Poppy Z. Brite's Blog, page 84

Gender Glossary

This will be 101 for many of you, but since it looks like I'm going to be talking about these subjects a lot, I wanted to make sure people understand what I mean by the terms I'm using.

Cis/cissexual: Identifying as the gender you were assigned at birth; not trans. (Also not a slur, though unfortunately some radical trans people use it as one.)

FAAB: Female-assigned at birth.

FTM: Female-to-male.

Gender (as opposed to sex): How you identify yourself in regard to maleness/femaleness/etc.

MAAB: Mal...

Check Out My New ...

I love Patrick Califia. I love Macho Sluts. I was proud to publish a Califia story in Love in Vein 2. When we met, I was starstruck and found him charming. Someone on my Twitter feed once accused him of transmisogyny, which dismayed me because, while it seemed unlikely from my own experiences, I hadn't read enough of his nonfiction to have an informed opinion on his views of trans women.

I'm currently reading his book Sex Changes: The Politics of Transgenderism (1997), which is also a well-re...

Trans Woman & Husband Imprisoned in Malawi

I thought I read a fair amount of queer media, but it still took me several days to learn that Tiwonge Chimbalanga, one of the "gay" couple imprisoned in Malawi, is actually a transgendered woman. I've identified as gay/queer for most of my life, and for much of that time I considered "gay man" my primary personal identity with "transgender" just being this annoying thing that had gone wrong in the womb, but between this case and what I've been reading in Patrick Califia's Sex Changes: The...

A Wild Hair

So I cut my hair:



Several people have asked me if I'm donating my cut-off hair to Locks of Love. I'm not here to hate on Locks of Love -- surely the generosity that inspires people to donate something as personal as hair is always a good thing -- but this strikes me as a rather personal question, with an implication that I should donate. I cut my hair in 2005, not long before the failure of the federal levee system, and didn't cut it again until yesterday. These five years have been the hardes...

It Should Have Stayed Secret

Yes, yes, "4 AM knows all my secrets," very romantic, very lovely, but honest to God? This is the kind of thing I usually find myself looking at at 4 AM.

[ETA: Some of the comments on this link are stupid and mean. Proceed at your own risk. But I loved the caption.]

Cats in Philly

Reposted from ellen_datlow 's journal:

This is from Susan Palwick. Please contact her not ME:
SusanPal@aol.com

My sister and her husband are in Philly and may need to find homes quickly for several declawed cats.

[PZB here -- For the record, I am strongly opposed to declawing, but it isn't the cats' fault.:]

Not a Map, But Possibly A Legend

infrogmation , whom you should follow if you're looking for information on the Gulf oil disaster or local issues in general, took this picture last week in Hopedale. (I was going to post the actual picture with credit, but damned if I can get it to work. Technology is slipping through my fingers, Will try to edit later.) If you've read Soul Kitchen, you know a little about the Shell Beach/Yscloskey/Hopedale area (all three communities are clustered together around Bayou La Loutre and Lake Borg...

When Will They Stop Already?

Now I have to do this one because marquisdd did.


visited 12 states (24%)
Create your own visited map of The United States

I'm not 100% sure about Connecticut.

[ETA: Oops, sorry about lack of labeling. This a States You've Had Sex In map.]

Another Damn Map

witchouse asked where I've been outside the U.S., so cool, I made a map of that:



create your own visited country map

Except that it depressed me because I couldn't help but wonder where I'd have been by now if the levees hadn't failed. Which is pointless, unless maybe it gives me a kick in the ass. "Hey, you old coot, you'll be 43 next week! Go somewhere already!"

Now marquisdd will make one of these and blow me out of the water.

[ETA: As I was writing this, marquisdd texted me, and I replied to ...

U.S. of Archie

I think I posted one of these years ago. I'm slightly better-traveled now, but I've just got to get to Maine and Alaska, and as you can see, there's also a vast neglected middle ground.