Maura's Illuminated Manuscript

At the recommendation of B, one of the organizers of the monthly women's munch at the Wildrose, I went to a coffee joint a not-short walk from my house. I learned:

• This city may not have any biker bars left, but it has a biker coffee joint called Two Kick Cafe. Oh, Seattle.
• There's a national organization called Dykes On Bikes that started in 1976! I had no idea they were that... organized.
• The event at the coffee shop was a fundraiser. Yes, I bought a miniature painting of a geoduck squirting a rainbow. It was one of dozens by that artist, many of which were hilarious.
• I might not have a thing for biker women but there was no shortage of women there who gave me the vapors, sometimes the bikers' partners.
• B, there in her Washington State Ms. Leather sash, introduced me tho the leadership of the Seattle chapter of Dykes On Bikes. They told me what I'd heard before: if I want a ride, show up at 4th & Union at 0900 (ungh) on Pride Sunday and maybe it'll happen.
• B said that if I don't get a ride, I'm welcome to march with the Leather contingent.

I've already contacted the Siberian Siren about Pride Eve, so I might (again) not be in any condition to be at the parade route that early. We'll see.

After three months I returned to the Mercury. I think I'm out of practice: I didn't quite make it to 2300. In my defense, I'd been walking and standing a lot yesterday. But at least I got to see A&J and Vienna La Rouge. Have I mentioned how weirdly comfy it is to talk to a cis woman whose eyes are at exactly the same level as mine? Vienna was there with a tiny butch date. De gustibus non disputandum.

Edited to add: Waliking down Nickerson on the way home from the Dykes On Bikes, a younger woman complimented me on my hair (All credit to Adi Chen!) and we basically shot the shit all the way to 35th St. It was nice!

Latex drinks were supposed to be at the Cha Cha Lounge, but they had a major equipment malfunction earlier that day, so up the street we bopped to the Unicorn. I learned that:

• Rubbermaid may be in Europe longer than I thought, which is a bummer for me.
• The gorgeous and charming lady I met a while back is still gorgeous and charming despite having a partner.
• I'm not the only woman who rides mass transit while wearing latex, but we both kept ours covered. It isn't warm enough not to just yet here.
• There's someone who helps run a Burning Man theme camp called Camp Frizz. They don't have much of an online presence; unlike the Space Virgins or Camp Beaverton, they don't seem to make their presence known in the default world. And I have no plans to go to TTITD; there's a long list of reasons why I might not want to go. But did my ears perk up when they mentioned Camp Frizz? Is part of me considering it seriously? You know it.

Just around the corner from the Cha Cha Lounge is Time Warp, the old sk00l video arcade with adult beverages. That's where Shelly Farnham, my Burner buddy who runs the Passable art space, was having a house-music-and-art-show night. How could I resist? It must be said, I was completely charmed by the deeply nerdy art; it had clearly been made by people who read more science fiction than I do, which isn't nothing. Also, there was an episode of original Star Trek on the huge screen above the bar. I watched the second half of it before I headed for the train. It wasn't very crowded, and I think it deserved to be.

My dentist is a long damn bus ride from the Devil Girl House. They moved a stop, which made me late, but that isn't really what I'm cheesed about. What I'm cheesed about was that on the way home, I was sitting next to a woman who didn't seem like the brightest bulb in the box and needed help with routes, transfer, etc. Being a bus maven, I helped her out, natch.

Then we got to talking about where I was going. It didn't take her a minute to blame "illegal immigrants" for high housing prices. What. The. Actual. I didn't argue with her. Should I have? I don't know. And there was some poor Metro employee who could hear the whole thing who, I'm pretty sure, was from somwhere in east Africa.

Took the bus to the Hill for the women's munch. Listened to a discussion about trauma responses to BDSM that I, at least, found highly educational. Confessed to one of the organizers that I was hoping to run into a certain lady again there. Groovy, said she, but I should know that said lady has had some rough relationship experiences, so I should tread carefully. Noted. But I shall still keep coming to munches for a variety of reasons.

A little bit of Seattle Goth history: down in a big basement in Seattle's oldest neighborhood, Pioneer Square, in the '90s and early aughts there used to be a goth joint called the Catwalk. Sweet young things showed up and did goth things. One notable feature of the Catwalk was that there was BDSM going on. Yes, in a bar in Washington state. That's now illegal here, and my friend I says that the Catwalk is likely why. (I'm unaware of any regrettable incidents involving BDSM at the Catwalk, but that doesn't mean they didn't happen. I describes the kinky folk there as decent sorts who liked to explain things, as most kinky folk are.)

Sounds like my kind of place, right? But remember, folks, I spent the entire '90s trying hard to be somebody I'm not. I didn't make it to the Catwalk until near the end of its run for a couple of fashion shows*. Now there's a club there called Ohm.

So it was with complex feelings that I heard about the Catwalk reunion scheduled for last night. There was tremendous excitement among the old-schoolers who actually did go there regularly. People who hadn't been regular clubbers for years were talking about going out. So would I indulge in nostalgia for an experience I never really had?

Hell yes I would! And I had a fabulous time, absence of kink notwithstanding. People dressed up, which I appreciate; I was not the only one there in a leather corset**. The goth spotting was excellent; many of the seldom-seen peeps did show up.

Ohm could have used another bartender, and you had to pay extra for one of the many tables, but it's otherwise a decent venue***. The door people were too young to have heard of the Catwalk.

Dancer, who drove us there, danced so much that it took her several hours of ice and heat to get ambulatory today. Yes, the music was largely goth standards from days past from DJ JQ et al., and I loved it.

Postscript: A few days ago I invited Taller Woman, who was a regular at the Catwalk, but she says she can't do Friday nights anymore because old. That's a great pity, not least because I've seen a photo of her in a black leather corset.

The promoters say they're going to do it again in June.


*Yeah, you know what kind of fashion shows.
**In that crowd, it's almost a wardrobe staple. Or at least it was.
***When I was a baby bat, child, the tables at Noc Noc were first come first serve. And at the Mercury & the Coffin Club they still are. Harrumph.

I went to shiny (i.e. latex) drinks last night. Happiness. I learned of a dangerous new place to shop, Polymorphe. I learned a little bit about latex repair. I talked to a bus driver in a latex shirt. And I got to see Rubbermaid! Pity I didn't remember about an event that I learned about from the munch until afterward.

Fun fact: Paulaner hefeweizen is significantly stronger than Manny's. The Merc has the former; the dive we were in last night carries the latter.

I was invited to the friendsgiving that I went to last year, but I wasn't feeling it. I stayed home, cleaned house, and had Korean instant ramen with seitan for dinner. Je ne regrette rien.

Oh: I discovered on Thanksgiving afternoon that my front bike tire was flat. I may have neglected to mention that my accident was right in front of a construction site. Yeah, you know what happened: I pulled an entire nail out of my front tire. I'm lucky that

1. That nail didn't puncture me when I hit the ground.
2. I was able to ride three miles home with it in my tire without even noticing for a week.

As I'd planned before my bike accident, I went out to the Mercury with Funny Lady on the night of Thanksgiving day. So I did get some social on.

With regret, yesterday I blew off the annual gathering of grad school classmates because a) it took me too long to recover, b) their place isn't all that convenient by transit, and c) I had on call stuff to do. But! I did make it to a trans and non-binary Leather social at Cal Anderson last night. It was a little cool in the shelter house, but it was packed with information. That mass transit trip was more than enough for my hip; it's for the best that it was the only one I did yesterday.

Came home, got to bed at a reasonable hour, and slept for ten hours. I have nothing to do today except pick up groceries & bike tubes. Bliss.

Latex dinner Thursday night at a place called Di Fiora. But it isn't Italian; it's Thai. With a lot of fake flowers everywhere. Whatever. It was a good time, and the food is pretty good. Anyone who thinks I'm hardcore about dressing up has not been to a latex event, boy howdy. Even the regular monthly ones each seem to feature at least one person who goes to the extra trouble (and no doubt expense) with their outfit and/or makeup. And since I'm a mass transit maniac, I wear boots that let me walk to and from train and bus stops.

Friday? Bailed on what could have been a fun birthday party with People I Have Much In Common With because my body just said nope.

Saturday? Seacompression. I wore the Victorian Sydney outfit with heels; one of my ankles is still mad at me about that. The weather didn't quite cooperate. I was ready with my umbrella, but I can't help but wonder if the weather explained the shortage of art on the lawn. Still, fun was had, including seeing people I hadn't seen in a while.

Sunday? Chores, sleep. I crashed at 1930, woke up at 0345, then got some more sleep from 0600 to 0645.

I think the shorter days are hitting me hard, right when I need to do an epic house clean.

Gosh, what have I been doing? When I'm not working, grocery shopping, it seems.

What haven't I done? Gone to the house music monthly that's just down the hill from my house because it's on the first Tuesday. Le sigh. I've moved into a neighborhood full of temptations, but they all have their price.

That's not the only weeknight event I've blown off in recent weeks for either health or sanity reasons, so now I'm ready to collect on that karma do what I usually do in October: party my little white booty off.

Luckily, I have many lined up:

1. A munch tomorrow night. It's a pity it'll be in a place with terrible food, but these are my people, If You Know What I Mean.
2. Brunch with trystbat Saturday!
3. Uwajimaya with Tacoma Girl on Saturday afternoon. I really should get non-alcoholic beverages and non-sushi eats for my Halloween party.
4. Possible outing on Tuesday to the Blue Moon. Hey, it's early doors, cover-free, and the DJ is a FOAF.
5. A Halloween party that isn't mine on the 11th.
6. Latex dinner the 17th.
7. A certain luminary's birthday at Massive on the 18th.
8. Seacompression on the 19th.

Madness!

Oh: I got my free gummint COVID tests in the mail. If you're in the US, order yours if you haven't already.

FedEx, unbeknownst to me until yesterday, delivered an expensive telescoping aluminum ladder that I bought to one of my neighbors before their given delivery window even started. I received no notification. So I spent much of yesterday ringing that neighbor's doorbell. I still haven't met him, though, because he's out of town. A different neighbor had taken in the package, and he rang my doorbell yesterday. He seems all right, and he helped me get that heavy package around East Neighbor's house to mine despite being in surgical recovery.

Moral: FedEx is stinky. This is the worst of several bad experiences I've had with them. Yeah, some people say all delivery services are no good, but FedEx has been consistently the worst in my experience.

And why do I need a fancy telescoping ladder? Because I don't have storage space for a sufficiently long extension ladder. Yes, I bought this for Halloween decoration, but it would be really nice to clean my windows on the outside someday, too.

I took yesterday off to go to my dentist out in the suburbs. The me of twenty years ago would find it hilarious to read this, but Totem Lake has gone upscale. I paid too much for shawarma and a glass of white wine, but everything else about Mamnoon is right on.

Latex dinner yesterday. Lovely as ever. SFDs: the little purple skater dress, out for its last outing of the year. I learned of an event called Illuminaughty on the 27th that's basically Burner plus kink; the organizers specifically invited latex folks. My sweet spot, right? Except that I've already made plans with the Tickler. Ah well, tickets are kind of spendy anyway. Crazy-making.

[Confession: While I was in Germany I used Zuckerberg's data mine as a microblogging platform and scratch pad. I could have typed up Dreamwidth entries on my phone, but I mainly couldn't be bothered. Much of what you're about to read here is based on what I put there. I'll be doing this in chronological order because it's just easier.]

On the 14th, just minutes after my on-call shift ended, I left for Leipzig, Germany for Wave-Gotik Treffen, the goth & industrial music festival to end them all. Basically, a black-clad mass of thirty thousand takes over every venue in greater Leipzip with... music. And outfits, so many outfits. And a (very) little kinky stuff.

So how was the trip over? Nine hours in a coach-class seat, but at least not nearly as bouncy as across the tropical Pacific. I did get to see something interesting as we zipped over the Netherlands and north Germany: hundreds of windmills in rural areas. They're serious about renewables over there.

I never did really adjust to Central European Time, but that's just as well because I was staying up into the wee hours every night to see shows.

Getting my wristband was an adventure. I left my hotel room around noon on Thursday expecting to need to take the tram, which is free if you already have your wristband. But no! I was staying in the beautifully designed Adina Hotel just two blocks from Hauptbahnhof (main train station). Since that's the transpo nexus for the whole city, the WGT ("veh-geh-TEH") organizers wisely put a satellite box office there.

There was one trip through the line to figure out that I needed to get into the short line for ticket buyers, get the paper ticket that they won't mail overseas, then go through the line again to get my wristband. It all seemed a little bit cumbersome; I'm not sure whether that's German or not. They just didn't seem very well set up for people coming from outside Europe. To be fair, such people are a small minority of WGT attendees.

I was wearing my Pride-and-stars-and-stripes leggings, so I stood out in the sea of black. A video crew interviewed me during my first trip through the line, asking me why I was so brightly dressed. I told them the truth: I wanted to make myself visible to someone I was going to meet later.

And did I see that person? No, but I was in the appointed place and time for that, namely the Sadgoth gathering. The Sadgoths are a large group of goths from Anglosphere countries. The dude running it now is English. I should have hit the Sadgoth Facebook page more to be less lonely, escape the horrible feeling of being that dumb Auslander who doesn't speak any German, and maybe party ridiculously late into the night, but honestly, I just plain forgot to. That, and I didn't really want to punish my body any more than I had already. This trip was... a lot.

At the Ratskeller, i.e. the cellar of the "new" town hall (Neues Rathaus), I had a salad with sorbet & ricotta on top (?!) with a one-liter beer. Fear not: Germans are so old school about their beer that it's usually at most 5% alcohol, so large volumes don't put you under the table. I got some interesting info: there were to be a couple of official pre-funks, one at Felsenkeller.

And what was Felsenkeller like? It has about ten times the capacity of the Mercury and is more of a concert hall than a club, but otherwise it looked and felt familiar. I didn't feel the live act that was playing when I got there, but DJs in the basement, Paradroid and Puppe, really kicked butt! The basement dance floor was about half the size of the Merc's, and the Germans just kept on packing in. It warmed the cockles of my heart to see two girls making out on the dance floor; some things really are universal.

On to Friday! I hit the local equivalent of PCC because it was going to be a long weekend for Pentecost, and I therefore needed to stock my hotel fridge. Hey, I got to try gen-u-wine Müsli, and found it satisfactory.

Sometime on Friday I tried Currywurst. They could do with more curry. In general I found that the Germans could do with more spice and less salt.

I donned the Devil Girl outfit only with comfier boots and bopped over to the Kätz Club for a fetish night. It's a playspace cum dance club into which an awful lot of love, money, and thought has been poured. It's mostly in a basement and is divided into many small rooms. Each of these rooms is set up for a different kind of... activity. I had a couple of Schwarzbiers, watched some impromptu pole dancing, and headed for Ladytron at the largest venue, agra. Yes, lower case.

On the way to the tram I saw a much younger blonde woman who was an absolute vision in a black dress with a hoop skirt. I made the heart sign. After the obligatory "I don't know German", she asked me where I got the Devil Girl corset and I told her. Game recognizes game.

WGT attendees basically swarm the trams, especially line 11, the one between agra and Hauptbahnhof. That passes through a heavily graffiti'd neighborhood called Connewitz. The representative graffito that stuck in my memory is "Yuppies raus."

Agra looks like it used to be a hangar. Half of it was devoted to vendors, and it's a minor miracle that I didn't buy something bananas expensive there. My fave was a sculptor and furniture maker named Lucas Haupt. He welds together arthropod-shaped... things. Spider chairs. Face huggers from Alien. Lamps shaped like spiders perched on pistons. Giant molars with faces. Creatures inspired by Hieronymus Bosch.

I needed to caffeinate because Ladytron wasn't to take the stage until 0100. This was where I first applied my knowledge of the Pfand that I gained at the Ratskeller. And what's a Pfand, you ask? A deposit that bars & cafes charge for the use of their reusable glassware, typically one euro. Much of my caffeine intake on this trip was in the form of Irish coffee at agra.

But on to Ladytron! I'd missed this band in Seattle at least twice, so this was my revenge, and sweet revenge it was. They sounded fabulous, and I felt a bit guilty for not buying their entire catalog and listening to it constantly. They seemed to have changed some of the arrangements to appeal to gothier tastes. Near the end of the show, their drummer burst the head of his kick drum. As the stagehands replaced it, Helen Marnie joked, "That's why they call him the Highland Hammer." When I laughed, I was the only one within earshot who did. Take that, Germans.

How did I get back to my hotel? By tram, of course. At 0233. Not only does Leipzig let WGT attendees use their trams prepaid; it runs the 11 at high frequency late into the night. God bless 'em.

Am I going to write up the wrest of WGT tonight? Hell no. There will be at least one more entry tomorrow, though, and I have pics that I'll put up.