Today I interpreted day two of the first-ever Community Bootblack Training. Yesterday there had been two deaf participants, but today there was only one - the guy I mentioned a few days ago. The job itself was fairly easy and I wasn’t bothered by going - but I haaaaate being away from A so much. I really am thinking of taking a day off this week, maybe I can convince her to take it with me. I didn’t get paid for this, unfortunately, but I was prepared for that. I was given a gift of a couple of cheesy little dog tags labeled with the workshop name and my name, but I also got a logo t-shirt from the owner of the Playhouse. She mentioned “you can’t buy these,” so I guess that’s special. More importantly, she mentioned that I am really recognized as always being there when needed, so I guess all of the times I’ve said “yes, I can be there” have done some good - she made it clear that I’m the one she thinks of for interpreting. Woo!

On the way home, I needed gas, so I decided to also make a surprise trip to see my dad (eudyptes). He was concentrating on something at his customer service register, so I snuck all the way up to him before he realized I was there! I really surprised him, because my presence was so out of context - I’ve never been to his work before. He asked if I needed to buy anything, and at first I said no, but then I realized I’d been meaning to pick up some soda. I tried chatting with him a bit, but he was very busy so I had to go. It was a lot of fun to visit him though!

It has been a long day. Because Mr. Baltimore Eagle 2005 was deaf, they needed an interpreter all day. So in the morning I interpreted the contestant interviews in a quiet, nearly empty bar. I was a bit surprised to see my company’s HR director was a contestant! He and I chatted a bit before the interviews, about how long we’ve been involved in kink and in the leather community. He mentioned he’d seen my website - he said there was something in my work portfolio that mentioned the URL! I will have to find out about that. Anyway, there was also a deaf contestant and while chatting with him I realized - oh my god, there’s a “hot wear” component to these contests! So I was going to be seeing rather a lot. It turns out he won’t be working for the company much longer though. He mentioned that nobody at work knew about his involvement in the leather community.

After the interviews were done, I was going to walk a couple of blocks to perigee’s house and borrow the microwave for my lunch. When I went to get it from my car, though, I realized it had been kept plenty warm in the car thanks to the greenhouse effect. So I just ate it in my car and then took a little nap.

When Mr. Misogynist got there, he gave me a hug and said “oh, I haven’t seen you since the cruise!” So it went okay with him. I guess he forgot how insulting he was to me. We worked pretty well together though. The contest itself was fine; seeing my co-worker up there made me blush a LOT. He ended up winning, which I’d predicted as soon as I heard him during the interview. The Ms. winner was a newly trans woman, and I heard someone (the playhouse owner, for those of you who know who that is) asking if she would be appearing as a woman whenever she wore the sash. I’m not sure what I thought of that…it seems mistrustful (is that a word? I’m tired) but it’s probably a reasonable question…I don’t know.

I got to spend some time with pegsioux, which was nice, and I got hugs and thanks from a lot of people. (The thanks were work-related, from both deaf and hearing people.) I got a wink from dawnmarie727 but she slipped out before I was able to say hi to her. I didn’t get paid very much…I seriously undervalued myself, but the deaf judge was writing a personal check, and I don’t think the bar is paying him back. That is SO inappropriate - it’s a bar title, the bar gets big revenues from the drinks people buy during the contest…and the deaf person should never have to pay for the terp. But I think this bar doesn’t like to pay for it, so I didn’t ask for much because I don’t think he’ll get paid back. I’m working at the bootblack workshop from 12-4 tomorrow, and I haven’t discussed payment, so I’m donating a lot of services this weekend. With Mr. M around, though, I really want to be the first one people think of, so I’ve been saying “yes” to whatever people want lately. I’ve been working every weekend though, and I’m really spending a lot of time away from A, which I don’t like. And I have so many little chores I need to get done, but I agreed to work tomorrow…maybe I need to take a day off and just chill out.

• I’m going to quit Diet to Go for a month and try NutriSystem’s all-vegetarian diet. It doesn’t have as much variety and the food isn’t fresh (you don’t even have to refrigerate or freeze any of it, although you do buy your own fruits and veggies), so I probably won’t stay on it for a long time, but it’s cheaper than DTG and I have been desperate for a change.
• I got my Sidekick skin and applied it. It came out okay; could be better applied but I think the curved nature makes it impossible to get it perfect. They have a money-back guarantee, but I’m going to wait a few days and see how it goes before contacting them.
• I am genuinely nervous about tomorrow, when I’ll be seeing Mr. Misogynist again. He was the interpreter last year for this contest. I know Jerry said he wanted me for the important stuff, but I’m nervous just about being in the same place as this guy. Who knows if he’ll even remember me. Ugh, I am just so unsettled about it.

• CampusFood.com
  Find online delivery and takeout menus from college area restaurants with exclusive discounts and online ordering. (Note: I am deliberately linking you to the wrong site. Someone did that to me, and I liked the cute animation they use for the redirect. Si
  (tags: random)

Am I the only one who finds Sean Paul’s “Temperature” video offensive? It’s not the bouncing boobs, it’s not the freak dancing, it’s not even the dancing kiddies (much) - it’s the stepping on women. Literally. I don’t consider myself extremely feminist, but this video is the most sexist thing I’ve seen on TV. There are a couple of spots during the video in which a trio of men literally step on a trio of women, physically pushing them down. (I’m not sure the link above is the full video, but it has at least one clip of this.) It’s horrible, and yet I couldn’t find much online about this. Now Verizon is using the song in one of their commercials; they’re not using the video but every time I hear the song it makes me mad.

I just sent the following to PayPal, using up all but a few of my alloted 1000 characters.

I am a longtime PayPal member since its early days. I seem to remember that when tiered accounts were introduced I was upgraded to a Premier account for free - this was probably a few years ago. I do not receive payments very often and so I never realized that I was being charged a special fee. Today I received $400 and I was charged $11.90. This large fee prompted me to look into it and realize I was a Premier member. I do not appreciate being “upgraded” for free and then being charged additional fees. I have downgraded my account but I was told the $11.90 could not be refunded. I would like to appeal this decision based on the fact that I was not told about these fees when I upgraded. Payments I have received between then and now had a very small fee deducted and I thought it was standard - had I known that ONLY Premier members were charged fees, I would have downgraded long ago. I would appreciate a refund of my $11.90. Thank you.

I am really annoyed by this. It was a long time ago, back when they introduced tiered accounts, that they offered to upgrade me for free. I’m not even sure they charged separate fees for Premier accounts when the tiers first started. I’m not going to ask for retroactive refunds, but it would be nice to get my $11.90 back since I just now realized it. I’m not holding my breath, though. Fuckers.
Added: Well, that was quick - five minutes or less. Here’s what they said:
(more…)

• Yahoo! Go
  Personal DVR, photo browsing, listen to music, all kinds of neat features that do require you to have a TV card and so forth but seem really neat. [via techcrunch]
  (tags: media)
• GotVoice
  Listen to your voicemail (cellular, etc) via the Internet. When you tell it to, the service calls your voicemail and records the voicemail as MP3 files you can listen to, save, etc. [via mypoints]
  (tags: tools)

I asked to be interviewed by kgola and here are the results! My earlier offer to interview others still stands - just post a comment. These questions are partly about sex, so my parents should probably look the other way…
(more…)

Remember this guy? I’ll be seeing him again on Saturday. I have to admit I am scared. I heard this weekend that he’s not very professional, and the person hiring me wants me for the important stuff and him for the lesser stuff, but I’m worried. I’m also a bit worried that all of my friends will be attending Jessi’s bootblack training and I’ll be interpreting for the people I am not especially close to. Plus, Mr. Misogynist is apparently interpreting for the bootblack training. boichick, what part are you coming down for? Maybe if I’m lucky the two won’t overlap and I’ll have everybody for the contest. The Baltimore Eagle website is not very forthcoming, so who knows. (Oh hey, I can e-mail the guy who’s hiring me and ask him.) I wonder if Mr. Misogynist will even remember me. You better believe I remember him.

I am having a hard time putting my finger on this malaise, but it’s been plaguing me for a while now.

• Scrapblog
  Online scrapbooking. Uses a Flash construction interface; you can give pages backgrounds, put frames around pictures, put stickers on a page, write text and speech balloons, etc. Played with it a bit; looks very nifty but the free account is limited.
  (tags: blogging tools)
• Bone Church Gothic Clothing
  By Jeannie Nitro. Seems to be reasonably priced, in S-XL and 1-4X.
  (tags: stuff.to.buy fringe)
• Video demonstration of blatant Google adword abuse
  I always knew about these sites, but I didn’t realize they were in violation of the AdWords TOS. Hosted on YouTube. [via reddit]
  (tags: internet)
• Counter-Hippie Stop Sign Stickers
  Not that I’ve ever actually seen any defaced stop signs in suburbia, but these are more fun ways to deface them.
  (tags: funny)
• A Scientific Approach to Myspace’s Failure
  Why Myspace.com is a failure of humanity - not debating whether Myspace offers a good system or service, but lamenting the place it has become thanks to its user base. (I think I love this guy.)
  (tags: onlineculture)
• SLurl
  In addition to allowing customized control over mapping locations in Second Life, SLurl also provides a better experience for web users who don’t have Second Life.
  (tags: second.life)