June 7, 2025
The inevitable quest for food
Mashed, fried, crinkle cut, hashed and baked. The brain under fed.
It starts in the morning, then the lunch break, again on our way home or waiting for us. The feeling of hunger only subsides as digested past meals are forgotten.
A 20-dollar meal, gone as fast as prepared.
The work stays, the 2 hours of labor, the upset customers you remember — unrelated to the need to eat.
Pleasing the modern noblemen. Those free to go out and able to make a difference, allowed to tip — we plea and service them.
For a crumb.
For a dignified meal of our own.
Unburdened and free from serving the class above. We scramble like an egg — unmade to hatch. Our membrane broken and smattered. Our lives disturbed as we latch to the hot, black top-pan. To be peeled, again and again.
As the rich and privileged starve for our labor.
It never ends.
The biting feeling, the reflexive sense of need.
The hunger is inevitable.
June 1, 2025
Fighting for Pride
A queer year indeed – recharged, empowered and finding voice.
Queerhood
This year my anthem was Pink Pony Club by Chappell Roan, and I am surely not alone in my perspectives of the song. I relate to its themes, the fun and the emotional drawl. The message of ‘taking a plunge’ for self discovery. In the narrative of the song, a performer risks the comfort of a family unit and the traditional values of her Tennessee town.
The idea of a fruitful satisfying life, with free expression and doing what brings joy – is a common subject of songs, typically an oppressed person. “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” by Cyndi Lauper is another song I have connected with because I value my free time, but with social attitudes against healthy masculin emotions. Whether happy or tired - are scruitinzed, and demonized. People want freedom and happiness regardless of gender or background. Most people support queer acceptance. Perhaps misguided by the tradition or their cultural echo chambers – the full-scale of gender exlcusion is regressive.
I left Oklahoma a year ago today – I stayed with family for a few months in another state before settling in Colorado.
Fled my home town, to asylum across state borders. The tensions and my loneliness in 2023 and in 2024 was traumatic, and confusing for me. I was harassed in public, and online by a former collegue and after cutting ties with my transphboic abuser. I was cyber stalked and without close friends. Family members disregarded my experience, I was outspoken and I seemed crazy - my AMAB privilage aparently outweighed the harm on me.
I had to move, despite what my family wanted or felt comfortable about. In March I began affirmation therapy, quit vaping to save money and began to sell most of my belongings.
Applied for Colorado State, could not afford to go – applied to Community College of Denver to transfer my credits over.
In August I moved to an apartment. Since then, Denver has changed my life, and I see the world – its different - Oklahoma will always be in my heart. But Colorado has community, policy and my fellow peoples support. The government takes action, and there are so many advocates here. I feel comfortable for the first time going forward I can live femininely, and feel radiant. The bliss of being out and honoring my feelings has made me more determined than ever. To share information and resources for other people worried to ‘take the plung’ like Chappell Roan sings about, in moving to LA to shine and have fun on stage.
Self-Advocacy
This blog is personal today, but I am a transwoman – so I am an expert, and my perspective is a legitimate one. The republican party has made it their goal to dehumanize me and the views of others (and the science of gender).
Expression, belief, equality, and autonomic rights are foundational to a healthy democracy. When I discuss self-advocacy I mean in day-to-day life. Speaking up and being aware of what affects you, also affects others.
For me I had to advocate for my education, and my place in the classroom, in moving - sharing my story is a large part of the curriculum too.
Seeking resources out can be daunting, for me Denver and Colorado have better processes for assistance programs. CCD and my instructors have helped me integrate into a productive approach. After the social and political paralysis, I felt from Oklahoma and its institutions.
My trans journey has not been a pretty one. I feel like I have settled into the best version of myself however and it came with a purpose.
There are waves of negative misinformation and political movements aimed at the public about trans people. To make us seem unhinged, immoral, and unrelatable. I am part of the counter message, however unfair that is – being my own advocate, with the public in mind – is primary support for trans rights.
Support
Queer stories are important – more than ever before. Telling your story, or the stories of a loved LGTBQIA+ member is a great counter message to the vitriol. Reporting clear hate to media platforms is another clear action to take every day.
An academic club, LGBTQIA+ centers through a college, Planned Parenthood locations, advocacy and legal defense groups like ACLU are great sources of prideful information. Finding a trusted representative for yourself, whether at university, an allied healthcare worker, and having good relationships with friends can be a game changer as far as feeling comfortable and confident.
If you see yourself in legal trouble ACLU may be worth a call. If you believe your trial will be inflicted by biases, they can assess the constitutionality, and such.
Planned Parenthood provided me care in Oklahoma, which was great as it was separate from my primary care. They are often specialized in understanding transitioning more in depth - HRT, affirmative care and more. They often provide vaccines and blood tests too.
I have always felt comfortable in Planned Parenthood clinics. Be sure to bring and wear a mask and stay away from protesters outside. They have security at the clinics, which is another plus.
Lastly,
The emphasis of advocacy should be on the impact of limiting expression generally. Meaning among cis herero people. Because gender enforcement is a slippery slope to full blown authoritarian. It opens the door to a government that mandates womanhood, to wear make-up, have babies, and serve men - away from society. Its a government in which mandated men work like machines, dominate others apathetically and serve US corpo-military interest.
The answer to this issue partly is to advocate for yourself, to find your community and to develop skills to fight for your happiness – pridefully.
(I posted this later than I wanted.)
"Rainbow Over Mountain" by @eberhardgross on Pexels.com
"Rainbow Flag" by @markuspiske on Pexels.com
May 31, 2025
Here We Go!
I have my plan for this daily blog. As well as what to research, mediums, tools, and goals for my coverage... Stay-tuned for updates on projects here! My daily blogs are free!
What is the plan?
Tomorrow morning I plan to post my first blog, after catching up on news - I plan to "clock-in" for the day, everyday at 9am Mountain Time. Read, my RSS and other feeds for my internet, politics etc. interests. Between 11am and noon there will be a floride_news.blog post, everyday.
My main media project
I will begin the research phase of my first episode of Propagander, 5 topics of the first series are planned to premiere on YouTube between July and November. The first episode will cover recruitment history, media and methods. Specifically to discuss military propaganda today in video games, VR and extremism pipelines that have similar marketing pools, and strategies.
Depending on how long each episode turns out, they may be split into parts. Shooting for 30 minutes to an hour for each topic.
(A gander - like a quick look and I will define propaganda in a trailer, but you get it)
I am starting the month off by reading Joystick Soldier a book edited by Nina B. Huntemann and Matthew Thomas Payne and I have collected studies, from peace advocates, video game sociologist and military research. So my first week of this month is reading and notetaking. With a goal of a Written Essay on June 15 - then to move into the storyboarding phase of the video episode. Hopefully a July 1st publishing. I will provide updates here. I will look for insight from the community as well, by interacting with others on Blue Sky, taking tips or talking with experts.
May 31 Gallery, Pre-Commitment
Below is some footage I took while testing shots, equipment and software. For preparation of recording later on. My cat Neville aka Nevi watching and providing back up in the process. My manual called floride_news: Plan and Guide, to be posted tomorrow and its inspiration by it. Journalism Next, by Mark Briggs - is an incredible resource for digital journalism. Additionally links are provided at the end of this post.
May 10, 2025
Designing my website
Starting to Code? These Website Tools Might Help
- Neocities.org
- HTML5-Editor.Net
- HTMLCheatSheet.com/css/
Neocities
A free hosting site, with an HTML editor and viewing option is hard to come by. For some purposes, your site might need more flare, and client options. For a profile, portfolio, blog and contacts/link page; simple coding is all that is needed. Create a site as easily as signing up with an email, site name and password.
Pros - Incredibly customizable, free webpages, optional Bots. Store files for indexing.
Cons - For free you only have 1gb of host storage, so large high quality media files may be limited. (Vimeo is a great way to share your video library).
For free, neocities.org.
HTML-5Editor.Net
What is so helpful about HTML-5Editor is that it allows a web developer the HTML code editor, next to a Word document like preview. While Neocities offers tutorials (which I suggest). Seeing the code represented is helpful in learning it. (For me I will write it out once I know it for short lines)
Link to HTML-5 Editor - html5-editor.net.
HTML Cheat Sheet
You may need to style further than what HTML allows. That is where CSS, style sheets become useful. HTML Cheat Sheet's webpage has common codes, and generators for fonts and colors, and allows the user to create customer website assets.
Then, copy over the codes to the style sheet, and html code to the html editor (to reference the style guide).
Link to HTML Cheatsheet CSS Section - html-css-js.com/css/.
Lastly,
Apprehension toward website development is common. It can be expensive with little affordances, or complicated for novice coders. Some people struggle with the repetitive nature of writing code, and language learning can seem insurmountable.
The tools provided are to help with some of these concerns.