, the choice was a no brainer.

You know, most guys really like Hooters, but I’m not a huge fan. Pretty women, and let’s face it, Hooters doesn’t hire unattractive women, have always made me uncomfortable. I blush, I stutter, and I feel embarrassed. When I am in male mode, I have no idea how to relate to them or chat with them comfortably. When I’m presenting as female, I feel fat and ugly when next to pretty women. Oh well . . .
So Sophie and I sat there drinking a beer and chatting when two of the waitresses started hugging each other. Soon I see them both trying to convince the guy next to me to take their picture using their cell phone camera, but apparently it was beyond his skill set and he flubbed it up several times. It drove me nuts hearing them try and explain to this idiot over and over “Point it and push the button” and so I held my hand out for it. In a moment we had a couple of nice pics taken and the camera phone back in her possession.
“They look great! Thank you so much!” she told me with a great smile.
“Your welcome,” I said . . . blushing . . .
I can’t recall if it was Sophie or I, but one of us made a comment that I ought to take fairly good pictures given all of the practice that I get at it!

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Saturday turned out to be a pretty big day for me! There was going to be a local TG get together called “Angela’s Laptop Lounge” AND it turns out that Sophie and Jenny had bought me a makeover with Amanda Richards! As if that wasn’t enough on my plate, I also got the call from my manager that our customer in Manassas was in trouble again already. The new parts we had sent had fixed their problem, but only for one day! Now I was going to have to complete my repair in Philadelphia Monday and then drive all of the way to Manassas and spend the rest of the week there. My trip had started off to be a three day journey and was now up to two weeks. It sure is a good thing that I always seriously over pack! On the way to the make over at Amanda Richards “True Colors” salon, Sophie was kind enough to give me a guided tour through Valley Forge.










Having been born and raised in Southern California, most US history has seemed kind of like myths to me – things that happened far away and long ago. To actually be standing in the middle of such a historical place as Valley Forge was nothing less than awe inspiring, and had it not been for Sophie, I would have spent days only five minutes away from it and never known.

When we arrived at “True Colors” we were met by Amanda. It feels a little odd to use that name as he was in boy mode, but I have no idea what “his” name is. Sophie got her makeover first, which gave me the chance to walk around exploring things and looking at the wigs Amanda had on display. The first thing that caught my interest was an awesome full length green gown with lots of different layers in the skirts. I was sure that it would look killer on me and kept trying to convince Amanda that it would be ever so much happier in my closet, but she wasn’t having any of it. While we were each getting makeovers, we were all three chatting, laughing, and teasing, and just having a great time. I’d have to say that cutting up and having fun with the two of them was the most fun I had that night.
When it came time for my makeover, I told Amanda to make me look like someone else and she rose to the challenge. I did have a bad moment though when she put a wig cap on me and then started applying tape across the back of my neck. Then she put some above each eye and started tugging on it – hard! More or less, she had given me a face lift using tape! I laughed and asked her if she had any tape tricks for getting rid of the bags under my eyes, and she told me not to tempt or dare her! Having the tape pulling on my face was one of the oddest feelings, at first very uncomfortable, and then fading to a mere irritation. After a lot of work on Amanda’s part, I was all glamorous and it was time to play with wigs! 

The first one I tried was sort of a page boy, with the sides longer in the front than in the back. Noting how adorable the models looked wearing it, I’d been wanting to see what that style would look like on me for years and now I knew – HORRIBLE!




Next we tried a very long wig that I was actually thinking about buying since she was selling it so cheaply. It had curls upon curls and this of course appeals to me, but in the end I decided that it really wasn’t going to be appropriate on me. Twenty years ago, maybe, but not at 44 years old.



The next one I tried on, I actually thought looked fantastic, but only with this elaborate and glamorous makeup that Amanda had provided. I would have taken it for the night if that had been an option, but I knew darn well it wouldn’t look as good on me with my every day face, so I had to pass on it . . .




The last one that we played with was Amanda’s own wig, because it appeared to be exactly what I was looking for. Just to be sure that it was the right color and cut, Amanda styled it on me for a quick look. Convinced that this was in fact the exact wig I have been searching for, Amanda now knew exactly the make, model, and color and ordered it for me. Not only that, but while it retails for something like $500, she sold it to me for just a touch over $200! With so many places out there ready to take advantage of TG’s, it was kind of heartening to see someone give an honestly awesome deal and bargain.




Done playing with new wigs, Amanda put my own wig in order. Despite my telling her of all the things that I had done wrong with my wig, she took a look at it and told me that it was actually in very good shape, especially given that it was three years old and gets worn so much. It didn’t take her long to make my wig look presentable and there I stood looking in the mirror at her handy work and feeling astounded that the person looking back from the mirror was me!



I made one more failed attempt to get Amanda to sell the green gown to me, which Amanda deftly avoided, making some comment about people that get obsessed over odd things like, oh, say, long green gowns. Knowing that her humor would be a welcome and fun addition to Sophie and my sarcasm, we invited Amanda to join us for the evening, but she declined. Something about her having had a very long day working with a wedding party and then doing our makeovers.



Back in King of Prussia, we made our way to Angela’s Laptop Lounge where we met and socialized with about 20 other TG’s and their guests from all over the area. Angela’s Laptop Lounge is in a pub attached to the mall, and it was kind of weird to see the mall empty of everyone except us and the security guard that kept encouraging us to stay in the area of the pub. I think we drove that poor guy nuts! I met and chatted with far too many people that night to keep all of their names straight so I’m not even gonna try. Suffice it to say that I met a lot of interesting people to talk to and really enjoyed the evening.

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Sunday rolled around and found me laying in bed until around 11AM. I wasn’t sleeping, but what with the pace I’d been keeping, the cold my first customer on this trip had given me, and the late night, I just didn’t feel like getting up. I was watching something of no consequence on TV when Sophie called me and invited me to breakfast/lunch with her. She was in boy mode, and so was I, and off we went looking for someplace that served brunch. Our search ultimately took us to a pub not far from her home, and as we entered, Sophie just about tripped over one of her life long friends and invited him to join us. We had an awkward couple of moments trying to skip over the issue of how Sophie and I had met each other, but in very little time everyone was chatting freely. After those two launched into several conversations regarding history and politics, I quickly came to realize that I was way out of my league with these two. It was nothing you could really put your finger on, nothing you could point to and say “That’s why”, but I just had the impression that I was sitting with two damned smart people. I began to think that I knew what the village idiot must feel like now, and I later commented to Sophie that I must be her token dumb friend.

When Sophie got me back to my hotel room, it was time to start getting ready for dinner with Captain Jenny! I had met Jenny before, in an airport when we were both in guy mode, but it’s just not the same. Jenny has an easy and infectious smile and constantly gives the impression that she is up to something or in on a joke that you don’t know about yet.





For diner, we went to the “Tavern on Camak” – a piano bar and restaurant that Sophie and I had visited before. We sort of circled the area first, making sure we knew how to find the place, and then we found a parking lot nearby. After a short walk down the alley to where the entrance was located, we made our way inside, where we found some people singing at the piano. The piano player played well, but frankly his singing left something to be desired, and so it was fortunate that several of the patrons were helping him out in that department. We looked around and found no indication at all that there might be a restaurant in the building and so I had to ask the bartender. He pointed out a staircase going down stairs that we had totally missed. I’d seen a blocked stair going up, but hadn’t noticed the open stairs going down. When we got to the bottom of the stairs, we found a couple of people gathered around a wine bar, and a cozy but empty dining area where the waiter seated us. I had my fears, assuming that an empty restaurant may imply a restaurant that people have decided isn’t worth eating at, but I’d have to say that the service was terrific and the food was good as well. Periodically as we ate and chatted, I couldn’t help wincing as I heard the piano player upstairs singing flat note after flat note, but what can you do? I had expected that hanging out with Jenny would be a fun time, and I wasn’t disappointed. As seems to be the agenda every time I meet with another TG, we talked for hours about everything we could think of. Way too soon, dinner was over and we made our way upstairs where we were discussing whether we should stay and listen to the piano player for a while or not. When I saw the tiny woman that had played the piano the last time I was here enter the building and begin getting ready to take her place at the piano, we decided that we would indeed stick around for a while. We stuck around and listened for a couple of hours until we both agreed that our work schedules the following morning really did dictate that the night must end.



On the drive back to King of Prussia, Jenny asked me a question that has kind of stuck with me, almost haunting me.
“How long will you do this? When will you stop cross dressing?”
What an interesting question. . .
“When I look in the mirror and see someone ugly looking back at me. When it no longer seems worth the effort I suppose . . . ” I hesitantly replied after thinking about it for a moment. The thing is, I am telling myself more and more often these days that it’s not worth the effort. I’ve had entire days on the road where I could have and didn’t. I’m making more and more flights in boy mode again because I just don’t feel like the work, effort, and angst of flying cross dressed.
“When will you stop cross dressing?”  I keep hearing that question in my head over and over this last week. Thanks for giving me something to obsess over Jenny!

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The next day, I completed my service call in the Philly area and then made the drive to Manassas VA, and the traffic going through the Washington DC area was every bit as bad as I had been warned it might be. I didn’t get in until after 7PM, so all I did was go grocery shopping and call it a night.

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Tuesday was of course dedicated to getting my customers system back up and running. That really didn’t take too terribly long, but given that it had failed twice in three weeks, I wasn’t inclined to go sprinting out the door as soon as it was working. Instead, I spent the day running the customer through how to operate it again, just to reinforce the training I had provided when we installed it a few weeks ago. I then told him that I was going to be staying in the area for a few days just to be sure everything continued to work! We had arrived quickly to resolve his issues, the system was now working well, and I was staying local just in case – the customer was thrilled!

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Wednesday, I checked in with my customer and found everything still working well and him still happy, so I returned to my hotel, got ‘dressed’, and headed for Washington DC to see what I could see! Sophie had warned me to wear “comfortable” shoes if I was going to check out the monuments in the National mall and I had just laughed. First of all, I don’t own a single pair of female flats, and second of all, life is way to short for wearing ugly shoes, so off I went in my cute skirt and high heels.



I knew everyone said not to drive in, but the very thought of trying to navigate my way through a huge city’s train and bus systems just scares the snot out of a small town desert rat like myself. To all of you that grew up in cities, this may be second nature, but to someone that has never used public transportation, it’s terrifying. Mind you, I am not concerned with my safety – that’s not what stops me. What stops me is having absolutely no clue how to navigate the system to the destination, and then even more important, to find my way back to what ever station I left the car at. I have this vision of being lost somewhere and with no idea how to get back to my car! Anyway, I made my way in to the city and circled the national mall looking at monuments and searching for a parking lot or garage. The Washington monument is of course visible from just about everywhere, and I also slowly drove by the World War II monument and could see Lincolns Monument way off in the distance. Several times I was forced almost entirely out of the city by traffic, one way streets, and streets that switch directions based on the time of the day. Still, I was stubborn and kept returning to the area looking for a parking area. Using my GPS, I did find several parking areas but that did me no good, because they were all full! When I found all of the parking areas more than two miles away from the monuments to be full and closed, I decided that it was time to throw in the towel and admit that driving in had been a bad idea.

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Thursday I was going to risk getting lost in public transit and return to DC in boy mode, but I just couldn’t find any enthusiasm for it. Just thinking about it I felt overwhelmed and exhausted and so I decided to just go see a movie in drab. I found that “The Other Guys” was playing and so I bought a ticket for it. If your thinking about seeing this movie – don’t. I would put it in the top three worst movies I’ve ever seen. It was boring, pointless, and had nothing I found even marginally redeeming.

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Friday it was at long last time to make the trip home. While I was gone, my one year old son had taken his first steps not holding on to something or someone, my (almost) seven year old daughter had started first grade, and my twenty one year old had at last called home from navy basic training. I know that most fathers would have missed these things, having to be at the office or job, but somehow it just seemed unfair that all of this had occurred while I was so far from home.
I felt absolutely no interest in flying home pretty. This time it wasn’t even a toss up, there was no inner discussion with myself over it – I just flat didn’t want to.

“When will you stop cross dressing?” Jenny had asked.
 “When I look in the mirror and see someone ugly looking back at me. When it no longer seems worth the effort I suppose . . . ”

I think I need a vacation – BAD!

Current mood:tired

 

I’m off to Detroit again, and apparently I’m not alone, ‘cause almost every car rental company was sold out. I always use Avis but this time they had to get me a rental car with National – more on that later.

I’m continuing to enjoy my new found appreciation for dresses and wore a new one on this trip. It is kind of a business / office kind of dress and I think looks very professional - unlike the tramp wearing it! When I took a seat in the gate area of the airport, I discovered that there is a bad girl element to the dress you see. While standing, the slit on the side didn’t appear to rise too terribly high, but when I took a seat I discovered that it showed a bit more leg than I was really comfortable with.



On my drive to the airport I was listening to the news on the radio and I got a little worried when they started warning everyone that the traffic in Austin, and especially around the airport, was going to go all to hell today. It seems that President Obama was visiting Austin somewhere around noon! How cynical I must have become in my old age, because here the President of the United States of America was coming to our city and my only real concern was the hope that he not mess up my drive to the airport! Fortunately I was arriving at the airport at about 630AM and he wasn’t coming in until around noon, so my drive did not suffer at all. I did have to chuckle a bit when I went through the TSA security process though, because they were all looking sharp, clearly intending to be “inspection ready”.

I got checked in and made my way through the TSA check point, then I pulled all of my things off of the X-ray machine and made my way to a seat where I put my jewelry and shoes back on. When I had all of my things back together I started off for my gate and almost fell flat on my face. The strap on my shoe had broken and it had come half way off of my foot! Limping along on my tip toe, I made my way to a chair, where I took my shoe off and examined it. The strap was supposed to be held on by a button, and the thread holding the button in place had broken. Fortunately the button was still gripping the strap and so I had not lost it. Tucking the strap inside the shoe and under my foot, I made my way through the airport looking for a sewing repair kit, thinking I could probably repair the darn thing myself. Not one of the half a dozen shops in the airport carried a sewing kit, and so I spent the rest of the morning wearing one shoe with a mary jane strap and one shoe without. Talk about a fashion statement!
The good news though, is that the Chicago O’Hare airport has not only a shoe shine place, but a full fledged shoe repair shop! With a lot of grins from the two or three guys working there, they had my shoe repaired in less than 10 minutes and it only cost me $6! The inside of the shoe looks a bit rough now, but the outside still looks flawless. Feeling more than grateful, I gave him a $5 tip on top of that, and headed off for my connection.

When I landed in Detroit, I almost headed to the Avis shuttle bus out of habit, but caught myself as I exited the building. The National shuttle bus driver was real nice, grabbing my bags as I boarded, and then chatting with me as we made the drive to the lot.
“Are you a member of our program?” He asked me.
“Nope. I’ve gotta be honest, I normally use your competition – Avis.” I told him with a laugh.
“Well, once you have used us, you wont go back to them!”
“Confidence AND pride! I like that! And you know, I have to be honest that Avis has sort of pissed me off pretty bad a few times lately anyway!”
“Really?! What did they do that made you mad?” he asked, looking at me through the large mirror as he was driving.
“Well the worst was calling me three weeks after I returned a car in Wisconsin to tell me that I had scratched the hell out of the trunk and they were gonna charge me for it! THREE WEEKS it took them to try and blame it on me.” I told him, getting mad at the very memory of it.
“No WAY? You didn’t pay for it did you?” he asked.
“I told my company not to pay for it under any circumstances and that I’d be willing to go to court over it. It offended my principles that they were blaming me for something I didn’t do. As if I wouldn’t have the moral integrity to admit it if I had scratched a car in the snow and ice that was covering the roads at the time. Still, I think my company IS going to pay for it, just because it’s easier than fighting with them.”
“Well that’s just not right!” he said. “Be sure you walk around and inspect the car before you take it from now on.”
“Oh, no question about that!” I told him with a laugh.

Since I was not a member of their program, I had to go the counter for my rental agreement, and the lady there was just awesome. She made the same claim that I wouldn’t want to go back to Avis after I had used National. After a little bit of chatting and laughing, I had my rental agreement and was told to go to the luxury lot and pick out the car I wanted. Since Ford was going to be one of my customers on this trip, I made it a point to grab one of theirs.

I got my bags put away in the trunk, my GPS programmed for the hotel, and then grabbed my contract and drivers license so I’d have them available for the gate guard. At least that had been my plan, because I couldn’t find my damned drivers license! I went through my wallet and purse at least half a dozen times – not there. I dumped every thing out of my backpack twice – not there. I pulled my bags back out of the trunk to be sure I hadn’t dropped it there when I was loading them – no drivers license. I had just had it not five minutes ago when I was at the counter, so I returned there and asked the young lady behind the counter – nope, not there either! By now I’ve been bouncing around inside the car, walking around it, and walking to the counter and back for about 15 minutes, so two National employees walked up and asked if I needed help.
“Thanks, but I don’t think there’s much you can do! Being the brilliant person that I am, somehow I’ve managed to loose my drivers license between here (I pointed at the car) and there (I pointed at the office).”
“Well, let us know if we can help!” they told me, both laughing as they walked off.
Just as I was getting ready to really get upset and blow a gasket, I found it where it had slid down between the seat and center console, standing straight up on edge so that the edge was all you could see.

As I pointed out in the title of this post, I think I need a vacation or something, because I am always exhausted these days. I don’t mean just tired, I mean the kind of worn out where you sit in your car or your room for a couple of moments trying to convince yourself that you really don’t have any reason in the world to feel like crying. To add to the worn out feeling, I have this wonderful condition called Erythema Nodosum. Ironically enough, according to the many doctors I’ve seen through the years, its an almost exclusively female condition. Anyway, the end result is that I have these large and very painful bruises and bumps all over my rear, my thighs, and my calves. This is a particularly bad flare up and so I pretty much hurt every where from the waist down. It hurts when I walk, hurts when I stand, and hurts when I sit, so I pretty much can’t win.
Suffice it to say that by the time I got to my hotel room, I was really tired, hurt everywhere, and so I just called it a night.

The following day I worked until 730PM trying to get both of my customers back up and running. To be honest, part of my motivation was also the hope that I could just get both repairs done that day and catch an early flight home the next, but it wasn’t to be. After staying so late, we ran into a serious problem that was going to take me a couple of hours to address, and so we agreed to return to the issue in the morning. Once in my hotel room I started checking my emails and found one from Victoria, a local Tgirl that I had met once before. She’s a real sweetheart and we keep threatening to meet up again but never seem to get our schedules together. Anyway, she wrote that she might be able to meet me that night if I was free. I sat there feeling worn out, with my legs hurting and throbbing, empty stomach growling, and looking at my hands and clothes that were filthy from the days work. I wrote her back and told her not today, but that I’d be happy to meet with her tomorrow. She wrote back to say that she wasn’t going to get off of work until 11PM tomorrow, so it looks like we miss each other yet again.

The next day I returned to my customer to resolve the remaining issues. As I parked, I reached for my cell phone to call them and let them know that I was there. The only problem being that I couldn’t find my cell phone. Once again I dumped my backpack just as I had when I was looking for my drivers license the day before, but no cell phone. Eventually I gave up and just headed for the lobby where I used their phone to call my contact. The good news is that I was able to resolve the remaining issues in a few hours, and was then free for the rest of the afternoon.



Despite the dark bruises all over my legs, I decided to wear a relatively short skirt because it was just too darn hot for anything else. Once I got dressed, I had the usual dilemma – what to do?! I decided to continue looking for new hair, and even realized that the Detroit area would be a perfect place to find a wig shop I can build a relationship with. I’m there so often, it would make a perfect place to find a shop that I could return to over and over if I wanted to.

I searched the internet for “wigs near Detroit” and while it came up with a lot of hits, I didn’t find a single one that had a web page I could browse, so I headed for the car, setup my GPS and searched for “Wig”. It offered me quite a few options and so off I headed to the closest one where I found an Asian woman helping an elderly lady. While she was helping the older woman I browsed around but didn’t see anything comparable to my favorite hair. All of hers were by a manufacturer that I’d ever heard of, and frankly struck me as cheap, and sure as heck didn’t approach the quality of the one I had, so I thanked her and left. The next shop I visited had gone out of business and was closed up tight. The third shop I went clearly catered almost exclusively to African Americans because every piece she had was either very dark black or brown, or exotic (Orange, red, purple, etc). I decided to head to Ferndale because I’d been told several times that they have a large GLBT community there, and so I thought that maybe their wig stores would have a better selection, but it wasn’t to be. The first one I visited there still had the lights on and everything, but had the closed sign up despite it’s being just 445PM, and the next store I found had also gone out of business. Apparently owning a wig store in the Detroit area isn’t a real good idea . . .

I’d had enough disappointment for the day and decided I’d give up for now and just go have dinner, and so I made my way to Maria’s Italian restaurant. I had found this place a couple of years ago, because it’s right next door to the “SoHo” bar / club where I used to go for karaoke all of the time. The food is good and the owner and wait staff have always been really friendly with me, so I’ve made it a point to try and eat there when I can. When I entered, I was greeted by the one waitress working at the time. She is a pretty woman with mid length brown hair, and I’d guess that she is probably in her early thirties.
“Just one?” she asks me with a smile.
“Yup, just me – the lone ranger.” I replied.
“Hey, I remember you, you’re the karaoke . . . person.”  There was a ever so short pause between “Karaoke” and “Person” and I busted up laughing.
“Go on, you can say it! We both know you were gonna say “Karaoke Queen” before you decided it might not be the best way to phrase it, huh?!”  We both laughed as she seated me.
“Uh, no, not at all! I’d never say anything like that!” she said with a shit-eating-grin that made it clear that this was exactly what she had been thinking. A little later in the evening, I could hear her softly singing to the Dean Martin music playing on the intercom as she was cleaning things up at another table.
“I see that I’m not the only one here that likes to sing.” I told her with a wink when she brought me my check.
“Just when I’m alone or in the shower, but NEVER karaoke!” she laughed. As she took away the check and my credit card, the owner approached my table. He is very tall, well over six feet, and has very short hair, almost a military cut. He has taken the time to talk to me every single time I’ve been there.
“So I see that your back in town.” He says, and then continues after a short pause. “I’m a master of the obvious, aren’t I?”.
“That’s OK,” I told him with a laugh. “I always make it a point to eat here when I can.”
“I’m glad to hear that. So how was your dinner?” he asked.
“It was awesome, thank you. Of course, that’s why I make it a point to come here!” I replied.
“Well I guess that makes sense, so then once again I’ve stated the obvious !” he said with a laugh, and then he retreated as I filled out the credit card slip and handed it to the waitress. I had to walk right by him again where he was sitting at the wine bar on my way out the door, and he spoke as I went by.
“Hey! You do know it’s not karaoke night tonight right?!” he asked, picking on me by implying that I had chosen the wrong night to be there.
“Actually, according to their web page it IS karaoke night tonight, but it doesn’t really matter. I’ve got a flight to catch in the morning, and they don’t start the karaoke until too late for me to hang around. I don’t do late nights followed by early mornings much anymore!”
“Well, I hope you have a good night anyway and we hope to see you next time you are in town.” He told me with a smile.

When I was seated in my rental car, I checked my makeup and was shocked to see a fairly large spot on my chin was 100% clear of foundation. I have no idea what part of my dinner I had managed to get on my chin that cleaned foundation off, but there was a spot about the size of a dime that was glaringly obvious. Embarrassed, I wondered how much of the evening I had spent that way. Still, even though I have never had to use it until now, I always carry foundation and powder with me just in case, and so in short order I had it repaired. It was only 630PM and so I decided ‘what the heck, let’s hit up Macy’s and JC Penny’s and see if we can find a new pair of shoes.’ I checked out JC Penny but didn’t find anything I liked there, so I headed to Macy’s. As I was browsing through their shoe section, I noticed a young woman, probably still in her teens, wearing a scarf over her hair, neck, and shoulders. I assume this is a Middle Eastern or Muslim thing but wouldn’t claim to know enough their culture to be sure. She is cute, and despite the very conservative scarf over her hair and shoulders, she is wearing a colorful and cute dress with pants under it. I noticed her because of her bright outfit, and because she apparently worked in the shoe section. I’d have to admit that I was a little nervous to approach her for help because I wasn’t sure how someone of her culture might feel about someone like me. Still, I told myself I was being silly for making assumptions, and besides, it was her job, and so I did approach her with one pair that I liked.
“Can I help you?” she asked with a professional smile that I thought might be just a little on the cold side.
“Sure! Do you have these in nine and a half and tens? I’d bring both sizes if you have them, because it might save you trip.” I asked, handing her the shoe I had picked out. She punched a lot of keys on her PC and then responded.
“I have both. If you will wait here, I’ll go get them!” she told me. She seemed a little friendlier, and despite her clearly middle Eastern features and scarf, her English had absolutely no trace of an accent, making it pretty clear that she was probably born in the US just like I was. As she walked off, I was feeling guilty for having had my reservations about dealing with her, and I was kind of contemplating the less than flattering things that my earlier assumption implied about me, when another young girl spoke to me over her shoulder as she walked by me from behind. I was caught by surprise and deep in thought and didn’t catch what she said.
“I’m sorry, what did you say?” I asked her. She was almost a carbon copy of the young lady that was now in the warehouse looking for the shoes I wanted. She was also probably in her late teens, cute as a button, and wearing a long scarf over her long hair and shoulders.
“I’m going to scare her when she comes out. Let me know when she’s at the door!” she told me with a huge grin, and clearly not willing to even entertain the thought that I might not want to be an accomplice.
“Hmmm . . . I dunno . . . . “ I told her.
“She’s my friend – it will be funny!” she told me.
“Well I sure hope so! I’d hate to think you were gonna scare the heck outta a complete stranger!” I told her and we both laughed.
“Just put your thumb up or something to let me know when she’s coming out, OK?”
“OK, but she might be a while you know. I sent her after two pairs.” I replied, and then moved to a position at the counter where I thought I’d get more warning as she was approaching the door. So there we stood, me at the counter getting ready to warn her when her friend was going to exit the door, and her beside the door and waiting to jump out. We kept glancing at each other while we waited for her friend, and then without warning, she said something to me that absolutely floored me.
“You are SO cute!”
I think my jaw literally dropped and it was right then that her friend walked out of the warehouse carrying two boxes of shoes . . . using a completely different door. . . .
Of course this caught her friend and I completely by surprise, but still the one girl tried to scare the other by running the ten or so feet to the other door and yelling “Boo!” at her. We all had a good laugh at what had turned out to be a pathetic attempt at scaring someone. The bad news? The shoes looked good but were far too uncomfortable for someone that does as much walking as I do.
As I left the store, it was with a mixture of feelings. I was very pleased that a young lady had been so willing to speak with me, include me in her fun, and even to tell me that I was cute, but I also felt ashamed that I had made assumptions about her because of her attire and presumed culture. Those who live in glass houses really shouldn’t be throwing stones you know!

The following morning was my trip home, and once again my legs hurt and I felt emotionally and physically worn out, so I made the trip in boy mode. Oh – do you remember that I told you I had rented a car from national? Yeah, I tried to turn it in at the Enterprise lot, and I swear I’m not kidding.

Did I mention that I need a vacation?

Apparently I spell "BWI" as "Dulles"

This week I’m off to Manassas VA for a few days where I have an installation to take care of. I wasn’t all that happy to travel on a Sunday at all, and it was even worse than that because my son leaves for the Navy today. Instead of seeing him off to Basic, I’m on airplanes. . .

Since I had a flight that leaves fairly late in the morning, and I prefer to be out of the house before sunrise to avoid being seen by the neighbors, I once again decided to stop at Denny’s by the Austin airport and eat a nice and leisurely breakfast. I got the usual smiles and grins from the waitresses and the patrons as I was led to a table. I kind of took my time eating, read my book, sucked down some coffee, and then caught my flight!



I had kind of a giggle moment on the flight. I was in a window seat and debating asking the woman on the aisle to let me up to use the restroom, when she simplified things by getting up to use it herself. As she came out of the bathroom, she opened the door pretty quickly and caught the flight attendant as she was going by and darn near knocked her down. As long as she was out of the seat and no longer blocking my way, I made my own way to the bathroom. When I returned to my seat I thanked her for getting up for me.
“Thank you! I thought I’d take advantage of your being up to go to the bathroom my darn self!” I told her with a grin.
“Oh no problem at all.” She replied with a smile.
“Of course I didn’t get to knock the flight attendant down. . . “ I told her with a wink and a smile. She turned bright red and quickly started to insist that it had been an accident, as if I’d had any doubt.
On the next leg of my flight, I sat next to a retired Lieutenant Colonel and he was one of the nicest folks I’ve sat next to. Everyone I’ve ever sat next to has been willing to chat with me, but I often get the feeling that they are either tickled about what I am or else tolerating me. Very few give absolutely no sign at all that I am not your average traveler, but this gentleman did. He neither went out of his way to make an exaggerated attempt to treat me as a lady, nor did he give any signs that he was either amused or irritated by what I was. He treated me exactly like anyone would treat me were I not cross dressed. It was kind of refreshing. So we were chatting off and on as people were boarding and I made the comment that I had missed getting upgraded to first class by only one spot on the list. The plane was at the end of the boarding process and he and I were laughing about the differences in flying first class versus sardine class when the flight attendant approached our seats. She looked at all of us in the entire row, looked confused and then spoke hesitantly to everyone in the area.
“Matthew Huddle??” she asked us all in a very timid voice and looking from face to face for some sign of recognition. I grimaced at the use of my full name as she had just essentially outted me to everyone in ear shot, but I figured I didn’t know any of them anyway, so I waved at her and smiled.
“That’s me.”
“Would you like to ride up front instead?” She asked with a smile that made it clear she knew what the answer was going to be.
“Hmm, let’s see . . . “ I paused for effect. “You betcha I do!”
I traded grins with the guy I had been chatting with as I grabbed my bag and headed up the aisle toward First Class. As I grabbed my stuff, I could see another flight attendant having the same conversation with another woman, and she was also grabbing her things and moving up. The other woman and I had just got our bags put away and were sitting down when another flight attendant walked up to us.
..”I am SO sorry, but you’re both going to have to go back to your original seats. It turns out that the passengers assigned to these seats DID make it after all and are on their way down the jet bridge.” She told us with an apologetic tone of voice.
“Danm them!” I replied with a laugh so that she would know I was just kidding.
“I know!” she told me quietly as she helped me by grabbing my bags. “And the woman assigned to that seat is pissed, because she has to check her carry on because that’s a bulkhead seat.”
“That’s ok, I suspect that she will get over it.” I told her.
As I got back to my seat, I see that the guy I had been chatting with has moved from the center seat to mine.
“I’m sorry about this, but it looks like we both got unlucky this time. They took one good look at me and threw me out of first class!” I told him with a grin. I was surprised to hear a number of people sitting around me start to laugh, though I’m not sure if it was with me or at me.

When the flight attendants made their rounds later to offer the passengers drinks, I told her I just wanted some water.
“Would you prefer a drink or beer for the first class mix up?” she asked me, looking terribly embarrassed.
“Nah . . . well . . . on second thought – sure! I’ll take a screw driver please!”
“I am so sorry about that! I hate it when that happens!” she told me as she gathered the things together.
“It’s absolutely not a problem! You tried to take good care of me and offer me a better seat as a courtesy and a perk. I very much appreciate the thought!” I told her as I accepted my drink.
After landing at BWI, I gathered my things and got my car rental car to make the hour and half drive to my hotel in Manassas.  As I was pulling out of the rental car lot, I saved the location to my GPS as “Airport BWI” so there would be no confusion finding it when it was time to go home.


The following day was all about work of course. It was a little more hectic than normal because this was not product line that I work on often. To add to the anxiety, it was an entirely new configuration AND it was with the same customer that my friend was fired for abandoning in the past. In other words, they were already angry with my company, looking for any sign of incompetence or our being unprofessional, AND it was a new configuration that I was not terribly familiar with. It was nerve wracking, but in the end we found and resolved a number of issues on our customers end, and were able to start a 12 hour long safety test before calling it a night. The other engineer from my company that was working with me had brought his wife with him to Manassas and they were in a different hotel, so I would have been free and clear to spend the evening as Kim. Instead, I chose to go to dinner with my wife’s aunt and uncle who live only minutes away from Manassas. He had come from a very humble beginning as had I, but he had managed to go quite a bit farther than I had. He had retired from the Air Force, where he had obtained at least one masters degree, and I think possibly more. While I admire the way that he has educated and made something of himself, that’s not really what impresses me the most about him or his wife. What really impresses me is the outlook and humor they have in their life. Like my wife and I, they have seen much of the world while they were in the service and even after they got out. They saw humor and brought humor to every place and everyone they visited. It is so hard to describe – I think that you would have to spend time talking to them to understand why I like them so much.

The following day we returned to the customer to find that our system and the customers semiconductor tool it was a part of, had both passed their 12 hour testing proving it was at least safe to operate them. In about three hours we had everything up and running, the customer satisfied, and we were free to do what we wanted for the rest of the afternoon.

I had seriously considered going to see some of the monuments in the nation’s capital, but I wouldn’t have time to do it as Kim. If I’d taken the time to get ready, it would have been too late in the afternoon and put me right in the middle of some of the worst rush hour traffic in the entire continent. On the other hand, I really had my heart set on being pretty, so I had a decision to make – be pretty or see the monuments? In the end I did what most cross dressers would do, and chose wearing a skirt and heels over seeing some of our nations most precious monuments and memorials. For the record, I consider this clear and obvious proof that I am screwed up in the head. . .
When I took my blond hair out of the box I carry it in, I had to laugh at it’s condition. In fact I thought that it looked so amusing I decided to share a picture of it. By the way, I never did get this to look decent enough to wear it out.




Once I got cleaned up and ready, I started looking for something to do that wouldn’t involve three hours stuck in traffic. There were no movies out that I wanted to see but hadn’t already seen, and my bank account has told me that I’ve done quite enough clothes shopping lately, thank you very much! In the end, I decided to go looking for a wig shop and see if I can find a replacement for my favorite wig, or at least a pro who could tell me exactly what the model is so I can look online. The first wig shop I stopped at was in Manassas itself, but they had very little that I had any interest in, and sure as heck didn’t have anything like the one I have.

Next I went south to Fairfax where I found a nice place called the “Hair Boutique”  (www.HairBoutiqueoffairfax.com). In it, I found a cute young lady who took my entry into her shop entirely in her stride.



“Hi! How can I help you?” She asked with a genuine smile.
“I’m looking for this!” I said, while pointing my finger at my wig. “It’s getting old and so I’m trying to find a replacement before it gets worn out.”
“That is beautiful . . .” She said matter of factually while she continued to look it over. “It’s clearly never been heat damaged either. How old is it?”
“Well thank you! Oh yeah, I learned the hard way a long time ago that heat and synthetic wigs don’t mix. I think it’s about two or three years old.”
”Well it looks amazing, especially considering that synthetics are only supposed to last six months to a year.”
“Well thanks! Even more impressive, this one gets washed at least twice a week so you would kind of expect it to degrade even faster.” I told her.
“Do you style it?” she asked, and then after a pause “Did you buy that here?”
“I hairspray and brush the snot out of it on a regular basis,” I replied with a grin. “And no, I bought it at the Southern Comfort Conference?”  I waited a moment to see if she had any idea what that conference is, and she shook head “no” indicating she was clueless.
“Well, it’s pretty much the world’s largest conference or gathering of transgendered people.” She still looked clueless. “More or less, Cross dressers like me.” I told her with a wink, and was rewarded with a smile indicating that she now had the concept.

As we were browsing the wigs that she had on display, I noticed a large photo with three beautiful women in it, and then grinned when I realized that the woman in the middle was none other than Raquel Welch herself. I was amused because the wig I was trying to find was in fact a Raquel Welch.
“Speaking of the devil!” I said to the lady while pointing at the picture. She got a serious look on her face and told me that one of the other women in the picture was in fact her co-worker (or maybe the owner of the shop?) and that at one point she had been the top seller for Raquel Welch wigs. She showed me lots of things but didn’t have exactly what I was looking for. Either they were long but kind of straight and flat, or they were full and too light or dark in color. She assured me that they could order something like it, but given that I was on a plane the following morning, that wasn’t going to be an option. I didn’t get what I wanted, but still I was impressed with the friendly service and also with the way she was so comfortable dealing with me. If you live in the area, I’d sure give them a shot were I you!




Having failed to find a perfect replacement for my wig, I headed back to Manassas where I hit up the Manassas mall. I browsed the sales racks and looked at shoes in Macy’s but didn’t see anything that I couldn’t live without, so I headed to JC Pennys where I found an awesome retro skirt on closeout for $5! Pleased with the great deal on the skirt, I headed for my car, where I found two women and a child standing in front of the car next to me. They all had an apprehensive look on their faces, as if their car had broken down or something. I got into my own car and tried to decide if I should ask them if they needed help or not. I sat there for a moment and watched them making phone calls and looking nervous, so I rolled down my window to ask if they were all right. As soon as my window started down, one of the women approached me.
“Excuse me miss?” she said with a huge smile making it fairly clear that the “miss” was probably a courtesy. “We are looking for the Bank of America. We thought there was an ATM in the mall but we couldn’t find it. Do you have any idea where B of A is?”
“No,” I told her as I reached up and took my GPS off the windshield. “But I’ll bet that this does!”
It took a moment to make the search and bring up a map that showed her the route, but soon I had it displayed and showed it to her through the open window. She looked at the map for a moment and then looked up at me and shrugged, clearly still confused about how to find it. I glanced at the map and thought to myself that there is just no way to make it any clearer, so I just told her to follow me and I’d take her there. As I’m talking to her, the little boy, maybe seven or eight years old, points right at me and laughs as he whispers in the other woman’s ear. She quickly pushed his hand down and gave me a quick and mortified look, apparently stunned that a child would do something rude. I just winked at her to let her know that it was OK and not a big deal – after all, you can’t really blame the boy for noticing that I’m different and she did her job by teaching him it was rude to point. In moments they were loaded into their van and followed me less than a mile to the bank where I waved good bye and then went to dinner at the Olive Garden close by.




The following morning I had the usual debate with myself – pretty or drab? Sleep an extra hour and a half and go as Matt, or get up early and go as Kim? Also as usual, I decided to go as Kim, and so it was up at 6AM for the drive to BWI and my 1230PM flight.
Checking out of the hotel, the clerk was a young man who was clearly fairly new to the job, and he was a nervous wreck. I don’t know if he was nervous because he was new, or because he was dealing with a cross dresser, so I just smiled and tried to be patient. As he was checking me out and getting my receipt, I recalled that I had lost the receipt from one of my other stays with their chain.
“Hey, can y’all print me out a receipt for a stay I had at one of your other hotels a couple of weeks ago? I called them twice asking them to send me one, but they never did.”
“Uh, I don’t know!” he said. He then turned and called to a woman seated in the office behind him. She came out and joined us, and he repeated to her what I had asked for.
“I’m so sorry, but we have no way to do that.” She told me. “We don’t have access to their database or anything like that.” 
“OK, no worries! I figured as much but thought it wouldn’t hurt to ask!” I told her with a smile. I guess she had noticed how nervous her young coworker was because she let out a short laugh.
“Relax and smile Tony!” she told him with a huge grin on her face. I just couldn’t resist it and spoke up.
“Yeah, don’t panic Tony, your doing just fine!” I told him to everyone’s laughter.



In a moment I had all of my bags in the rental car and was ready to head out for the airport, so I grabbed my GPS and looked in my “favorites” where I quickly found and selected “Airport BWI”. I made the selection on the GPS and then scoffed at its asking me to “Please fasten your seatbelt.”

As I turned in the rental car at Avis, you could see the moment that the man figured out that I was a guy, and it was all hands off after that. Regardless of whether I’m in male or female mode, they will often offer to help when they see all of the bags and stuff I’m traveling with. Not this guy though, because he backed up and clearly wanted nothing to do with me. I fumbled with my luggage, tool box, and my purse, and then made my way to the shuttle bus where the driver did go out of his way to help and so I tipped him a couple of dollars.

Checking in at the Delta kiosk, the machine told me that I had to see a representative, and so I dragged all of my stuff over to the “First Class / Elite” line where I waited my turn. Behind me I can hear two women talking, and one is being asked to repeat herself over and over.
“Where IS your hearing aid?!” she finally asked the other woman.
“I didn’t bring it and I don’t give a damn!” the other woman replied. At this point I had to turn around and see this pair. One woman in her 60’s was pushing the other and older woman in a wheel chair. Both were clearly Caucasian, but were wearing turbans. Struck by the contrast (Caucasian but wearing a turban) I looked at them in more detail and noticed that they weren’t wearing any of the other garb I would typically associate with a woman from the middle east. I decided to take the plunge.
“No one is going to say anything you want to hear here anyway right?” I asked the older woman in the wheel chair. They both just laughed and agreed but I had to cut the conversation off as the Delta rep was calling me forward. I approached, wished him a good morning, and handed him my ID. He punched a few keys, then a few more, then looked up at me with a confused look.
“Where are you flying to dear?” he asked.
“Honestly, I didn’t pay any attention to where it connected at, but I’m going to Austin Texas.” I told him. He hit a few more keys then looked up at me again.
“Your reservation is with this airport right?” he asked. He actually set me back a step with that question. I mean the very idea that I was too stupid to go to the correct airport was kind of offensive.
“Yes,” I laughed, “from this airport. This is BWI right?” I asked, in a heavily sarcastic tone. The joke was on me though because he started shaking his head ‘no’.
“Dear, this is Dulles – NOT BWI” he tells me.
I just stood there looking at him for a second with my mind reeling, trying to think of all of the implications. How in the hell had I managed to go to the wrong damned airport? All I can figure is that at some time in the past I had flown in to Dulles and saved the airports location in my GPS as “Airport BWI” by mistake. Turning dark red with embarrassment, I began to consider my options. It would cost several hundred dollars to rent a car to drive one way from Dulles to BWI. I looked at the time and discovered that I couldn’t make it in time for my scheduled flight anyway, so it would be several hundred for the car, and at least $100 to change flights, and quite possibly I’d have to purchase all new tickets for a hell of a lot more.
“So how much would it cost to change my flights to leave out of here?” I asked him sheepishly.
“We don’t have anything flying coach until late tonight.” He said after doing a lot of typing on his computer. “That would be an additional $750.”
I choked when he told me the cost of my little screw up. While I was standing there in shock and trying to figure out what I should do, he was still typing away.
“Well, if you want to buy a first class ticket I can get you out of here at noon. That would cost you $900.” He tells me.
“Fine, I’ll take it. . . “ I finally told him, still kind of in shock that I had done something so very stupid that was going to cost my company so much. I glanced behind me and saw that both of the older women behind me were looking irritated as hell over how long it was taking me. I shrugged and mouthed “I’m so sorry.”
“Are you going to be much longer?!” the one standing behind the wheelchair asked me in a highly irritated tone. Clearly this woman in the expensive clothing and turban was not used to having to wait for others.
“No, we are almost done.” I told her as I handed the man behind the counter my credit card. I turned to leave after he handed me my tickets and receipt, and the older woman in the wheelchair practically shouts in a very snotty tone “Well! It’s about time!” 
I just smiled and walked off, now day dreaming about pushing her wheel chair down the “up” escalator. . .

On the flight home, the flight attendant was a real sweetheart, full of smiles and always calling me “Miss”. As I was stepping off of the plane in Austin she leaned in close.
“You look fantastic!” she said softly in my ear.
“Awe, thank you, and thank you for calling me ‘miss’ too!” I told her with a grin.
“It was my pleasure!” She said with laugh and a pat on my back.

"Sir. . . "

For those of you that have been bitching about the length of my posts, this one ought to make you happy, or at least happier, ‘cause there really isn’t a hell of a lot to say this time around.
I was gonna wear a new skirt and a new top, and as I often do, I laid them out on the bed and I asked my wife if she thought that they went together. She looked at the proposed outfit for a moment before she answered.
“Maybe . . . . on second thought, no, I don’t think so.” she said. She hadn’t seemed all that confident in her answer though, so I thought I’d make my own call on it.
“Well, I think I’m gonna have to buck you on this one because I think they do and that’s what I’m gonna wear tomorrow!” I told her with a grin.
“Ok, it’s your call!” she replied, while walking out the door. She was probably afraid that if she stayed, she’d get hit by shrapnel from the Kim bomb in the room.
The joke was on me though, because the next morning when I put the outfit on, I had to agree with her – damn it! Off came the new top, and on went one of my standard fall backs – a black knit blouse that goes with just about everything.



Absolutely nothing of interest happened going through the airports. The only amusing moment was listening to a mother talking to her children behind me as the plane started to land..
“Yay! The plane is starting to drop! This is SO boring!” says the little boy loudly. Very quickly I hear the mother offer him some advice.
“Please DON’T say ‘we’re dropping’ - say ‘we’re landing’ instead!”
Of course everyone in ear shot busted up laughing.



By the time I had settled in to my hotel room, I’d been up and running for over 14 hours and looked and felt tired, and so I called it a day. I got showered up and went back to caterpillar mode for dinner.

The following morning I headed for the Canadian border to go to the University of Waterloo where I was to repair an instrument. Apparently the Canadians have decided that my prior trips had gone too easily and so made this one tougher. The female immigration agent at the drive through check point grilled me on where I was going and why. When I told her I was going to perform a warranty repair for the University, she wanted paper work showing that the instrument was under warranty. I explained that the instrument was several years old and technically beyond it’s warranty, but that it suffered from a known manufacturing flaw and so we were repairing it free of charge. She still wanted something in writing describing this, and so I pulled up the service report on my laptop and showed it to her, though I had no way to give her a copy. She grilled me for 20 minutes and then sent me to their Customs office where THEY grilled me for another 35 minutes. At last, he agreed I was probably OK to go through, but that since I was carrying over $10,000 in parts and tools in my standard repair kit, I had to go to their “Commercial” office and complete paper work there. Now at the commercial office, they grilled me for yet another 30 minutes!

“I’m sure the University has a broker for this sort of thing. We need you to contact them and have them send us the paper work showing that this is a warranty.” The man tells me after he had grilled me for half an hour. This was the last straw for me though – I’d just had enough.
“I know you guys are just doing your job, and I’ve no complaint with that, but this whole thing has just exceeded my maximum allowed pain in the ass factor. By the time the professor I’m dealing with finds this broker, they find and complete the paper work you want and get it to you, I will be missing my flight home. I wanted to take care of him, but I guess he can just mail the damned thing back to us in the States and we’ll fix it there for him.” I told him. I was mad as hell, but still managed to say it calmly and politely.
He looked at me a second, told me to wait there, and a moment later I hear him talking to a supervisor. Soon she approaches me, asks me all of the same questions, and then tells me I am free to continue on to the University! What do you know – we finally made progress when I threatened to take my toys and go home!
After flying 14 hours, being delayed by their immigration for 2 hours, then driving another 2 hours to get there, it took me a whopping 2 hours to repair the instrument. I thought I was going to have time to go out as Kim, perhaps even to the see Niagara Falls, but I wound up in a huge line of cars trying to enter the US, and by the time I got through that, it was too late and I was too tired to worry about going anywhere.




On the flight home the next morning, I had thought that I was looking pretty good, but when I ordered a Chocolate Mocha, the woman at the counter started every question with “Sir”.
“sir, do you want large or extra-large?”
“Sir, do you want whipped cream on it?”
I might have thought that she was just being rude, but I heard her speak to all of the customers behind me the very same way. English was clearly not her first language and so perhaps it is the custom where she is from.
“Sir. . .”
“Sir . . .”
“Sir. . . “
Oh well . . .

Oh I wish I were an Oscar Mayer Wiener . . .

Just a couple of weeks ago I was in Indianapolis covering a service contract of ours with a customer in the region. Normally we have a dedicated engineer for this customer, but he wanted to take a vacation and so they mailed me in to fill in while he was out. Well, as luck would have it (bad luck for him, good luck for me) shortly after he got back from his vacation he had some sort of crisis with his family and had to turn right back around and leave again, and so here I am back in Indy.

.. ..

You know, for many years I’ve avoided wearing dresses, feeling that they were not flattering on me. Lately though, I’ve been rethinking this and giving them another go, and to be honest, I’m having a ball. I just bought this dress on sale from JC Penny through the internet and adore it! It fits well, and the white tabs on the sides sort of help give the illusion of a waist AND JC Penny’s was practically giving it away for something like $30! It was a win-win the whole way around.

..
..

..
..

When I checked in at the Delta counter for my flight, I was helped by the very same gentleman who had helped me the last time, and we had a very similar conversation.

.. ..

“Hey! Nice to see you with us again! So they aren’t making you take US Scareways anymore huh?” he said with a smile, poking fun at his competition.

“From time to time they still are. Believe me, if I had my way, I’d fly Delta all of the time.” I told him.

“Yeah, that’s what you were saying the last time we talked.” He said with a compassionate tone of voice.

“Well, I’m also Silver on their program, but I never get upgrades from them. You guys have me in first class almost every time I fly.”

“No kidding? I wonder why they don’t upgrade you?”

“I think most of the time they actually don’t even have first class sections, but my last flight with them they had three empty first class seats and still didn’t upgrade me.” I told him with a bit of a pout.

“Well then, we’ll have to make sure that we do better than that!” he said, and he did, because I flew first class the whole way!

.. ..

I’ve sort of made it my mission to try and chat with the TSA folks at least a little bit while going through the lines and process. I’m not sure why, I guess I just sort of want them to see me as a person and not just as a cross dresser.

.. ..

“Good morning! How are you doing this morning?” I asked the female TSA inspector who took my ID and tickets. She looked up at me and smiled.

“I’m just fine thanks! How are you?” She replied

“Oh, I couldn’t be a hell of a lot gooder, but I guess I would rather be home and still in bed!” I replied and we both laughed.

.. ..

As I was placing my stuff on the x-ray belt, a flight attendant walked up behind me. Flight crew can walk right to the front of the line, and often do, but she got behind me. I sort of waved her forward, letting her know it was fine if she wanted to get in front of me.

“Oh no! Thank you, but I’m in no hurry!” she told me.

We were both standing there bored, and waiting for the woman in front of us to get her act together and out of the way, so I looked at her again.

“You know, sometimes I feel like I spend as much time on these things as you flight attendants do.” I told her with a grin.

“Oh I dunno, I pretty much live in the airports and airplanes.” She replied, and we both went back to waiting for the woman in front of us. By now she had set off the metal detector twice and been sent back yet again to take off more jewelry. I looked at the flight attendant behind me, nodded toward the woman that had now held us all up for five minutes, and rolled my eyes. She laughed, and then caught me off guard with a comment.

“Do you ever get tired of smelling dirty feet?” She asked. I was absolutely clueless and had no idea what she meant, and it must have shown on my face, because she pointed at all of the shoes on the X-ray conveyor belt. Until that very moment, the thought had never struck me, and as soon as she planted the thought in my head, I’d swear that I did indeed smell dirty feet. I couldn’t help myself, I busted out laughing.

“You are a mean and evil person!” I told her when I had stopped laughing enough so that I could speak. “That thought had never entered my mind until you said that, and now every damned time I fly, that’s all I’m going to think about when I’m going through this line!”

At last it was my turn to go through the metal detector, and the TSA inspector waived me forward.

“Well! It looks like you made it!” he said with a grin as I passed through with out setting it off.

“Yeah, you would almost think that I had done this before huh?” I asked him with a grin and was greeted by his laughter. Pretty much, this was the last thing to go according to plan all day . . .

.. ..

You know I flew for years without a single delayed or canceled flight, but these days it seems to be a rare trip indeed where there isn’t some sort of delay. Well that turned out to be the case for my connecting flight from ....Atlanta.... to Indy – it was delayed by an hour. At long last, they start the boarding process. As those of us in the first class section are boarding, they are making their apologies and are telling us that they can’t serve drinks during the boarding process because the aircraft hasn’t been catered yet. This turned out to be a foretelling of things to come, because once the plane was fully loaded, we still sat there. . . and sat there . . . and sat there . . . After 20 minutes the aircraft catering service guy explodes on to the plane, and with lots of frantic activity, swaps out carts and supplies, and in about five minutes he is gone like the wind. As soon as the catering door is closed and he has pulled away, the flight attendant inspects things and starts to grumble. I’m in the first row of seats so I can hear her explaining to the captain that they have not supplied them correctly – there are NO sodas, and NO juice. Apparently airplanes can’t fly if those on board don’t have soda and juice, because we sat on that damned plane another 20 minutes waiting for that guy to come back again and do his job right. Soon people are complaining and joking about the situation. The guy across the isle from me is a real comedian and he leans over and taps me on the shoulder.

“If they will just get this plane in the air, I’ll donate my bottle of water to anyone that needs a drink. What do ya think?” he says with a huge grin, while holding up the small bottle of water they always leave in the first class seats.

“I’m with ya’! Besides, this is only like an hour long flight. If they had just gone, we would have been there by about now!” I replied. About this point, 40 minutes after the flight was loaded, there is another catering guy on board and he and the flight attendant are arguing. I can’t hear the conversation, but this cute flight attendant is clearly PISSED. While they are arguing, the comedian across from me looks around the first class section and starts trying to instigate a riot.

“This is the STUPIDEST reason for a delay I have ever seen! I’ve been doing this for over 20 years and I’ve NEVER been delayed for ‘sodas and juice’!” he says with a grin, though he clearly really is agitated.

Soon the catering guy is throwing little bins of sodas on the galley floor, and as he turns to run after another load, I hear the flight attendant gasp in frustration.

“Those are the wrong bins! They are for a different type of aircraft and wont FIT here!” She almost yells at the catering guy and the captain.

“These are for a ..!” She tells the Captain, raising her hands in defeat and frustration. Finally someone got the bright idea to take the drinks OUT of the bins and just stack them in the carts. One of the Atlanta Delta reps is now standing on the plane, looking apologetic, and clearly trying to see what he can do to help get this flight moving, when the flight attendant had clearly had enough. The flight attendant talks to him, consults with the captain, then comes back to him.

“No, we are aren’t waiting for anything else. Get that man off my plane, we are pushing back NOW.” She said while pointing at the caterer.

Two hours late, my flight at long last takes to the skies, and first class is getting comfortable with an assortment of alcoholic beverages being served all around, and everyone joking about the delay the entire way.

The comedian across the isle from me is apparently a bit of a ladies man. He spent the entire hour and twenty minute flight with the flight attendant kneeling by his seat and him chatting her up. I deeply envy them both. She is young, skinny, and beautiful, with long blond hair in a glorious pile on top of her head. He is not young, but he is clearly comfortable and capable when it comes to talking to beautiful women. I can hear that much of the conversation revolves around wine, and that is convenient as she is bringing him bottle after bottle of it. Later in the flight, after a few too many of those little wine bottles, I hear him tell her with a slight slur to his speech, that he would be delighted to send her a bottle if she would tell him where to send it to. I wonder if this is an honest gesture between two people who had spent an hour talking about wines, or if it was a thinly veiled excuse to try and get her number?

As the plane is landing, I see the lady in the seat next to me getting clearly nervous. She is gripping the armrest so hard that her knuckles are turning white, and as the plane approaches the runway, I can hear her talking softly while staring out the window.

“He’s going too fast, too fast, too fast . . . “ she says under her breath, probably not realizing that I can hear her at all.

“You know,” I said, trying to distract her a little “landing is the one part about flying that makes me nervous too! All the rest of it I’m fine with, but landing gets my heart racing a little.”

“Yeah, well, a couple of flights ago, they landed fast like this and skidded the damned plane on the runway!” she told me, clearly not in the least comforted by my speaking to her.

“Well, I can see how that might tend to make you a little nervous!” I told her with a laugh as the wheels hit the ground with a distinct “thump”.

.. ..

As the plane approaches our gate, you can hear most of the first class section laughing and cutting up about the silliness of being delayed waiting for sodas. You can tell that most of them have had a drink or two, because they are really letting loose and cutting up. You should have seen the looks on their faces when the plane stopped just short of the gate and the captain comes over the intercom, clearly disgusted with the way this flight has gone.

“Uh folks, it looks like they don’t have a crew ready to guide us in, so we are going to have to wait here for a few minutes. I’m sure they will be here momentarily, so please remain seated and we’ll get you in just as soon as we can.” He says. Now the conversation on the entire airplane goes into over drive, with lots of angry voices mixed in with lots of laughter and joking. I’m kind of with the folks that were laughing, because what is the point to getting excited about it? There is nothing you can do to influence things, so you might as well just relax.

.. ..

The comedian across the isle from me is having a ball, cutting up left and right, so I get his attention.

“What do ya’ say that you and I go guide the plane in for ‘em?” I asked with a wink.

“That’s a GREAT idea!” he then looks at the flight attendant. “Hey! Let us out! She and I will guide the plane in. You got any of those bright orange vests? I think we ought to have a vest. Don’t you think we ought to have a vest?”

Thankfully, twenty five minutes after we landed, the plane starts to throttle up to pull into the gate area.

“Their just teasing us.” Quips someone.

“Thank God! We’re finally there!” someone else comments.

“We aint there yet! Don’t jinx us” replies a third person to the laughter of all.

Once the seat belt sign goes off, people rocket to their feet and start to grab bags, clearly sick to death of being on this airplane. I’m in the first row of seats, so I was standing right behind the flight attendant as she is peering through the little round window in the door to get a look at the jet bridge. Minutes drag by, tick-tock, tick-tock, when I see her forehead fall against the glass so hard it makes an audible thump.

“It’s not moving. They can’t get it to move . . . “ she says to no one in particular, with her head still buried against the door and slowly shaking it back and forth. After a bit, she lifts her head and looks out of the window again.

“All right! Here comes someone else to help!” she says, with a voice filled with hope, but soon it was dashed. “Noooooo . . . he can’t get it to move either . . . “

“Thump” goes her head against the door again. . .

.. ..

Then we all hear the static of the captain triggering the PA.

“Well folks, your not gonna believe this . . . “ he starts to say in a weary voice, but I couldn’t hear the rest of the announcement over the groans and complaints from the passenger cabin.

“You know, at this point I think we would all be thrilled just to use the stairs.” I told the flight attendant.

“Hey, don’t y’all have one of those fancy inflatable type emergency slides?” I asked her with a grin. “You know I’ve always wanted to try one!”

She turned around and looked at me with a smile.

“You know, I’m starting to consider that an option!” she said. We continued to wait and wait and wait . . .

“So, umm, what happens if they cant get the jet bridge to work? Do you have to get all of these pissed off people seated again and move us to another one?” I asked

“Ayup, and wow would I NOT want to do THAT right now!” she said with a laugh. She cut her laugh short, and her head whipped toward the door.

“I hear bells! I HEAR BELLS!” She said, clearly excited. “YAY! They got it to work!” she shouted, and the entire plane started to applaud. At almost 730PM I stepped off of the flight that was supposed to arrive at 330PM . . .

.. ..

As I did on my last stay here, I had booked a room at the Staybridge Suites. I like this because they have fully stocked kitchens, with dishes and everything, so you have the option of cooking something instead of eating out. To most people that don’t travel a lot, eating out is a treat, something to be looked forward to and enjoyed. A lot of us that travel a lot though, grow sick and tired of restaurants and would rather eat mac and cheese or top ramen in the comfort of our own room. The bad news though, is that if I was gonna cook something, that meant I had to go grocery shopping, so off I headed to the Super Walmart grocery store not far from the hotel.

.. ..

After I parked, I took a good long look in the mirror and decided that I was really pushing my luck. Sixteen hours after I had started getting ready at home that morning, my makeup and I were both starting to look kind of rough and tired. Still, I was tired and just wanted to get this over with, so in I headed. When I entered the store, I saw the carts all parked off to the side, and went to get one. There were two teenage boys and one girl sitting on carts and bullshitting, and I see one tap the other on the arm and nod my way. Soon he looks at me and gives a mock cough.

“*cough* dude *cough*” he teased.

I was too tired to really care much about his comment or attitude, and so I grabbed my cart, smiled at them, and entered the store. Despite the greeting of the asshole at the door, I had a fleeting moment while shopping where I started to fantasize about what it would be like to be a house wife, just out doing her grocery shopping. Of course I doubt many house wives go shopping in heels and a dress, but still, it was kind of a profound moment.

More than eighteen hours after my day had started a thousand miles away, I was in my room and washing and brushing my sweaty and nasty wig out. That accomplished, I then collapsed in the bed and went went sound asleep!

.. ..

The following day of course involved doing my job, but I did get to break free long enough to eat lunch with Dana (http://www.crossdressers.com/forums/member.php?u=12163). We both met drab (dressed as males) so I’ll use male pronouns. I was shopping at what is becoming one of my favorite stores – the Vanity Fair Outlet. I had just found three summer tops that I thought might be OK on me despite the fact that they were intended for juniors, and I was looking for the dressing room when Dana calls and suggests meeting at Arbys for lunch. I agreed, wrapped up my shopping, and headed off to meet him. While I’m parking the car, I get a call on my cell.

“So is that you that just pulled in?” He asks.

“Yup, I just got here!”

“Good! I wasn’t sure I’d recognize you, but thought that was you!” he said.

I got out of the car and started looking around but didn’t see him. Then I entered the restaurant, looked around, and STILL couldn’t see him.

“Ummm, you apparently saw me, but I’ll be damned if I see you anywhere!” I told him.

“Yeah, it wasn’t you that I saw earlier. So where ARE you then?” he asked with a laugh.

“I’m at Arbys, just parked and am standing inside looking for you!”

“Well that explains it then, because I’m at Hardies across the street!” he said with a laugh.

“I’m so sorry!” I said between laughs “I thought you said “Arby’s” not “Hardies”!”

We sat and talked for an hour or so, about everything and about nothing much. Wives, jobs, women and men and the differences between them. . . It was an entirely pleasant lunch and strongly recommend you take the chance to meet Dana if you ever get the chance. A really nice person, and a “real” person too.

We said our goodbyes and I went to get a refill on my iced tea to tide me over on my drive back to Indy. I had to wait a few moments for an older woman who was moving kind of slow, with her hands shaking, and moving in a slow and deliberate fashion. I noticed that she had a cute little butterfly clip in her thin and gray hair and leaned over to tap her on the arm.

“That butterfly is such a pretty hair pin!” I told her with a wink. She looked up at me, clearly surprised that someone had bothered to speak to her.

“Well thank you! I think you’re the first person to ever comment on it.” She said with an odd smile. I got the distinct impression that she was grateful for the comment.

“Your very welcome. My six year old daughter just loves pretty things like that. After all, what’s the point of being a girl or a woman if you can’t wear something sparkly once in a while, right?” I asked.

“Well, I’m just an old woman, but I still like ‘em!” she said with a smile, patting my hand as she turned and walked away with her drink.

.. ..

I made the drive back to Indy and I had just parked my car when the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile pulled in, circled the parking lot, and parked directly behind my car! The first thing I thought, was that no one was gonna believe this if I didn’t get pictures. Last week I wrote about Dora the Explorer walking right by me, and if I now claimed to have touched the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile, folks were gonna think that I have been wearing my wig just a touch too tight. Scared the thing might just be turning around in the parking lot and then leaving, I dove across the drivers seat to snatch my camera out of my back pack and snap a few shots as it drove around.

..
..

..
..

Much to my surprise, it parked, and after a long delay, two small women got out! Why I was surprised that this icon from my childhood was being piloted by two women, I have no idea, but there it is. The urge to go talk to them was killing me, but it was late, I was tired, and they were probably tired as well, so I left them in peace. Still, I couldn’t help myself and so went and peaked in the windows. Did you know that things has a first class interior, huge leather seats, and looked to me like it could put a Limo to shame for comfort!

.. ..

.. ..

The following day I was tied up with an assortment of customer issues on the phone and by email until almost noon. At long last, all know fires were put out, issues addressed, and I had the chance to head out the door ‘pretty’. Guess what was still parked in the parking lot?

Once again I went to the Castleton Mall, but this time I hit up the Sephora cosmetics counter. The lady that approached to help me couldn’t have been but about five feet tall. I’m five feet nine inches tall AND was wearing three and half inch heels, so the conversation gave us both a neck ache. She tried to be helpful, but in the end didn’t have any products I really thought were going to take the place of my current foundation, so I thanked her and moved on to the movie theater. I went to see “Inception” and had to smile most of the way through the theater. As I was buying my ticket, a manager walked up and stood behind the girl at the counter, and she kept grinning at me. When I was buying my coke and candy, another manager came over to “help” the girl that was taking care of me, and she also grinned from ear to ear as she handed me the soda and told me to enjoy the movie.

.. ..

The movie . . . I just don’t know what to say! I’m sitting here thinking about it a day later and still can’t decide if I liked it or not! The special effects were of course stunning, but we knew that going in to it. The plot was pretty good too, but it was just so damned confusing, even for a huge sci-fi buff like me. Circles in circles, puzzles inside of puzzles. I can’t really explain it any better than that with out being a spoiler, but I guarantee you that if you go see the movie, you will come out thinking ‘Damn! Kim was right! That was confusing!’

As I was leaving, the adorable blond manager from the ticket counter grinned from ear to ear and shouted out to me as I was walked by.

“Thanks for coming and come back soon!” She was so cute. Sigh . . . .

.. ..

I went back to my hotel room for an hour or so to freshen up, and then took off for English Ivy’s where I was to meet up with Kim (http://www.crossdressers.com/forums/member.php?u=27750) and Sarah (http://www.crossdressers.com/forums/member.php?u=62741 ) for dinner. I got seated about ten minutes before they were to arrive and decided to revisit the whole white wine thing from my recent visit with Missy and Anne.

“Hello Hun, would you like something to drink while you wait?” the waiter asked me.

“I would, thank you! Do you have a chilled white wine?” I responded. I couldn’t recall the details of the wine I’d had and liked a few weeks ago, but I recalled that it was white and chilled.

“Of course we do! I’ll be right back.” He said, then he left to go and get it. A moment later he is back, but empty handed.

“Did you want like a chardonnay?” he asked me.I'm getting the distinct impression that he doesn't know any more about wines than I do, and is stuck playing the go-between with the bartender and I.

“I’ll be damned if I know! I don’t know a thing about wine and am just trying to kind of check the stuff out.” I replied. He laughed and then left to return to the bar. A moment later he returns, but is again empty handed.

“Did you want it kind of sweet?” he asks me, clearly doing his very best to be sure I’m going to like what ever I get.

“As a matter of fact I would like it sweet! So, white wine, chilled, and sweet! That ought to do it!” I told him with a grin, and once again he took off to the bar. In a moment he returns, and this time he is holding a glass of wine. He waited while I took a sip and assured him I did indeed like it, then he started to leave but I stopped him.

“Hold on just a sec! What is this?” I asked, quickly swallowing my drink so that I could catch him before he walked off. He just got kind of a confused look on his face, clearly not understanding the intent behind my question, so I expanded.

“I just want to know how to order it again in the future, so that I don’t look like a damned idiot again!” I told him, and we both laughed. I was in the midst of making a note “Barefoot . . . “ in my cell phones memo app when Kim and Sarah walked up to the table. I stood to greet them and in a moment of uncertainty I offered to shake hands while they offered to hug. I’m never quite sure which way to go when it comes to shaking hands or hugging . . .

.. ..

Both were very likable and attractive people. They joked about how Kim’s look and wardrobe got an upgrade when Sarah got involved. Sarah must have done a good job, because Kim looked terrific, and very much like your every day woman out and about her life. Sarah was cute, with pretty eyes and a head full of hair that I’d kill for, and she had that wonderful quality of being a pretty woman that might not actually know she’s pretty. Funny how often that happens . . . 

Clearly she did something right in her life where I did something wrong, because she’s only a few years younger than I am but hasn’t got a single damned wrinkle on her and looks at least 15 to 20 years younger than I do. That’s just not fair I tell ya, not fair!

.. ..

We talked for quite a long time I think, and much like my conversation with Dana the day before, we spoke of everything and nothing. We swapped stories of meeting our spouses, dating, the pros and cons of having children, careers, and of course being transgender. Kim had just left a job she had had for eighteen years and was now exploring her options for the future, and Sarah has an interesting job that she enjoys and finds fascinating. Both are considering having children and I’m not sure if I encouraged them or discouraged them! There is nothing like having your child sleeping in your arms, or getting a hug from them, or having them say “I love you”, but there is also nothing like having them scream and cry all night when you have to be up at 4AM in the morning!

.. ..

Just off to the side of our table was a large group of older folks having a birthday party. It was really kind of sweet, and I found myself hoping that maybe someday when I was that old, I would have a group of friends that would care enough to share my birthday with me like that. We had been there talking for a couple of hours when someone picked up and moved one of the tables near the party. I had thought it was just that the birthday party group might have had someone else arrive and so they needed more table space, and so I paid it no attention. Shortly though, I discovered that I had misread the situation, because they were laying one of the birthday party folks flat on the floor and doing CPR on him. It seems that he had decided to have a heart attack. I sat there watching a couple of men working on him, and tried to decide how much I remembered of my CPR training from 20 years ago in the army. Ultimately I decided I recalled very little of it and so was most grateful that the two men who were doing CPR on him really seemed to know what they were doing. Despite their best efforts, the poor man on the floor was turning gray, and clearly wasn’t breathing. One man was doing the chest compressions for a few moments, then he would stop and check for a pulse while the other would do mouth to mouth.

“I can’t feel a pulse.” The one would tell the other, and they would start the cycle over.

A few more cycles and the news gets little better.

“I can feel a pulse every once in a while, but it’s weak.” And then back they would go to the CPR. I looked at Kim and Sarah, they looked at me, and I think at first we were all pretty sure we had just watched a man die. We discussed calling around the restaurant for a doctor or EMT, but I think we all decided that the two men working on him already sure looked like they were professionals and knew what they were doing, and so we just waited. Time has a funny way of stretching and contracting during events like these, so I’m not sure, but I think it was about five minutes later when we notice that the mans chest does appear to be expanding and contracting on its own, but only every once in a while. I was holding my mothers hand when she died about a year ago, and this was exactly the way she had been breathing a minute or two before she went. It sure wasn’t normal breathing, but it was something, some small sign that might still be there. It was right about then that the paramedics arrived, and never has there been a more welcome sight. They started shoving tables farther out of the way, we all helped them get the piles of chairs moved to the back, and we watched the pros go to work. They wired him all up to a portable defibrillator, shouted at everyone to back away from him, and zapped him once or twice. Unlike the movies, you didn’t hear anything – no loud pop and no electrical sound at all, you just see the man go rigid for an instant. By the time they carried the man out on a stretcher to the applause of the entire restaurant, he was breathing and did have a pulse, so I can only hope that he made it. Soon the tables and chairs are being moved back in to position, the lights are once again dimmed, and the few remaining party goers are clearly in shock. So is most every one else in the room for that matter. After watching the heart attack, all levity was gone from the evening. It just didn’t seem proper or appropriate to return to a frivolous evening after watching the heart break of a man coming so close to death that he may yet not escape with his life.

.. ..

The following morning I again spent on the phone and in emails with customers. Such is the life of a field service engineer! Somewhere around 2PM I got it all done, and so got to head out in to the world again. I had decided to visit a resale shop that Kim had told me about – the Toggery (http://www.toggeryresale.com/). As I entered the store I was greeted by a woman behind the counter.

“Hello! Come on in!” she said as I hesitated at the door. I smiled at her and entered, still looking around. I can see several older women looking at me with that ‘What the hell! That’s a guy!’ look on their faces, but I ignored them and returned my attention to the woman behind the counter.

“Hi! I’ve heard good things about your store!” I told her with a smile. She actually paused and stopped working for a second to look up at me in surprise.

“You have?!” she asked, sounding almost incredulous.

“I have!” I told her again, mimicking her excited attitude. She just kind of laughed and again invited me in to shop. I found a gown there that I liked but just couldn’t bring myself to buy. It was short, green, size 12, and adorable! It was very short, and sort of poofed out at the bottom, and I liked it enough to go try it on. It actually fit, but I decided it would be silly to spend $30 on something I know I’m not going to have anyplace to wear. Trying to do the intelligent thing, I put the dress back with a disappointed sigh . . .

.. ..

.. ..

.. ..

Next I raided the mall and made it a point to visit JC Penny. That is quickly becoming one of my favorite stores as I really love their “....Worthington....” brand. I found a couple of tops I was interested in and headed for the dressing room . . . where I was stopped by an attendant. Since I had thought the joint was empty she really caught me by surprise, but all she did was look up at me, smile, and tell me to take my pick of open rooms! Both of the tops I tried on looked awful so I took them out to the rack where they ask you return unwanted items. The attendant was standing there as I hung them up so I tried to make her smile.

“They were both terrible mistakes! I have no idea what I was thinking . . . “ I said with a grin.

“Oh . . .” she replied, not even thinking about smiling.

.. ..

You know, some days I feel very confident, and some days I don’t, and today was a “don’t” day, so I decided to call it quites at about 6PM.

In the hotel, they serve kind of a light dinner most week nights, and so it makes the dinning area a popular place to be in the evening with many of the guests, so when I got to the elevator I found two children on it. I’d say the girl was maybe 15 and the boy about 10, but since its getting harder for me to tell with people that age, I’m not really sure. The girl was adorable with long, light, red hair, and she was chewing gum and staring at me. As she was standing right in front of the panel, I asked her to press 2 for the second floor but she just stared at me, still slowly chewing her gum. I didn’t know if she hadn’t heard me, or had decided that lifting a finger was too much work on my behalf, so I smiled and leaned in front of her to push it myself. When I got off at my floor, I had made it maybe ten feet out of the elevator when they both erupted in laughter, and I heard her yell at him “That’s it! Get out! Get out! GET OUT!”

.. ..

The next morning was my flight home, and I stood staring at the old man in the mirror and trying to decide – pretty or comfortable? First I decided on comfort and going male, but then I changed my mind, changed it again, and then changed it again. In the end I selected a new skirt and sandals that I had just bought last night. I’d have to admit that the shoes really didn’t work so well with the outfit, but I was dying to wear them anyway.

It was hot as hell making the long walk from the rental car lot to the airline counter, and by the time I got checked in, through security, and in to the bathroom, the back of my top was soaking wet and had a huge dark spot where my backpack had rested. I was kind of grossed out and depressed, thinking to myself that this was just more evidence to everyone that saw me that I was just a sweaty old guy. I took my top off, and since they didn't have a hand dryer I tried to use towels to soak the worst of it up. In the end it remained wet and looked terrible, so I gave up and headed to the gate area to wait for my flight. I was sitting there reading my book when a beautiful woman walked up to the gate counter, clearly in a hurry and concerned she might have missed her flight. I was looking at her flawless hair and outfit, and then just couldn’t keep from grinning as I realized that her back was also soaking wet. . .