Monthly Archives: December 2009

When I was a kid I looked at the years 2000 and beyond as almost mystical. Would the world come to an end? Would we all be flying in hover-crafts? What would I see when I looked into the mirror?

Well, the world is still here, although I don’t know how the way humans abuse it.

Hover-crafts? Why do they always bring up personal flying machines? Texans can’t even drive in the rain, let’s not give them individual flight.

I looked in the mirror this morning and saw a combination of my father, my mother, and Jay Leno. Not quite the look I was thinking about at 10 years of age. I know the alternative to growing old sucks, so let’s just establish that right off the bat. But when did this happen to me?

The other day I was talking about being a fat girl, now growing old. I know it seems like I am self-absorbed, but I am a baby boomer. We have always been self-absorbed, why break stride now?

Baby boomers are people born between 1945-1964. Our favorite subjects tend to be ourselves and the past. So let us continue to talk about me for today.

A funny thing happens to a person after both parents have died. If you haven’t experienced this, get back with me when it happens. It is such an odd feeling. My father died when I was 14. My mother died in 2004 when she was 82 and I was 42. I became a 42 year old orphan. You may smile at that, but that is what I instantly felt like. I cannot imagine feeling that as a child. At 42 it felt like my heart had been ripped out of my chest.

Hey mom, watch me jump in the pool. Hey mom, did you see that homer? Hey mom, watch me graduate high school. Hey mom, I got accepted into law school! You don’t realize it, but you do a lot of things in life just to get your parents approval. When they are gone, you have to look inward and wonder why you do the things you do. You stand there after an accomplishment and wonder who to call.

I look in the mirror and see that I am up to bat next. The baby boomers are running the country right now. I am the same age as the President.

I know there have been countless books written by boomers on this very subject. I just don’t think any of them can fix the way I am feeling. The words on this blog render no solace to me.

We boomers just have to suck it up and deal. Our parents were the greatest generation, as labeled by Tom Brokaw. What will they write about us after we are gone?

Hey mom, there is no hover-craft in my garage…..and AARP just sent me an application!

Why let dopers and boozers bring me down? I have my own addiction. How can I possibly judge the poor slob sitting across the table from me, with his 3rd DWI, if I can’t put the damn Maple Nut Goodies down until I see the bottom of the bag?

That my friends is the result of fat girl’s remorse post-Christmas. That time when all fat girls set their sites on January 1st and the new diet! We like starting on the first of months and other milestone dates. That gives us time to go pork out on Tex-Mex and eat leftover turkey until we almost go into a tryptophan coma.

We humans are hedonists, every one of us and we pick our poison….early on. In my family the drug of choice was food, followed secondly by prescribed medication abuse. I won’t “out” anyone, but slurred speech is to be expected when I see certain names on my caller I.D.

I have all the common fat girl bitches, so I won’t bore you with the laundry list. Except one….the Yo-Yo Syndrome. Every time I lose 40, 50, or even my top of 90 pounds….I start to relax. I walk past a mirror and am not repulsed…”damn, I look good.” Famous last words, then the fat girl starts to think she can eat normal again.

I have a guilty pleasure that I am going to admit right here and now. I watch the TLC network late at night, what my partner has coined, “The Freak Channel.” I fly my freak flag and enjoy watching shows about people that weigh 600 pounds or more. I always feel svelte when viewing and go to bed thinking that I am not so bad after all. I don’t drink 6 liters of Coke a day or eat a dozen eggs and one pound of bacon for breakfast. Who knew I was a light eater?

Bottom line is when I am gaining weight I eat more calories than I burn off. When I am losing weight, I exercise more and consume no more than 1800 calories a day. That seems simple doesn’t it? Someone with an IQ in the 130s and 19 years of education should get this and stay with it!!! Don’t you friggin think so??? The answer is:
Yo-Yo….No.

You non-fatties need to get one thing. Fat girls are not losers. We have fat genes passed to us by our parents, we have a tendency to eat just a few more calories than we need, and we sit on our ass too much instead of going out for a walk.

Fat girls spend a lot of time self-loathing. I am no exception. I am a person that seemingly has everything, but at least once a day my inner voice tells me I am a failure. Even my inner voice has fat bias. You cannot be a fully evolved person if you are obese.

Wow, wonder where I got that notion? Couldn’t be that American Medical Association weight chart that the doctors started showing me at the age of 12??
If you are a 5’11” woman in America you should weigh between 152-173 pounds. Well, no point in being totally honest here, but I last weighed 152 pounds in 8th grade.

That my friends is the recipe for shopping at Lane Bryant and the chunky chick section of Dillards. That my friends is the recipe for shoe collections, the one thing fat girls can shop for just like everyone else.

Knowing all of this about myself, can I correct this cycle? Yo-Yo No. Well, I do have five days until January 1st.

I could add a few more comments on this blog, but I have to go, my friends are waiting on me and it is $3.99 enchilada dinner day at El Fenix.

As I write this it is December 24th and my 48th birthday. The number 24 has always been my lucky number, and now my age is 24 doubled.
I am not a numerologist, I just have weird things happen to me regarding this number and then….there is Streisand.

When I was about 9 years old I first saw the movie Funny Girl with Barbra Streisand. Her tour de force performance blew me away. With Babs you either love her or hate her and for me it was love at first sight! In one scene, as Fanny is racing to her love, Nicky Arnstein, she is aboard a tug boat on the Hudson River. She is singing Don’t Rain on My Parade and as the camera pans around, you see it is the number 24 tug boat. Knowing now about Streisand, what I didn’t know then, that 24 was no mistake. Streisand was born on April 24, 1942 and 24 has always carried weird luck for her as well.

On February 24, 1987 Babs won the Grammy for best pop performance by a female. In her acceptance speech she went down a laundry list of great things that had happened to her associated with the number 24, including the award she was accepting. That is when I knew for sure that the number 24 was one thing Barbra Streisand and I had in common!!

Through the years I have seen all of her movies, good and bad. I have bought or downloaded all of her music and watched every TV interview, scant as they are.
I love music of all types, I have pretty eclectic taste, from Nine Inch Nails to Andrea Bocelli, but Streisand is the mainstay.

In 2006 Streisand announced a rare tour. I had missed her tours in 1994 and in 2000 because of varying reasons, but now was my chance! On November 18th she was singing at the MGM in Las Vegas! I booked the trip and purchased the seat online. Needless to say, it was the most expensive concert ticket I have ever bought, at $700.00.

My partner, well, …let’s just say she doesn’t share my enthusiasm for the perfection that IS Streisand. She stayed home. I have no problem going to Vegas alone, have done that before, but my friend Bob decided he would meet me there. He lives in Minnesota and the chance to thaw out in November was appealing to him. Mind you, he would be engaging in all types of debauchery while there….and during the concert, I understood the agreement.

The big night arrived. I was going to be in the same enclosed space as my musical idol. Albeit with 20,000 other people, but damn it, I was going to be there!! I was staying at another hotel on the strip so I grabbed a taxi and headed to the MGM at the appointed time.

Upon arrival, the crowd was being directed to the back of the casino where the entrance to the Grand Arena was, more like “herded” as we walked the center isle, thousands strong. Streisand fans are varied, old and young, gay and straight, terribly weird, and freakish. Picture Richard Simmons being “subtle.”

Right at the last turn to enter the arena was a roulette table with two men seated at it. Now I am a gambler, so the fact that I chose to place a bet is not unusual, but what followed is…

I walked up to the table, looked at the dealer and made the following statement. “I have waited all of my life to see Barbra Streisand. Her lucky number is 24 and so is mine. I am walking into the concert right now. I am betting $20.00 straight up on 24. Roll 24 please.”

The two men at the table looked at me like I was at the “freakish” end of the Streisand fan demographic. They had one dollar chips scattered about and continued to scatter. My twenty bucks was placed on black 24 and the dealer let the wheel spin.

I wish I could have taken at picture of the three of their faces when the ball bounced all around and then snuggled safely into the black 24 slot! I just started laughing, joyously laughing!

The dealer asked me if I knew how much money I had just won, as the odds on a straight up bet were 35 to 1?? I just won one ticket, to the show of a lifetime, I replied.

I had tears in my eyes that night as Streisand sang Don’t Rain on My Parade just as strongly and clearly as she had on that tugboat so many years before…..and $700.00 in chips in my pocket. Lucky, huh?

And so it begins.  I guess I had to finally find a place to throw all the random bullshit that runs through my head in a day.  Turns out WordPress is high on bullshit and doesn’t mind the diatribes, and daily assaults of anyone that can think of a four letter password and click enter.

Not looking for followers or haters.  Sometimes it is just good to toss stuff out there and see if anything sticks.  The catharsis I am looking for isn’t much different than anyone else out there…just to be heard, to be acknowledged…to be….in answer to Hamlet’s inquiry.

I try not to be angry all the time, but it really pisses me off that I fail in that regard.  This is an angry time, a time when Congress is fighting over health-care while Americans are dying for lack of it.  Not to mention senior citizens pondering whether to refill their prescriptions or pay the electric bill….don’t even think about that Luann platter at Luby’s grandma!

Did I mention why I named the blog, “Dyke in the Heart of Texas?”  I really don’t even like the word “dyke”, and have always had an aversion to “lesbian.”  I actually like to be called a queer…because that is how I feel most days….just different than the norm.  Which brings me to the new Southwest Airlines commercial “fags fly free.”  I know, I know …they say “bags” ..but I dare you not to hear it my way next time you see it..now that you heard it here.  Oh yeah, the reason for the name of the blog.  Okay…routine ramblings of a queer woman living in a red state, with bullshit constantly running through her brain….it fits.

So there it is, the first post to my new blog.  The brevity is the direct result of a nine pound wiener resting on my right shoulder…but that is a whole other story.