Aspen Wilde

Five pounds of frozen wild blueberries and an immersion blender. I'm going to make smoothies. Every. Day.

Bagels and lox spread, lox spread and bagels. Also, pickles.

Bunny ears and legwarmers

Younger CERB member here, chiming in to agree with what most of you have said. Experience and the passage of time are absolutely factors that can shape who we are, but there are many more. There are also traits that we seem to carry with us throughout our lives, our beliefs, our choices, our sense of style, our sense of humour, our strengths and weaknesses and the stories we tell ourselves when we're bored. I'm fortunate to have friends of all ages, and while I know they've all been shaped by their lived experience, however much or little of it they have, age appears to have no bearing on the diversity of personalities that I've encountered. I, for example, will probably never stop being wordy and introspective. I believe these to be timeless qualities.

I'd have my toes sucked. That's hot. Would you rather live forever in the sky (drifting weightlessly but unable to come down) or in the sea (you can breathe underwater but you can never walk on dry land)

I can now play 'trapeze waltz' and 'ski ride' on the accordion. I'm learning the coordination required to play a keyboard with my right hand, press buttons with my left, and maintain a continuous airflow in the bellows. I've been experimenting with melody. I think it's so much fun- but I am a bit concerned that my neighbours don't agree. I'm pretty sure it was my playing that made their baby cry.

This morning, the tender fascia under my shoulder blades met the hard surface of a tennis ball. At first they resisted each other, but eventually my body just melted around the ball. My shoulders haven't felt this good in ages.

I found a googly eye on my couch. I don't know where it came from. This fills me with such glee, you can't even imagine.

Had an incredibly effective shoulder massage yesterday. Could not help but scream a little in pleasure/pain. Might have disturbed the neighbourhood.

Gangnam style! I saw this for the first time today and I just wish I could be half as cool as Psy. :P

Hugs to you, Old Dog- and get well soon, okay? Okay.

I am so proud of myself! I've been talking about doing it for ages but this time I finally did it! I signed up for accordion lessons! Y'all better get ready for this sensational sound.

Is this with me as the SP or me as the client? In either case, my companion(s?) and I would do all of that hot, sweaty stuff but while train-hopping from nowhere to nowhere, in a dirty dignified era of steam engines, stylish vagabonds hurtling into the sunset while air whistles into the shabby car drowning out our sounds. I haven't fulfilled this fantasy yet, but I think it has promise. With time I'll work out the finer plot points and do the story justice.

Has anyone mentioned Adventure Time yet? Follow the adventures of Jake the dog and Finn the human in the land of Ooo!

I think it's as much a matter of your personal comfort as it is about your level of risk. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't know of any widely accepted scientific formula for determining the exact frequency of testing necessary for any individual. It helps to have an understanding of how different STIs are transmitted (different STIs can be transmitted in different ways), the level of risk for transmission in your own sex life, and also your own body and what 'normal' looks like for you. To make a decision that is right for you, I would encourage researching STIs, their risk factors and treatments. It helps to take the mystery out of things. The HIV virus won't actually show up on tests until about three months after transmission. Certainly the sooner any STI is caught the sooner and often more effectively it can be treated. And often there's no way of knowing if you have an STI unless you get tested- it could lie dormant for a while, and show no symptoms. It sounds to me like you're keeping a good check on your health, but it all comes down to you.

I love drinking tea. Tea is a social ritual, a way to bond, a way to warm up, a moment of pause. Lately I've been enamoured by a hibiscus-lemongrass tea that I discovered this summer. Peppermint has also been my preference as of late. Fresh mint from the garden is best. A chai latte is practically dessert. I assert that there is a tea for every occasion. It just requires a little experimentation on your part.

Mine is a nod to the dandy queer playwright Oscar Wilde. :D

Today I bought a couple really tacky garments from the thrift store, because I love myself and I love to wear brightly coloured clothing printed with images of fruit sometimes.

Someone stole the front wheel off my bike. Poor beautiful golden steed. :( Not having a functional bicycle, even for a little while, makes me anxious. We've been bonding- the bicycle and I. Together, we go places. I feel violated. Bike thievery is pretty low. And because of this incident, I missed a play I was going to see with some friends. :(

Seeing a praying mantis for the first time! In my apartment! I have no clue how it got here but I'm excited! (She's a little shy, hiding in a corner. I can't actually reach her to bring her outside so I do hope she can find her way out and continue to roam in her mantisy way after a nap in the sun.)

Have you ever considered writing a novel? Your posts brighten up my day!

It seems I had forgotten about Dre. D'oh!

I am blessed in my life with the company of many brave, beautiful souls. People who share my values, people who care for one another, people who challenge me, and teach me what they know. I am blessed when I feel like hiding by the persistence of friends who coax me out of my shell. I am blessed with the opportunity to celebrate life with the wild and wonderful members of my communities. I am blessed to know so many people who value love, life, and the pursuit of wisdom over productivity, money, and the pursuit of a narrow ideal of success. I live in a world full of secret revolutionaries. (Uncountable numbers of people who, in living their lives, shift the balance in favour of love.) </hippiewords>

I'd go for it. Hell, I'd do it for a month. The only thing that would stop me from doing it permanently is, well, the fact that I like my job. And my boobs. But I've always been the genderbending sort, without having to change around my anatomy. (Y'all would be surprised how often strangers call me sir. Or young man.) I'm just going to throw it out there that I don't really suppose physical sex has much to do with who we are. I imagine I would experience different kinds of privilege in a male body- I'd probably also get gay bashed a tad more. (Even with boobs I've been harassed at bus stops by confused gangsters who see me as some kind of skinny fairy boy. They're not far off.) Also... what's a 'gender interest'? Also, not to be a gender studies snob, but I really would like to point out the difference between sex and gender- sex being the combination of physical traits that society deems 'male' or 'female', and gender being your internal sense of being and role in society, as well as your outward expression of that identity. So even if you were to change your sex, your gender expression might change (in the clothes you wear, etc.) but your internal sense of who you are would likely not. (At least, not mine.) Ahem. But anyway, my stance on the matter is YES to genderbending of all kinds.

Not an injury of the person but rather a crippling injury to the furniture. It was shortly after I moved into my new place, and I had one of those metal bedframes on wheels that I had disassembled for the move. I suppose that when I put it back together it was a bit too wide- because the first time I had really, really good sex on it, the mattress and box spring fell through and one of the metal beams bent beyond repair. We almost ended up on the floor, and I was out a bedframe, but all we could do was laugh and high five each other. I have no regrets. I think that beds on wheels are a pretty dumb idea, anyway. Do you know how hard it is to keep up a steady rhythm when the bed is rolling around under you?