Boy bands

Every single girl on this planet, whether gay or straight, has that one boy band that they crushed on when they were teenagers, whose songs bring all the teenage angst and love and hate and all those other feelings forth. For my generation (that just makes me sound old) depending on which continent you grew up in, it's between NKOTB and Take That, or other british boy bands. I think I was just few years or a year too young to really get on the NKOTB bandwagon but really LOVED Take That.

I was so crazy about Take That, that I called a friend who subscribed to Finnish teen magazine "Suosikki" and asked her if she would sell the Take That posters to me that were in one weeks/months magazine and when she said yes I left her on the phone while I rode my bicycle to her house about 20 minutes from mine. When I got there I asked her mom where she was and she said still on the phone waiting to hear from me. Oops! My room was plastered with Take That posters. I loved the music. Gary and Howard were my favorites. Was so sad when they broke up. No major feelings when they regrouped few years back.

Reason why I'm writing about this is because I have been listening to my iTunes and once in a while their songs pop up. And it's kind of, how should I say this? Not-worth-calling-your-friend-and-asking-her-to-sell-her-posters...It can still make me remember all those things I felt when I first started listening to them but now it's like if you were just coming out with these songs you'd never make it.

I never saw Take That in a concert but I did see Mark Owen in Swansea at "Party in the Park" while me and Laura were volunteering there in the summer of 2003.

We also saw Liberty X, Girls Aloud and another girl band whose name I can't remember and the pictures are all kind of blurry so I can't even try to recognize them.

Anyways, just thought I'd share. It was something that I have been thinking about for few weeks now. Also, went and voted for Pekka Haavisto for president today. Now we'll just wait till the 5th to hear the results. Let's make history again Finland!

This and that

I bought a scale today. I really wanted to see how much the kittens weigh because the Veterinarian didn't weigh them and Ybi's scale wasn't calibrated so those results were tentative. And it might be good for me and my life style stomach to know when to stop eating and maybe, maybe start exercising.

When I brought the kittens home I was given starter packages for them, sponsored by Science Plan cat food brand. They also included a little health booklets for both where you can follow their development, healthy weight etc. I'm sure you know that I think my kittens are kinda skinny, I mean I have been talking about it. They're kinda long and now that they are shedding some of their baby kitten fur, Brooklyn especially is looking really thin. DD has the advantage of long hair so she at least looks fluffy and since she's smaller than BK, with the extra fluff she looks stockier. More like the norm that I got used to with Sox and Bailey. Well, looks like I was totally wrong about their skinniness. According to the booklet male kittens 5,5 months old should be about 2,7kg on average. Brooklyn is 3kg. Females at this point should be about 2kg. DD is 2,7kg! She's so big that she's not even in the female chart anymore! And seriously, I check their forms everyday and they definitely do NOT have any extra fat anywhere! But, few of my friends who've seen them have said they think they'll be big cats so hopefully this is just because of that.

We are still on course to have the first openly gay president in Finland. He was able to come in second at the first round so for the next 2 weeks both of them will be running around all over Finland to make their case. Early voting starts tomorrow and I'm gonna go vote before or after my hair appointment tomorrow. Pekka Haavisto for President!

Presidential Election

Today is the first round of Finnish Presidential Election. When I turned 18 and was eligible to vote My mom told me to always vote for a woman because men will not represent the things that are important to me, as a woman. And I have. Until this election. There are 8 candidates, 6 men and 2 women. I will NEVER vote a christian democrat, even if the online "election machines" make me out to be one and Eva Biaudet was not "it" for me. My vote went for Pekka Haavisto and if he makes it to the second round my vote will go to him again.

I am now watching the election broadcast at MTV3 and they have already have a little mishap. They were interviewing Paavo Väyrynen with his wife and afterwards the hostess said that "behind every successful man is a wife or a woman". As she was saying this they had a screen with Pekka Haavisto waiting to be interviewed and as a gay man in a registered partnership I thought it was extremely heteronormative.

The final results are over an hour away and as of right now Pekka Haavisto is in 3rd place. A lot of urban votes are yet to be counted so this will hopefully change and he will move to second place and into the second round. The people speculating on TV are saying that many of the feminist votes are going to Pekka Haavisto instead of the 2 female candidates because of his sexuality and they feel that he's the best of the men. That's part of the reason why I am voting for him. Part is that he has international experience and I feel that he could represent Finland in a positive manner. President may not have a lot of power anymore but he/she is still the figurehead of this country and I would much rather see someone "hip" representing Finland than some grumpy old man.

But whatever happens, Finland has taken a huge step ahead in the equality department with an openly gay man being so successful in an election which is more about the person than a party. Go Pekka!

Dunkin Donuts playing fetch

I though the pretty face needed a post of her own. I uploaded both of the videos on youtube yesterday but for some reason the one with just DD took a way too long so I couldn't post it yesterday. But here it is now. Sorry about the quality but my camera sucks!

I would like to point out that even though she didn't exactly bring the balls back to ME, she did go after them and carried them back to my vicinity so that I didn't have to be the one to go get them in order for the play to continue. Which hasn't happened with DD before. Brooklyn brings the balls back to me if he's the one to catch them but if it was DD, he didn't bring them back. So now maybe the chances of the balls being returned to me have gone up slightly.

oh happy day!

My kittens are geniuses! There's no other way to describe them! And can you imagine how happy I am to discover that Dunkin Donuts is not just a pretty face! It might take her a little longer to learn these things but today, out of nowhere, she fetched the ball! 4 times in a row! And twice on camera! I'm downloading them on youtube as we speak! I'm so happy! I'm so proud!

Brooklyn and Dunkin Donuts fetch the ball

Walk down the memory lane with Emperor's fiancee

I was googling cat fur patterns and colors yesterday because I wanted to get a word to describe what type of cats I have and also what types Sox and Bailey were. Well Sox obviously is a tuxedo, same as Dunkin Donuts. Bailey is a tabby cat and now I have a confirmation for Brooklyn. According to wikipedia, the most accurate information site out there, he is, indeed, a "moo cat". Black and white cow pattern equals "moo cat". There you have it folks. As I was doing this I had to go to my files and look at the pictures of Sox and Bailey because I couldn't remember what they looked like exactly. It's a sad sad state we're in...can't even remember my poor babies anymore. But looking at those pictures I can now totally understand why I think Brooklyn and DD are too skinny. Sox and Bailey are big girls! I don't think I really understood their weight problems until now that I have DD and BK. And even though these 2 are just wee kittens and still growing, the difference is huge.

You know what else is sad? Adulthood! It's the stage in your life when you willingly do things you swore you'd NEVER do again when you were a kid. I have found myself having a bowl of oatmeal every night for I don't even remember how long. And as someone who spent 6 years in kindergarten eating breakfast there every morning, breakfast usually equalling oatmeal, I am totally disgusted with myself! Although the oatmeal they fed us was nothing like the flavored instant just-add-hot-water oatmeal I'm eating now but still. Oatmeal is oatmeal even if you fry it in butter. And back then you either just ate it as such or maybe added some sugar and a dollop of butter. No cinnamon, no apples, nothing. Plain oatmeal still tickles my gag-reflexes. Just like banana yogurt does and I used to eat it like crazy when I was a kid. It was the only flavor that didn't have fruit pieces in it. For some reason fruit pieces offended my sensibilities.

Wanna know what I drink with my oatmeal? A cup of TEA! Check out my profile on the upper right hand corner. What does it say? Something about being a coffee drinker and hating tea cuppers? Tea Party is giving tea drinkers a bad name. And for coffees sakes, I named my cat "Dunkin Donuts" after my favorite coffee chain! You can't get much further away from tea party/cuppers/drinkers. But, I do remember my friend Antti saying once upon a time that drinking tea was so gay. That was right before he himself started drinking it. And he's straight. So there seems to be a conflict of interest: on one hand there's the homophobic religious right of US political map who call themselves the tea party, which would just be so totally against everything I am or represent and on the other hand there's Antti, my straight friend saying drinking tea is gay. Should I listen to the people who hate me and who and what I am or my friend? Hmmmm...there's a problem if ever you encountered one! But I still maintain my coffee drinker status.

To go back to my tea drinking ways...The brand I drink is called "Emperor's fiancee". It's something that I drank at Janne's place when he was living next door at Linikkalankatu. It's also around the time when I had my first girl crush. Or obsession. potato-potato. And when I had the subsequental boy crush. When I projected my girl crush feelings to a boy so I wouldn't have to deal with the fact that I was totally crushing on a girl. Great survival mechanism. I was about 14 at the time. Time sure flies when you're gay. Or coming to terms with the fact that you're gay. As I came out at 24 so it only took me about 10 years to deal with it. Anyway, the taste and smell of the tea just brought all that back. So I thought I'd share. No reason for me to walk down memory lane by myself.

Have a blessed Tuesday! OYG, the tea is making me religious! Somebody come and take it away!!!

Till next time!

The perfect winter's day

Today is the first "real" winter's day of this winter and I feel like all is right in the world. You can't be sad, or depressed or gloomy in this weather. It's -12C/10F and the sun is shining. I just took the rugs outside, I'm enjoying my umpteenth cup of coffee of the morning and am about to vacuum. If I had a washing machine I would be doing laundry today and if I had food in the fridge I'd be cooking today. THIS is what perfect weather does to me. It motivates me. It makes me want to do things, finish things. Be productive. This is the weather we enjoyed the whole last winter. Snow, below freezing temperatures, sunshine. Perfect!

This is what you get when you "complain" about your winter weather and how pointless having your winter clothes are in Finland when there's no need for them. I should try to jinx these more often!

Let's hope more of days like these for this winter! Enjoy it while you can.