LIX - Newsletter

Hey LIX Chicks!

First off this month, I want to extend a big thank you to our Wondrous Web Wizard Wendy for a new page that she's created for the LIX web site. At the brilliant suggestion of LIX Chick Pam, Wendy has added a summary page of the five-minute infomercials from our LIX coffee meetings! This new page tells you who spoke, what the topic was, the speaker's web address (with a direct link) and another link that takes you directly to the e-newsletter containing a summary of that infomercial. Bloody brilliant! To check out this great addition, go to www.girlswanttoknow.com and select 'Events'; then click on 'Monthly Coffee Meetings'. At the bottom of that page you'll see 'Click here to see a list of our fabulous 5 minute infomercials'...click there and voila! you'll be taken to the new page. Thanks again Wendy and thanks Pam for the excellent suggestion.

Well...just when I thought I had menopause sufficiently under control, along comes the 'Attack of the Chin Hairs'! Those of you who are familiar with this quirky manifestation of hormonal shifting know exactly what I'm talking about. For the rest of you, I hope you're not wearing bifocals when the dreaded chin hairs become an issue! I never know if I should leave my glasses on or take the damn things off when I'm zooming in on one of the coarse little devils with my tweezers. Just when I think I have it in my grasp, I realize that, due to the distortion created by my 'progressive' lenses, I'm actually about 1/16 of an inch to the left of my target! So I take off my glasses and approach the mirror more closely...close enough to see, but so close that I have to turn the tweezers sideways to fit them between my hand and the mirror (I'm incredibly nearsighted)! It usually takes me about 47 tries before I'm successful. Ah...the joys of being a middle-aged, menopausal dyke.

That being said, there's one aspect of being in menopause that absolutely delights me. I, for one, am quite thrilled not to be having periods anymore. No more cramping, no more emotional roller-coasters of PMS, and no more bleeding! Call me crazy but I enjoy bypassing the ‘feminine products’ aisle in my local drugstore. A few years ago, my mother (a.k.a. Saint Josephine) had to have a hysterectomy at the ripe old age of 82. After her surgery, she needed to wear pads for a week and sent me off to the Shoppers Drug Mart for 'supplies'. Well...I'll tell you I couldn't make head nor tail of the feminine hygiene aisle! What had happened in the years since I stopped having periods? The aisle was about a quarter of a mile long and there were pads and tampons stacked six shelves high! What exactly is a ‘light days, fresh weave, super-wings, maxi, pantiliner’ anyway? In desperation I sidled up to the only other woman in the aisle and asked her for assistance. Fortunately, she turned out to be the Martha Stewart of feminine hygiene products and within seconds directed me to the appropriate product for geriatric women recovering from gynecological surgery! Who knew?

Which leads me to this month's LIX coffee meeting. Lucy and I drove up to The Roasted Cherry at 6:30 on July 3rd only to find the place closed. What! Was I having a menopausal moment here? It was Tuesday wasn't it? Had I possibly received an email from Rob telling me that they were closed and then totally forgotten that I had read it? No I hadn't, damn it! Well we still don't know what happened, but let's just say the coffee was not brewin' at the old Cherry that night. Lucy is on the case and she will most definitely find out what went wrong. As we were locked out of The Roasted Cherry, we put a sign on the door redirecting our members to the new Starbucks a block away. There we had a small (about 25 LIX Chicks) but very festive mini-meeting. Five new women showed up! And a good time was had by all! On top of that, the staff at the Starbucks brought around trays of samples of three of their new summer frosted beverages. My guess is that they were so thrilled to have any customers at all (there were only two people there when we arrived) that they went nuts trying to entice us with Starbuck's products.

Nonetheless, on behalf of the Steering Committee, please accept our apologies for the inconvenience...especially to those women who came early to have dinner at The Roasted Cherry and to any women who saw the lights off and drove on without reading the sign that explained where we were. And thanks to all of you who tromped down to Starbucks and made the best of a confusing situation...especially our two five-minute infomercial presenters, Marika and Heidi. As Starbucks was way too small for presentations, Marika and Heidi will have the floor at our August meeting and we'll move the scheduled August speakers to September.

Thanks again everyone for all your patience and understanding. LIX Chicks are the best! See you back at the Cherry in August.

Special Interest Groups and Activities:

1. Motorcycle Club for Lesbians. LIX member, Molly King,has started a motorcycle group to unite experienced women motorcycle enthusiasts as well as beginning riders. She's looking for lesbians who are interested in fostering a positive image and promoting safe riding skills. Molly also encourages women who may be thinking of buying a motorcycle or who would like to be a passenger to join the group. She has contacted the organizers of the Canada Safety Council Motorcycle Course in Ottawa, Kingston and Cornwall to let them know that this new club is starting up in Ottawa. For more information, contact Molly at doberman@monaco.ca or (613) 282-1068 (cell) or (613) 335-2906 (home).

2. The Ottawa Out Golfing Group (OOGG) is a friendly, recreational golf league for gay men, lesbian women, bisexual and transgender persons of all skills and abilities - beginner through to expert. The National-Capital-Region-based league plays golf weekdays and weekends at courses in and around Ottawa and Gatineau from mid-April through to the end of October. If you want to know more about the OOGG or if you want to register with the OOGG, please contact the coordinator, Robert, at (613) 565-1967 or by email at rmeagher@istar.ca. (See details about the August 11th tournament and BBQ below...#14)