I don't exist, and if I did I'd be a tree

Well yes, I'm writing this blog so it seems I do exist after all... but apparently a lot of people believe that people like me don't exist.
I received the link to this article a little while ago and meant to write about it myself ever since. (Much workout, much fatigue, much stuff going on.) Because this article is about me - not personally, but about people who are asexual just like I am.

When I read it I recognized much of myself in it, although this guy in the article realized amazingly quickly that "asexual" is the term for what he is. Myself I may have had lots of additional complications going on - being very introverted, even autistic-leaning, and suicidal for hating my then weak and useless body, etc.
But what once more shocked me about the article, even now, is the extent to which asexuality is still unknown, so much even that lots of people seem to have never heard of it or it never even occurred to them that it exists at all!

It really puzzles me how this can be so, since virtually everyone spends at least their first decade of life in this same state! In fact when asked about my sexuality, which happens sometimes since I'm obviously gender-nonconforming or at least extremely masculine (and probably most often deemed a lesbian), this is what I usually tell people when they can't make sense of "asexual": Just think back of your own sexuality when you were about 5 years old. You didn't have any sexual feelings then? See, and in me this just never changed. It's this simple really.

It's good to see that by now there's some information available, but you'd probably rarely come across it unless you search for it.
Definitions may vary slightly, and I personally strongly disagree with the statement, as given in this info sheet (PDF), that asexual people "may experience arousal and orgasm". In my opinion, if you have anything at all going on down there then you're by definition not asexual.
Even more recently I chanced upon this article explaining "graysexuality", a term I'd never heard before, and I think it's in fact a neat description for all those people who are, unlike myself, not 100% asexual.

Everything is not that simple, obviously, and I've been puzzled myself to read that there are asexual people who are interested in dating, and apparently even a number who are willing to compromise for a non-asexual partner... something which would be absolutely beyond unthinkable to myself, but then again, I'd never have any interest in dating in the first place. Frankly, I find humans to be physically quite repulsive animals.
I wouldn't want to live forever in such a body, and so I'm glad we don't...
I don't know if other asexuals also feel like this to some extent, but personally I've always felt somewhat indignant about having to eat, to sleep, and excrete wastes... getting hungry, getting tired so easily, being cold most of the time...
It's a bit of a comfort that there are other animals who all share the same predicaments, although in very much prettier bodies. The ones with pointy fins and pointy teeth...

The quest to see the Milky Way

I still haven't succeeded in it, but although the Terschelling plan has been abandoned since the climate has taken a turn for the worse here in Europe (and the northern islands are generally even colder than here at home), there is new hope. I found a new dark sky map with previously unseen resolution, and thereby found that not too far from home there's a spot in the woods which, albeit not ideal, is considerably more favorable to stargazing than the closer vicinity.

So I rode there yesterday - twice; first by day to explore and then in the evening to wait for nightfall.
I was thwarted by cloudy skies. But I hadn't been in the woods by night in a long time and it was good to be back once more, sitting on a bench in the darkness, listening to the nocturnal insects and having a large moth buzz around my hair.
I soon decided to venture back homeward though since the cloud cover only kept increasing. When reaching an unlit, open field, I saw pools of intense light pollution reflected off the distant clouds to the north, presumably from downtown Bonn and possibly Cologne.
But back in the woods I also saw some glowworms, I had one crawl over my fingernail.
I had a flashlight in my backpack but I didn't use it a single time, I had no trouble finding my way through the nocturnal woods. Only on the most difficult parts of the trail (more potholes and gullies than trail) I rather pushed my bike as riding was too tricky in the dark. I was back home around midnight.

According to the map, even further south from here there are places just as dark as on Terschelling. For the most part they seem to be in the Eifel mountain region and possibly inaccessible, but another one southwest of Rheinbach would be a close second. I have to keep an eye on the phases and rise & set of the moon as well, but I'll keep trying. Clear nights are rare though, and sadly they're usually even colder than under overcast skies.

As usual, I meant to post again much sooner and more frequently but as usual I've been busy...
For at least a month I meant to write a blog post about being asexual, because that's what I am (and so yes,it exists) and it's so difficult for me to imagine how difficult most people find this to imagine - apparently.
More about this next time though.

Naar de haaien in Maastricht!

"Naar de haaien (gaan)" is a Dutch expression whose meaning is along the lines of our "(going) to Hell", but literally it translates as "going to the sharks". And I definitely had to see de haaien!

I hit the wrong week for my trip to Maastricht from July 12th through 14th, it was cold and rainy; summer would come the next week only. Anyway, there I was, traveling by train (on the cheap, so having to change trains 4 times on the relatively short trip of ~3 hours) and staying at the Stayokay hostel on the river Maas for 2 nights. I was lucky to have the free choice of beds in a dorm of 6,so I picked the top bunk by the window from where I could watch the barges passing on the river. Two other girls, about my age, arrived later to share the dorm, speaking Dutch.

Dawn rose to a nearly flawless sky the next day but which would change all too soon, and it was cold. Wearing a longsleeved shirt, a hoodie plus a jacket and fingerless gloves, I told myself that it wasn't so bad for April. Of course it wasn't April, but I'd just have to pretend it was...

So I set out on my bike, rented directly from the hostel, which to my surprise had 7 gears but they wouldn't be too much use since the handlebar was so high and close to the body that it forced my hands into an awkward angle at the wrist, making it very uncomfortable to hold especially when riding all the cobblestone roads of Maastricht, so that it wasn't possible to go really fast anyway.

"Witches' Street"!
(Escape in either direction? LOL)

I went to find the main objective for my trip: the Natuurhistorisch Museum, housing a temporary exhibition about sharks! The latter was only one single room, but it was nicely done,especially with the large video walls above that had a great white shark and a manta ray swimming around, giving the impression of being underwater with them. A selection of teeth and jaws, one set of jaws even open to touch, as well as a sample of skin from a zebra shark with its denticles, giving it that sandpaper-like texture.

Jaws.

The rest of the museum was also very interesting, having lots of fossils many of which had been excavated in the local region, including skeletons of mosasaurs and a lot else. Samples of extant species of butterflies and many other creatures as well, and there's even a small but really lovely botanic garden in the museum's backyard, surrounded by a tiny canal. I sat on a bench by it to have a little lunch break (just a banana actually) but then quickly had to go back inside as the thunderstorms arrived...

Some very extraordinary ammonites.

I waited out the rainstorm inside, looking at some Dutch books about haaien (sharks) that were actually meant for kids. I was a bit disappointed they didn't have any more shark merchandise there, I only found myself a bookmark and a magnet. But of course there's still the free booklet about the exhibition which was included with the visit! It's 40 pages with comprehensive information and photos.

Later I still found that "Hoge Fronten" Park, which used to be part of the ancient city fortifications but nowadays is a nature preserve.

With more rain coming, I already returned to the hostel around 5 PM. After spending a while on my bunk reading and talking to two older ladies having newly arrived at the dorm (pointing out a rainbow above the river Maas to the one of them), I realized the weather had markedly improved, and so I set out once more, although it was already about 7 PM by then, to ride my rented bike one last time.
This final ride was pretty much my best time there, certainly making for the best photos too (more of which will be posted on my Facebook).

Last evening in Maastricht,
just about 2 sunny hours.

The next day, of my departure, I walked through the old city center one last time and then across the bridge since the station is located on the far side of the river Maas. On the way there I strolled, looking at some stores, especially one curious one selling lots of extremely useful essentials, such as giant pencil sharpeners but used to sharpen carrots and other vegetables. LOL

I arrived at the station hall just in time before the next downpour. Inside, there was a grand piano free to be played by anyone, and a lady who was no doubt a professional played wonderful music on it.

A last look back at Maastricht from the bridge.

Carved shark with magnet on the back,
a souvenir from the museum.

Happy 4th of July!

Once again I didn't post in a while, and there's both good & bad news.
By far the best news is this:

It's been mine for just over a month now, for a relatively low price at a place selling used bikes - all the other ones were far over 100 €! But I think this one wasn't popular because boys won't like it for the pink and girls won't because it's a men's bike. For me it's just perfect though.

So I already took it on a tour when summer finally came to Germany, it was beautiful, over 90 F that day...

...and now the bad news: That was on June 23rd, and summer lasted only that one day.
So far it hasn't come back. No idea if it will. I wouldn't even mind all the rain, but can't it be raining at 80 F (or higher)? Most days I have to wear gloves when riding to the gym in the morning. :(

I meant to travel to Terschelling this summer, which is an island in the North Sea, but since there is no summer I had to cancel it as it's even still a bit colder there than it is here.

But the other week I'm traveling to Maastricht instead, and on that trip I'll be going by all means because there's something there that I absolutely have to see. It's an exhibition about my favorite animals, those with fins & many sharp teeth...
And I'll certainly have to post again about that.

360 degrees, gender, and other conventions

I meant to write this for a long time now (once more), inspired to it by a controversy with a friend of long years whom I'd never have expected to hold such extremely reactionary views as recently displayed, and I didn't yet anticipate that shock I was in for when first I came across the following meme on Facebook which I then shared because I perfectly agree with it, although it doesn't stop there:



A fiction is sure is!!
Another thing that definitely belongs in there with the "fiction" is gender, which is exactly what the controversy with my friend is about who claims that "chromosomes determine your gender and you are that gender," irrevocably. This is so wrong on so many levels, obviously - well, at least to me it couldn't possibly be more obvious, and I'm absolutely puzzled how it can be less than obvious to my friend, especially since there's been other confrontations involving racism in the past in which I've always made clear I won't condone such bullshit.

(The only times I'm all for "white power" is when it's really Great White power!)

I'm certainly not one of those who get easily offended or "butthurt", and I'm tolerant of people having very different opinions. But what startles me is that I've had this friend for nearly 10 years, we've even talked on the phone so she has heard my less-than-feminine voice, my voice which is this way because I've taken the testosterone injections even longer than 10 years, these injections which have been the only thing to save me from the verge of suicide back then in my more than troubled teenage when I despised my then weak and wimpy body more than words could ever tell.

Back to the baby meme - yes, we all have been thrown into this,born into these vessels with minds like perfectly blank pages at birth, to be filled with anything that starts pouring into them from then on, unceasingly. And it's perfectly normal to believe whatever your are told when you're a young child. Children have no concept of truth and untruth until they are at least about 5 years old, and then it's only the beginning.

Name, religion, nationality... I've disowned all of these things and more. I don't have a true name for myself except "Satan's warrior", and that's not a name, but that's the one, truest thing I feel I am. "Diana" isn't really my name... I go by that name, yes, but how can it be "mine" if thousands or millions of other people on Earth share the same name?! 
"Diana" says absolutely nothing about who I am. I don't know who I am, and I'm here to find it out. "Warrior", "Satan's warrior", at least that says something. Including the fact that I replaced the religion I was born into with one of my own choice - with the faith in a God of rebellion, in the struggle for freedom and quest for truth, and in these efforts I see it as a very fundamental step to see through all these pseudo-truth pushed upon me by others.

It was hard to sort out, especially this gender issue. I certainly don't want to be a man - but back as a teen that's what I thought I wanted, because the common people make you believe there were only those two alternatives, and I knew I didn't want to be a woman. And I still don't. I absolutely don't care for the parts that make me female, I've never liked them and I usually ignore them. Well, I've had breast reduction surgery, and the rest I ignore.

I think in a strange way it even makes it easier for me than it is for others to see through the delusion - I've never identified very much with my body. I never hated myself, I only hated my body - I strictly distinguished between the two; it was my adverse circumstances that taught me to do this.

Name, religion, nationality, race; all these things are handed to you by your family, and as far as I'm concerned I have no family; I disowned them along with these things more than they've ever disowned me, they would have never understood anything, they frankly weren't very bright.
As I see it, the body I currently inhabit is borrowed from their genetic material, I'm living in it, but that has little to do with who I am except for the life experience I've had in it.

Amid all the adversity, it may have been these circumstances that forced me to keep questioning in ways as some smart children will but that most adults eventually cease to do, and to their detriment. They lose the ability to see the forest for all the trees.

A while ago the famous physicist Dr. Brian Greene posted on Facebook some new findings about the planet Pluto, in which he also confessed that he will continually regard Pluto as a planet indeed. Some of the comments on the post criticized this view as "unscientific", or even as "dismissing science in favor of a personal belief", which struck me as most ludicrous and I felt compelled to add my own comment, as follows:

"Oh dear. This has NOTHING to do with either science, truth, or personal belief. WHY is Pluto either a planet or not a planet? Because of arbitrary classification! It's as if I'm saying, "even when everyone else says a week has 7 days, to me a week has 10 days." I would be neither right nor wrong because a week has been made up, it doesn't correspond to any cycle in nature. If I said that to me a year had either more or fewer days than 365 I'd either be wrong or I'd have to move to a planet where my chosen amount of days in a year was true. Because a year is one full orbit of a planet around its star, and one day is one full revolution of the planet around its axis. The duration of a year or a day can be objectively measured. But the duration of a week, an hour, a minute, or which day is Christmas, have all been made up by humans and therefore can't be true or false, they're purely a matter of consensus, nothing else. Same goes for Pluto being a planet or not. And to me it always will be a planet as well, because that's what I learned when I was ~5 years old and I see no logical reason to revise it. It's like using either the Fahrenheit or Celsius (or Kelvin) scale for temperature, one can prefer one or another but none of them are wrong."

That's how it is - conventions, conventions. In case you wondered, the 360 degrees naturally also fall into this category. Have you ever wondered why a circle has 360 degrees? If not then you really should - just another convention!

I'm not saying conventions are always necessarily bad, in the contrary, they often prove indispensable for effective communication. Errors in translations can lead to grave misunderstandings, and confusion about the use of the metric system vs English units can cause the very expensive loss of a spacecraft.

Still it should be kept in mind that they are but conventions, but in this digital age the fallacy to adopt a binary way of thinking, just as like a computer system, may come easily. Only a while ago I chanced upon a video on the subject of consciousness in which  this was brought up, and the lecturer related that in some other cultures people use more categories than only "true or false", that in addition to these two something can as well be either neither true nor false or both true and false. I imagine it might be pretty difficult sometimes to distinguish between the latter two... but right now I can't think of any examples nor will I bother to even try and find back that video, as it's already pretty late at night here in Germany.
Instead I'll ask you this question: How many colors are there in a black and white photograph?
Some people will say, "that's easy, it's called black and white, that already tells you how many: there is black and there is white, so it's two colors!"
Someone else will say, "but that's bullshit, you can see that most of the picture is neither black nor white but a shade of gray, and there's an uncountable number of shades, so there's an infinite number of colors in the photo."
The next person may agree for the most part but says, "ok, but humans can't distinguish an infinite number of colors, let alone of only shades of gray. My Photoshop program has 20 shades of gray in the default palette, and even in those the difference between one nuance and the next is barely perceptible to me, so I'll say there are about 20 colors in it."
Another one comes along and say, "but that's all bullshit - black and white are not even colors, so there are no colors at all in a black and white photograph!"

That's four different answers to a simple question, and I don't think any of them is true or false. Pick one that you agree most with, or find your own. But keep an open mind to different options... the photographer might have had a different number of colors in mind.

And when it comes to gender there certainly is much more than only black or white.

Amsterdam photo blog (another)

Last Saturday I once more went on a day trip to Amsterdam.
Perhaps this "Sensation Express" bus should be more aptly names "Surprise Express", since you're always in for some. Keen eyesight helped me to spot the bus at the very far end of the station, the opposite end from where it had been last time, at least 100 meters away - that is, to spot a bus that looked different from the regular public transport ones, more like a travel bus, and so I walked over to inquire and it turned out to be the one. Other people apparently kept calling the driver on mobile phones, having trouble to find it.
I felt grateful and kind of proud that, having no such gadgets, my keen warrior senses once more proved to be all I needed instead.

It kept raining on and off, but all in all the weather kept improving the closer we got to the destination. There was some traffic jams and slow going on the highways too, and eventually the driver stopped the bus on Piet-Hein-Kade, next to the Ij-Tower, and announced he wasn't going any further. I asked him to be sure he'd be back in this same spot for the return trip at 8:30 PM. At first he had trouble understanding my English but then he told me to be there by 8:20.

Personally I didn't really have any problem with the odd place of arrival (and pick-up) he'd chosen but it did bewilder me and I was wondering how the other people might feel about it - I had no problem because I know the city well enough, I wouldn't have any trouble to find my way around from here nor my way back here in the evening. But had I been a stranger to Amsterdam and here for the first time, I imagine I'd have felt quite a bit taxed by the situation and worried about finding back later. I'd have searched for a sign with the street name and then bought a map somewhere - but as it was, I didn't even consult the old map I had with me already, and not a single time for the rest of the day; I had the advantage of familiarity with Amsterdam and so it wasn't a thing for me to complain about. But I'd understand perfectly well if the other passengers would complain! But maybe their fancy gadgets helped them along again.

Zuiderkerk reflection

I decided to walk all the way to Waterlooplein and then rent a fiets (bicycle) at the MacBike rental there, and to pass by "Knuffels", the plushie store where once I bought my sweet Sharky - years ago, my first one, and they've never had such a pretty sharky again.
This time they had spiders. LOL

Sharky - with me since ~2007

Spiders at Knuffels store

At Waterlooplein I strolled the market for a bit, then went to MacBike to get a fiets on which I rode on to Albert Cuyp Market. Sadly I found no more of the warm "winter" leggings of which I bought a pair there back in December and which I was in fact wearing. They're certainly NOT fit for actual winter, of course, at least not without an additional pair of thermo-leggings underneath, they're only a bit plushy inside, similar to tennis socks. Outside they're printed to look like jeans. But this time around they only had the regular, thin ones, so I didn't buy any as I already got enough leggings that can be worn with long underwear only (unless it's summer, which rarely happens in actuality - not only on the calendar).

Old cams at Waterlooplein Market

Interesting tidbit: At a drugstore I noted that painkillers (which in Germany you can't buy at drugstores at all but only at pharmacies) are ridiculously cheap there while hair dye is ridiculously expensive - at least 3 times the price it is in Germany!

Turds at Albert Cuyp Market. LOL

I rode on to Vondelpark. As I settled down there on the trunk of a willow that extended nearly horizontally over the pond where I intended to have some lunch (brown bread with honey & diet coke, bought at supermarket) it suddenly started hailing. Fortunately it lasted only a few minutes.
As it was closing in on 4 PM I decided to return my fiets already so I'd have to pay for 3 hours only - beyond 3 hours you have to pay a whole day, which isn't even that much more (about 15 € instead of 11 or so), but it wouldn't have been worth it since I'd have had less than 2 hours more because MacBike closes at 5:45 PM. So I returned it & even got a discount again as a regular customer - even if only once or twice a year, but MacBike is that cool. :)

Iepenzaadjes (elm seeds), everywhere in Amsterdam now

I walked on toward my next stop: The English book store in Kalverstraat! I browsed the store for about an hour and eventually found two books of sci-fi short stories that I bought.
Later I still bought some very nice plush ear muffs at a souvenir store by the Flower Market, and they're the kind of things you really need in these climes.

Me at the Flower Market

My souvenirs

About time to slowly move in direction of the central station again - passing by Dam Square which I found transformed into a fairground. The occasion I'm unsure about, it may have been for the upcoming King's Day celebrations already - formerly Queen's Day, which used to be right on Walpurgis, but they recently changed it and I think it's a couple days earlier now too. (26th? But that would be Chernobyl anniversary... whatever. LOL) I didn't go on any of the rides but only took photos of them since they were expensive and I'd already spent so much on the books & ear muffs, and my backpack would have hindered me anyway.

Fairground at Dam Square

Beautiful sunlight reflections

Last I went to the public library building which is seven stories tall with a cafe terrace at the top one, from where I took a few more photos. (I took a ton - more will be on Facebook.)
I was at the pick-up location on Piet Hein Kade early and was amazed that everyone else had found back there in time as well and we were in fact already departing by 8:20 PM.

Today I'm a roll of asswipe

And I'll have to work my ass off to remedy this situation because it's absolutely unacceptable, obviously.

I did this 10/10 Treadmill Challenge, and I'd never have expected my result to be this catastrophically embarrassing - I do consider myself a pro athlete, after all; it's what I do, my profession - always will be, until the day I die. And until then I'll keep getting better.

Winter time is hard on my body and energy, I can handle anything but cold temp's, and it's still f'ing freezing here although it ought to be spring by now.

But I've kept getting better so far, and I absolutely intend to get to the 2 minute mark with this one.
Even if today it's been only an embarrassing 34 seconds. :(

Calling on other athletes to try this challenge and let me know if it's really this hard - ?