just stuff
greetings to you all on this bright and piercingly sunny thursday morning. at least it is here in londonshire. i know that it annoys you if you live far away and people in london assume that you care about what life is like here. but it really is a truly gorgeous day and i wanted to share the uplifting joy of it with you.
and - is the following just a london thing?
there's a graffitti campaign on many of the huge billbaords used to advertise new housing developements. you know the kind - 'apartments for the new generation' or 'loft living luxury' they have pictures of couples dressed in muted beige, reclining on leather sofas looking as if they are sharing the funniest joke in the world. the accompanying graffitti around where we live has speech bubbles coming out of thier mouths with the phrase 'but i'm empty inside' written in them......
it made me laugh. heartily.
has anyone else seen them?
best wishes and all.
Reading about London in your blog reminds me of my last trip to London in 1987. I hope to come back soon.
Complain about this postHi Fi,
I saw an electricity junction box (or whatever you call it - you know the ones on the side of the street) the other day saying "DANGER ELECTRICITY" and someone had stencilled a picture of a bee on it with a speech bubble saying "Bzzzz". I thought that was funny and kinda sweet!
Clare
Complain about this postWhat are 'huge billbaords?' Is this a London thing ?
Complain about this postThanks Fi. I am always interested to hear about London. No need to apologise at all. The population of London is well over 7 million, or more than Scotland. If the other regions have something interesting to say, I am sure they'll find their forum.
Complain about this postI can't tell you my name for fear that the bearded Radio 4 reactionaries will hunt me down and tear out my cochleas, but I wanted to say "Hasta la victoria siempre", and love the show - just the breath of fresh air that R4 needed.
The silent majority will keep listening, and the farming-obsessed and hedgehog-fiddlers that lived for the insufferably smug Home Truths will eventually die out.
And please replace Desert Island Discs with Inheritance Tracks, which is superb. Even when they're religious or xenophobic.
Complain about this postHi,
Complain about this postI am a female to male transexual. I think you refer to being transgendered as "making the decision to have surgery" too much. operations are what everyone thinks makes you one gender or another. But rather than that it's 'treatment'.
I do have treatment. I have testosterone injections, but I have had no operations. I live totally as male and look male and no one I know or work with would know otherwise. I cannot afford chest surgery (which I need purely to make myself pass as male or not) and I certainly dont know if I ever will afford lower surgery which is more dangerous and does not have a terribly good effect anyway.
My identity and gender do not depend on operations. Polly on your show was female whether she could face surgery or not. I do not want anyone else who feels they are transgendered to lose heart because they dont want or cant have or cant afford any operations.
The first thing people ask when I say I am TG is "have you had the op?". I wish the world didnt see transgenderism as just a consequence of surgery. It isnt fair.
Yours
Paul from Scotland.
good morning to you Fi from a rainy dull and beautiful saturday morning in Perth ( Scotland).
Complain about this postWe dont have too many bill boards here, but i did see one the other day, with a similar phrase,
"are you empty inside"or words to that effect with a picture of jesus.
does 500 miles make all that diffence?
Am I the only one to have started singing "Oh Jemima look at your uncle Jim" as soon as the Soldier's March started? Wonderful to know that children in the West Indies were singing the same words at - I think - the same time as I was in a Surrey school playground, sometime in the middle of the last century. The invisible network of childhood invention ...... and we all thought we were being terribly original.
Complain about this postLove the show and so pleased Fi glover is doing it, great voice. Always listened to her on Sunday mornings. Never missed John Peel on Saturday mornings, I now always listen to sat Live. Only complaint, Too much all talking at once in the studio, don't need yet more "celebs" airing their views. Don't listen to the moaners, this is the first time I have ever contacted the bbc, so that tells you how I feel!!!
Complain about this postI don't laugh at a person who is empty
Complain about this postFi
Have been a fan of your voice for a long time.There are very few female voices i really love. Jeeny Murray,Anna Ford ,Charlotte Green and yourself.Once i was on a train and the safety announcement was I thought in your voice. Am I right?
Anyway i dont get to listen every saturday,but did today and really enjoyed it.
I havent got anything phlosophical or very clever to say,just wanted to say how lovely your voice is.
Its just stuff....!!
Keep up the good work.
Complain about this postThis is a message for Paul (coincidentally, that used to be my name, too).
You are right, of course, that surgery does not change a person's gender...and I think I alluded to that when I talked I about people looking at me and seeing a man and expecting me to behave like a man. Gender is what you are inside. Sex is the body you have. Gender identity dysphoria is the conflict between the two. For me, surgery is the process of bringing my body into line with my personality or psyche.
For you, as female to male transsexual (ftm), surgery is a far longer and less satisfactory procedure than for male to female transsexuals (mtf) and many people do not go through with it. On the other hand, your testosterone injections do help with your voice (female hormones do nothing to help the voice of an mtf) and some ftm's that I know seem quite pleased with male pattern baldness that can follow!
My experience of people asking if I have had the operation mirrors your own...and, with some, I do get a sense that they might regard surgery as a measure of how serious I am about the whole thing. As you say, there is a great deal that is misunderstood about the whole issue.
My part in Fi's programme was as a 'human interest story'. Against the background of the action being taken against Russell Reid, I think the aim was to show a success story...and I do see myself as a success story in the sense of how surgery turned my life around and made me normal (well, as normal as anyone is!). Against my expectation, surgery turned out to be important for me, although this is not true for every transsexual.
For Saturday Live, I did not see it as my role to 'educate' people about transsexualism...I think that would require a different kind of programme...and if I had tried, then I don't think that I would have been able to get across such a positive and affirming story in the short time available to me. Maybe next time? (Programme makers, are you reading this??)
In the meantime, you might be interested in looking at the FTM Network at if you haven't already found it.
Good luck, Paul, on your journey. :-))
Warmest regards
Polly
Complain about this postglad to hear that 'i'm empty inside' is a national campaign. and for those who object to any mention of london in posts or on programmes can i reassure you of the following reasons to feel sympathy rather than prejudice....
1. absurd house prices
2. that bloke who shouts out of a megaphone at oxford circus
3. bendy buses
4. litter and filth
5. 4.5 million traffic wardens
6. daily delivery of 18 pizza flyers through letterbox
7. the resurgence of TB
having said all of that i love it here and would defend the city to the hilt. although no one ever asks me to do that because we don't ever really talk to each other here.....
Complain about this postlove and hugs
fi