http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/ (a.k.a. "Mouse" in our Community Forums) en Copyright 2008 Tue, 19 Feb 2008 11:24:41 -0500 http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/ http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Right now: 1. School stress. Going to college in August fer sure stress. 2. Living at home stress. 3. Wanting to break up with my boyfriend stress. 4. Money stress. 5. Cannot afford a new laptop stress. 6. Work stress. Just saying. :( http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2008/02/d.html http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2008/02/d.html Tue, 19 Feb 2008 11:24:41 -0500 Working is crap. It's just crap. And I'm convinced that having a job in retail is JUST like /b/, except in real life, and the cats at the store don't shout overdone memes at me (I SEE WUT U DID THUR.) Last week I had to train at the main office, which is aka the owner's HOUSE. He is creepy and older-middle-aged and rich as holy goddamn fucking hell. The entire experience sucked and I'm glad I don't have to do it again. Tomorrow I'm back in the store. I took home three baby mice the other week because they got stuck in sticky traps (why the FUCK did they put down sticky traps?) and had broken legs and shit. One of them died, the other two seem to be doing well, so I'm glad I gave them a chance. When I lost the little one it was incredibly sad. I really expected her to pull through for me but I'm glad she isn't suffering anymore. Poor girl. I just wish there was something else I could do for. I've named the other two Gimpy and Limpy. If you saw them you'd see how appropriate this is. One of them has two broken legs, the other has a broken leg and a smashed paw. Mice tend to do fine with broken limbs as long as they're given time to recover and don't have anything they can injure themselves further on. They're feeding themselves, drinking and are generally playful (they're very young). They're completely pathetic but as they improve I just find them more and more endearing. I keep wondering why I find myself drawn to animals that have such a high mortality rate. It's incredibly difficult for me to have a creature that I invested so much love and care for die after only a couple years of being with me. Despite whatever I do it's inevitable. I don't know why I keep doing this to myself. Maybe because I feel like no one else will and I feel an obligation to them, and in other ways, a kinship. I love my rats but it's the mice that scurry their way into my heart. I'm just not capable of turning down an injured or sick mouse. Most people find it a little weird. I have to agree with them. Tomorrow night I'm leaving with my sister to visit my college of choice on the other side of the state. It's a long trip so we're staying overnight and the tour is on Tuesday morning. I'll also be meeting my friend Julie there that I have known online for years. I call her my favorite lesbian, she calls me her favorite gay boy, I call her a dyke, she calls me a fag - we love each other. She promised to give me the REAL tour after I get the official one. I'm looking forward to it. We're going back to our house on Friday most likely. It'll be relieving to be in my own place, though a bit weird and slightly lonely-feeling. My dad isn't much company. I can't wait until August when I'm finally off to college and I'm around other people constantly. I like being around a lot of people. It comforts me. That's about it I guess. - Jase. http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2008/01/of_mice_and_wor.html http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2008/01/of_mice_and_wor.html Sun, 27 Jan 2008 20:59:12 -0500 What have I been up to lately? I was at the doctor recently. In addition to getting some antibiotics and a decongestant for a chest infection thing I had going on (which is, thankfully, mostly gone) I also found out new numbers! Which are, in comparison to how things were going, pretty much awesome. My cd4 percentage was the biggest shock. Cd4 now officially up to 305 (19%). Viral load still undetectable. I was told that if by my next set of labs my cd4 is still over 300 I won't have to continue with the Bactrim, which will be nice. One less medication is one less medication, even though I'm taking Atripla now I still feel like I'm taking infinity different things. Thank you HIV, asthma, tranny-ness and thyroid condition (the condition being that I don't have one, of course). I've been keeping myself busy with school, my crochet business thingie (still taking orders, wink wink, nudge nudge) and my overly sensitive but completely endearing boyfriend. Oh - and reading. Matty made me curious about HP Lovecraft so I'm reading an anthology of his stories right now, and so far I'm really enjoying them. I just finished the book that inspired the movie The Ring - it was so coooool, omg. I can't wait to read the rest in the series. Why am I so into horror? I scheduled my appointment to visit the school I was accepted into for this upcoming August. I'll be there on the 29th of this month for a tour, and I'm really nervous. They still don't know I'm trans or gay, and I have a feeling things may get a bit awkward before they're all settled, but I'm confident it'll all work out. I'll be a secondary education - english major so um. I'll be teaching your children in the not so distant future. Fear for their minds. http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2008/01/kay_well.html http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2008/01/kay_well.html Tue, 08 Jan 2008 23:30:43 -0500 Perhaps, perhaps. I had my very first job interview today. I think it went pretty well. I was nervous as fuck and she asked me some simple questions that I had the hardest time figuring out. They're so awkward. But she was super sweet to me and she seemed to like me a lot so I have a good feeling about it. She liked a lot of my answers, she told me outright. Haha. I'm supposed to get a call within the week. It'd be really cool to get that job. Oh my God. Save up more money for surgery. Help pay off college because ohmigawd I was accepted into the college that I wanted to go to, so that's really exciting also. :[. I'm so overwhelmed right now that I don't even know what to do. I have so much going on in my life I barely have any time at all. Inbetween schoolwork, whipping up crocheted stuff for my orders, spending time with my boyfriend and my friends... it's nuts. I don't know how I'm supposed to keep up with all of this. I really just want to be successful and there is ALL of this pressure on me to be able to juggle everything and I'm really scared that I'm going to fail at it. FAIL EPICALLY. Buuut... yeah. That's pretty much it. Hopefully my dad and I will be moving back into our place in a couple of weeks when they finish the renovations. Fingers crossed. We're having a lot of money problems because of our lack of income so things are really hard right now. My dad is afraid he's going to have to stop his treatment in order to start working again so we can have an income and that's a really, really stupid idea. I know my uncle would let us stay with him as long as we needed to, if only my dad weren't so stubborn. Christ. I ordered a bunch of books on Amazon with the Christmas money I was anonymously given online. I made a post about it in the forums and it's a long story (well, not really). Some stuff I'm really looking forward to reading, though. It should be here in the next week or so. I'm REALLY excited about it and I still have 100 bucks left. God, that was such a nice thing - whoever did that for me. I'm still baffled by it. I treated my dad to breakfast this morning before the interview at the Waffle Lair and he seemed to appreciate it. :]. Started my day off really good. Then after the interview my friends met me at the mall. It was really sweet. I spent a few hours with them and just chilled out and stuff and I'm going to be seeing them again later tonight. I adore all of my friends. I don't know what I'd do without them. They are so supportive and funny and nice and total enablers when it comes to my procrastination habit, hahaha. I am SO ridiculously lucky. I'm in a great mood lately. Things seem to be looking up. I feel great and I think I look great (hehe) and life is pretty alright. :] - Jase. http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2008/01/pet_store_job.html http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2008/01/pet_store_job.html Wed, 02 Jan 2008 15:54:14 -0500 I think I had a 24 hour virus or something today. I was feeling really congested and sick and coughy and it was getting late, so I took a bunch of Nyquil and threw myself into bed... only to wake up about 4 hours later feeling like I was going to throw up. I was sweating like hell and cold at the same time, and it failed. So I whined at my dad until he woke up. He gave me an ice pack to put on my head, some acetaminophen and a bucket because I felt like I was gonna lose the contents of my stomach. Which I did. But it was over with quickly and I felt a lot better. I slept for like 12 hours on and off like that. Really uncomfortable. But I just got up like an hour ago and I feel a LOT better. I'm weak because I haven't eaten and whatever I had eaten was deported from my intestines, but generally I feel like I'm the right body temperature, I'm thirsty and drinking ginger ale, and getting a little bit of an appetite so I might have some toast. I'm sad I'm sick cause I wanted to go out and see my friends tonight, but oh well. I'll live - and there's always next week. This weekend I'll hopefully be with my boyfriend. He gave me my Christmas gifts early and I'm giving him his late, but I guess that's just how we roll. :P - Jase. http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2007/12/ew.html http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2007/12/ew.html Wed, 26 Dec 2007 19:12:18 -0500 real boy. Telling him that he's a freak, etc. You just don't want to have to expect that from people within your own community - people with whom you're supposed to work side-by-side for to help everyone be treated decently. And yet I continue to see a large amount of transphobia in the gay community - as well as sexism, racism and a whole bunch of other prejudices that are as shocking as they are damaging. As I've heard so many people ask, how can someone have experienced such terrible abuse and still turn around and do it to other people? I suppose some of it could be fear. I actually had a run in with someone this week who told me very blatantly that he thinks that transguys are attacking gay men and forcing them to go against their very nature in being with someone that is genetically female. As if someone my size could ever force someone to do something they didn't want to. Honestly. The guys who I've been with have been with me because they wanted to - because they find me attractive, perhaps, or because they can honestly recognize that I'm as much of a male as they are. I'm personally tired of the accusations against trans people. If we aren't looking to gain male privilege, gain access to women-only spaces, gain HETEROSEXUAL privilege, abandoning our duty as women or men and now we're even being sneaky women and going after gay men. As if anyone would be so desperate for a boyfriend that they'd pretend to be a guy just to go after gay men. Christ. Anyway, I guess that's my beef for the day. Oh - and I dunno if I should post this on here, but I figure some more publicity can't hurt. I'm selling scarves/knitted/crocheted things to try and save up money for top surgery. If you're interested in anything, you can email me at: caffeinemouse@gmail.com. I can send you pictures of work I've done before if you're interested. This is apparently the only way I can make money since pretty much NO PLACE in my area is interested in hiring me. What the hell. So just email me with a description of what you want and I can tell you if I can do it and what the price will be. Scarves are going from anywhere between 10 bucks and 20 bucks usually. Everything else'll be judged off of that. - Jase. ]]> http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2007/12/on_being_a_mino.html http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2007/12/on_being_a_mino.html Wed, 12 Dec 2007 15:31:49 -0500 The Golden Compass with some friends of mine. It was a pretty good movie. For all of you guys that are reading this that have seen the movie/read the books, can you comment with what animal you think your daemon would be? I think that'd be pretty cool. Thanksyouguys. <3. Last night I stayed at my sister's house. I always have the best time with her 'cause she's like my partner in crime. We're about 17 years different in age, so our dynamic is a bit different than what most brother/sister relationships are. It's a really good thing, though, really. When we're together we revert to like mid-teen sillyness though. We like to go to bookstores and go to cafes and hang out and talk. She literally knows everything about my life and she tells me things she doesn't tell anyone else. I'm really lucky to have her. Last night we rented two cheesy horror flicks - The Mortuary and The Haunting of #24. They were awful, but it was fun to watch them with her and my two nieces. I seriously have the coolest nieces. One is 11 and the other is 4, and they are so smart and so cool. They also think I am like the coolest uncle ever in existence, so, yeah. Hehe. (I guess I am, so neh.) Uuuhm. I read a pretty alright teen fiction book about an FTM transgender guy. It was alright. I've read better though. I'm starting to get annoyed by the fact that almost all resources in the literature/film/etc department are representative of heterosexual trannies and you get almost no mention at all of FTMs that are into other boys or MTFs that are into other girls. What's up with that? For all you guys that are interested in the book, though, it's called Parrotfish and it's by Ellen Wittlinger. Check it out. I'm starting to fall behind in my schoolwork again, so I'm going to start back with that tomorrow. I'm going to go make some hot chocolate and chill for a little while and then try and get some sleep. I actually haven't been having as many issues falling asleep as I had been recently. So that's good. Although my stomach has been acting up and I'm dropping weight a little faster than I think I should be. I honestly think it's just nerves, but I am not eating as much as I normally do and I am in the bathroom way more than I think I should be. I'm very, very, very thirsty lately too, and I've seriously been drinking so much water that I'm peeing like every 45 minutes and it's TOTALLY CLEAR. I'm sure that's more information than you all wanted to know, but what has been seen cannot be unseen, so you are stuck with knowing it. <3. So, that's about it. - Jase. ]]> http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2007/12/i_hate_thinking.html http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2007/12/i_hate_thinking.html Sun, 09 Dec 2007 02:25:48 -0500 Underworks (although they still are far from comfortable) and halfway through UNpacking the car my back cramped up really bad. I slept like a rock though. So that was cool. Around 11 this morning the RCN guy came to hook up my net connection down here so I could get online and do my school work and talk to my friends and post blog entries for you all. It works great, but RCN-guy was fuckin' weird. I was sitting on the couch watching him hook up the wires and stuff and he kept looking over at me with this really difficult expression. I think he was nervous that I was watching him. The best part though, was he finally finished and asked if he could use the bathroom. I told him to go right ahead, and at the same time his cell rang so he was talking on the phone as he was peeing and I could totally over hear his conversation: "... oh, yeah, I know, baby ... haha, yeah - that is really dirty... yes... I love you, too...". :[ I dropped off an application to a dry-cleaners down the street. A girl that works there is supposd to give me a call tonight, but so far nothing. God, I could really use that job. Me and my dad later went out and got some Quiznos (there was this totally adorable Russian guy eating there at the same time at us and I kept looking over at his table) and then I picked up my mail at our house and then we came back here. And now I'm doing working on sociology and talking to Matty. My aunt is watching some reality show. When my uncle comes home I'll be able to hear him shout loudly and obnoxiously over a football game, so that'll be fun. - Jase.]]> http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2007/12/i_live_in_your.html http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2007/12/i_live_in_your.html Mon, 03 Dec 2007 17:23:07 -0500 There is so much crap going on. Tomorrow morning we're moving the rest of our junk to my uncle's because we're going to be staying there for maybe a month. Most likely afterwards we'll be moving to Arizona, but if not we'll be coming back here - to our newly renovated place. Our landlord decided to redo the entire house so we have to get out of here for at least a month while he does that. It suuuucks. My dad doesn't have much of an income right now. He has hepatitis C and was denied for longterm disability (there is a lot of junk going on with that I don't feel like getting into) while he's on treatment for it. Which has just fucked us all right up. His friend has been telling us to move to Arizona with him for years, but it wasn't until recently that we started to seriously consider it. I personally am excited for it, and I think he is, too, it's just the specifics of it that are giving us some trouble. I'm confident that it will work out now. It'll be a long move for me. I have never been away from the east coast, and other than a trip to Florida when I was 1 (that I, of course, don't remember) I haven't really left my PA/NJ area. I travelled to Boston twice and I was in DC once and I've been to NYC a few times, but other than that, I've never left my area. I've never even been on a commercial plane (ever ever in life!) We're going to sell most of our stuff and buy new crap when we get down there, so that we can save on costs of bringing it with us. The stuff we have now just isn't worth taking with us. Annnnyway, that's what's going on with that. Tonight I hung out with my friends at this queer youth group I go to. Ugh, it sucks because this guy I have the worst crush on showed up with his boyfriend and I was like, "Nooooo!" Except... not outloud. Just... in my head. :( I took some pictures but my camera decided to die promptly afterwards, so I can't upload them until I get some batteries, but I'll post some cool pictures soon. It's weird how close I felt to all of these kids, but the longer I go the less and less I like the kids that are showing up. They just all seem so conceited and obsessed with their looks and with just... stupid shit that isn't actually important in real life. Especially this kid Mat that I dated for a few weeks. I totally fell for him, but then I realized that he was a brainless little freak. He's really not as stupid as he pretends to be, he just does it for attention and it pisses me off. He also sleeps with like... every guy he comes across and it's really disgusting. He has no standards at all (guess that says a lot about me. D: ) I really hate this culture now where it's cool to act like an idiot and to listen to bad music and, by the way, I hate people that use the word 'hot' in like every sentence. I can't stand it. If you want to date me, my new criteria is to be able to hold an intelligent conversation for at least 15 minutes and to NOT use the word hot to describe everything. I'm sort of seeing this kid right now but I don't think it's going to work out, mostly because he has no social skills and I really like to be around people. He doesn't know how to talk to human beings and he is frighteningly obsessive over me which, believe it or not, is a bit of a turn-off. I just wish he'd chill out a bit. (I'm really not as picky as I sound, I swear.) And, oh! My friend gave me the idea to review a book he recommended to me here so I'm probably going to do that soon! :D So, yeah, look out for that. And uhh. On Friday I have a party to go to. Except... ergh. There is this guy that shows up at these all the time and he's creeepyyy and he won't leave me alone. He's actually very nice but... well, you know. He just feels the need to be around me all the time and I have trouble going around and talking to other people while he's around and it's frustrating. He also seems to think that he has the right to know all this personal stuff about me and it's weird. That's about it, I guess. I have all these ideas but when I go to blog I'm like "....what?". - Jase. http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2007/11/errr_this_is_th.html http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2007/11/errr_this_is_th.html Wed, 28 Nov 2007 23:37:01 -0500 a. I'm 17. I've been HIV+ since I was 14, so that's 3 years now. b. I'm a transgender kid. FTM to be more specific. No, if you met me on the street you wouldn't be able to tell. Seriously. I've been on HRT for almost 5 months now, it's a pain in the ass (literally, they're intramuscular injections and your ass cheek is a pretty muscular place) and it's difficult for such a variety of reasons (physically/emotionally/mentally/financially, is the list I usually run off) that I can promise you it's not something I chose. c. Also, I'm gay. I like the boys. The boys like me. You know how it goes. I'm a gay, HIV+, 17 year old trannyboy. Be afraid, bitches. All things considered though, I'm not that strange (I know, shut up). There are a few other things that are a bit different about me than most boys my age though. I don't go to a regular public highschool. I used to, but kids suck. I'm now homeschooled via a cyber school on the net - it's safer for me, I can work at my own pace, I don't have to stress over what the kids in my class are gonna do or say to me and I get to sleep in. Also, it's much more comfortable to do Brit Lit in your pajamas. Taking into consideration the amount of time I took off for not feeling well, because I was afraid of being harrassed and because my teachers gave me a hard time because of all of that, I was missing a lot of school, as well. I'm doing much better now. My geometry grade is crap (like a really low C at the time of writing this) but everything else is all As and high Bs. I guess one of the things that bother me the most about being + at this age is the fact that a lot of people assume that it's okay to ask me 'how I got it'. You don't ask adults how they became positive, so why is it alright to ask me? Seriously guys. Most people assume that I was born with it, or I got it medically somehow, but I didn't. And if you think 14 year olds (and even younger, honestly) aren't having sex, I suggest you take a day trip to reality to get a better understanding of what's going on. They are, and I was, and a great deal of the stuff you'll probably hear me angrily rant about is how poorly kids are being taught about sex and HIV. I angrily rant a lot, though, you'll notice. :D As far as the transguy thing goes, I am usually pretty outspoken about it. However, I reserve the right to live my life as comfortably and happily as possible, and that includes not informing everyone I know about the fact that I am trans. I want to just live my life as a normal guy. Unfortunately there is so much trans prejudice in the world that wanting to be treated like a normal guy and simultaneously telling everyone I'm trans just isn't possible. That is why not wanting to go public about my HIV status isn't the only reason why I will not be using my full name in this blog, and why I've chosen to use a baby picture instead of a recent picture of myself. That's just how it's gonna be, at least for now and until/if I decide I'm willing to risk the chance of everyone finding out about these things - which I'm not saying is never gonna happen, but for right now I think that'd be a pretty bad idea. I'd like to use this space to not only talk about what's going on in my life, but to bring to the attention of whoever is reading some issues that normally go ignored that are personally relevant to me. You don't hear a lot of talk about issues specific to HIV and teenagers, or how trans people are affected by HIV, either. Those are topics that are important to me so I'll probably be bringing them up a lot. Not to bore you guys or anything, just because I think they deserve some attention. Finally, I suppose, if by reading what I write here one teenager prevents himself or herself from getting HIV, or one trans person that is already HIV+ understands there are other people out there struggling with their issues, or someone who isn't affected by any of this stuff comes away with a better understanding - and maybe even has some of their opinions changed, I would be happy. Also, I really like to talk, so that's appealing, too. I have a couple of friends that are going to tell me to just blog about it now whenever I start ranting. - Jase PS: WTF. I had this entry typed out in Notepad and went to paste it here and the formatting like threw up on me, so if anything looks weird I'm sorry. I know how to punctuate and crap, I swear, it's the blog's fault.]]> http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2007/11/omg_first_entry.html http://blogs.poz.com/jaser/archives/2007/11/omg_first_entry.html Tue, 27 Nov 2007 13:31:11 -0500