Category: transgender

Insulation and Roof Venting

Wolsey2 Comments

This last month we had to upgrades to the house related to insulation and heat issues.

Insulation

Over the last winter our house could not maintain heat. The floors were icy, and the heat cycled on every ten minutes. At one point during an ice storm it felt like the heat was running constantly for 24 hours straight. It was just that cold and the heater could not keep up.

Notice no insulation under my home.

We were recommended Boulton Insulation from our home inspectors, and we had them come. The inspector (Kevin) was honest, and really fair in his assessment. He was also super knowledgeable about heat pumps which is on our home list. He said it would be an easy job to put the insulation under the house.

If I was 20 years younger, or didn’t have my disability, I’d have done it myself, but I just can’t anymore.

Our quote came in at approximately $1200, after a power company rebate. That is less than the iPad I was eyeballing. Sold!

They scheduled us and had it done in a week. It was a one day job, and the next morning we noticed an immediate difference. The floors were warm. We could walk barefoot. As the mornings are getting colder, we have only turned the heat on for ten minutes in the morning and our tiny house just heats up and stays heated. If we cook or run the dishwasher we don’t even need it.

Best of all, my wife is comfortable. That is worth a lot to me.

Roof Venting

The second issue we had was the house roof was done by the previous owners, and while it’s a fairly good job, there is literally no venting in it. Like none! The blown in insulation in the attic is five star good according to Kevin from Boulton, but the lack of venting means it heats up in there, and just cooks us in the house.

On a sunny day you can literally feel the heat in the ceiling start drifting down and making the house hot. In the most recent sunny day, it was 74F, and the house was 85F just because of this with windows open. On a really hot day, our air conditioners struggled to fight it.

Kevin at Boulton gave me a recommendation for Patrick at Sound Roof Care, and I got a quote. Like Kevin, Patrick was fair, and gave me a reasonable bit of information that mirrored my own experience and research. Basically, I was risking mold and reducing the life of my shingles because I had no venting.

The quote to add venting along the entire roof was approximately $2700. That’s great, because I went up there to seal some nails and the roof cap on the recommendation of the home inspectors report, and I hate doing that. Even if my body was able, nope! There is no fucking way.

I helped my father roof two homes when I was a kid, just being up there and nailing down shingles. I don’t remember having an issue. Now, I apparently am not okay with doing this at all.

So as far as I am concerned $2700 is a fair price. We got scheduled and they were pretty quick at finishing the job.

Super heroes adding roof venting to my roof.

I probably won’t know for sure how this feels until it’s warm again next summer. I do know it’s a good preventative measure to make sure my roof lasts and I don’t end up with a moldy attic crawlspace.

I do know, it can’t hurt, and I can’t wait to see how a hot sunny day is in my home now.

A Transgender Aside

My wife and I are both trans, with my wife being visibly transgender. Part of hiring people in during the current political climate is fraught with concern that people might refuse to work with us, or treat us terrible for being transgender. Since my wife is the visible one, that will fall on her. She takes more than enough abuse when we go out, that bringing it home to her isn’t something I want to do.

I have to say these were concerns we had when we looked for professionals to work on our house. Yet, both Kevin from Boulton (and the office staff when we went in the pay it off) and Patrick from Sound, were kind and respectful.

If you have never had to consider this, it might seem strange to worry that someone you are paying may not want to work with you. It happens though. It might seem like a low bar to have to be happy someone treats you with respect, but we’ve had companies in recent years refuse our business. Not everyone takes a cake lawsuit to the Supreme Court. Some of us just go somewhere else and put our money in small businesses that are not staffed with bigots.

I can say these two companies were fantastic, and respectful, and safe for transgender clients as far as our experiences go. I am so happy we chose them, and will definitely be recommending them to everyone that asked now.

House Improvement Baby Steps & the Physical Impact of Projects

Wolsey4 Comments

I am in my 50s, and I have a degenerative joint condition. As a consequence I work 4 days a week at a sit down office job, not five, because sitting in an office chair is painful. This is in stark contrast to my younger years, when I would not only work 5 days a week as a floor nurse, but also do 12-16 hour project days on the weekends. This means that small projects can wreck me for a few days.

With this in mind, yesterday was a nice day, so I pulled out my saw horses and tools, and built a cabinet box for next to the dishwasher.

I haven’t put the trim molding back because we are contemplating putting some sort of panel on the wall there. Something more water resistant due to the dishwasher. We are waffling between a traditional bead board look, or just abandoning all sense and doing art under acrylic sheeting.

This was just a gaping hole under the unsupported butcher block counter tops that the shit contractor left. He was paid to make a slide out cabinet but didn’t do the work. This is an ugly cabinet box made of 3/4″ plywood. I plan to paint all the cabinets and I will edge band and paint it when I do the rest. I was mostly concerned about the unsupported heavy butcher block drooping onto my $600+ dishwasher. Now I feel my dishwasher investment is protected, and we will be fine.

While I did this, I also cut up two closet sliding doors that we had to get rid of, so I can slowly feed them into the garbage can.

It also was good practice for using a circular saw guide that you clamp onto the wood. I’d never used any kind of guide before and this is my first circular saw.

This is a Bora WTX clamp. I really like how it works, but the reviews are right. The sled was just a pain in the butt for my Dewalt saw, so it’s got no use for me. I got straight cuts without the sled just fine.

I don’t have the most experience with circular saws, because when I was a kid I looked like a girl and my father refused to let me use any tool you had to plug in. I’m mostly self taught with the help of online videos. The guide came with a saw sled, which pretty much all the reviews said was garbage, and they were right. I tossed the cheap plastic thing, and just did my thing without it.

Turns out circular saws are not as scary as I had originally thought. I feel pretty comfortable now. It’s definitely weird going from being treated like a girl, and disallowed all access to the tools to make my life easier, to now not only being given access, to being supported and having other men in stores get excited to walk me through it. If transitioning from female to male ever taught me anything, it’s that sexism around home improvement and gender rolls are pretty damn real.

Speaking of ignoring gender rolls, I also finished sewing the curtain for my work room.

The house came with these thick white blinds. They aren’t terrible, but the cat and I hate the blinds. We lost about 6-7 inches of window at the top of these like you see in my half thought out before picture below.

That cat tree is going to be replaced with a built in wall unit for our fat princess. It will take less space and be in less dire threat of being toppled by her antics.

Below here is an unfairly better taken after picture in which I opened both curtains, and also washed the windows because I noticed how filthy it was.

Ignore the potting bench that I am using for delivery drivers to hide packages behind, when they can be bothered. I am buying a bench to put there instead. Also, ignore the portable air conditioner. Getting mini splits for air conditioning is a few years off.

We will probably always keep the sheers closed because there is a lot of . . . activity across the street and we don’t necessarily need to live in a fishbowl.

I mean, The windows look so much bigger with that 6-7″ of space back. Also, look at that nice new window sill! I did that a few weeks ago, mostly because our cat is fat and can’t get up on there without it.

These projects are all a part of Phase 1 of the house plan. When I get all these little things done, I will deep dive into each room. That means better curtain rods, painted walls and cabinets, and finishing touches. Right now? I am just trying to get things functional and ready for a full launch into next year.

After all this, which I don’t think is much, I spent the rest of the day laying in bed sore as hell. I will probably not do much today either. I have to accept I am not 25 anymore, and pushing my body this hard has consequences. I’d be very kind to anyone else fighting with this, but I always feel like I could have done more.

After I finish writing this, I will probably make some breakfast for the wife and I, and go lay in bed again. Not a bad days plan, overall.

Crochet Helper

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I am making a very large scarf and Tally has been all over it. She cannot understand why she can’t attack it, lick it until it’s fuzzy, or generally freak out on it. She’s very disappointed her input is not being taken.

I am not the greatest with yarn arts, but I like to crochet because it gives me something to do with my hands besides pick at my cuticles when I am nervous. I haven’t really done a lot of it since before I transitioned to male, so I don’t actually look forward to dealing with the extra attention as a man who crochets if I take it out of the house with me.

I think knitting, crochet, and sewing are so very unnecessarily gendered. I like it, and I am not giving it up just because I look like some random cis dude these days.

Groceries, Breakfast, and Transgender in Public

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Yesterday we went to a business/restaurant supply Costco. You can use your normal membership to go to the business/restaurant supply Costco. It’s just a Costco that doesn’t have all the electronics, clothing, and home goods, and instead has the food in bigger quantities, and restaurant supply stuff. The reason we went is it opens at 7am and is practically empty, with easy parking. We get up really early, and hate crowds so it’s super nice.

We spent a lot at Costco, and filled our chest freezer with restaurant quality crinkle fries, salami, lunch meat, hot dog sausages, a sliced cheeses, and corn dogs. Just about everything you could need for the next six months when you have non-cooking days.

While I like to cook everything from scratch, I am not always physically up and running. On those days, I like a quick and dirty meal and ready made food is a part of that. As my condition progresses, I have had to make peace with the fact that while I have the skills and prefer 100% from scratch cooking, concessions will have to be made. I focus on those items I really love to make, and make do with store bought for the rest.

Arguably, the best greasy spoon on the west coast.

We then went out to eat at one of the best kept secret diners in our area. The staff is amazing. The food is 110% Americana diner food that is well made, affordable, and with portions that are bigger than I ever eat.

However, going out in public these days is always risky. When my wife went to pee, some lady complained to staff about a “man” in the bathroom. My wife looked damn good in her little floral skirt, doc marten’s and top. She has boobs larger than my head, and her hair color was killing it. To call her a man at this point in her life is just literally being a bigot. She may be identifiable as transgender, but she looks NOTHING like a man.

We live in such a blue area that this was a non starter with the staff. The staff member cleaning the bathroom completely blew her off. When my wife left the bathroom the lady had gotten her husband to come stand with her by the door to the women’s room. Apparently, not content to just wait and come back after my wife, she wanted a man person to come menace my wife.

I should remind everyone my wife is 6’2″ tall. This apparently matters to the cis men she towers over. He couldn’t look her in the eyes when she smiled and waved at them both, and came back the the booth. This has been happening more and more. The amount of times my wife has been challenged by some lady in the bathroom, who then goes and gets a man to come help her threaten my wife with either implied or overt violence is just insane.

To be fair, the silver lining to this madness is the number of cis dudes that completely look out of their depth and back down when my wife shows up. Size really matters to cis dudes when height and threats come into play.

Oh, and can I be petty? My wife looked more feminine, had better fashion sense, and was just factually more beautiful than the nasty tired old lady freaking out?

The real challenge of this all was actually just being in public. My wife can’t leave the house without something happening right now. Those bigots seem thrilled there is a minority they can unabashedly attack because they feel they finally found a socially acceptable victim. Don’t be mistaken, these same people are probably racist antisemites, too. They just found a new group that isn’t fully protected by social convention and are gleefully on the attack. The Venn diagram for transphobia, racism, sexism, antisemitism, and all the other ‘isms, is pretty much a circle.

The most insidious situation is the picture taking. People will just take my wife’s picture like they saw Bigfoot. They are not as discrete as they think when they even try to be sneaky. Some assholes use it as a way to harass her by outright getting in her face to do it.

I live in a large city. My wife, is legit not even the weirdest thing I see driving to get donuts at sunrise just last week. Have you seen a meth head wearing a feather boa and nothing else at a bus stop dancing? I have! This is not a really rare occurrence because we live in a city that has a rep for that kind of drug use.

I mean, there are so many more pronounced situations going down at any one time in my limited time outside my home, that to pick my slightly gothy transgender wife to target for photos is just people being assholes.

It’s a risk whenever we go out these days, and while I am a transgender man who can “pass” as cis, my wife cannot. I worry for her safety a lot these days because the uptick in violence is very real, and you never know if you are going to run into someone that has been wound up by the media and is just foaming at the mouth to hate crime someone.

I truly wish this wasn’t a concern we had to work with just to go get breakfast and groceries.

Gendered Canning

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See my first strawberry jam attempt? Turns out, like the raspberry jam, it tastes far better than any jam I have ever had from the store in the last decade.

I ended up making some gender based observations this weekend. My goal was to can up some raspberry and strawberry jam this weekend, and yesterday I went ahead and bought a stupid amount of raspberries and strawberries to do it.

I am new at this, and wasn’t sure what constituted 5 crushed cups of fruit, so this saw me in the check out line with six containers of strawberries and four of raspberries.

The cashier was a bit odd about it, and asked what I was doing with so much fruit, and I said I was canning.

I am a 51 year old, heavily tattooed man. I am also transgender, but she would not know that to look at me.

Instead she was completely bewildered that I was canning jam. She nosed around why, and I said becuase it tastes better than anything store bought, and you can’t even buy some of the flavors.

Then she asked if I was doing it as a gift with someone, presumably a wife or mother, by implication of her wording. I said nope. Just me, canning jam for the year for my wife and I.

I then stopped at a regular grocery store for sugar, and bought a single 10 pound bag. I was asked why I was buying so much sugar by the clerk and the bagger, and I said I was canning jam.

The bagger, a young man, was completely gobsmacked. He was like why? Did you pick a bunch of berries? I said it was too early in the season for that, but I was making a years worth this weekend.

Before I transitioned 11 years ago, I don’t recall anyone caring at all what I bought for food, and being a weird quasi-foodie that does a lot of odd ball things from scratch? I have purchased some empirically odd food combinations in really large crazy amounts before. Nobody has ever said a word.

Now that I am read as a man? It’s like my very existence beyond buying beer and snacks is read as odd, and worth further questioning.

It reminds me of the first weekend of the pandemic. I was in the grocery store with my wife stocking up on things, and being the primary cooks I had the cart stocked. The lines were stupid, so I sent my wife with the cart to the line while I grabbed a loaf of bread and some beer.

A middle aged gal saw me walking back to the line juggling a loaf of bread and several IPA’s, and just made eye contact and smirked at me. I knew instantly she thought we were in the middle of a national emergency, and this dumb dude was buying nothing more than bread and beer. She was laughing, and I am sure I presented a hilarious picture in the half panicked grocery store.

It’s such a weird gendered construct that men can’t cook or or take care of the home.

I find I also get questioned a lot more in fabric and craft stores. I still sew, and make clothing for my wife and I, and now I get questioned a lot more in fabric stores. I think there is a social construct for the gay designer archetype, so if I look competent they immediately shoot me into the expert category. It’s like there is no middle ground in perception. I am a dumb man who is invading women’s spaces or I am a gay expert. The truth is I am a confident middle of the road seamster, that is bi/pan, and is married to a woman.

Conversely, I am treated way better at Lowe’s Hardware, and any of the other hardware stores I end up in. People just assume I can do the work I am asking about. They start from an assumption of competence first, then back up if I tell them I need more information.

This is in stark contrast from when I looked like a woman. I have literally had hardware store guys argue with me over basic information I was 100% correct about, because they assumed anything that came out of my feminine mouth must be wrong.

I just find it interesting what people seem to expect is so gendered. Maybe we could just abolish useless gendering of activities, and I think we’d all be better off.

The Real Transgender Agenda – Operation Doppelgänger

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I saw this picture of a transgender woman that was just killing it on Reddit. She was blonde in a professional suite skirt, and just damn fine looking.

I sent the link to my coworker friend and asked if it looked like a mutual coworker that is probably the worst person ever personality-wise, but very cute physically. We both agreed it looked like her, and at first glance you would think they were the same person.

I told my coworker friend, who is cis, that this is the real trans agenda. We are replacing terrible people one by one, with nicer, better, prettier versions. I told her as her personal trans representative that I had upgraded her clearance to know these things.

She then immediately asked if she could supply a list of prospective targets.