On online dating...

Geez guys. Post a picture where one can see your face. Where you haven't cropped out your previous girlfriend.

This morning I saw pictures of:

The back of a head. Teeth. In a Burger King mask. (really? REALLY) With the girlfriend obviously cropped out. With the wife and kids. (maybe its the ex-wife, but really? And do you really want to post pictures of your kids on a online dating site? Particularly your teenage daughter?)

A lovely neon arrangement...very artistic, yes, but I can't see what you LOOK like. Isn't that the point of this?

Muscles.

Tons of photos in the gym. Really? That's the only place you can get someone to take a picture of you? Or maybe you live there.

*sigh*

Its amazing the criteria you end up judging these guys on.

Spelling. Photos. Being able to write sentences. Bleah.

I know I don't have many photos of myself, but I have a few.... and I've posted them!

How growing up in a third-world country can colour your viewpoint...

So, I bought a house that was on a community well. This is in the not-so-distant past. In the further reaches of time, I spent my formative years in a third-world country. I remember coming back to the US in the summer and being astonished that one could drink out of the tap... in Cairo the water systems were so old that the sewer lines were sometimes above the water lines...and some of them, according to my mom, dated back to the time of Salah El-Din. (or, as Westerners may know him, Saladin...in other words, the Crusades).

My street recently switched over to town water, and I've been resisting. I have not been happy about it, had a pit in my stomach, etc, etc... and I realised why last night. I still have a gut sense, from growing up drinking bottled water, that tap water is dangerous. It isn't helped by me being a little bit of a nutty-crunchy born-again granola girl... the websites that I tend to read are full of the evils of town water...

I'm still not happy about it, but at least I know the reason why... and for me, understanding why I am so upset is half the battle...

I still prefer well water.

Some days, there are some things I should not do...

like watch videos of my friends' kids. Sheesh.

I always thought I'd be somewhere else in my life at this point in time... I thought I'd be more successful, or established somehow... I thought I'd at least have kids... Or have had a lead in something....

I know a lot of great people, but as I was proclaiming to folks last night (btw, one glass of wine gets me drunk), the majority of men in my life on a regular basis are gay. Or married. (whispers) or both....

The choir director-gay (and vulgar, too)
People in the theatre--gay and single, gay and single, gay and in a relationship, gay and married.
The former choir director-gay (and engaged)


And the guys out there? gaaaaaahhhhhhhh! I don't want someone who just wants hot sex. (don't get me wrong, I like it as much as the next gal...) And you know what? at 40, yes I am going to have my own life, I'm not going to be waiting, pantingly, for Mr Right to drop from the heavens.

But its just, UGH! There's nowhere to meet them! Bleah.

I wish more places like Hillstead would have singles nights. I really do. Because straight guys can appreciate the arts, can appreciate music, culture. Can't they?

But recently friends of mine have been posting pics of their adorable babies.... and, *sigh* I really want one. I just feel like I'm growing old alone...

On beauty, self-image, and perception...

So I'm doing props for a show that, to some extent, deals with stereotypical images of women...there are Playboys on the set, there are going to be nudes... there's probably going to be a Farrah Fawcett poster. (ugh!)

Also, yesterday, someone (who has turned out to be a bit of a jerk) took a headless shot of me looking my worst as I came in to church (wearing my cape), and posted it, along with a NASTY caption to Facebook. I actually looked nice underneath the cape, but you wouldn't know it from the picture.

But then this morning I found this wonderful site, this wonderful project, called which is these gorgeous photographs of normal women. Not models, not made up, some have hair where women have hair... wrinkles, stretch marks....

And they are all photographed beautifully and empoweringly.

And THAT is what we need more of in this world. Not pictures oozing negativity, but positivity. We need more pictures celebrating the beauty that is within each and every one of us.

On the "Evil Chef" and the power of Facebook.

So, if you are gluten-free or have gluten-free friends, you probably know of the latest furor. A certain "chef" posted on his facebook profile that he has INTENTIONALLY glutened people. *urgh*

He has since deleted his profile. Now why am I posting this here instead of my gluten-free blog? Because of musings on Facebook. Its an interesting tool. It can be fabulous, as in helping promote a revolution in Egypt, but it can also be dangerous. They keep changing the privacy settings, so you have to keep on top of it. But its being used as a marketing tool by authors, artists, designers, etc.

Its being used to keep in touch with relatives, to network professionally, all kinds of things. But the lines sometimes get blurred. I have settings for people from work, the theatre, games I play... but I have also removed my address completely from my profile. Because a setting change has caught me by surprise.

I also limit the number of outside applications that network with Facebook. I shouldn't have ANY, but I do. Basically, I try to control the damage as much as possible.

Because of Facebook, this chef has basically lost any credibility in the food world. People were calling the restaurants he'd worked at, incensed. I feel bad for those places.

Sick and single.

The one real problem with being sick is that I have to go out, while sick, and get my own medicine, my own things I need.... Bleah.

Otherwise I quite like not having to worry about bothering people with my coughing, or having to take care of other sick people while I feel like cr*p.

It just would be nice sometimes to be able to have someone to send out or to make phone calls while I feel like death warmed over.... I don't like driving and searching for the right meds while I feel dizzy and like I'm going to pass out....

And it would be nice to have someone bring me tea while I cough my lungs out.

Or go buy an expectorant when my sinus infection turns into a post-nasal drip and starts settling in my lungs....

But other than that, I like being single and sick.

Disability awareness and understanding....

I've recently been reading a fantastic blog called Love That Max. And its made me think in some ways about my growing up with a hearing impairment, but also my experiences working with differently-abled kids when I was younger.

I worked at a summer camp with a kid named James. James was born with half a brain. He couldn't talk, but he had some amazing qualities. He had a wicked sense of humor, and even though he couldn't walk well, he would create his own games with the other kids....but we did have to correct the other kids when they called him a baby, "no, he's your age, he just hasn't been growing as fast as you". But the telling thing was when I'd go back to the house and talk about his good qualities with my relatives. Because they were always saying "Well, you know, he's never going to get better, he's never going to improve, yadda, yadda, yadda" and that pissed me off. Not because I thought James was magically going to transform into a tall, sturdy child, but because I was talking about his positive qualities, and they mistook it as something else.

I also worked at a summer camp in MD with hearing-impaired youngsters. That was unique for me and the kids. It was good for them to see someone older with a hearing impairment, something I really had not had, growing up. And in terms of my learning, I was glad (mostly) to have been mainstreamed, although I wished there had been some adaptations made for me... it would have made all the difference in high school if I'd been able to get help with my note-taking (trying to hear, lip-read, understand, and take notes all at the same time? urgh.) My mom, a few years later, when I lent my sister my chemistry book, made a comment about my notes...about how few they were and how bad they were. In retrospect, looking back, the times I had good notes in class were times I knew the subject well enough to be able to take the notes. Or where it would be easy to just put a keyword or something...

The thing is, there are limitations with everyone. The differently-abled just have different limitations. I can't swim with my hearingaids on. (they make waterproof watches! waterproof cameras! Why can't someone make waterproof hearingaids!?) I also take them out at times because I get tired of sound, of hearing. But that doesn't make me less of a person....

But where parents of differently-abled children have to watch out is overprotection. My mom (and a certain extent, the whole family) do this overprotective thing of me that drives me bonkers. Even now. And I realise that some of it comes from advocating for your child. But I think that is the one thing I'd call on parents to be aware of.

Because people judge. But educators judge by different yardsticks. I've been aware that my speech isn't always "up to par", and that I don't always hear things that others hear. But when I started singing lessons, all of a sudden, my speech, which had been deemed just fine, etc by a lot of speech therapists, started to improve, according to my mom. And I learned to match pitch better... I still have a horrible memory of music lessons at the British School, where the teacher would play a random note and ask us to identify it. That, I still cannot do. I can tell if something is a wrong note. I can even sing a note that's played. But I cannot identify the notes.. when they are played.

But what is fascinating is that taking the singing lessons really improved both my hearing and speaking, as well as my singing. But that isn't a tactic that would be considered, even in the modern world. It would be "Why do you want to take singing lessons? You can't sing." And I still feel like I need reassurance that I am doing ok at singing... because I can't always hear myself...

Because, as most people with disabilities know, to some extent, I have limitations. And I will never be a hearing person. And there are some advantages to that.