Height: 6'3" / 192 cm.

Weight: 193 pounds / 88 kg.

Dress Size: 14 tall, often 12 tall or junior 13 tall for skirts, slacks or jeans.

Shoe size: ladies 13 wide (sometimes 13 1/2 or 14 depending on the manufacturer)

Measurements: now that I have had breast implants, I am 40C (=45)-32-42. Before the surgery I was a

"natural" 41-31-42--i.e. before breastforms (in centimetres: 103-77-107); with breast forms, 44-31-42

Favorite Clothes: very form-fitting things, either very long or very short (my legs are my best feature!)

Favorite Colours: for clothes, rich blues, greens and purples suit me best; for buildings, etc., peach (the interior of my house is done in peach with white trim).

Favorite Perfume: Adrienne Vittadini

Age: 42

Birthday: June 23 (Cancer, for you astrology addicts, or Year of the Dog for those who prefer the Oriental variant). I was born at 5PM, just in time for dinner!

Place of Birth: London, Ontario, Canada

Married: Single, never married.

Sexuality: Hoping for a male partner after GRS, though I may be somewhat bi. Celibate for the last 13 years. For an article I wrote on this topic several years ago while trying to get by as a crossdresser, please click on orientation.htm

Habits: non-smoker; no drugs; almost never drink (no taste for it--no health or moral reasons).

Languages Spoken: good French and Russian; functional German and Japanese (I passed Level 2 of the Japanese Language Proficiency Exam in 1994). I'm going to start doing a little Spanish for an upcoming trip to Mexico. I also took four years of Latin long ago, but have forgotten most of it-sic transit scientia discipuli!

Interests: world economic and political affairs; Japanese stuff (especially Japan's original wooden castles-- I've visited all 12 that still exist--ukiyoe (especially Utamaro), sokaiya, sumo, onsen, sento, and contemporary graphic artist Tsuruta Ichiro);

Religion: brought up with Baptist and Presbyterian influences, but abandoned organized religion at the first possible opportunity. I basically felt all religions were just superstition, but if it helped people to get through their lives and didn't encourage hatred (as some fundamentalists do), what's the harm? Then on October 24, 1999 I began attending services at the Centre for Positive Living, a non-Christian church affiliated with Religious Science International, a California-based organization. No, it's not a cult. If you want to decide for yourself, RSI has a web site at:

http://www.rsintl.org

and the Centre itself has one at

http://www.positiveliving.org/.

This is a link to the other main branch of Religious Science, the United Churches of Religious Science:

http://religiousscience.org/.

This one is a magazine put out by the UCORS:

http://www.scienceofmind.com/

And finally, this is a link to the website of a Chicago church that has some good explanations on it:

http://members.aol.com/elpeabody/webprof/INDEX.htm

Anyway, this church has come to mean a great deal to me. I volunteer as usher, coffee server, cook for the youth group, and member of the Administration, Social and Outreach/Marketing Teams. I am also taking courses in the Science of Mind (the spiritual philosophy behind the church) and am seriously considering becoming a Minister.

Favorite Foods: quality chocolate; pralines and cream ice cream; pizza (pepperoni, bacon and double cheese; spinach and feta is also good); fresh, hot bread; maple syrup (especially on MacDonalds hot cakes) & maple sugar; butterscotch meringue pie; white chocolate chunk cookies; onion rings; homemade French fries with lots of salt and mayonnaise (a Belgian cholesterol special!); batter fried halibut--the king of fishes!; Korean spicy instant noodles (a breakfast favourite); baclava; Greek food, especially lamb dishes; just about anything with melted cheese on it. The spironolactone I used to take changed my appetite; I no longer crave sweets, but more salty things, so the onion rings and halibut and chips have moved up in my list; you can put a ton of salt on them and they just taste better and better. I like most spicy foods, and have never really tried an ethnic cuisine I didn't like.

Dislikes: squash, turnip, cucumbers, beets, squid, beans (the kind in baked beans or pork & beans), pickles, bigoted red-necks, slimy guys who figure any TG person must want to be fondled or jumped.

Favorite Pastimes: walking; saunas; soaking in a hot tub (I have a Hot Springs spa in my basement); reading (The Globe and Mail, The Economist, The Nikkei Weekly, and struggling through the Nihon Keizai Shimbun whenever I can get a copy); baking desserts; making homemade chocolates; photography; zoos;

Favorite Music: I have very eclectic tastes and tend to like specific songs rather than artists or genres. If I had to pick a genre, it would be Motown, but I like stuff ranging from Celine Dion to the Sex Pistols. I am glad to see the start of a resurgence of swing music, too! Here are some of the songs I have been listening to a lot lately:

Ends & What It's Like (Everlast); Here But I'm Gone (Curtis Mayfield); That Girl (Maxi Priest); Love TKO (The Nylons); Bohemia (Mae Moore); Zoot Suit Riot (Cherry Poppin' Daddies); Seize the Day (Carolyn Arends); I Will Take Care of You (Amy Sky); Walkin' in Memphis (Cher); Principles of Lust (Enigma); Heaven or Hell (Salt'n Pepa); Too Legit to Quit (MC Hammer); Oh Girl (The Chi-Lites); Use Me (Al Jarreau-the source of, or at least the inspiration for, the sample on rap artist Snow's 1995 song Things to Say); Strong Enough (Sheryl Crow); Blood Makes Noise (Suzanne Vega); Two-Fisted Woman (Katie Webster, the blues pianist); Jump, Jive and Wail (The Brian Seltzer Orchestra); Smooth (Santana with Rob Thomas).

Three of these songs have a very strong emotional influence on me. "Seize the day" I guess is what I am now doing; we only get one go round, so there's no use not venturing to do the things you want to do. It's worth trying even if you fail. I guess this is what I realized when I recognized that I would always regret it if I didn't take the plunge and go for GRS despite the obstacles. "I will take care of you" strikes a chord because I spent my holidays in May, 1991 at my mother's bedside as she died of cancer. I arrived not realizing how close she was to death. She was released to die at home, with a nurse who came around once a day. She was almost completely incoherent the whole time, and required constant care. She also needed someone to turn her over periodically due to her bedsores and to control the morphine dosage via a little machine she was hooked up to, as she could not do it herself (she could not do anything at all). My dad couldn't handle this and my sister lived an hour's drive away and was working full-time while raising her small children, so the task fell to me. I spent every day at her bedside, fed her the last few spoonsful of food she was ever able to eat, gave her the final water she could take, and swabbed out her mouth, which constantly filled up with brown goo (she had lung cancer, which appeared after she had been OK for several years after having been treated for breast cancer; no, she didn't smoke). I was doing that when she breathed her last. A little gurgle came up and I knew she was gone. I cry every time I think about this (like now), and this song reminds me of those last days. "Strong enough to be my man" I guess hits home because I realize how hard it will be for any guy to be my companion eventually. I'm not sure what's harder: being a transsexual woman, or being the partner of one. I'll need a very special guy to love me--I just hope he's out there somewhere!

Favorite Comedy: Among the classics, Monty Python, Fawlty Towers, Fernwood Tonight and America Tonight (I may be dating myself here); among contemporary comedians, Steve Wright (the bald guy with the big curly side patches who uses a really deadpan voice to mutter one-liners like "24 hours in a day...24 beers in a case. Coincidence?"--OK, that was two lines, but you get the idea); among authors, P.J. O'Rourke, whose books like Holidays in Hell and Republican Party Reptile are a politically-incorrect hoot;

Favorite Movies: I love going to the movies but seldom remember much about them afterwards. I like aisle seats so I can stretch my legs and sitting close enough that all I see is the screen. Some of the movies that I actually liked enough to remember the plots:

Something About Mary; Shall We Dance (Japanese); Hanabi (Fireworks; Japanese); American Beauty;

Favorite TV Shows: I like to veg out in front of the TV, but almost never get time to do so lately (gotta work a lot of overtime to pay for all that electrolysis!). Among news shows, I like Pacific Rim Report; among dramas, Homicide and NYPD Blue; among late-night shows, I prefer Letterman, even though he's not as good as he once was. As soon as it became available in March, 1999 I got Channel 91 TV Japan, a Japanese language channel which repackages NHK broadcasts for North America.

Favorite Quotes: "People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public or in some contrivance to raise prices" (Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations, 1776, p. 128); "Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influences, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist. Madmen in authority, who hear voices in the air, are distilling their frenzy from some academic scribbler of a few years back. I am sure that the power of vested interests is vastly exaggerated compared with the gradual encroachment of ideas" (John Maynard Keynes, The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, 1936, p. 383.)

Favorite Artists: I am not very knowledgeable about art, but I do love ukiyoe, which are Japanese woodblock prints. They were the world's first mass-produced art and could be bought at the time for about the cost of a bowl of noodles. My favorites are women's faces by Utamaro and were done in the 1790s. I have quite a few reproductions scattered around my home. Among modern artists I am very partial to Ichiro Tsuruta, who has done many ads for Noevir, a Japanese cosmetics company. I also have a lot of his art in my home. Here are two web sites where you can see his art. They are in Japanese only, but obviously the pictures need no translation.

http://www.adgallery.com/

http://www.from.co.jp/tsuruta

Among Western artists I tend to like the Impressionists, and especially the style known as pointillisme (looks like little dots). Interestingly, I read recently that the originators of Impressionism were strongly influenced by Japanese ukiyoe wood block prints. In at least one case the artist even reproduced an ukiyoe in an early Impressionist syle!

Favorite Pantyhose: Hanes Her Way Extra-Tall in linen. These are the only kind that are long enough not to be stretched to the snapping point. They are fairly durable, too, and cheap: C$2.75 for the non control panty and C$3.75 for the "satiny control panty" (useful for smoothing if you're wearing a skin-tight dress). I get them at Shoppers Drug Mart in the Eaton Centre downtown, where you get another 20% off if you buy six or more pairs. I usually shave my legs on Saturday or Sunday and then wear outfits requiring pantyhose only until Tuesday or Wednesday, then slacks. For knee highs, Tall Girl's are the only ones that go up high enough to go over the thick part of my calf so they stay up. I usually wear the blush colour.

Favorite Underwear: Olga bra style 35984 in 40C. This is an underwire style that is quite comfortable for everyday wear. Of course, I have sexier ones for "special occasions". Jockey cotton brief in size range 7 (they have their own system). The latter are very comfortable for night wear or if you don't need to worry about a tuck. I like white, in general, though I do have some in black or blush.

Favorite Books on Relationships: I really like Barbara De Angelis's books. I started off with The Real Rules: How to Find the Right Man for the Real You, a book written in response to the better-known but hopelessly outdated and harmful book The Rules by Ellen Fein and Sherrie Schneider (don't worry guys, I would never treat a man like that!). I bought several more of her books in paperback and am now almost done Ask Barbara: The 100 Most-Asked Questions About Love, Sex, and Relationships. I also enjoyed Men are From Mars, Women are from Venus by John Gray. I am definitely a Venusian! If any guy ever wanted to know how to win my heart, reading Men are from Mars and the Ask Barbara book would give him a pretty good guide as to how to do it (of course, probably 99.999% of the people who have actually read these books are women). These books also helped me to understand men better. Prior to reading them I felt like a failed anthropologist: even though I had spent 41 years living among them, I was still unable to figure out the male tribe! On the physical side, I highly recommend a book entitled How to be a great lover: Girlfriend to girlfriend totally explicit techniques that will blow his mind by Lou Paget (a woman). Before buying this book, I knew very little about sex, and even less what to do as a woman. These books seem very good to me, and I have even practiced some of the techniques using inanimate objects (carrots, salamis, etc.) Please note, however, that this book is an extremely explicit sex manual and should only be read by those who are totally comfortable with explanations and line drawings of a wide variety of sexual techniques, including manual and oral sex. I got the Lou Paget book from Amazon.com (apparently it's one of their best sellers!). The others are available in most major bookstores, or from Amazon.com or Chapters.ca.

Other Books I Have Read Recently: The Science of Mind by Ernest Holmes and Rescuing the Bible from Fundamentalism by Bishop John Shelby Spong. I am now reading Living the Science of Mind, also by Ernest Holmes, who was the founder of Religious Science. I read Creative Thought and Science of Mind magazines each month, along with less spiritual stuff like The Economist, The Nikkei Weekly, The Globe and Mail and Sumo World.

Political Affiliation: Eclectic. I haven't voted for a major political party since 1984. At one point I a couple of years ago I belonged to two political parties (PC and Reform--I know, but there were specific reasons I had to be on the inside at the time!) while donating money to a third (the Libertarian Party of Canada) and voting for a fourth (the Natural Law Party, the nutcases who believe 7,000 meditators could solve the world's problems by creating the right vibes--obviously a protest vote since the Rhino Party was killed by the last reform of Canadian electoral law). I'm a moderately active member of the Coalition on Human Rights in Alberta and a member of and the transgender resource person for the Calgary chapter of PFLAG (Parents and Friends of Lesbians, Bisexuals and Gays).

Weirdest Thing I Own: A mint-condition Radio Shack Realistic TR-802 8-track recorder-player with Dolby. Yup, that's right, I can still make freshly recorded 8-tracks of your favorite music! I have rather unusual collecting habits, so the competition was pretty stiff in this category. Runner-up was probably an unopened can of Anne of Green Gables beer from the now-defunct "Canadian World" theme park in Ashibetsu, Japan, which was devoted to Anne of Green Gables.

Most Embarrassing Thing I Do: Read romance novels with pregnant heroines (My fantasy rears its head again. In a true tribute to niche marketing, there are actually quite a lot of these, believe it or not. My fantasy must be reasonably common among women to support a whole series of books!)

Television Appearances: an interview on the Barrie, Ontario TV station when I came back from studying in Russia in 1979; a week on the game show "Jackpot" in 1986; a leading part in a documentary feature on the Illusions Social Club which was filmed for CBC Roughcuts in 1995 (en femme); brief views of me on the local news in the Pride Parade in Calgary in 1996 and 1997 (en femme). I was also interviewed once on CBC radio about Illusions in 1995, and have done a few brief radio talks in Calgary to discuss my field of professional expertise.

Best Transgender Movies I've Seen: "Just Like a Woman", a very realistic portrayal (until the fantasy ending) of a heterosexual; crossdresser in London, UK. Also "Flawless", a movie with Robert De Niro as a bigoted cop who has a stroke and then takes singing lessons from a TS who is eking out a living as a drag performer, and "Better than Chocolate", a movie about a lesbian in Vancouver who has a TS friend.

Best Transgender Book I've Read: S/he: Changing Sex and Changing Clothes by Claudine Griggs, the result of a long series of interviews with transsexuals, both MTF and FTM (the author is herself a new woman).

Education: Honours B.A. (Economics and Russian), Laurentian University, 1980; MBA, University of British Columbia, 1982; Ph.D. (International Business), University of British Columbia, 1991. (No, it didn't take me nine years to get my doctorate--I worked for a while in the banking biz in between degrees).

Countries Visited:

As Teri Jane:

As Terry:

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