Hunting with Boobs

About a week ago I tried something that I have never done, I wore a bra and a set of the small boobs out while hunting.  And what was the result?  I had the best shoot average I think I have ever had.  I was super amazed.  I mean I have gone out shooting before while wearing boobs.  You may or may not have seen the post that the above picture was from.  But going out hunting to the duck field while wearing boobs?  Nope I had yet to ever do that.

There are a myriad of things that could go wrong with wearing boobs out to the duck field.  The first of which is that I could be spotted as having breasts.  I wasn't dressed as a woman, I had my standard male hunting gear on.  Besides my face also had quite a bit of beard growth on it and being on vacation I have not bothered to shave in a while.  So there's that!  Another thing is that, really what is the point?  Why would I possibly want to wear boobs while out hunting?  What could the be the possible benefit?

Well, with that last one, the benefit could be better shooting.  Better shooting?  Yes, better shooting?  How in the world could boobs help to make me shoot better?  Well, one of the main things about wing shooting is properly shouldering your gun.  One might think that is a pretty simple affair.  Put your gun to your shoulder, and shoot.  Ha!  I wish it were that simple.  Shooting happens to be one of the hardest things I have ever done.  Anywho, one of the best ways to shoulder your gun, is to begin by putting the gun but away from you while you bring it up and have it touch your cheek.  You then pull it back to have it seat against your shoulder.  If you do it right, then every time it is in the right position.

How often do I do it right?  Possibly about half of the time.  The other half my gun is sitting on my upper arm, or half way across my chest.  This results in a missed shot, and a possible bruise!  Anywho, while shooting with boobs, they are far bigger than my standard chest equipment.  This makes it so that I do that first part, of putting the gun out away from me, much more often.  If I don't do it, it bonks my boobs!

Thus, it actually helps me to shoulder my gun better!  And the result was that I shot much better than normal!  Yay!  I really thought that I may have found out what my difficulties with shooting have always been, missing boobs!

The only problem with my theory is that I have been out hunting twice with boobs since that first time and I totally sucked!  I mean sucked bad!  It was some of the worst shooting I have ever done!  So much for that theory!

Okay, just a silly little post today.  Oh, and yeah, nobody has said anything about my boobs while hunting.  Either everybody is super polite, or nobody noticed under all of my super fluffy hunting gear.  Oh and I totally know that I have not been posting much lately.  I am technically on vacay right now!  Yay again!  I say technically because while on vacay I am involved with remodeling portions of my house.  Currently I am stuck sanding and filling the ceiling.  Super fun!  So.... I work on the house and twice a week I go hunting.  I am pretty darn tired!

I hope everyone has been enjoying the holiday season!

Love you!

Love yourselves!

Funny Shopping Experience

The other day I had a bit of time to kill so what better to do than a little bit of shopping!  I first went into Famous Footwear to check out their Converse selection.  That is something I do quite frequently as they tend to change up their selection quite often.  And the really cool Converser sell out quickly so you need to be on top of it!

Afterwards I went into the Marshalls next door.  Lately I have been really into wearing bralettes pretty much full time.  They are pretty comfy and have a very small amount of padding in them.  Thus while they show a little bit, they don't show too much for me to feel too self conscious while at work.  Anywho..... Marshalls will often have a nice selection of them at pretty cheap prices. I found a few that were cool and I grabbed them and headed up to the checkout lanes.  Along the way, a candle caught my eye and a tough to destroy puppy toy as well.  While waiting in the line I was eyeing the various cashiers and I noticed one who appeared to be transgender.

It is often difficult to accurately assess someone who identifies as transgender, but I am pretty sure this person was.  As best as I could tell, this was someone who was born female, but was clearly presenting very much similar as I was, except in the opposite direction.  I thought to myself, I hope that I get them as my cashier.

When it was my turn for a cashier, I got called to this person.  I was wearing, female jeans, shoes, top, and a lightly padded bralette, but otherwise presenting as male.  No makeup, shaved head, a bit of scruff on the cheeks.  The cashier had a super short hairstyle, which in and of itself is not enough for me to assume transgender.  But they also were wearing men's clothing, and had on men's jewelry.  They also carried themselves in a very masculine manner.  The other thing was that while they were ringing up my purchases, we gave each other a knowing look and a few wry smiles.

It was quite amusing and I chuckled to myself as I walked out of the store.


No, we didn't sit there and gab with each other about our gender variances like a couple of old pals.  We just sort of silently acknowledged each other and respected each other in the standard roles we were playing: customer and cashier.

Some people tell me that these people don't exist.  In my experience I see far more FtM than MtF transgender people.  No, you can't just assume transgender status from simply wearing jeans instead of dresses.  But if you look close enough, there are many, many people who were born female and clearly present as male.  Fully male.  Not just eschewing fashion, but actively trying to appear as masculine as I try to appear feminine.  Funny.

Okay, that is all.

Love you.  Love each other!  Love yourself!  Love the wide variety that is the human species!

Photo Credits:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:SF_gender_symbols.png
https://pixabay.com/en/women-men-people-human-gender-149577/

What's in a Name?

Brook, Bobbi, Nadine.  So far those are the iterations of names that I have gone through and I think I am getting ready to go through another.  I am mentally amping myself up to begin going with Kelly as my new nom de plume.  Well, actually what I have been contemplating is adding a middle name to my current name.  So..... my current name is Nadine Spirit, but you already know that right?  Okay, well there is no middle name included there.  Thus my full name is going to be Nadine Kelly Spirit.

Cool?  Well, possibly.  But actually it can be a bit annoying to me.  Annoying you ask?  Well yeah.  One might think that it is awesome to get to choose your own name.  Yeah, I kind of thought that as well, before I actually did it.  The first name I chose because I liked it.  Duh!  But after awhile I didn't.  I kept picturing a ditzy blond, and I didn't like thinking of myself that way.  Not that people with that name are all ditzy blonds, it just happened that is the image my brain came up with and I didn't really like it.  Bobbi, I never liked.  I thought I would try it out and it lasted for maybe a month or so, maybe even less.  It is something I was called as a young child as it is a derivation of my actual name.  I thought I'd really like it, and actually I hated it.  Viciously.

Hmm.  After those two failed attempts, I went with Nadine.  I have no idea why I chose it.  I think I just kind of liked it.  Possibly because I couldn't think of anyone I knew with that name.  Possibly because of its meaning.  Possibly because it just popped in my head and I thought it was nice.  Who knows why I chose it!  I certainly don't!  Anywho...... I was totally fine with it for years.  I think I have gone with it for at least 7-10 years now.

But I have encountered a problem with it.  And that problem is beginning to come out to people.  Why is that a problem you ask?  Well because I have noticed that being as it is a bit of an unusual name often people have a difficult time with it.  Maybe it is because I am saying it strangely.  Maybe it just doesn't roll of my tongue the way that it should.  Maybe it is because people don't hear it very often.  Maybe it is because it is a difficult name?  Who knows!  I do know that many people struggle with it.  I have had some sales associates just straight up not be able to understand what my name is.  And that is weird.

More importantly, now that I am coming out to more and more people in my regular life, outside of this fine online world, I feel weird saying "Nadine" to people.  I am not quite sure what it is.  Possibly it is that I get a look from people that says, "you sure don't seem like a Nadine to me."  Nobody has ever said that, but I kind of feel it from people.  Almost as if their looks say "hey, if you're going to make up a name for yourself, couldn't you just go with something more mainstream, and not something that sounds like you should be some gorgeous South Pacific Islander or something?"

Okay, so maybe they are not thinking anything like that at all.  But, still, I have become reluctant to state my name to people and I don't like that.  I have started to become more aware of it lately and last week while wine tasting I was VERY aware of it when the crowd of early 20's ladies asked my name.  I felt super self- conscious about it.  After that, I decided, that in real life, I have to change my name.

In the past when I changed my name, it was pretty easy.  I decided to do it, and then told my wife.  And that was it.  Being as she and I were the only ones who knew about me and my gender variance, it made it pretty easy.  But now?  Now that I have told many people in real life and as well, that I have worked hard for about 7 or 8 years to develop my online brand under the name of Nadine Spirit?  How does one go about changing all of that?

The answer is, I'm not.  Online I will still use Nadine, but in real life I am going to begin using Kelly.  I will tell people I know in real life to use Kelly.  Any of you wondrous folk here in the blogosphere can use either one that you would prefer, Nadine or Kelly.  And if you know me in both locations?  Yeah, it doesn't really matter to me.  Use whichever one makes you happy!

So um, yeah!  There you go!

Love you!

Love yourself!

I kind of wish someone else would have just named me with a female name when I came out of the womb.  Maybe that is what everyone should have, both a male and female name given to them by their parents.  That way once everyone starts to self-identify their gender, they can go with either of their given names.  Hey maybe that is why we have a first name and a middle name???  But one should just be male and the other female.  Hey, this could work!

Love ya!


Photo Credits:
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AName.jpg
https://www.flickr.com/photos/vblibrary/6517132943
https://www.flickr.com/photos/jackdorsey/170257936

What A Weekend

My Wine Tasting Outfit

My wife, Jules, really wanted me to write a post for you all.  I told her that I didn't really think that it would make all that much of a difference in the world being as those that know this, know it, and those that don't will find some reason to doubt it.  But I'm getting ahead of myself aren't I?  Yup, I have a tendency to do that on occasion.  Hmm.......

This past weekend my wife and I travelled to the coast for a bit of wine tasting.  It was her birthday this past Sunday and it was her choice on what we were going to do, and she chose wine tasting, so off we went!

On Saturday we woke up, got ready, and were out by about 10:30 or so.  A little bit late, but that turned out to be a good thing as by the time we rolled in Denny's for a super carbo loading breakfast, we were able to be seated right away.  We casually chatted, and ate our food before heading off to our first winery.

I totally forget the name of the place, but it was just okay wine.  They are probably happy I forgot the name of their place considering I am giving such a raving review!  Ha!  Anywho, we stopped to get gas before going to the second location.  We were travelling in the Santa Maria area, which is nice for wine tasting as they are so spread out you really have to drive some good distances between each place.  As well, for all of you nit pickers out there, Jules and I share tastes, drink lots of water, and eat lots of food.  We are well versed in what it takes to wine taste safely.  So, um, yeah!

Anywho.... after gas, we were off to the second location.  We tasted a few, poured out much of them, icky!  Then back into the car, driving through the oak tree studded rolling hills.  The area is just starting to turn green and it is so super pretty!  We drove on through the area, pulling into Los Olivos, a small wine tasting town.  But it was way over crowded.  I pulled up the local Indian casino on the GPS and off we went for a little gambling fun.

The casino was boring.  Nothing fun, but it killed a bit of time.  I lost a grand total of about 50 dollars, while Jules lost about 20.  So, for an hour of fun, it didn't cost us that much.  Back into the car we went, stopping at a couple more wineries before we were back at the hotel room.  We freshened up and then went out to sushi for dinner.  Jules really likes sushi, me not so much.  But I love my wife, so.... I ate sushi!  Hmmm...... yum!  I guess!

Okay, so there was the thrilling day.  So why did Jules want me to write about it here?  Because it was a totally normal day!  Absolutely nothing weird happened.  And I was dressed fully as a woman for the entire day.

So then why did I say that nobody would be swayed by this totally normal day of mine?

1 - I interacted with people who I was buying things from, thus they needed to act professionally.
2 - I pass so awesomely amazingly that nobody would ever suspect that I am anything but a natal born female.
3 - The only reason nobody bothers me is that I live in the ultra liberal state of Kalifornia.
4 - I have a perfect wing-woman in my wife.

Now, what about that above list is wrong?  Hmmm...... prettymuch all of it.

Taking those points out of order:
3 - California is not quite as liberal as much of the rest of the union would make it out to be.  Most of the liberal attitudes come from our big cities, San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego and their surrounding metro areas.  Myself, I live in California's bible belt, the central valley, where it is actually super farmer right wing, gun toting, Trump loving, conservatives.  Now what do I have going for me in this area?  Most people keep to themselves.  That is about it.

4 - Yes my wife is a great wing woman, but often she and I are not together.  As well, I don't require her to be by my side holding my hand while we go to the potty together.  Sure we are together, but we are also apart often enough.

2 - Nope, sorry folks.  I may have figured out how to take a decent picture of myself while dressed as a woman.  And as well, I do concede that I pass the glance test.  Meaning, I pass well enough that with a few seconds of a glance, most people probably take me as a woman.  But in actually interacting with me, with pouring me wine to drink, with standing next to me in a tasting room, yeah, nope, no way, now how, never do I pass as a genetic woman, even to totally drunk people.

1 - This is the part that I think is interesting.  Yes I did interact with many people who had something to sell me.  But that is not all.  Take all of the other patrons in the wine tasting rooms.  Like the couple with the young kid who laughed at all of my jokes that I was making.  They had nothing to gain by being pleasant with me, and all of them were.  Even the group of young kids celebrating their friend's 22nd birthday.  That was a fun crowd who came up and spoke with my wife for much of the time we were there.  Men and women, mostly quite drunk actually.  And all of them were super friendly.  What about all of the people in the casino?  That place was packed.  And how many pointing fingers did I get?  Yeah, that's right, none.

Okay, well, that about sums it all up.  Nothing all that thrilling to report.  Except for me being able to be me, and society yet again being totally fine with it.  Just another totally normal weekend out wine tasting with my wife.

Don't believe that it can happen?  Well, meet up with me sometime and we'll go out together!  Sound like fun?  Contact me and we'll make it happen.  Now I must warn you though, I am not into going out with fetish dressers.  So if that is your thing, well then, don't contact me!  Ha!  But if you're up for a totally normal day hanging out, wine tasting, or shopping, email me!

Love you!

Love yourself!

Love others!

Finally Feels Like Fall

Coat - Guess - Similar

Top - White House Black Market - Similar

Leggings - Connection18 - Similar

Booties - Madden Girl - Similar

Belt - ?? - Similar

This past weekend we finally got some cold weather into the part of California that I live in!  Yay!  It was so wonderful finally feeling cold again!  For a transgender individual such as myself, cold weather is such a wonderful blessing!  Seriously it is.  Besides the awesomeness of having many layers of clothes on that help disguise my obvious male figure, wearing a wig during even warm days can be so darn uncomfortable.

I so wish that I could still grow out my own hair.  Boo-hiss for balding!  Ugh!  I remember growing up and hoping with all of my mite that I would never end up going bald.  But alas, genetics are an inescapable bitch!  Okay, well maybe if I had started finasteride and rogaine treatments back in my early thirties, or maybe even late teens, then maybe I could have warded off the evil balding genes for at least a while!

Have I ever told you that my natural hair would actually get to be about the same color as the wigs I currently wear?  Well it was!  I am actually a brunette, but apparently it is not to firm of a brunette color as with just a bit of swimming and sunning, my hair bleaches out to a nice blond, again, very similar to my blond wigs.  So pretty much the only difference between my old natural hair and my wigs is the fullness of my wigs.  I would say that my hair looked as though maybe I only had about half of the hairs of my wigs.

So uh yeah.  Thrilling insights into my hair, right?  I think sometimes I like the partially frivolous nature of my blog as all too frequently I torment myself with way too serious thoughts.  Yup, on occasion those thoughts appear here as well, but I still like to think of my blog as a light hearted fashion blog with a light sprinkling of seriousness.  Ha!  I just made myself laugh.

Love you!

Love yourself!

Love the lighter side of life!

Pleated Skirt

Skirt - White House Black Market - Similar

Top - White House Black Market - Similar

Shoes - Madden Girl - Similar

Belt - ???? - Similar

Bangles - Torrid

I absolutely love this skirt!  I have probably written about it before, but I will say it again, and most likely again in the future as well, I LOVE this skirt!  It is so much fun to wear!  It is pleated all the way around and is made of such smooth silky material that I love the way it moves while walking around in it.  It feels like I am wearing a cloud!  What exactly does it feel like to be wearing a cloud?  Okay, well I really don't know what that would feel like, but I would imagine that it would be all light and fluffy and swishy! Just like this skirt is!

The thing I don't really like about it though is that it doesn't do much at all to give me a bit more shape.  But you know, I am a bit over that.  I used to be very concerned that I had all the right curves in all the right places; so that I looked more like a woman.  But ya know, not every woman has all of the right curves in all of the right places.  Sometimes they have a few extra curves in places they would prefer not to and sometimes they don't have any curves in places they would prefer to have them.  Such is life huh?  And such is my body.  I may have been born with a bit of a male body, but that is not going to stop me from enjoying fun clothing!  And this skirt is super fun!

Really, when I am walking around in this skirt I just get this big old shit eating grin on my face, like I am a super happy little clam!  (What is up with that saying?  Like clams are super happy or something?  Why?  Why would they be happy?  What is up with their lives?  Maybe I should investigate what it would be like to live as a clam.  Oh wait, that's right, I'm not trans-species, just transgender.  Hmm tangent much????)

Okay.  Well that is about it folks.  I hope that things are going well in your lives.  My last post seemed to be a bit of a thought provoker for many of you.  I will return to it again in the future as many of your thoughts got me thinking in a variety of directions!

Love you!

Love yourselves!

Love Happy Clams!

(Hmm..... maybe a happy clam is not a clam at all but a euphemism.  Hmmm.... okay now my mind is FULLY in the gutter! Ha!)

Numbers - The Truth of Partner's Acceptance

Have I ever mentioned before that I really like numbers?  There are all sorts of fascinating things that happen with numbers that are often overlooked.  For instance, I often go to various events where you buy raffle tickets, but them into various buckets, and then cross your fingers that your name will be called.  These events are truly very random drawings and yet, often the draws do not seem very random.  Some people tend to get their names drawn more than others.  It just happens to be the nature of apparent randomness.  Just like my phone, I will put the music on random play and frequently the same song comes up again and again.  Random?  Well yeah, but it sure doesn't seem to be a very good random!

Anywho..... some of the numbers I have been looking at lately are the true numbers of acceptance of spouses of transgender people.  Within my research I have been looking at numbers of MtF transgender people who are not transitioning, that have told their spouse or girlfriend of their gender variance.  The common theory states that it is very rare for a genetic woman to be accepting of a gender variant male to female significant other.  My own theory is that is actually simply based upon fear and not a true reflection of reality.

Many gender variant people spend a large amount of their lives in hiding.  They fear what might happen if they are honest with those around them.  And why shouldn't they be fearful?  They dominant narrative states that there exists an overwhelming threat to the transgender community from a large variety of sources.  From being attacked on the street, to being harassed in the bathroom, to being fired from your job, to being shunned from any sort of companionship.

But, unfortunately from what I can tell, many gender variant people are not actually willing to risk attempting these actions to discover for themselves whether the narrative will pan out that way for them or not.  Now don't get me wrong.  I understand that bad things happen.  Bad things happen all of the times.  For no reason.  To good people.  And they shouldn't happen.  But such is the nature of life.  It is unpredictable.

Alas, I fear I have drifted off topic yet again!  Low is me!  Okay, focus here.

The focus of my personal study has been trying to decode true numbers of reactions of the reveal of being gender variant within relationships.  My study group has been the users at crossdressers.com.  My method has been to simply comb through the various threads and categorizing people and their partner's response to them being gender variant of some sort.  It has not always been clear but I have tried my best to determine what happened within their relationship once they told their partner.

Some early results??

Of the 458 members I have included:

363 did not leave the relationship upon the reveal
280 are at least somewhat accepting
29 are in what is called a Don't Ask Don't Tell situation
45 didn't leave but are not accepting of the partner's gender variance
23 are accepting genetic women
74 are partners who left because of the gender variance
20 left but not because of the gender variance

Okay - a proviso with these numbers, some members reported their responses from several different partners over the years, thus the numbers may not total as one might expect.  This explains why their are variations within the totals.

So some percentages huh?

84% of partners did not leave the relationship upon the reveal
74% percent of the partners are at least somewhat accepting of the gender variance, which could range from DADT to full inclusion and acceptance
68% would be considered to be openly accepting of their partner's gender variance

These results are what I have up to this point.  I will continue to compile the numbers.  There is about 10-15 years worth of data on that website and so far I have gone back about two months only!  I don't really know how long I will continue to do this for.  We shall see.

But so far, I would have to say that the common assertion that a partner will NOT accept a gender variant partner is completely wrong.  Apparently far more partners DO accept their gender variant partner.  Who knew?  Well I personally had a suspicion.

Interesting.

Love you!

Love numbers!

BTW - This data was all taken from publicly accessible areas of the website.  Anyone can find this information if they so choose.

Here is the raw data, if you are really interested: