Saturday of Memorial Day weekend and I am going to the Escape tonight.

Happy Memorial Day weekend and a special thanks to all our military men and women, past, present and future who gave so much to make our country great and free.

It is Saturday of Memorial Day weekend and my plans are to go to the Escape bar and grill tonight. I got up today and started my day by going to the gym for about 1 ½ hours, 40 minutes on the elliptical, a few weight machines and then a 15-minute walk on a tread mill to cool down. I did stop at a Starbucks for about 30 minutes as I wanted to post to the group about going to the Escape tonight and also post my blog from Wednesday night’s dinner. I also had some errands to run this morning and stopped by a friends house to help him with fixing an outside faucet, something I did at my house a while back. No he does not know about this side of me as I still keep my male and female sides separate with family, friends and co-workers. Now if they ask me I will not lie about it but also not volunteering any information on it either. Again this is what is right for me. I will talk about my nails a little as usually if I get a compliment on my nails in male mode I of course thank them and always follow it up with telling them I have week nails which I do by the way. Well Friday at work one of our newer female employees noticed my nails and complimented me on them, I think her words were “I love your nails that is such a pretty shade of pink”. My reply to her was simple, I said, “Thank you, I like the color also” and just left it with that, no other explanation. Well back to today.

It was almost 3pm when I had everything done and could start getting ready, I had posted I would be at the Escape at 5:30pm. I took my time getting ready as I really enjoy doing my makeup and transforming myself. I decided to wear one of the dresses I got from the bag of clothes Nicole gave me that I haven’t worn yet, it is a clingy dress that comes down to just below my knees and is black and maroon stripes, it is pretty cute I think. It was 3:45pm when I was ready and I took a few pictures and then decided I would leave a little early and stop at the Starbucks I Orchards for an hour or so and work on my computer and relax.

I got to Starbucks and went in and ordered, the young girl working the counter told me she loved my dress so I guess I was right it is cute, so I thanked her. yes I do love getting compliments, something you normally don’t get as a man. I got my drink and checked my e-mails. one of our girls in the group whose wife is supportive had posted, today is their 45^th wedding anniversary so I replied back with congratulations as did several other girls. It really is awesome for them. A few of the girls also posted they would be at the Escape tonight also which is nice as the last couple times I went no one showed up. I stayed here at Starbucks till a little after 5pm before going to the Escape as it takes about 15 minutes to get there from here.  I got there right at 5:30pm and Gina had just arrived too so we walked in together. Now they were not busy and I really had no idea how busy it would be tonight being Memorial Day weekend. We ordered drink and I ordered dinner and then we sat down to talk. I did get Gina to take a couple pictures of me to show my fress off.

About the time my food came Poppy showed up which was nice. They also ordered dinner. now there was 1 man at the bar and us so it was really quiet tonight. Poppy talked a little about a group she belongs to as she hasn’t come out fully but some people know about her transitioning so imagine it won’t be long. She coordinated and event and was the main speaker at it. It was interesting to hear about it as in all groups there are people on both sides so you never know how it will go when you come out. even our group here we have people from both parties and multiple religions which is why I try to keep politics and religion out of our group. It was a little before 7pm when Jan & Lynn showed up so we had 5 of us and at this point there were 4 other people here so we were still the majority. Jan and Lynn told us about their week at the Esprit last week, they go every year. We actually had several members from our group there, Jennifer and her wife went along with Brenda and Kea. I have never gone to it but maybe once I retire I will. They have a lot of events but the one I really want to do is the High Tea, they take the ferry from Port Angeles up to Victoria BC and do High Tea at the Emperess which just sounds so fun.

 We talked a little bit about the fashion show they hold every year and how there is just so many more options in women’s clothes then men’s. I brought up the red dress party and how even with more then 1,000 you really don’t see the same red dress very often. Well we got talking about the red dress party which actually started here in Portland in 2001 and now they have them in several other cities but Portland was the first. The sad thing is the one here in Portland has closed down so there will be no more red dress parties here in Portland. It was an all-volunteer event and with anything when everything is volunteer it can be hard to keep it going long term. I did go 6 times over the years with Julie and Trixie and had a lot of fun.

Karaoke started about 7:30 and there were still maybe 10 people here so I guess it would have been a good night to sing as half the people here were our group and I did think about it. I have sung with other people several times and I even did it once by myself on a night like tonight when there were not many people but in the end I chickened out. By a little after 9 it got a little busy but still only 15 to 20 people so it would be a slow night. Poppy was the first one to call it a night and then Gina. I hung in till a little after 10pm before I paid my bill and called it a night. It was a good day. Now I am looking forward to Sunday and Monday as I have a 3-day weekend and should get a least a little Susan time each day.

Thanks for reading my blog and sharing this part of my life with me.