Eight Weeks Down, Eight Days To Go

Give or take...Ohhhh... I am all a-fluster! Be still my beating parts!

Up S*&t Creek Without A Paddle

'All of me, why don't you take all of me?...'

I had always hoped that if I were to crap in a plastic container it would be as some sort of art project, a profound statement that 'art is shit' or a reclaiming of my bodily waste as worth venerating, or even an attempt at some sort of scatological sexual adventure, but it seems that no, this is the latest test that my doctor has come up with in the quest to work out Why Zoo Hurts Where Sie Does. I suppose I should do it, really, and write a critique of why pissing in a jar or having blood taken is perfectly okay with me, but the mere suggestion of THAT made me VERY indignant! Ooooh, Zoo not as cool and unflappable as sie thought sie was! YOU WANT ME TO DO WHAT, DOCTOR??? And there be no prizes for guessing what colour they use for the lid of the container. Just in case it wasn't REALLY OBVIOUS.

The only question I can really ask is should I do this before or after they shove a probe up my pink bits in tomorrow's ultrasound adventure? (Apparently the latter is quite cool 'cos you can actually see your ovaries and stuff from the inside and all so half looking forward to it). Poked and prodded, images of organs captured and analysed, with various excretions and fluids cultured and counted, well. am beginning to feel like I know more about me than ever some how. That's where my WHAT is? How many white blood cells do I have? Oh, so THAT is how long my kidney measures? Look at the ducts on that! The rub, though, is that someone else understands it more than I do, and this new information is not MINE as such. (And for the record, my gall bladder is rather pretty and stone-free, hence more tests 'cos we still don't really have a clue what is wrong, if anything.)

Cue the Vapors' 'I want a doctor, to take your picture, so I can look at you from inside as well'. Arrgh. I just want them to work it out and it not to be anything really serous and then for offending part to just be ripped out/medicated/beaten into submission adn for me to get back to relatively (bad)painfree existence. This is getting dull. Though probably more so for me than you lot at home reading this!

Flower Power

'To be overcome by the fragrance of flowers is a delectable form of defeat'- Beverly Nichols.

I think my persona for the playhouse party this weekend will smell like a church when the flowers haven't been change for a week, dankness and organic decay, heavy incense... Having a moment of divine inspiration derived from the Nick The Stripper film clip, David Byrne's giant suit in the Stop Making Sense film, and a play I once saw by Jean Genet. Want to carry fleshy blooms, chrysanthemum or maybe jonquils? Want them juicy between my fingers or underneath my feet, carpet, fistful, something to hold onto or walk upon, or maybe to flay myself with? Flowergoo elixers, pressed and pretty.

When I was small I would play with my cousin in my grandparent's backyard, making perfume by rubbing our wrists with camellias. I think there was a fountain/birdbath there, and a strange potted plant that grew some kind of shiny berries, and big frangipani trees and once I found a real knucklebone on the ground by the garage. There was also a bird of paradise by the back steps, and with the botanical name starting with 'regina' I thought it must somehow related to my aunt of the same name. She does look rather similar, though not quite as colourful.

Two Years Tomorrow (28th July)

We were there when he stopped being there. Tonight the three of us proposed a toast to a lost loved one. I should have ordered a cognac. Cheers, wherever you are.

It Is Indeed Much Fun

To be a pink fluffy rabbit, chewing up cherries and dribbling strawberry syrup into a bowl of pink and white iceream and vanilla wafers for a photo shoot set in a truckstop diner, a kind of roadkill sundae. My life is surreal, and fabulous, and oh so silly! Yay!

Inquisition Photos

Lots of lovely pix of me and my extended family available at

SLPA website and
SameSame

No Devonshire Teas For Zoo

I am in pain. And sickly, shaky, fevered, off-colour, weak. Dr thinks maybe it is my gall bladder? Anyway, lost of blood tests and scans and whantot to follow, the most pressing outcome of which is that the Southern Highlands Adventure has been cancelled. Bugger, big bugger. Was looking forward to it ever so much...

WomYn Need Defending From Grumpy Weirdo Feminists And Bad Spelling

Read the last letter in the latest Cherrie. And PLEASE respond! This is what I just sent in reply:

Now, when I signed up for feminism 101 I must have been in a different class to Justine D. For nowhere in my doctrine did it tell me that I had the right to make value judgements on the decisions other women made about their bodies, their right to engage in pleasures of their own choosing and their right to interrogate such fields as 'health care' and make up their own minds as to which avenues of embodied gratification and expression were 'proper' or 'normal' or 'healthy'. My feminism granted women, womyn, wimmin, and anybody else who cared to join the big old struggle the basic assumption that they were intelligent, ir/rational enough and capable of making their own decisions without some, ahem, paternalistic figure dictating to them. Sorry, who made Justine D Lord and Master of WomYn's Bodies and What Pleasures They May Seek? Did I miss another meeting of the Sheila Jeffrey's Fanclub again?

Please excuse me, I am off to sit quietly in a corner with my mind and my legs closed tight lest I lose control completely and make a most unladylike spectacle of myself. Whatever next??? Who can tell, these new-fangled maidens will be demanding penetration and sex toys!
Cheers

-- Zoo: Bloodslut, Feminist and Founding Member of the Pierce de Resistance

Also, great article about Mayhem in that issue (heehee). Loving the mag!

Two Weeks To Go Tomorrow

Not that, like, I am counting down to the Joy Of Monster or anything...

ACMP Projections 08

KellyAnn Denton, one of my fave Sydney photographers, will be in this... so check it out! I'll be in Perth already so need to send my minions to clap and cheer without me:

ACMP Projections 08 in association with SONY Finalists notified, and tickets on sale for Melbourne Sydney and Canberra. Now in it's 5th year, Projections '08 is a nationwide competition run annually by Trampoline to find and showcase the very best emerging photographers in Australia. The judges have made their decision and this year Finalists will have their work shown with contemporary music on cinema screens in Melbourne and Sydney theatres, as well as at Vivid in Canberra. In an event that showcases the latest photographers to keep an eye on and provides a night that is inspirational and entertaining. Finalists will also be featured in exhibitions, magazine articles and have lots of other awesome opportunities that money can't buy. The event will be heavily promoted to both the photographic and creative communities as well as the general public and already tickets are selling fast. Get your tickets here:
Projections 2008 Photographic Screening - Sydney Chauvel CinemaCnr Oatley & Oxford Sts.Paddington NSWTuesday 15 Jul 20086:30 PM - 10:30 PM
Projections 2008 Photographic Screening - Melbourne ACMIFederation Square, Flinders StMelbourne VICThursday 24 Jul 20087:30 PM - 10:30 PM

In past years the finalists have come from the many disciplines of photography from commercial to photojournalism and art to science. In 2008 we are proud to announce that Projections will have 3 defined categories, Commercial, Editorial and Art with a winner announced for each category. Full details a the Trampoline website at ACMP SONY Projections webpage

Flesh, Pulls

Have been pondering (yes, more pondering) the way in which play is often mediated through items other than the body (hooks, paddles, whips, crops, collars) and that shagging much more often isn't. In the context of degress of intimacy, flesh-to-flesh vs flesh-to-flogger-to-flesh... hard to explain why I've been thinking of it, but...

Hmm, somehow wanting to put all my thoughts up here today and see what comments they get! Not sure what I am looking for: Guidance? Approval? Debate? Dissent? Immortality?

One Track Mind

Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster Monster etc!!!!!!!

So Many Ways To Let Blood Flow

CaneToad was saying that she liked the idea of cutting but not piercing, and I was thinking about the differences. They both hurt, create new orifices, cause blood loss (usually). Came to the conclusion was that one of the main differences for me was that a cut created an opening for the sake of the opening up and it contained only the body (even when it scarred), but a piercing created an opening precisely for the sake of filling it with something other than the body( needle, jewellery, hook, canula). Cuts are left to close themselves somehow, even when sutured or stapled its their own matter which fills them up... Hmm. Such pleasant musings, and sure NecroTitties will have something to say?

Pained Articulations

Someone mentioned at a seminar I spoke at the other day (with NT and Scragg's alter ego) the way that we all spoke about pain, and different kinds of pains, and that our vocabularly for it was much more varied than most people's. Is that true? Perhaps, as most of us play with it a lot. Was thinking that it might be interesting to get some sort of discussion going regarding different kinds of pain and sensation, eg the sting of 23gauge needle through a pinch of upper arm flesh to the grunt of a 6 gauge hook through a chunk of back, the subtle differences in floggers, the cane vs the paddle, the smack of a hand against cheek, what it is that we all like or dislike about certain types of ouchies, or where and when and how we want certain types of ouchies, what draws us the the scalpel or neuro wheel, what repels us from the single tail or the crop...

Mentioned this to a mate, who has also been consdiering such matters and he said 'but others I can't stand- then there is discomfort...discomfort sucks. and the type of pain I like is dependant on mood. There is "medical" pain- metal through meat etc, its cool- clinical and produces an endorphine rush like you have been injected. just associate diff pains with diff colours, smells and tastes- Heavy flogger is red and warm (but not hot) its comfort pain' and then he had to dash off but hopefully there will be more. Any comments?

Of Course, I Leave For WA on the FOURTH!!!!!!!!!!

Oh well, seems I shall be missing out on all manner of Sydney mischief for a while- this IS the Sity that never stops... at least I get the pervy play party the weekend before I go. Oh, and MUCH naughtiness awaits me in Perth, so I'm not too fussed really *lol*... But for those of you sticking around:

Wanna ride? Sit on my HANDLE BAR!Welcome to Handle Bar, the fag precinct’s easy peasy tease me pseudo sleaze bar, wide open and pulsing each and every Saturday night.Adding a new layer of filth to Sydney’s festering scum scene, Handle Bar will offer the grimiest respite yet for homos, punks, misfits, slutchops, gaylords, nymphos, lesbos, bean queens, chic freaks, leather daddies plus the usual miscellaneous extraneous plus ones.Resident face slash disc jockeys Seymour Butz, Lovertits, Sveta, Mark Murphy, A-Cybele, Ben Drayton, Matt Vaughan, Johnny Pash and Vinyl Richie will provide a little underground background noise, unless we find far more appealing special guests poached from international touring acts. Add some perfectly nasty performers and a few tasty surprises, and you have the latest greatest den of Sin City iniquity.Handle Bar – starts Saturday 5th of July. Come, take a ride. 134 Oxford St Darlinghurst, Australia

Walking Wounded

Bruises and pin-marks on thighs from beautiful piercing scene the other night with the Darkling.
Giant bite-mark from ill-behaved CaneToad who should know better on my arm. Not impressed.
Hook-marks and emerging bruises from the five-way flesh pull late yesterday afternoon.
Just been poked and prodded by ouchy ultrasound to check out why I am getting such bad pains in my sides.
Random pulled muscles and sore points from general trashiness over the weekend.

I mean, I LIKE some pain, but not all of this is pleasant!

Boot Jobs

Recently someone offered to polish my boots, and for some reason I felt the need to check in with the Monster about whether this was okay. Think all concerned but myself thought this was odd, but then I explained that a boot job may as well be a blow job as far as I am concerned- it gets me off (if done well, and in an appropriate context). Told this to Necrotitties 'but its SEX' and she just looked at me and replied 'Yes, but to you EVERYTHING is sex.' Giggle. Not quite true, but I do like to see the pervy potential of most things in life, from lagerphones to WD40...

Monster In A Blue Dress

If a boy had a chance, a chance with someone like you
Are you gonna break his heart, let him cry for the moon
Are you hiding somewhere behind those eyes?

I just freeze every time you see through me
And it's all over you, electric blue.
On my knees, help me baby,
Tell me, what can I do, electric blue.

Oh I had a dream, For a moment I believed it was true
Oh I'd have given anything just to be there with you
Are you hiding somewhere behind those eyes?

I just freeze every time you see through me
And it's all over you, electric blue.
In too deep, standing here waiting
As I'm breaking in two, electric blue.
I can see, can see that it may be
Just a vision of you, electric blue.
On my knees, help me baby,
Tell me what can I do, electric blue.

- Icehouse
'Electric Blue'

Inertia

When I chat to PhD-freak friends and they say thinsg like 'I've got to go and teach blogging to a bunch of homeless teenage mums in Penrith tomorrow - oh -and I've just landed a job as a research assistant for a community arts organisation in granville......' I get to thinking that maybe I am really a little lazy? All I really do is write articles for mags, travel, perform, make photo shoots and work on the tome!

Chapter And Verse

Editing away, referencing and changing my commas and hyphens... But think this book chapter may well be just about done. Wooooooooohooooooooooo! Now, just have to see what the editors think. And start writing that seminar paper for Friday. LOTS OF COFFEE FOR ZOO!!!

Remission Is Over, Return To Your Seats

Her remission is over, the second of my recently cancer-cursed mates to have to decide that enough is enough. Brain lesions, malignant, numerous. It is time for one final holiday, hoping to make the next birthday, making peace with the world, preparations for memorials and ashes, farewells to loved ones, refusing to prolong the ordeal, organising palliative care teams, dying with dignity in her own home.

Dying with dignity? I'm with Mrs Madrigal on this one. When asked by Edgar Halcyon what she would day on her death bed, she answered 'How about 'oh shit'?' (or words to that effect). Oh shit, indeed.

Dream A Little Dream Of Me

'And I find it kind of funny, I find it kind of sad
These dreams in which i'm dying, Are the best I've ever had'

- Gary Jules
'Mad World'

Twice already we have shared blood (unusual given my usually blood-less state), and now we dreamed different perspectives of the same (ficticious) event on the same night. I don't what this means, but it feels like it means something.

Threadless Shirts

Threadless have amazing shirts. And a sale ending today- but pretty cheap mostly anyway! Thanks to MSM for the link...

My Significant Monster

Girlfriend? Boyfriend? Special friend? Partner? Spouse? Lover? Beloved?

Think My Significant Monster covers all bases with more accuracy and greater potential.

I Do Like A Good Artist Statement *CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS*

Ambiguousity: Am-big-u-ous-ity [am-big-yoo-o-si-tee], -noun

1.The act of an Artist whereby one’s artist’s statement about one’s artwork justifies one’s existence and vice versa

Ambiguousity is a group show where artists are asked to enter an artist statement with a humble artwork in response to the exhibition theme.

All entries from the sublime to the ridiculous will be accommodated. We accept such methodologies as humour, dry seriousness, philosophic gibberish, nonsensical or sensible ranting, appropriation in any form, manipulated language, or, anything poetic, profound, prophetic or indeed, pathetic. Ambiguousity promises to be the largest survey of artist’s statement ever to be held in Newtown!

Please see www.atthevanishingpoint.com.au/index.php?p=1_15_SOS for further details.
Entries close Monday 16^th June

For further details and to receive a proposal form email atthevanishingpoint@hotmail.com

For The Inquisition I Wore...

Big black feathered eyelashes with blue and silver glitter cat-eyes. Red lipstick. New quiff-esque haircut. Gas mask. Gaffa crosses on nipples. Cincher cinched tight. Big blue velvet skirt. Black army boots. Packing big and hard over crotchless fishnet tights.

My look was delighfully androgynous somehow, and attracted a whole new variety of admirers. I danced, snogged occassionally, cuddled, chatted, frottaged, considered my options, and at one point may have sat on a Bear's head (not quite like that, and its all a bit blurry, perhaps he was just under my skirt). But it seems My Significant Monster (aka The Westie) has spoiled me for mere mortals, and whilst it was a dizzying festival of mutual admiration and flirtation with a vast array of the prettily perverse, I really wasn't very interested in much more action than a quick grope in the queue for the loo or a promise of boot polish. But it was very, very nice to know it was there for the taking if I changed my mind.

Daddy Zoo

Procure for them (or give them the means to procure) tickets, volunteer shifts, outfits, piercing supplies, someone to pierce them, toilet sex, a place to stay, coffee, food, addresses, phone numbers, pre-party drinks, car rides, taxis, spending money and quirky adventures.

Pat them, cuddle them, listen to them, organise them, socialise them, let them hide behind your skirts, teach them manners and allow them to crawl into bed with you when they are scared.

Then walk home alone when they go dancing without you. Ah, sometimes I do feel SO parental! My charges are all sorted out with (most of) what they need and I can sleep easily.

Hack-ed Up

Leesa and I on Hack, JJJ radio today at 5:30pm Sydney time. I was being pierced by her, and kinda floaty, so don't know quite what I said but she seemed to be very entertaining...

Love Thyself

'The link between sexual intimacy and knowing comes about through the idea of secrets revealed through bodily knowledge shared with a lover. Sex with ourselves while alone is also a form of intimacy with literary connections. And the secrets we reveal to ourselves when masturbating can be even more revealing, or confronting, than those we learn from our partner. There’s nothing like sexual desire for oneself to fuel narratives of the wildest kind. This is when the secrets of our bodies perhaps speak most eloquently and without censure' writes Fiona Giles in MilkBrain: Writing the Cognitive Body (2007).

Extra justification for a little 'private time'. Or public, as you please.

A Room Of Hir Own

Seems that I be getting lots of what I ask for here, even if it comes some time after I mention it. Recently filled wishes have included instant gratification booty, a bevy of subbies/bottoms (really! people want me to do bad bossy things to them!) and someone who fits most (if not all?) of my stated criteria for Really Good Relationship Material. So, a new wish:

By the end of the year, I want to have a proper place to work on my projects. Study/studio space. Quick, consistent internet. Working printer. Big bookshelves. Desk to myself. Worktable. Stereo. Enough floorspace to rehearse shows or do small photo shoots or stretch out like a cat when taking a break. Cushions/big comfy chair/blankie to cuddle up and read in. Peace and quiet. Lots of stationery. A safe place to create, invent, explore. Freedom from constant interruptions, strange housemate energy, noisy officemates, dirty coffee cups and other distractions.

Have a good feeling about this one, that perhaps finally I am in a situation where such a thing is feasible. Fingers crossed- got a PhD to write and art to make and its getting tricky...

PayBack Time

I am a student on bugger-all scholarship. If you owe me money at the moment, PLEASE pay up as soon as possible! I don't mind people owing me but its getting silly now- I got bills and plans and need to balance my books somehow... Thanks!

Don't Shop@ Don't Look

the 2203 collective presents Don't Shop! A new installation playing with the concept of shop. Our grand opening is this:

Thursday 5th of June
@Don't Look 2203
419 New Canterbury Rd, Dulwich Hill (nr Marrickville Rd on the 425, 426, 428 and 445 bus routes)
6pm-9pm

runs for two weeks.

Featuring artists such as; Miss Helen, Vanessa Berry, Irit Pollak, Simon Yates, Chris Lego and more!

Smug Bitch

A friend's snatch-waxer once reminded her that looking fabulous and being successful was the best revenge. Not feeling particularly vengeful, but all the same am enjoying being sort of smug about my life at the moment- amazing Westie, heaps of art-making, new travel plans, lots of writing, my fair share of infamy... all good!

Egghead

It is very remiss of me, but a quick search of this here blog reveals that I have NEVER included this quote! Apologies... From Lewis Carroll's 'Through The Looking Glass':

"I don't know what you mean by 'glory,'" Alice said.
Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. "Of course you don't -- till I tell you. I meant "there's a nice knock-down argument for you!'"
"But `glory' doesn't mean `a nice knock-down argument,'" Alice objected.
"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in a rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean -- neither more nor less."
"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean different things."
"The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master -- that's all."
Alice was too much puzzled to say anything, so after a minute Humpty Dumpty began again.
"They've a temper, some of them -- particularly verbs, they're the proudest -- adjectives you can do anything with, but not verbs -- however, I can manage the whole lot! Impenetrability! That's what I say!"

Leathered Up And Lusting

SLPA's Pride Week makes me very happy. There's a certain something in the air, a smell of leather and dubbin and amyl and beer, pressed hankies and new chaps. Everyone I encounter is some sort of deviant. I am among kin more than ever, more than at Mardi Gras or Sleaze or Queer Collaborations or any other Big Queer Sort Of Happening. I find myself bouncy around singing along to J Bear's Meatloaf cover versions, grinning at strangers in cow hide, flirting and schmoozing and cruising and sniffing about in dark corners, getting cheeky and assertive and brazen and bold in my boots and collar, nipples hard and hairs up on the back of my neck, a heightened alertness and energy... Wish the Westie was in Sydney for it this year, want to drag her about on a leash at Inqui (or vice versa, I am a switchy creature), want to give her a tour or every toilet block in town, want to leave the whole city stinking of us...

Trans Urban Spaces *Call For Submissions*

XYZ TRANS-FORMATIONS OF URBAN SPACE: TRANSGENDERED AND TRANSSEXUAL EXPERIENCES OF THE CITY

Women and Environments International Magazine is seeking submissions for its upcoming issue on trans urban space. The objective of the issue is to critically examine the production of trans urban space in cities of the global north and south through a consideration of the lived embodied experiences of transgendered and transsexual people. International contributions and transnational perspectives are welcome from people who are genderqueer, gender variant, transgender, MTF, FTM, intersexual, and/or omnigender, in addition to those who identify as transvestites, cross-dressers, trans youth, queer activists, and trans allies. Submissions can be in the form of essays, book or film reviews, poetry, photography, and/or visual art.

Contributors are invited to explore:
- Locations that enable, constrain, and commodify trans sexuality and desire (e.g., suburbs, public spaces, cruising areas, bathhouses, play parties, pride festivals, drag shows, bars, bookstores, community centres, homeless shelters, and the Internet);
- Everyday negotiations of sex/gender relations and norms in home, school, work, recreation, and commercial environments;
- Anti-oppression advocacy work by individuals, community-based organizations, and institutions addressing experiences of violence, harassment, discrimination and multiple oppressions in cities;
- Urban policy frameworks that create, maintain or challenge transphobia;
- The inclusiveness/exclusivenes
s of queer space to gender variant people;
- Trans-formative challenges to heteronormativity and homonormativity in urban space;
- Tensions between cultures of respectability and flamboyance; and
- The fluidity, performativity, and ambiguity of the gender continuum and its materializations in the spaces of the body and the city.

Deadlines: Abstracts or indications of interest are due by July 1, 2008 and final manuscripts by Sept 1, 2008.

Writer's Guidelines: Features should not exceed 2500 words. If you would like to submit an article written in a language other than English, please let us know and WEI will do its best to facilitate translation. All written work must be original and not previously published. Detailed editorial guidelines and information can be found on our website http://www.weimag.com.

Pinnacles Of Perversion

I want to make a photo shoot at the Pinnacles in WA, most probably for Slit. Or possibly even Spunk. Any ideas? Someone suggested something Frankenstein-y. Hmm.

Welcome Winter

It is the first day of winter, and the sky has has been overcast and spitting gently on and off all day. All I can think of is the Westie, wanting, wanting, wanting...

Be Still My Bleeding Arse

I still have two rather large and itchy-ouchy cuts on my butt from last week's photo shoot with the King. Perhaps it was not, then, a good idea to force Mr Red Shoes to spank my arse on the dancefloor last night. It was fun at the time, true, but...Owwwwwwwwwwwwww!

Trans/Gender Variant And Physical Activity

Because I think research is important!
------------------

Hello Everyone, Attached are links to two surveys I am asking trans/gender variant folks to participate in.

I'm investigating how physical activity fits into a gendervariant person's lifestyle andthe factors that might influence whether they participate in physicalactivities of any sort. These surveys ask questions regarding activity level from early childhood to present, sex/gender identity, and your experiences as a gender variant individual. I am particularly interested in your personal accounts of inclusive and/or discriminating experiences. Please take the time to fill out the surveys and contact me with any questions concerning this research.

Thank you very much, Wil Bailey PO Box 2883 Olympia, WA 98507, 484.883.4659 wilbailey666@hotmail.com

This survey is for folks identifying as gender variant:
http://FreeOnlineSurveys. com/rendersurvey. asp?sid=x9g8y3hp51brqdg444593

This survey is specifically for folks who have transitioned at least once:
http://FreeOnlineSurveys. com/rendersurvey. asp?sid=w7250jdi85vagbb444514

Please complete both if you feel both apply to your experience.