I am having some issues with my voice. I currently sound like a frog. I don’t know if it is allergies gone bad or if I actually caught something but it is in my throat right now. Yesterday I actually had no voice. I don’t think that has ever happened before. All I could do was whisper. I could get some cracky notes out but not really turn them into words.

I had a test at Kaiser in Fremont that I had been waiting 3 months for in the morning. After that I was wanting to call some people and realized that no one would be able to understand me over the phone. I was cut off from communicating with anyone I knew. That really threw me for a loop. It was a little hard to face.

Then I thought about how I handled things before I got addicted to this cell phone of mine and it became a Gina-day. I went Shopping!!!!

I am looking for a white short sleep dress thing to wear under my rather transparent white flapper dress. Didn’t find it this time but I did find some cool stuff at Ross and amazingly so, in the Mall. I think a skirt from Ross will go very nicely as part of my New Year’s Eve outfit so I am very happy. Two things will work very well for work type clothes at investment bankers.

Today, the froggy voice is back and I am grateful that I can do what phone calls I need. Communication is important to me. Any blocks to it are hard to live with. I will take care of myself but I will not be quiet.

I went to a show tonight. The basis was Satan gives Jesus a surprise birthday party. It was somewhat scripted and somewhat improv. Somewhat good and somewhat boring. The thing that surprised me was I felt threatened. I realized it was because there were a lot of people at the show that were even more strange than I. I was out-weirded. They made me look pretty normal and conservative. *shiver*

I am so use to being “different” and accepting that about me that I have a problem not being the Weird One. I have taken great pride in my Weirdness. And I can’t compete with some of these people at or in this show. I don’t want to be that far out on the fringe and they aren’t really that far out there. I am not sure if my old boss (the one I have so many problems with) wouldn’t be comfortable with these people. He just hides it during the work day. I felt like I was the suburb version of weird. Not in the inner city and not completely rural.

So now I have to get use to the idea that I am not all that weird. I am not normal and will probably always be different. But I am not at the top of the scale of Weird either.

Hmmmm, more getting use to being in the grey area between black and white.

I am insane. I have spent over 4 hours on dial-up. A lot of that was doing OKcupid tests and answering questions. So many of their questions I don’t want to be bothered with and I came up with something brilliant. I looked at my own profile and it had a list of questions they though I would consider important. I always thought those were the questions I marked as most important to me but most of them I hadn’t answered yet and they were mostly ones I would consider important. So I answered a bunch of them while writing emails that have been waiting for me when the page reloads.

This is all well and good but I don’t need to be doing this at 5-fricking am when I have something to do this afternoon. I should be sleeping. Too bad the 17 hours or so of sleep I have been getting for the last could of days can’t be allotted here. I have been oversleeping to avoid not having work or things to do outside my house. Welcome to my coping mechanism for the holidays.

The reason the computer got started at such a late hour was because I went so see Narnia at 9:30pm. That was a nice treat for my Xmas eve. It was really nice to see people out and about around midnight.

And so begins the protected section of my LJ. I finally was able to get my LJ backed up so I am now actually going forward with protected posts idea.

I just posted one to Friends only. If you don’t see it, let me know.

Recently I had someone close to me that has trouble with some of the clothes I wear. An example is my drawstring velvet pants. He was concerned about how strangers would judge me based on what I wore and thereby judge him based on his association with me.

There was a lot of discussion about this. I understand his point of view and I sort of agree with it. I actually want those strangers that would judge me by my clothes and dismiss me to do exactly that. I want what he is so worried about happening. If someone were to judge me based on my clothes and dismiss me without getting to know me better, that is the type of person I don’t want around me. I want them to go away so I don’t have to deal with them.

There are “normal” people out there. Many of fandom call them mundanes. There is my subset of people. I usually refer to them as “my type of people.” They are the fans, the geeks, the oddballs I hang out with and enjoy. I found the option of being around “my type of people” in college. I hung out with the New Wave crowd. We wore rhinestones and formal wear to class. We cut our hair into odd shapes, died it unnatural colors, stuck it straight up (or in some weird concoction) and painted our faces. We were different and we wanted people to know it. One of the things I realized about the people dealing with us is that they had to overcome how we looked. Something I saw with the New Wave crowd was that we were very open to anyone that wanted to talk with us.

My theory is that everyone has defenses set up when dealing with people they don’t know. Normal people have all that small talk, weather, sports, social niceties that you have to go through to get to know someone to find out if it is safe to let down some of your defenses. The defenses the New Wave crowd had was on the surface. People were able to tell a lot about each of us by what we wore, what we looked like, and how we presented ourselves. If they liked what they saw and still approached us, then it was likely that it was ok to have lowered defenses. So there was less game playing, less tug and pull to see where people stood. It was a much more open environment.

I prefer this open environment. I like it when I don’t need to put up defenses. I like the concept of people being prescreened before they even get to talking to me. I want the judgment of those Mundanes out there that think I am a bit off and should be avoided.

Ever since this discussion about the clothes I wear, I have been very aware of every comment about my velvet pants that I have made. I have gotten so many complements (from like to love them) from people I enjoy and respect. Even professionals that have no reason to give me a complement. I think I have had one comment from a family member (who’s taste I think lowly of) that they look like pajamas, which I will admit, sometimes they do.

Sometimes, I must sacrifice my desire for a different appearance for things like work environments. But even then, I have a tendency to bring a taste of it in.

We are judged by our appearance. And there are times I am very grateful for the distaste of “normal” society.

I normally don’t like the concept of Dating. The getting to know someone while doing events, like eating or seeing movies. I find it very uncomfortable. I like doing things with friends and then I find myself romantically involved with one of my friends. I know the guy already relatively well and then we work on getting to know each other very well.

So it was really odd when I heard myself say the other day, “That is why I like dating.” I was showing pictures to a friend of mine and I had some of outfits I would wear out on dates. I have a lot of clothes that I can’t wear to work. I can wear them to parties or dancing or a con. They are dress to impress type of things. Some of these things aren’t good for dancing or a lot of walking, like over the knee high heel boots. But they would be great on a date.

So, dates are considered costume opportunities. A time when things from my closet that don’t get out much get a chance to show off.

It made me realize any event gets a +2 if it is a costume event.