Since I have flown on a buddy pass so often I end up in the middle seat a lot. It’s not so bad because I’m small. I slouch down in the seat and put my knees up against the seat in front of me. I can sleep this way.  You get really bored flying this much, the novelty wears off quickly.  I have a sadistic game that I play with the people in front of me. When they first try to put the seat back I flex my legs so they cannot get it to recline. It’s not that I don’t want them to recline the seat. In fact it’s more comfortable for me when they do. But the game is that I will prevent them from moving the seat back, then as the flight attendants start to come around I’ll sit up. The person who previously could not get the seat to recline will ask the flight attendant to assist, the flight attendant will press the little button and recline the seat with no problem. Then the person will think that they’ve lost their mind.   

At Mr. LA Leather last weekend I was trying to put on my medal and Ross, the outgoing Mr. LA Leather was helping me get it fixed. He said you look really sad and I said I am because always before I just put on my sash and this is the first time I’ve had to put on my medal instead.

Saturday I got up and went to the boy/girl breakfast with Wendell. Mysti was there and so I got a chance to hang out with her. 

Then we had the outgoing titleholder roast. Between Q having been a titleholder for two years, and me being around in the community for 18, there were a lot of good stories about both of us.  

I felt bad for Brendan. He came all the way from Ottawa just to tell the story on me that is the best roast story because it’s the one that embarrasses me the most, and right as he was getting to the best part of the story these incredibly rude large women came and walked right through the middle of everything, then stopped and stood in front of Brendan so nobody could see him. Later that night Dave Rhodes was taking a picture of me and another person and one of these incredibly rude large women pushed past Dave and he would have fallen on the floor had we not caught him. She gave a perfunctory ‘oh I’m sorry’ and continued on. The rudeness is amazing. 

The roast was cool. It was nice to have a thing where it was the people that knew Q and I and could tell stories. 

After the outgoing titleholder roast I went to the contestant interviews. I took notes, mostly what I was looking at was the judges reactions. Lauren and Darryl in particular are very expressive in their body language. I could tell what those two thought just from watching them. I could tell that Darryl liked Lamalani because he started coloring his program with crayons during Lamalani’s interview. I totally love that the interviews are open, it takes the mystery out of why one person won over another. There isn’t any more people sitting around asking why somebody won and hearing that ‘they did a really good interview’, at IMsL people can see the interviews for themselves and know why one person wins over another.

Right after the interviews I went and was the ‘stunt bottom’ for Cru’s workshop. You’ll have to read about that on Fetlife.

After the interviews I was exhausted so I went to sleep for about 3 hours. I missed Diamond’s Black Beat reception which I really wanted to go to.

I got up in time to get dressed for the contest. 

Glenda and Levi did a good contest this year. Bear was a good M.C. He was funny and understandable. I thought I wouldn’t be on stage for anything until the very end but it seemed like I went up a lot. Which is cool with me because I’m a big ham. They wanted us to say a few words of encouragement to the contestants before it started and I couldn’t think of anything to say except to go out and make the stage theirs and have fun with it. 

During the contest California State Senator Mike Leno came and read a proclamation and gave me and Q California State Senate Certificates of Recognition for our visibility and helping the cause of gays and lesbians through being titleholders. It’s totally cool and I’m going to frame mine. 

Glenda and Levi changed the order of the evening so that Q went and gave her speech then they announced the bootblack winner. Then I gave my speech and showed my video and then they announced the winners of IMsL. We were supposed to show my video first, then the speech, but things got backwards and I gave my speech first, then the video. Then it came time to bring out the contestants which I could do from memory except I flubbed Mina De Sade Fatelle’s name. Then after they announced that Lamalani was the winner I put the sash on backwards. So I took it back off and just handed it to her. I felt really bad about that and apologized to her later. She didn’t mind considering she won.

You can see my video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cew9TYU8bgQ The title is International Ms Leather 2008 Hobbit Step Aside Video

I made a break for our hotel room and noticed that there were pictures of all the past IMsL’s with the new title holders, minus me. Oh well. 

Friday was a really busy day. We had something to eat then went and met Charmin from Ottawa to go running. Wendell took us running around the hotel, up to Coit tower and did a great speaking tour the entire way. We didn’t do a huge major workout, but we got in some good running and learned a lot about San Francisco. 

We went to brunch with a bunch of people and I hurried everyone along so we could leave and get to the contestant interviews on time. Charmin and I were early so we decided to ride up and down the elevator a few times which was fun because you meet erally interesting people that way. We got up to the room and discovered that they had changed the schedule and it was the boot black contestants. So I went back down to the hospitality suite, a little not sure what to do with myself. Wendell and Millarca were watching the cigar class on the patio so I hung out there for a while, then decided to watch the interviews and left to go do that. I got through the first bootblack interview, Pony, she did a good interview, then got really tired so I went to the room and took a good two hour nap. 

I got up in time to go to the VIP reception. On the way I ran into KZ and Kona knocking on the door next to ours. They were going to the Black Beat reception in Diamond’s room only they had the wrong day. But it was funny because we discovered in doing so that Diamond was in the adjoining room so we hung out for a bit, then went down to the hospitality suite for the VIP reception. The VIP reception was nice, but nothing that interesting happened. 

After the VIP reception we went down to the opening ceremonies. They added in doing a parade of colors this year. I have yet to remember to bring the SBOL flag and sign up for the parade of colors. The M.C., Bear, was funny. Q and I went up to get introduced. Then Bear had to read something boring. So Q and I started to pretend fuck each other on stage. Bear banished us backstage so we wouldn’t upstage him. Then he introduced all of the visiting current titleholders. He got done said ‘And that is all of your national titleholders’. He had forgotten about me and Q. So we came out from back stage looking pitiful at being forgotten and all the titleholders came back up so people could take pictures.

To read about the dungeon party, please go to Fetlife and read my writings there.  I'm under the tag: Hobbit

We went to the Uniform party.   I wore my girl scout uniform from when I was in high school. It occurred to me that I must’ve fallen in love with a sash with my girl scout badge sash. It was fun to go to a uniform party and wear a uniform that was my actual uniform and a sash with all badges and awards that I earned. They aren’t stuff that I bought. 

I changed and went down to the dance. Glenda and Levi originally were going to do a Sunday afternoon country western two step dance. I advised not to bother because nobody would come. Instead we did a set of about 4 two step dances at midnight. Unfortunately all of the people that know how to two step that said they’d go did not show up except for me, Scout and Bootdog. Also Tonyinabag knows how to two step a little so I dragged him out. The other thing that was annoying was that even though I asked the people that were bumping and grinding to stay to the middle of the dance floor so we could get around them they still stood on the outsides and blocked our way. But I did get in some good dances with Scout and Bootdog (who’s a very good dancer) and there was no loss on anybody’s part (cost of dj etc.) for playing 4 country western songs and having almost nobody show up. 

I didn’t sleep well Friday night.

If you would like to see my step-aside video it can be found at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cew9TYU8bgQ under the title International Ms Leather 2008 Hobbit Step Aside Video

Thursday

The night before we went to a fundraiser at the The Cuff in Seattle and there discovered that we were on the same flight as two of our friends in Seattle, Tracy Yorker and Monica, who were also going to IMsL. How cool is that?

We had an uneventful flight to San Francisco, got our bags and took BART into the city where we got onto the cable car up to the hotel. At the front desk they had lost our reservation, I got to say I *am* International Ms Leather, which was cool, and they got us a corner room. 

We went and swam laps in the pool.

We hooked up with Millarca and Mysti and went to get something to eat. Wendell took us to eat at a place where they served up large quantities of meat and vegetables consisted of beans or potatoes. It was quite good actually. I was nervous because Wendell and Millarca were meeting for the first time and for obvious reasons I wanted them to like each other. 

It worked. Wendell said if he was stuck in a fox hole, Millarca is a person that he’d want to be stuck with. 

We went to the Burlesque show which was okay. Q danced and that was fun. I was having fun having our own party for Millarca, Wendell and Mysti. I put myself on the list to dance but they put me at the very end of the evening which was sort of annoying. My enthusiasm had worn off by then. I did it but I think it was a lackluster performance. I went out and worked the audience rather than staying on stage, then stood on stage and had Scout pull the money off of my jock etc. Scout then put me over his shoulder and carried me off the stage which was fun.

An unedited version of my evening can be found on Fetlife under the tag: Hobbit

When I was Washington State Ms Leather 1996, waaay back when I was 28 I was at a party here in Seattle after a contest or something. There was in the room the ubiquitous ex-girlfriend whom I had recently had a bad break-up with. She was on one side of the room hanging out with a couple of her friends and I was on the other side of the room hanging out with a couple of my friends, plus Stacey Ms. NLA and Jill Carter IMsL 1997. They were telling funny stories and we were laughing and having a good time. I caught the ex sneaking a look over at us and I knew that she was not happy that I was having such a good time and hanging out with the celebrities at the event. It made me feel good, not just because it was getting back at her a bit, but also because it helped my self confidence that I was a nice person that people like to hang out with. 

One of the best compliments I have gotten as IMsL is that I'm nice to everyone.  I like going to small events because I like to get to know the people that are local and do SM, but don't necessarily travel around to the bigger events.   I love getting emails from people that live in the town I’ve just been to saying how great it was to meet me and how much they enjoyed hanging out with me.  That’s one of the best parts about being IMsL. I like giving of myself, and as IMsL I’m a celebrity. It makes people feel good to have the celebrity hang out with them, and I like to make people feel good. I like that I have that celebrity status, not to make me feel good or important or whatever, but that I have the ability to take that status and use it to make other people feel good. It may sound really arrogant but I don’t mean it that way, I have something that people want and I give it to them. 

I’m sad now that I won’t have that to give to them any more. 

I went to Phoenix to help judge the Southwest LeatherSir LeatherBoy and Arizona Leatherwoman contest. Their Arizona Leatherwoman, Eli, is pretty amazing and is going to run for IMsL next year. 

I’ve never judged a contest before where there was only one contestant and they didn’t get enough points to win the title, but I have now. The Southwest region is without a Sir titleholder for now, though they can appoint somebody if they want. 

It was my last event as the current International Ms Leather so it was kind of sad for me. I had a fun time hanging out with Doug who is the outgoing titleholder and also a friend of mine from Seattle (now). It was also nice to hang out with RubberBuck and Lauren (IMsL 07) I feel like I don’t get to see my Sister IMsL’s very much and Lauren has a special place in my heart since she’s the one that talked me into running. 

I got in a little two step dancing on Friday night. On Saturday they had the contest at an outdoor venue and the temperature kept dropping. By the end of the contest all of the judges were freezing. To the credit of the M.C’s they rushed things towards the end because we were so cold. 

I got to Dallas with no problem. Thursday night was the meet and greet at the hotel. It was a low-key event. I met among other people, Vic, a hot 20 year old FTM. 

My ride left fairly early so I stayed since I could get a ride from Olivier and Sparky later. I had dinner with Master Chris and Slave Tina, the outgoing titleholders. We had a thought provoking dinner conversation. I was talking about some of the differences between Berlin and the US leather scene. At one point I said the line ‘if you oppress one of us, you oppress all of us’. Chris wanted to use it in his step down speech, but the next day couldn’t remember it and couldn’t find me the next to ask me about it. 

Olivier and Sparky had to go up to Mark and Randell’s suite for the board meeting for ILSB. I went up to wait for them. It was cold in the room and I was rummaging around looking for a blanket. I could find only this pitiful little bed shawl thing then Randall noticed and got be a cozy fleece blanket. So I laid down on the couch and fell asleep. I was coughing in my sleep and must have presented quite a pitiful sight because Randall got up from his board meeting once again and got me some cough medicine. Randall is really sweet.

I went back to Tucker Inn and went to bed.

The household had discussed it and decided that a late arrival at the event was in order. I slept blissfully late and we got to the event as lunch break was ending and just in time for the start of the first afternoon workshop. Usually I don’t go to workshops because if they are really bad, I feel trapped in them. For me, ‘really bad’ describes workshops that turn into group therapy sessions. I like a workshop that is more like a college lecture, or lab. Since so many of the workshops were about M/s stuff which I don’t know much about, I thought I’d brave it. Unfortunately the first workshop I went to was a lot like group therapy. Fortunately the topic was one that directed the contributions towards the fun aspect of M/s and not drama, so it was bearable, but fairly useless.

The next workshop I went to was about protocol. Sometimes these workshops can be the most hilarious ones to hear the protocols one is supposed to follow. At one protocol workshop I went to, we were told that Boys/Bottoms/Submissives should never wear underwear. I thought ‘unless we’re on the rag, or we don’t want our packing penis to fall down our pantleg….’ This workshop was more about the theory of protocol and was really good. The presenters were funny. Somebody brought up slaves having to ask to go to the bathroom. This topic went on for a while, but was funny. I’d been having to go pee for a good while and was at the point where I was checking the time to see if I could make it to the end of the workshop. The chairs were in a big circle, there were a lot of people there and I was across the room from the door. The only way I was going to get out of there was to walk through the middle of everybody, I couldn’t do it discreetly. So I took advantage of the topic and the ongoing humor of the workshop and announced ‘I’m sorry, I need to pee’ and got up and went out. Everyone in the room laughed pretty hard about that. When I got back they were still talking about slaves having to ask to go to the bathroom and I announced ‘you’re still talking about going pee?’ I was told later that somebody asked ‘is she a Top?’ *snort*

Friday night was the opening ceremonies. I stayed for most of it but not the auction. One of the judges Malik, is from Pakistan. Randell, was the M.C. and he and Malik are good friends. Randall was doing really great humor with Malik’s accent. ‘When I was little we did not have cartoons and had only one camel…’ It was particularly amusing to me. The next night I had occasion to meet Malik, he is a delightful man and found my bit about how when it snows in Seattle 90% of Microsoft employees open the door and say ‘oh no no, I am not driving in this, it is too dangerous. I am working from home today’.

Q advised that she was delaying our date until the following night. SIGH. 

We got back to the Tucker Inn at about midnight.

Saturday morning came a bit earlier since they wanted to get to the host hotel for the 11AM workshop, thankfully not the 9AM workshops. I had some time to kill so I went to the fitness room to lift weights. I didn’t have workout clothes so I couldn’t do a cardio workout, but I got to crunch my arms some. I’m getting really good at figuring out how to use the multitude of universal gyms that one encounters at hotel fitness rooms. There was a student at the event that was doing her doctoral dissertation about women in SM. So I had scheduled an interview with her and went up to do that at noon. I think I skewed her data because she needed to know about how having to hide our SM lifestyle affected our lives and since I’m 100% out, well I’m not hiding any. 

After lunch I ran into Vic again. Refer to my Fetlife writing to read more about that. 

In conversation with some of the contestants I discovered that there was a hospitality suite with food it in. It was really for people who were working on the event or in the contest, but I figured I’d play my current IMsL card and I went up and got something to eat. That’s the last time I’ll be able to do that. Sigh.

I went to another workshop at 2PM. This one was on breath control, done by Mark Fraizer. It was a really good workshop, combination of college lecture and lab. They asked if anybody wanted to get knocked out by having their ceratoid arteries pinched. I decided to forgo that hands-on part of the workshop because I needed to pee again and this was a breath control workshop and not a watersports workshop. After that I went to another workshop. It was not group therapy but it was stuff I already knew and not presented very well. I walked in late, went to the front, then left after about 15 minutes so I ended up making a production about coming and going which I don’t like to do but I was tired and feeling VERY TRAPPED. I went to Jess and Ranelle’s room to take a 2 hour nap. They came and went and I didn’t even wake up I was so out. 

I’d been invited to Diamond’s reception in her suite that evening so I went to that. It was nice. The people she invited were all really nice people, some I knew, some I didn’t. But it was nice getting a chance to get to know them and to spend some time with Diamond also. She is really nice. 

Next I went to the contest. It was a contest. I’ve been to a lot now. Master Ken and Slave Tim won. 

After the contest Q and I had out date. Vic was a part of that. See Fetlife for details and pictures. Then I went back to the Tucker Inn.

I love Alaska Airlines. For a mere twenty-five bucks I could confirm a seat on the first flight of the morning so I did and left early. It was an uneventful flight except for one thing. Alaska Airlines does not allow lap children. Halleluiah! I have been stuck in a row with a lap child beside me only once and I was able to move. I can’t stand the lap child thing because they kick you. Alaska Airline’s reasoning is profoundly simple. There is only one oxygen mask per seat. If you have a child in your lap you have to choose who gets the mask. You or your child. 

This is the first time I've gone to an event and really had the sense of it all coming to an end soon.  I'm definately sad about my title year ending.  Margaret and Eric, producers of Northwest Leatherfest really wanted me to come back this year.  Wendell and I have a party at our house scheduled for that weekend and I am the party so I won't be able to come, but I will be going in 2010.  I also told Kendra that I'd be coming back to GLLA this year and hopefully for many years to come.  So it helps that I still have stuff planned that I'm doing, and people that still want me to come to their events even though I'm not going to be current in a couple of weeks. 

For those of you who read my blog about the 'flagstop bus' I have an update.

Metro has canceled my flagstop bus.  This makes getting home on public transportation problematic.  They justify canceling the flagstop bus by putting in a bus stop 1.75 miles from my house which I could walk to and from except for two problems. 

I can walk along the frontage road that parallels the 2 lane rural highway I live on, but in the winter time a large portion of it floods so I either have to wade home through ankle and sometimes knee deep water, or....

I could walk along the rural 2 lane highway with it's 2 foot shoulder and cars whizzing past at 70+ miles per hour in the dark and the rain in the winter time but have you ever read the news articles about people that get hit by cars as they are walking along the side of a rural 2 lane highway?
                                             
                                                     EXTREMELY DANGEROUS

So I can take public transportation in the summertime, but not in the winter.  By private-vehicle-during-non-bussiness-hours it takes 37 minutes to drive from my house to my place of employment in Seattle.  To commute not-using-a-private-vehicle-during-business-hours it takes two hours each way. 

When Wendell and I were temporarlly housed 3.5 miles closer to Seattle my commute on public transportation dropped down to about 50 minutes.  It's amazing what a barrier 3.5 miles is.

I still live in the wild wild west.

Friday I arrived in Detroit. The organizers of DARK put me down for doing an hour of stand-up so I got to tell all of my funny stories. It turned out to be about 40 minutes of material. I was told by many people that it was funny, so I assume it was. Somebody even asked me if I had a DVD. 

After me Dave, the current Mr. Michigan Leather, did a food fetish presentation. He had put a bunch of food on the tables. He started out by telling us to pick up some of the food and feed somebody else at our table. I turned to look expectantly at Pandora but she was already ready with a grape in hand. 

I ate the grape.

‘now bite this one in half’

‘peel it’. That was harder, she held it and I had to attempt to grab just the peel with my teeth. I persevered.

‘now bite it in half’

‘now lick it’

By this time Dave had stopped his presentation and was watching us in fascination. 

‘you guys are having your own party’

We apologized and ceased our food scene and paid attention once again.

Dave explained some of the fun things you could do with food. He was standing around with a familier looking can in his hand. I finally asked

‘is that a can of chocolate frosting in your hand?’

‘Why yes it is’

‘Hook me up!’ I begged.

He incorporated it into his presentation by saying you could force somebody to ‘work-out’ using food. He put some chocolate frosting on his finger and told me I had to do push ups to get the frosting. I got onto the table and in the push up position and lowered myself down to lick the frosting off of his finger. He got another fingerfull of frosting. I did another push up. He stopped and I whined for more. He laughed and put some on his tongue and bent down so I had to lick it off of his tongue. Then he said that you could use food as a punishment also. He put some on his boot and put his boot on the table so I had to lower myself down and hold while licking the frosting off of his boot. I’m not a boot licker but I did a complete licking of that spot in his boot. It was also hard because I had to hold myself in the lowered position which is a workout. 

It was a lot of fun.

After the presentations were over I went with Merrill and the other judges to Diamond Jim’s Saloon for the meet and greet for the contest. Diamond Jim’s used to do country western dancing on Friday nights, but they had discontinued about six months ago. Just for me, Randall re-enacted it on Friday and got all of this two-stepping friends and the guys that come to the lessons regularly to come out. He also introduced me and said to ask me to dance. The did mostly line dances but he put in a two step about every third song or so. The guys were all really nice, asking me to dance. They start on the quick-quick here. I danced with Randall which was fun because he’s about a foot taller than me and takes big steps. 

We went back to Merrill’s house and I went to sleep at about 3AM (midnight my time zone).

The next morning I woke up at 1.30PM (10.30 AM my time zone). I had warned Merrill that I’d sleep late having been up 20 hours on Friday. He didn’t realize that it would be quite that late, but was in a good humor about it. 

We made it to DARK in time for the last 3 workshops. Bob did a really good one on aftercare and I spoke to him about possibly coming out and doing a workshop for the Seattle crowd. He was really excited about the idea.

Chuck Renslow did a presentation about the history of SM. Since he had limited time he stuck to a basic overview of some of the legal struggles they dealt with in the 50’s over SM/Gay images. A lot of it I already knew from workshops I’d been to before, but it was cool to hear in from one of the people who was actually there.

Dave asked me to come to Mr. Michigan Leather to judge in September. It’s the same weekend as Folsom street fair so I checked with Wendell before saying yes, and he said go for it. At the same time the guys that put on CampIt (FTM and those that love them weekend) in July were asking me to come to their event. I called Wendell and told him about it and he was excited to go to that.

We went to dinner with a bunch of the guys. Then headed over to Diamond Jim’s Saloon for the contest. As it turns out, the bar owner wouldn’t have a contest unless there was more than one contestant, and since there was only one they cancelled the contest. But Randall asked me to do my stand up again, I obliged since the practice is always good and about half of the people hadn’t heard it. Then we did a roast of Randall which roasts always turn into speeches saying what a great guy the outgoing titleholder is because in the case of Randall it is totally true. I couldn’t roast him because he was always nice. 

After the roast we went to the R and R, a bar that wants to be the sleaziest bar of them all. For the details of my evening, please see my fetlife writing, my tag is Hobbit.

The host hotel was near the events, but I wanted to go to the airport early on Sunday. Merrill came up with a brilliant idea, that I could stay at a hotel near the airport that had shuttle service. So Dave drove me there, totally out of his way so that was really nice. I slept for about 3 hours, which I know probably kills Randall because he paid for the room, but it was worth it to get event that little sleep and take a shower. Then I went to the airport and caught the first flight to Chicago. In Chicago I was not only able to get onto the very next flight to Seatac, but I am in first class. It’s really really nice being in first class. I’m enjoying a nice hot breakfast with hot chocolate as I type. Ahhh this is the life.