A customer at work today told me that I was "practically perfect in every way, like Mary Poppins."

xoxo, Travvy

Dear Olivia & Jacob

Dear Olivia & Jacob,

Please feel free to be the worst tattle-tales that the world has ever seen, because I was just called out by your mother, to my mother, aka Aunt Karen, to you, for being drunk, while I was mid-(semi-coherent)-story.

xoxo, Travvy

Gender Bending Sans Drag (Go Me!)

This afternoon at work, for the second time in about two weeks, I was mistaken for a female.

I was on my way from my department to the back room of the store, taking the garbage back to the trash compactor, and a customer stopped me to ask if I knew anything about meat. (Haha.) (That is what she said, I'm not making it up.) I do work in the deli but she was asking about the meat from the meat department, boneless skinless chicken to be precise, but that wasn't really the point of the story. You should be used to that from me by now though, I mean, come on. Anyway. She stopped me, saying, "Excuse me, Miss?" I was wearing residual mascara and trace amounts of eyeliner that I didn't take off from last night, (I like "'the morning after' look" that is achieved by sleeping with your mascara on. Eyeliner doesn't hold up as well, not that the mascara really does either, but what it ends up looking like the next morning is a good look unto itself, at least I think. That being the mascara. The eyeliner tends to smear throughout the day even without you touching your eyes, which I don't do, at least not that I'm conscious of. So it gets into wrinkles in your lower lid, well not wrinkles, because obvious none of us, The Beautiful People, have wrinkles, I mean the folds created in your lower eyelid when your eye is open, you know what I mean, look in the mirror. It may not be that apparent if you haven't got runaway leftover eyeliner in the crease drawing attention and making it blatant but it's there. So the point being, last night's mascara works the next day, last night's eyeliner, although it looks fine in the mirror that morning, throughout the day, not so much. That wasn't really the point, that was just the point of the random maquillage tangent. Which wasn't really the point of the entire thing, just of the last thought. I don't know where I meant to go with that whole thing, or where I was going when I suddenly veered off course, but let's see, I was mid-sentence...) but other than that, I was just wearing my work uniform: baseball hat type hat, marigold polo shirt, and black slacks. I sometimes have my apron cinched so tight that it takes my coworkers' collective breath away, not because of the stunning figure it gives me, which it totally does, (Think Scarlett O'Hara, or Rosemary Clooney's sister from White Christmas, whose waist you could probably wrap one hand around and touch your thumb and fingers together.) but because they feel that it's so tight that they can't imagine how I am able to draw breath, and they empathetically cease to breathe for me. (Another side note on White Christmas, my friend Fran from work and I are would-be sisters and do the "Sisters" act with the big showgirl feather-fans from the movie.) So I sometimes wear my apron cinched at the waist, which though one nay-sayer (jealous) said that no matter what I do I will never have child bearing hips, (which I do have when I wear it like that. 36-24-36 all the way!) but I wasn't wearing it like that today, so I didn't give the illusion of being a woman by my hourglass figure. She realized her mistake, and was very embarrassed. She needn't have been, I rather enjoyed being mistaken for a young lady, and she didn't seem nearly as foolish for it as the guy who did it the first time.

The other night when I arrived home, I apparently failed to notice that there were orange cones on the grass area between the curb and sidewalk with No Parking signs taped to them. The next morning, I woke up and my cell phone was ringing, it was my mom, but before I had a chance to answer it she had either hung up or the voicemail picked up, and I simultaneously heard someone knocking on the door. I assumed she had locked herself out on the way to work, so I came down, but she was in her bedroom doorway and said that there was someone at the door, for me to see who it was. I wasn't dressed, I just had a Breakfast at Tiffany's fleece blanket with Audrey Hepburn's face on it, and she and George Peppard kissing in the rain, it's a movie poster in blanket version, wrapped around my waist. I answered the door, and the guy said, "Sorry to bother you ma'am, but is that your car?" Bleary eyed and barely awake, though I caught it, I didn't bother to call him on the "ma'am." I didn't say anything to the customer at work either, she realized, but anyway. "Yes." "Could you please move it...blahblahblah." It wasn't until I closed the door and went back upstairs quickly to change, so I could go outside and move my car so they could dig a hole in the street, that I realized that I had been ma'am-ed. I was outraged! Not that he had thought that I was a women, which wouldn't have bothered me, but, um, hello?! I'd be a miss, thank you very much! I'm only in my early twenties for crying out loud! The nerve! How dare?! (And also, if you didn't take note, I wasn't dressed, read "no shirt" and I had the blanket around my waist. I sometimes wear a towel up under my arms when I have just exited the shower, (stage left,) but it was around my waist, and my chest was exposed. What a moron.)

xoxo, Travvy

P.S. Along with being mistaken for a woman, I have also recently been mistaken for being "Not that gay," hahaha. But that is a different story.

xoxo, Travvy

Someone has a High Opinion of Herself...

I like me, who do you like?

I just realized the depth (or shallowness?) of my vanity and narcissism. A friend of mine did one of those "surveys" on Facebook, which were more popular on MySpace like five to seven years ago, but still make their rounds, more infrequently, but you can still catch them every now and again posted as a "Note" on Facebook. The first question was to write a list of "Ten Things You Want to Say to Ten Different People." Number three was: "The world does not revolve around you." My immediate thought was that I was in fact the person that my friend wanted to say this to. Oh the irony!

Oh and by the way, I don't think, I know that Carly Simon's song was about me. (Don't you? Don't you? Don't you?)

I'm going to go listen to that, and Culture Beat's Mr. Vain, which if not written specifically for me, at least speaks to me.

xoxo, Travvy

Putting the Cart Before the (W)Hor(s)e

Oh Em GEE! I am so excited! There are a lot more stories left to tell and even some that Catherine reminded me that I mistakenly left out of the club post, (remember the lap dance I mentioned in the beginning? I didn't! Haha. So I have to revise that. I also now see that that post was somehow screwed up, halfway through the font gets bigger and then eventually goes back to normal - and then further down it gets hard to read because words cut off in the middle or just the last letter and then start on a new line which only reaches halfway across before it jumps to the next line. That has happened once before and I don't know how to fix it without going through the time consuming process of going back in and editing it line by line, which takes absolutely FOREVER! But I've done it before, I'll do it again...) But anyway, I have to tell you what happened today. I had lunch with my ex-boyfriend David, whom you haven't met yet but will after I catch you up on the rest of my Mississippi misadventures, but anyway we randomly went to see this apartment which I fell completely head over heels in love with. I won't go into the whole tale right now, all in due time, but I am überexcited about it and just have to gush!

I have been telling everyone about it. I am now trying to quick swing a full-time job at work rather than just part-time I have been working, and my mom said that normally the full-time job tends to come before the apartment and my friend Pam also said that I may "be putting the cart before the horse," as the saying goes, but I can't help it. I knew that this was going to happen too, I texted my friend Alisa with my premonition before seeing the place that I just knew I was bound to fall deeply in love with it and then be devastated when it inevitably falls through. (Female intuition? Haha.) Well hopefully I was only half right. I want only to be right about the loving the apartment, but pleasantly surprised and dead wrong about the outcome and somehow magically be able to manage to actually get it!

This rickshaw is already miles ahead of the cyclist because I am already thinking of how I want it decorated. If by some miracle I actually land this place, its not like I'd be able to afford paint any time soon, haha, (housewarming gift anyone?) but I want to paint it, wait for it...

Pink! That's riiight! Haha, can you imagine?! One of my very favorite movies, starring one of my very favorite actresses, if not my all time fave leading lady, is Batman Returns starring Michelle Pfeiffer. She plays the mild-mannered downtrodden secretary Selena Kyle by day, and her fierce villainess alter-ego Catwoman by night. (I was talking about this movie the other night with my friend Paul, and I said that Michelle Pfeiffer was the only Catwoman, except for the several actresses who played her in the old television series/movie of course, Julie Newmar, Eartha Kitt and Lee Meriwether.) The point being, Selena's apartment is shades of pink and I adore it! When she is first making her transformation into Catwoman she has this breakdown and shoves her stuffed animals into the garbage disposal and smashes pictures and knick-knacks with a frying pan, (which I will try to restrain myself,) but the part I will do is what she does next. She takes a can of black spray paint to the pink walls! Haha.

Selena-isms that I like to apply to other parts of my life aside from interior decor cues and wardrobe hijacks, (Hello, practically-sprayed-on-second-skin-latex-catsuit!) are in the scene when she first comes home to her coveted apartment, (which also has a Murphy bed but I hear they are stupid-expensive. One day, one day...) and later when she replays the whole charade after, oh just watch the movie! Anyway she walks in and calls, "Honey, I'm home! ... Oh, I forgot, I'm not married..." which I told my mom I would do religiously every time I got in. Another is a quote, (one of my favorites, and I realized when watching this earlier this evening that I could probably recite 97% of the screenplay verbatim) she says to Bruce Wayne, "It's the so-called 'normal' guys that always let you down. Sickos never scare me. At least they're committed." Not exactly the most sound dating advice I could follow, but hey, what are ya gonna do? (Is it bad that a villain is one of my heroes? Haha.)

I want this apartment to be part Selena Kyle, part Holly Golightly (Audrey Hepburn's beloved Breakfast at Tiffany's role) and part Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker in Sex and the City.) I feel like I shouldn't have to tell you who these people are, and most of you probably know, but you'd be surprised. (Those of you who don't ought to be ashamed of yourselves and educate yourself in these important references to popular culture!) A fabulous mash-up of the three of these ladies and you have all Travvy!

I wasn't planning on getting into this entire thing, and I'm really not, like you won't get the whole back story of the events of the day leading up to the apartment, (which is really quite riveting, stay tuned!) but let me just tell you more about the apartment. It's one bedroom, one bath, a big kitchen, and that's basically it. One small closet, (and Girrrrllll you know I will be needing me some closet space!) but then there is this little hallway/half-room between the bedroom and the bathroom, which is a really neat bathroom, too, by the way, at least as far as bathrooms go... that can be converted into a walk-in/dressing area a lá Ms. Carrie Bradshaw! It is very Sex and the City, or Gay Sex and the City, because it wouldn't be suburbs anymore if/when I am living in this to die for downtown apartment, but anyway. And the other thing that is trés SATC about it, is you know how Carrie had two bathroom doors? One right inside the front door and another off the bedroom via her walk-in? (See?!) It became important in one episode where Carrie and Aidan were mid-fight while he was mid-moving in, before their second break-up? "Why do you need two bathroom doors?!" "So if a rapist climbs in through my bedroom window I can see him in the mirror and ("vamoose" whistle noise and two thumbs off to the side hand gesture) escape out the front door!" (This wasn't a direct quote, but very close I should think.) If the bathroom access through the closet weren't enough, there is also a second entrance/exit from/to the hallway from the from the would-be/(this fact actually makes it even more literally a) walk-in. Not exactly the same but close enough! Not exactly the same city either, smaller, (read less expensive,) but a lot to see and do and there are buses every hour, David told me more than once, to NYC anyway haha. Not that I'd be going there much, at least at first, with the cash flow situation. But I don't care if I had to not do as much, I don't do much now anyway, I could probably manage to go out about as often as I do now, maybe skip an invite here and there, but it would be worth it because I would be in this cute little apartment! And it is little, notice I didn't mention a living space. Well the whole thing is living space, but like a living room area. I could have room for seating in the bedroom or kitchen, but I don't have furniture anyway. Well that's not true, I do have my Great Grammy's coffee table that was going out for a yard sale despite my best efforts to hold on to it, but my Gram said that I should keep it for when I had my own place someday. (I was maybe ten when this happened, haha.) So I have a coffee table. And my bedroom furniture and decor, endless amounts of tchotchkes, that are in my bedroom at home now. (Including an actual movie poster from a theater a family friend once owned, the ones that are hung outside the theater to advertise, from guess what movie? Batman Returns!) (I also have Mermaids (Cher!) but that doesn't tie in to the Batman theme.)

Another movie that I have intended to incorporate into my home one day, but that I haven't mentioned to anyone, as far as I know, up to this point, at least not since the recent developments and my subsequent fixation/obsession/mania over this apartment, is the mirror from the Elizabeth Taylor film BUtterfield 8. I intentionally also capitalized the "u" before Danielle points out my apparent typo, as I have become a sort of spelling and grammar Nazi on her Facebook posts. In the movie, which just two night ago my Aunt Tracy and I were discussing the confusing subject of Elizabeth Taylor's (Academy Award winning) character, who is apparently a call-girl but is infuriated and outrageously offended when a date and or john leaves money on the night stand the morning after. We don't know what the deal is, and I said it is compounded and made more confusing by the fact of the MGM and really all studios of the time period with their strict rules of propriety so things are only alluded to rather than outright said. Although, I do recall, Aunt Tracy, in one scene where the guy says that, oh, he understands, she chooses the men, they don't choose her. So I guess even though she is technically a call-girl using a calling service (BUtterfield 8 is the calling service, hence the name,) she doesn't go with just anyone and she isn't or at least she feels she isn't prostituting just dating so she doesn't accept money? I don't know. I am getting sidetracked again. To finish the original train of thought, and bring it back to how it relates to my apartment, when she wakes up in the morning and discovers the envelope of money, she becomes enraged and writes "No Sale" in red lipstick on the mirror above the fireplaee, leaves the envelope and cash on the mantelpiece, but storms out with a cut-crystal bottle of liquor and wearing one of her "gentleman" caller's wife's mink coats. (She needed to wear something to leave though, she found her dress torn in half on the floor and couldn't very well have gone out in her slip.) So I want a mirror in my apartment on which I will write in big scrawling red lipstick letters, "No Sale."

I'll keep you posted on how this whole apartment fiasco plays out. I am getting way ahead of myself and carried away, but it's fun and I enjoy having things to be preoccupied with. Well as long as it's something fun to be preoccupied with like the prospect of this apartment and not the everyday mundane things that I deal with on a regular basis. Clearly none of those things are fun or interesting or I would be blogging more. So look for the mess the layout of the club night part II post became to be fixed, and the addition of the lap dance escapade and another run-in Catherine had with a bitchy Sweeney Todd-type queen. Til then, Mes Chères.

xoxo, Travvy

If you like Tranny Manny and Sex and the City...

...then you'll love Gay Sex and the Suburbs!

I have finally updated! This is not an April Fool's prank! The new entry is actually shown after the Travvy Horror Manny Show post with the wallpaper I suggest that you download and set as your desktop background. Danielle's new North Carolina neighbor, Nancy was the one who finally got me to post the thing, I started it back in June, you can see the date stamped on it, and had written more of it periodically, but now I finally just finished it. What made me actually do it rather than just keep talking about it, don't everyone else be offended that your being after me didn't get me to do it, haha, was Nancy's suggestion that I should have a newspaper column. I had the idea for "Gay Sex and the Suburbs" awhile ago and made some blog title banners for it, but I can't edit my ideas into which is the best one. I'll just post them all and one Tranny Manny one that I was going to use for the New Look of Tranny Manny for when i eventually began to write again, but I still like the "Burned Bridges" sequel one haha.

xoxo, Travvy