I am the Bionic Woman! (Oh, and a FetFest post)

First things first, an update on my knee, since you all have been such good viewers on this regularly scheduled program:

I am the Bionic Woman. It's true! Apparently, on my MRI, I no longer have an ACL. Yup - the muscle is frayed away. We're not sure how long this has been the case, but my theory is that I damaged and then subsequently snapped it last summer. Being the Bionic Woman (or rather, an idiot, depending on your perspective), I iced, elevated, avoided the hospital, and instead just continued to ride my bicycle as much as possible once the swelling went down.

Well, as life would have it, one's leg has moments of being unstable without an ACL. It is, ya know, a pretty relevant muscle. Throughout the past year, I've had a few episodes of unsteadiness, which I just took to mean my knee hurt. When I collapsed before GLLA, carrying luggage down my front stoop, I was just having another one of those episodes, with more swelling and pain than usual. Thing is, even a few hours after that incident, my leg was swollen and I couldn't entirely move it (as in, like, do a jig! or squats! or...walk up stairs!) but I wasn't in pain. At all. (Sidebar: Yes yes, masochists, I get it - perhaps my pain tolerance is a little askew.)

Long story short, my doctor, after manipulating my leg and examining my MRI, called me "Ripley's Believe it or Not" (seriously, he did), and told me that his diagnosis was that I should stay as far away from surgeons as possible, and instead? Bicycle my little face off. That's right - he wants me to exercise *more*.

Like I needed an excuse to bike more...

Anyway, I still shouldn't do things like climb Mount Everest, go line-dancing, play soccer and/or frisbee, or go chasing after small children in an Escher painting. Forward motion only, please. But I can still bicycle, jump daintily into the arms of attractive leatherbears, and get on my damn knees in a dirty dungeon.

And now, I was at FetFest:

It was great! I've been on the campground they use for a number of events, and it's always a great way to submerge yourself into your kinky culture. What better way to feel at home than to be able to wander over to other various subculture camps, completely topless? At least that's one of my highlights.

I was volunteering with my lovely sash-wife, Sara Vibes, for the National Coalition for Sexual Freedom. I've been a volunteer of some kind at every event thus far, and it's my favorite way to exist. I like having a role, and places to be. I enjoy the schmoozy nature of title-holding, but the truth of the matter is, I prefer to get my hands dirty. I should be bootblacking, flyering, talking up an organization, setting up a table for promotion... I do all these things in my usual life, title-holding isn't any different for me. Being able to really rock all these skills and more always make me happy!

My only sadness is that a lot of the events (and there were a lot of them!) overlapped in such a fashion that I didn't really get to attend the things I wasn't directly involved in. I would have liked to have seen how other camps (we were attached to the Queer Village, but there was a Rope Village and a Sex Village and a Poly Village... you get it) did their thing.

My next stop...

I'll be at Folsom Street Fair in San Francisco! I've never been so I'm excited to pop my cherry. I'll be doing a demo on bootblacking (or what I like to call, Fucking Without Sex), at 3 p.m. at Venus' Playground, and will be at various parties and meet'n'greets. Find me!

Additionally, I'm staying a few extra days to attend and bootblack at my friend Allie's BOOK RELEASE! How cool is that?


Up, up, and awayyyyy!
- The Bionic Bootblack

p.s. Don't actually call me that.

p.p.s. Okay, I lied, totally call me that. I have a Wolverine Complex.

Leather Page comic - leatherladybear

The first comic is up!

A Knee Update

Hey everyone,

By now you may have heard that the day before I was supposed to leave for Great Lakes Leather Alliance, I took a tumble and damaged my right knee. Essentially, what happened was probably bound to happen at some point in the next year ...

Some backstory:

In 2007, I tore my left ACL playing ultimate frisbee. It was a frustrating process, but because of my bicycling-addiction, I had a pretty speedy recovery (read: about 6 - 8 months). There's a pretty high rate of ACL-tearing in female-bodied-folks who are super athletic, due to several factors, one of them being wide hips, yadda yadda yadda...

Additionally, there's a pretty steady rate of hurting the *other* knee at some point, because the stronger knee (read: non-surgery knee) winds up compensating during the recovery period.

Even though I quit frisbee and the more hardcore sports I was doing (because my right knee had started to feel funny... surprise surprise!), I still managed to do some pretty consistent damage to my right knee throughout the past year, and I guess it decided to give up last Wednesday. (I was carrying luggage down my front stoop stairs and just collapsed.)

So, what does this mean?

Well, with the exception of missing GLLA, I'm going to be back on my travel schedule this coming September. I took the doctor's recommendation, and decided that resting and icing and ibuprofen-ing was probably in my best interest, and I already feel worlds better than I did last week. I've decided to not have reconstructive surgery until after my title-year, if I have it at all, and instead wear a hearty brace.

So, what does this really mean?

Please be gentle with me. I am a tiny bootblack, and I love leaping into everyone's arms, but for the time being, we must treat my knee like a delicate flower. I've had knee troubles since my surgery in '07, but knowing that something really is wrong with my right knee, I need to be a little more cautious than my bouncy ways normally permit.

I'm not saying I don't want someone to beat the crap out of me or decide they can't negotiate a take-down scene with me -- I just need initial loving to be careful. I know that I have a large amount of people I like to tackle hello, and unfortunately, we must pretend to be pretty princesses for now.

Thanks for being so amazing, community and family. The past few days have been smooth due to the aggressive loving you all have given me, and the (at times, demanded) care you have laid on me. Love!

A current travel schedule!

September 1 - 4
FETFest in Maryland
(Doing boots!)

September 22 - 26
Folsom Street Fair in San Francisco
(Confirmed! Doing boots!)
((I'll also be sticking around until September 30!))

October 6 - 10
American Brotherhood Weekend in Chicago
(There to support my ABW family!)

October 20 - 23
I'll be rockin' out in Montreal for Salacious!

October 29 - 30
Queer Invasion in Connecticut
(I'm the presenter!)

November 4 - 6
Philadelphia Leather Pride
(I'm presenting with my sash-husband, Jim!)

November 11 - 13
Transcending Boundaries
(Not primarily a BB event, but awesome nonetheless!)

November 18 - 20
Hopefully presenting in Montreal
Trying to figure out how to teach!

November 25
Fort Lauderdale, Florida
The Leathermask Ball
(Lyndon and I will be rockin' out in my hometown!)

---- 2012 ----

January 13 - 15
Mid-Atlantic Leather
(Doing boots!)

January 20 - 22
Phoenix, AZ
Southwest Leatherfest
(Confirmed! I'll be presenting and judging)

February 10 - 13
Providence, RI
Fetish Flea Market
(I always do boots!)

March 21 - 25
Portland, OR
KinkFest

Stickin' around on the West Coast between...!

March 29 - April 2
International Ms Leather - Step Aside
www.imsl.org

My art is at the Leather Archives and Museum!

Check it out!

So, this happened:

So give me some time until we can properly resume our regularly scheduled program...

My first tip of my title year

The half hour after getting of the stage, I went to the Boots and Cigars party at IMsL... Everything is very much a blur, still, but I do remember being approached by Bootdawg and being handed what he called "my first tip of my title year" - a 2011 silver dollar. I've had this tip on my person in some capacity since.

My friend Matt (of the famed boot shaped glycerin soap!) created a great little coin protector out of leather for me. Check it out!











Isn't it great? It's in my pocket right now.

Speaking of bright colors...

Daddy got me a whole bunch of awesomely colored parachord so I can lace your boots up right! Lace flagging is sexy.

Illustrated Hankies

The beginning... My test hankies for illustrations!

ILSb / ICBB

This past weekend was the International Leather Sir and boy / International Community Bootblack contest in San Francisco... It was my first time back in the IMsL host hotel since my own title-run! That was a little bit of a mind-fuck, to be honest... I think we sometimes develop associations with places (did I say sometimes? I meant, we develop associations. Period.), so it was sort of jarring to be there for another event...!

It was nice to be able to witness another bootblack contest, from the outside. Congratulations, SF Luna!

I'm attaching some fun photos of the event that I took, in and outside of the hotel.

This is Spencer the Sock Monkey. He is my traveling companion, so I don't get too lonely.

I'm just a sucker for city-scapes!

Sara Vibes, IMsL2011, being sexy at the Mr. S Leather VIP Party, in their new Locker Room.

Luna, our new ICBB2011, rocking out with her tech boots.

Leo, Mid-Atlantic Community Bootblack 2011, also workin' his tech boots.

Some sexiness from the, ahem, Interpersonal Skills section of the ICBB contest.

Interpersonal Skills - butt!

Jay, Northeast Community Bootblack, with his Interpersonal Demo Top.

I love this pic - Northwest Community Bootblack, Dylan, uses his mouth to buff his demo's boots.

Red Warrior, ICBB2010, gives her step-down speech. She makes a great Frodo! :)

Lastly, Lamalani (IMsL2009) and I before the contest begins.