sumbloke

The closest I know to a book of this kind is How to Be a Happy Homosexual: A Guide for Gay Men by Terry Sanderson It's available new or used from Amazon. There are a few "coming out" books for teens but most of them are collections of coming out experiences and there's only one that I know of from the UK and it's out of print. Good advice for parents, family and friends of gay kids is to be found on Family and Friends of Lesbians and Gays for the UK and the equivalent Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays for the US. There's some pretty good websites out there that provide information and social networking for gay and lesbian youth. In the UK I recommend Puffta Queer Youth Alliance Out Everywhere Puffta is quite mainstream scene oriented; QYA is an autonomous, youth organised group that does campaigning work and social networking and has regional groups; Out Everywhere is a social networking group that isn't only for young people but does have a pretty youthful membership. The best advice I can give anyone is that joining a gay youth group is one of the best ways of finding out what it's all about. There are a good number in the UK although they're clustered around big towns - check out QYA's site to find one near you! Jakob

My favourite - if you ever get the chance to hear it it will blow you away! (And I hope that our resident Mississipians won't be offended - autres temps, autres moeurs) (1963) Nina Simone The name of this tune is Mississippi Goddam And I mean every word of it Alabama's gotten me so upset Tennessee made me lose my rest And everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam Alabama's gotten me so upset Tennessee made me lose my rest And everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam Can't you see it Can't you feel it It's all in the air I can't stand the pressure much longer Somebody say a prayer Alabama's gotten me so upset Tennessee made me lose my rest And everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam This is a show tune But the show hasn't been written for it, yet Hound dogs on my trail School children sitting in jail Black cat cross my path I think every day's gonna be my last Lord have mercy on this land of mine We all gonna get it in due time I don't belong here I don't belong there I've even stopped believing in prayer Don't tell me I tell you Me and my people just about due I've been there so I know They keep on saying "Go slow!" But that's just the trouble "do it slow" Washing the windows "do it slow" Picking the cotton "do it slow" You're just plain rotten "do it slow" You're too damn lazy "do it slow" The thinking's crazy "do it slow" Where am I going What am I doing I don't know I don't know Just try to do your very best Stand up be counted with all the rest For everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam I made you thought I was kiddin' didn't we Picket lines School boycotts They try to say it's a communist plot All I want is equality for my sister my brother my people and me Yes you lied to me all these years You told me to wash and clean my ears And talk real fine just like a lady And you'd stop calling me Sister Sadie Oh but this whole country is full of lies You're all gonna die and die like flies I don't trust you any more You keep on saying "Go slow!" "Go slow!" But that's just the trouble "do it slow" Desegregation "do it slow" Mass participation "do it slow" Reunification "do it slow" Do things gradually "do it slow" But bring more tragedy "do it slow" Why don't you see it Why don't you feel it I don't know I don't know You don't have to live next to me Just give me my equality Everybody knows about Mississippi Everybody knows about Alabama Everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam That's it for now! see ya' later

Hi Michael, I don't think the Hebrew can be read the way you suggest. The verb is: "muut yawmuut". The verb muut (emphasized by the yawmuut repetition) is definitely a passive (I think it's the hophal but my Hebrew is er rusty...) - it will be done to them. It's not "they will die" but "they will be put to death. The context also makes it clear that this is not a warning of the "natural" consequences of some activity but a legal sanction against a religious crime. The chapter starts with condemning worshippers of Molech! My feeling overall about dealing with religious fundamentalists is that they weren't argued into the positions they take and they can't be argued out of them. There's a fundamental fact - their belief in revelation of truth by supernatural means - that makes it pointless to argue and chop logic over these issues. After all, the fundamental reason for their beliefs is straightforwardly that omnipotent and omniscient G-d told them so: who can argue with that? That being the case I tend to talk to people not about their doctrines but about whether they want to impose a theocratic government where the religious laws that they believe are imposed on the rest of us, or do they want an open society? Very few people I've discussed the matter with think it's really appropriate to impose biblical law on modern society as a whole.

I went to re-read Finding His Own and it seems that it's gone - draketales is off line and it looks like the domain has lapsed. Does any one know anything? Is the story on-line anywhere else? Dewey's Pete and Brian stories are fantastic and Drake's side story is one of the best. I really hope it's not lost forever. Maybe if draketales is gone gayauthors could host it?

Goodness! Well, thank you all. Sebastian and I were married in San Sebastian in Spain on August 29th after lots of confusion over legal stuff. It worked out because Seb has Spanish nationality - thank goodness. We decided after much heart searching not to take up a pacte de solidarite civil (civic union) in France. We both feel that it would be demeaning to accept second rate legal recognition. My whole family (I have something like seventy first cousins!) came to celebrate (and dozens of Hassidic Jews at a gay wedding caused quite a stir in San Sebastian). It was, quite simply, the best day of my life. I feel unbelievably blessed. I started University this month. We're living in Palavas, on the beach, a fifteen minute bus ride from the Uni. I'm having the time of my life so far! When I'm a bit more settled I hope I'll find time to blog again. At the moment I'm still attending all my lectures (I think I'm possibly the only student in the whole Uni to do that!) and Seb is taking up all my free time ;-) J

It's a loan translation from French "d

Thank you all of you very much and thank you Kurt especially. We will take a while to finalise the details but in out line our plan is to have a civil wedding in Spain and then a ceremony/celebration in France after that before we go to uni in September. It's still a bit of a shock - I had thought we'd wait until after Uni to do anything like this but now I've faced it I realise that you pass this way only once and I'm in love so...we're doing it. Thank you again and peace and loving kindness Jakob and Sebastian.

Baruch Dayan Emet Blessed be the True Judge May Chaz and all the rest of Green's family be comforted among all the mourners of Zion.

My deepest deepest sympathy. It's all down hill from here on. Happy Birthday Ben!

Just for the record... Dhamma-Vinaya-Bums isn't really meant to teach anyone about Buddhism - I'm not against the idea but the story is what it is. I left a link in the preamble to the site I recommend for people interested in finding out about Buddhism. I loved Seeking Nirvana. I agree with other commentators that it would be good to see more but I also think that a short story is sometimes perfect as it is and we'll have to see whether or not David finds he has more to say about it... peace and loving kindness, sumbloke

Never let the sun go down on your anger. best wishes, sumbloke

Welcome aboard Twolf! Now -- blog!

I didn't laugh when I read this! Honest! Wishing your superheroidentifying boyfriend a speedy recovery. sumbloke

Erm, no detailed comment, just wanted to let you know that I love it. sumbloke

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday! Hey, next year we should have a joint party

oops, responded by pm instead!

Thank You All! Thank you all for your birthday greetings. I'm sorry I didn't reply earlier but I was otherwise engaged with the beach, the desert, the souks and a certain shaggy blond. Of course there is some mistake - I can't be 18! Don't you have to pass a test or something? You guys make this one of the nicest places to hang out on the net and I also want to say as a new adult that I've always really appreciated the respect that gay teens get around here.

Dear Nick, May G-d comfort you among all the mourners of Zion. I'll be thinking of you and hoping that you find peace and loving kindness after your loss. sumbloke/Yak

Seb's family tradition is both names anyway - he uses both his parents' and so do they so that's the way we'll go. I like his name well enough though it's not easy to read the pronunciation correctly for lots of people. I would want to keep my name because it's culturally significant - it identifies me as Jewish which I'm proud of. Of course I do worry about saddling sprogs with an unpronounceable Basque-Jewish hybrid name! Still, that won't bother them - they'll be too busy living down their forenames: Moonbeam, Sunshine, Stardust...

Hey Kevin! I'm guessing from what you say about the Latin test that you don't just get translation exercises. They used to make us "construe" (explain grammatical points, label word endings etc) a lot but now it's almost entirely translation for tests - the grammar is expected to be automatic . Now, I prolly shouldn't mention this but, quite a few dictionaries give noun declension listings and verb morphology - Bantam New College for example. As to a Spanish course, friends of mine who started Spanish from scratch used a course called Digame! which I think was produced by the BBC - it's supposed to be excellent but I can only say that they all started speaking pretty good Spanish very quickly. I don't know how easy it would be to get in the US. One thing you need to decide is how important it is to you to learn Latin American or European Spanish - though of course they are the same language in the end! Good luck on your test. sumbloke

I know I'm supposed to celebrate and be pleased but...OK I am glad and excited and I have to say it's a very good thing when an authors knows when the story arc is over and lets his characters go...BUT I love Yankee: it's a superb story and even though I'm excited to be reading the final section I'm going to miss it. WRITE MORE STORIES RIGHT NOW! Or I shoot the puppy and it will be all your fault

No-no and Philip are driving me mad about this. Lesbian and Gay history month is coming up. And the puppies have decided to push it. Hard. LOL. The idea in general is to get schools to recognise it so they've come up with the following idea. They're going to take historical queers - people of whom it's accepted they were gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender - and they are going to design postcards for each one with a picture and slogan on one side and a story about that person's historical contribution on the other. So, for example they wanna do Turing for Computer Science. On one side a portrait of Turing and accross it in bright text The Turing Machine - That's SO gay! then a short account of Turing's achievement on the back. Or Charlotte Bach (transgendered ethologist) - picture on one side and the slogan Charlotte Bach - Transgender? Transformer! and the story of what she did on the back. OK, I have decided they are so enthusiastic that I'm swallowing my cynicism. You can't sneer at this pair they just wear you down with enthusiasm. So you lot have to help me out here. We need to get a list of suitable historical queers pretty quick so that we can have them printed by february. I want you all to think of someone who made a difference and was gay and post their name at least here in my blog - if you have some bio detail or a link to some fine, if not the puppies will do the research. Also useful would be ideas for the slogans - I quite like their that's SO gay idea for the gay cards and Transgender? Transformer for the trans people but so far for lesbians they've only come up with Damn! Dykes! which I don't think will go down well and for bisexuals they're still totally stuck. So, you're a creative lot. Put your thinking caps on and help get this pair of puppies on a mission off my back! Just occured to me that we should definitely have Martina Navratilova down there for history of sport. sumbloke

On laptop: OS: Suse Linux 10 WP, spreadsheet, presentation: OpenOffice Text: emacs pdf: pdfWriter browswer: firefox or opera e-mail, diary: Agenda programming: php - so just emacs for writing code images: gimp formats: usually xml or opendoc formats if it's sensible or .txt or proprietary including .doc, .xls etc for ineroperability On desktops and at school: Windows, Office, Dreamweaver, Homesite, VisualStudio, photoshop elements.

protein bars blow chunks. as sharon says there's good sources of protein for your veggie days. try: rice with any pulse - so rice and peas, rice and lentils, rice and beans of any kind the combination of grain and pulse is a richer source of protein than almost anything. tofu: ok, it's bland to the nth degree as it comes but if you get going with the spices and garlic and stuff it's pretty good. falafal with hummous in pitta bread: protein overload. All vegetables (but not the non-vegetables mushrooms etc afaik) are good sources of fibre and most are good sources of vitamins. I have to say there is just one tiny down side to my diet - vegetarian and no processed food, very little dairy - i have to leave the room a lot...not only am i regular but erm well frankly on very beany days it gets windy around here! Oh and...for good nutrition if you can help it - get used to brown rice. I still have to have white rice sometimes brown rice really is just so much work to eat!