Babes in Bronco-land part one

It was approximately 2:50 am last wednesday when I awoke (barely) to set off on my trip out to Denver. My mom, being the Brahman-ish deity that she is, offered to drive me to the airport at the ungodly hour of 4 am, although truth be told, she is normally out the door by 5:30 or so anyways. Not only would I get to hang with my brand new niece and her mom and dad (my brother and sister-in-law) for a week, but I would also be hooking back up with an old friend Tori and a bunch of other t-girls from the Denver area for a weekend of drunken debauchery.

This was to be a major milestone for me from it's very beginning: passing through airport security and flying as a woman. The security thingy was the major concern since as I mentioned in a prior post, I had purchased my ticket under my old name several months ago (at the time I didn't realize how quickly the change over would happen). Luckily, my brand-spanking new driver's license, WITH the sex field clearly marked "F" had arrived in the mail only days before. I had also gotten a new social security card, work ID and credit card (yay for me!). I also brought along my old license and a certified copy of my legal name change order. For this occasion I had donned my new zebra-patterned tunic over my maroon hip-hugger pants, along with my biker boots and a light make-up job. I was fully prepared to parry any bureaucratic, legalistic or chauvanistic attacks the Man could throw at me!

That's certainly not to say I wasn't sweating a bit as I approached the ticket counter to get my boarding pass and check my luggage. After fumbling and mumbling my way to trying to explain my name change to the poor airline person and finally just shoving both my photo ID's into her lap, she gave me my ticket and sent me on my way with no hassle whatsoever. Next was security. Being the quick learner I am, at this point, with ticket already in hand, I decided to take the easy way out and show the guard my old ID. Worked like a charm - no problems! Being so early, it was also dead at the security gate and so I breezed by quickly. Whew!!!

Half a day later, but in human time, only a couple hours later, I arrived in Denver (via Chicago) to see my smiling sister-in-law and her snoozing daughter awaiting me. My huge suitcase (a girl has GOT to have outfit options you know!) even arrived after only about 5 minutes and we set off into the environs of the strange and flat uniformity of residential and strip mall architecture that so dominates the western suburbs of Denver.

On to my niece! What a total sweety, outfitted with an innocent, dimpled smile like her mom and a sometimes blank stare of absent wonderment like her dad when I start talking politics to him. And as would be expected of a two+ month old, she's as light and tiny as a mini-schnauzer-sized, heroin-addicted Lara Flynn Boyle, complete with a wispy mane of rust red hair and a body covered in wrinkles. Needless to say, I fell in love on the spot. I am an aunt! Can't wait to start buying her little outfits. That will have to be later though because through gifts and loans, they already have a full closet's worth. Not gonna bore you with the details on my stay with my family - suffice to say it was thoroughly relaxing and enjoyable and oh so needed! Lots of good eats, home-brewed beer, baseball and discovery channel and a good dose of low-key outdoors as well. My kinda vacation...

This life of ease, however, was scheduled to be interrupted for a couple days over the weekend as Tori and her merry gang of buxom babes was to have a 2 day party and club extravaganza, sort of in my honor I guess, although I get the distinct impression these girls do so on a regular basis with or without me, hehe. Anyways, back to the adventure:

On Friday evening my brother was kind enough to drop me off downtown at Tori and Cassandra's apartment (they are engaged to be married btw - congrats you two!!!) where I could get all vamped up for the evening's festivities. The plan was to have our own "school girls' night" at a club called LaRumba, called LipGloss on Fridays.

So Tori and I donned our plaid skirts and headed over to Markie's place to meet up with the rest of the gang for some pre-club drinks (Cassandra was working but would join us out later). By the way, if you've never had Fat Tire beer - check it out - local microbrew that tastes fantastic. I made Tori stop on the way and picked up a twelver and a small bottle of vodka for Markie. A few beers later (mixed drinks for everyone else) and a few girls larger, we piled into two cars and headed for LaRumba just down the street...