Tall Kitty

In case you can’t tell from other photos, here’s one giving you an idea of exactly how large our cats are. That’s a standard sized desk in a hotel room somewhere (I think Kenosha, WI) and the cat is Aeneas – the smaller of the two boys, weighing in at 15 lbs. (or thereabouts). His brother is around 18 lbs., and is both taller and larger.

My favorite is when we bring the boys to the vet together, & Aeneas comes out of the carrier first, & the vet tech comments on what a big cat he is. “Just wait,” we usually say, & then Big Guns, as we call him, comes sauntering out. At that, the vet tech usually just blinks for a while.

& Yes, those are my pink flannel cat pajamas. They’re my favorites. I got them from North Shore Animal League, which is a no-kill shelter. They have lots of cool cat jammies (and dog jammies, for those of you who do that sort of thing), and all profits go to doing the cool work they do.

Inconvenient

In response to this last post, I received this short email:

“My Husband Betty: Love, Sex, and Life with a Crossdresser”

This is where you loose me Helen. You say you don’t use words like “Husband or Wife”….but then you write books using that exact terminology.

Very confusing.

I responded:

I wrote that book 6 years ago. My thinking is surely allowed to change, no?

He responded:

Convenient. No?

& I responded:

Is that how you’d talk to Betty about her decision to transition? That it was “convenient”?

My partner was a self-identified straight drag queen when we met, with a male identity.

She is living as a woman & doing what paperwork she can to reflect that.

One of the reasons I can’t & don’t use “husband” anymore is because people then start using “he” pronouns about my partner. She is not a he. To avoid that, I avoid the gendered terminology that leads to it.

When she had a genderqueer/androgynous presentation, she didn’t mind mixing up the pronouns – as I did in the 2nd book. Now, “he” chafes her, doesn’t fit.

So sue me for having had to make adjustments – especially ones that are entirely out of consideration of my partner’s gender.

Please don’t write back. Your response was rude beyond belief. I shouldn’t be justifying it with a response at all, but I like to give people a fair shake.

If I stop using “husband” then it’s somehow just “convenient” that I’m doing so. Surely it couldn’t have anything to do with my partner’s change in gender! *sigh* I’m having one of those days.

Gendered Words

We don’t use the words “husband” or “wife” because they’re gendered, but we don’t generally use “spouse” because it seems too clinical, or legal, & yet I wonder if it lacks warmth precisely because it’s not gendered.

Unlikely Luddites

This blog post about the editors of magazines being stubborn about not accepting electronic submissions wouldn’t be half so amusing if it weren’t about the “big three” sci fi magazines.

That’s not to say editors shouldn’t have their cranky prerogatives. They should, and generally they do. I’d be disappointed if, say, Lewis Lapham didn’t. Older people who knew more than the average 20 year old – or even the average 40 year old – can even dream of knowing are allowed some room.

But it’s still funny when when it’s the editors of Analog.