Ovulation & Gaydar

Alright, ladies. Chime in with your gaydar stories. Personally, I need verbal clues for mine to work. (and short conversation) Sometimes I'm thrown for a loop. Once a guy at Wal-Mart had a ten minute discussion with me about video games and gave me his number to hang out later. I took it as being hit on until his boyfriend appeared. (I lost that number before I gained two friends.)

Anyway. A new study appeared! Where do these scientists get their ideas? They took women, they took photographs, and they determined women can pick out the men who won't be fertilizing their eggs if near their laying stage. I sort of want to hit up bars around my cycle and see how true this is. I also don't want to.

"The researchers correlated the participants' accuracy in judging sexual orientation with the point at which the women were in their fertility cycle, and found that the nearer women were to peak ovulation, the more accurate they were at judging each male's sexual orientation."

Hit up the full story here.

WIP Wednesday

Much like Six Sentence Sunday, here's a small tease from a work in progress. I plan to use my blog more for this type of posts, so expect more teasers from me.

This one is from my most current WIP. It’s fantasy with humans, demons, angels, devils, and faeries (oh my). A beta has said it has a touch of steampunk to it. I love Victorian era and steampunk so I can see why that element might have slipped into the story. I’m enjoying the plot and characters, and I’m taking my time to groom and grow all parts of the story. It’s nearly done now so I hope to have it ready for submission by fall.

Enjoy this WIP Wednesday tease.

“You’re a tyrant some days.” Nolyn squeezed passed Varun, nodding a goodbye to Triste. “Be kind to your butler, Varun.”
“Kind?” Varun whispered, moving his gaze onto Triste. He lifted his hand to tuck back a lock of silver hair that had fallen out of place. An angel with silver and white mixed hair was rare.
“The—” Triste ran his fingers through the fringe across his forehead, repeating the fix Varun had done. “The human is still asleep, and I’ve placed water in the room for him.”
“Are you concerned?”
“Concerned about a human, sir? Not entirely.”
Varun studied the angel, observing the green eyes that were so uncharacteristic for his angel type. Triste could have been so much more.

Six Sentence Sunday [Adult Addition]

A piece from World on Fire, my finished WIP. I started the submission process just last week...or week before?
This one is from a sex scene between two men. So...you've been warned if you ventured in from outside of the M/M blog sphere...

“Still afraid of the dark?” Lucian’s whispered words sounded much louder.
“I wasn’t afraid of the dark,” Cole corrected. A shudder rocked his body when Lucian suddenly stopped teasing and eased a single finger into him.
“You’re beautiful,” Lucian murmured against Cole’s back. Cole answered with a quiet moan.

Ah. What a tiny tease.

Help: I'm destroying marriages by loving a gay man!

I have a best friend who is gay. I refer to him as my gay boyfriend. He’s always my date to weddings, and I’m always his. Even if he or I have a boyfriend at home, we turn to each other for events first. If we go out and want to avoid being hit on—we pose as a couple. (Without the PDA) We have a monthly "date" night and never correct waiters when they assume we are, in fact, dating.

I received a notice today about a couples-only cooking class. I ignored it—I’m currently single—but my coworker reminded me that “couple only” had never stopped me before. I thought about asking my gay boyfriend, but another friend spoke up against the idea.

According to her, each time my gay boyfriend and I pretend to be a couple, we degrade what it means to be in a relationship because he can’t have a relationship with me. Huh? So holding hands, calling each other silly endearments and caring for each other without taking it to the bedroom or the chapel is apparently making real straight couples’ relationships also a farce.

If we went to this cooking class as a couple, would the couples around us spontaneously break up? Would their love mean less because my gay friend and I love each other differently?

I do love my gay boyfriend—he means the world to me—but that love ends at friendship and that isn’t only because I’m missing a key physical feature he likes. Should I make sure every person around knows he’s only a friend in order to protect the obvious delicate structure of straight relationships? I don’t see how what I do with a friend is destroying love that has nothing to do with us to begin with.

Is this a new type of anti-gay message starting around? Or does this make perfect sense to every one else?

I Loved It

"FIRSTLY: dont touch the hands of your cuckoo-clock heart. 

SECONDLY: master your anger. 

THIRDLY: never, ever fall in love. For if you do, the hour hand will poke through your skin, your bones will shatter, and your heart will break once more."

The Boy With the Cuckoo-Clock Heart by Mathias Malzieu

Since news of a movie in the works reached me via Youtubevideo posted on my Facebook newsfeed, I grabbed up the book and read it. It sounded interesting and a little steampunk to me. (hello! The dude has a clock in his chest!!) I didn’t expect to fall in love with the story as I did. It might be a short tale, but it’s as bittersweet as it is beautiful. 

(translated video of the above, if you prefer.)

Little Jake was born on the coldest night the world has ever seen. It was so cold, his heart froze. Madeleine, the midwife, fixed him up with a cuckoo-clock to keep his ticker ticking. Jake grows up saddled with the fear of harming his delicate heart, but he desires to branch out and, above all else, to love—despite knowing the damage strong emotions could inflict.

The style was far from wordy but very detailed. Analogies filled the pages. It painted a whimsical world. I felt like I was reading Tim Burton’s next film. I didn’t read other reviews, but I can guess why Goodreads has such a bad score for it: the ending. The ending snuck up on me and slapped my face. It might have been surprising, but any other way would have felt wrong and I would feel cheated.

I have no idea who is doing what to this film adaptation but I hope they do it justice. (And keep the ending as it is!) I know it’ll be animated but I haven’t heard which style. I could see it in a stylized version much like Caroline or Corpse Bride, but I’ll take it in any form. (the youtube video form is a great choice!)

I know this blog is M/M romance centered, but readers venture out of a favorite genre every once in a while! I recommend this one if your delicate heart can survive Mathias Malzieu’s take on life, love, and the heartache associated with both.

Pride Parade Photos

Shirtless men, almost shirtless ladies, and lots of rainbows. What else does one expect from Pride!

 I love her sign!

More after the jump! (and more on Facebook)

Pride 2011

The parade was fantastic--as expected. Not as many condoms being thrown around this year. More necklace beads though.

I'll upload photos when I return from more fun. My group split up for a break--two are going to a birthday party. I'll rejoin them in an hour and we'll go into the fair grounds where Pride is in full swing!

I'm handing out bookmarks too. I forgot the stack when I left this morning. I wanted to drop them off around Nob Hill too. Oh well. At a later time.

I have to say, I love Albuquerque!!!!

Fire for Pride!

Arizona Wallow fire has been burning up the dry brush since May 29^th. New Mexico has been basking in the ashes and smoky haze since June 2^nd. (Maybe June 1^st...I can’t remember when it reached us)



from krqe

The conditions in the middle of the state are only getting worse. I’ll take the ash and smoke over a fire destroying everything I’ve ever known. I don’t know if the Wallow fire went through communities already, but I know it took out vacation homes and is encroaching on small towns now.

awesome sunset (pic from krqe)

So let’s see. The east has tornadoes, the middle section has floods, and the southwest is on fire. Is there volcanic activity in the west yet? That would round out the disasters. Or a tsunami or something. (I certainly hope this does NOT happen, but I can’t always be optimistic. I think I’ll start asking friends to move out of the west coast now...)

from krqe

It isn’t all bad. I can’t be outside, my house is a warm 98F degrees without the swamp cooler on, I can’t use the swamp cooler because it blows the outside air into my house, I can’t have the windows open to get that cool evening breeze, and my house remains a stifling 90+ hell, but my allergies have yet to react to the smoke! See? Silver lining. There’s always a lining of silver somewhere.

Writing:

I’ve also managed to write at least ten sentences in that final scene that has been blocking me for over a month! It took two nights to write those, but it offers me some hope it might be finished by July. I wish I understood why my mind shuts down when I try to finish that WIP. Do I not want it done? Do I hate that scene this much? Maybe I know it’ll go off to be a submission and I fear rejection? Ah. I need a shrink in the house!

Citizen Police:

Tonight I’m attending my first citizen police academy alumni meeting. I have no idea what tonight’s class is but the classroom offers air conditioning so I am so there! The police have been involved in a lot of shootings lately, and I’m hoping they discuss it tonight. The news stations are all over the stories and I don’t trust the reports. From experience, the news warps the details to make the police a bad guy. (Sometimes the police are in the wrong, but not as often as the news would make you believe.)

Pride:

If I remember on Saturday (Pride day! Whoo!) I’ll post a six-sentence-Sunday from the WIP I’m finishing soon. And next week (or Sunday) I’ll post photos from Pride! My gay-bf asked me for fashion advice. (The irony was not lost on me) My advice was a banana hammock and a sign for deposits and withdraws. He informed me that on Pride weekend, signs are unnecessary. I promised him a box of condoms for his Price present. I won’t forget the lube.