It's Better In Writing

About two weeks ago, the boss and myself had a two hour meeting about the salon. We discussed which way we wanted to talk the salon. My duties to him and to the salon. What he wanted to achieve in the salon. Most of this meeting was him working out the details in his head and me being a sound board.

Well something happened yesterday at work and I went ballistic. I was alone when I had seen what happened and was unable to vent. Finally my boss showed up and I showed him what made me so upset. I even left a nasty gram to the culprit who pushed my last gay nerve.

Last night my boss calls me up asking me to write a list of things I need from the salon and from him. So today we had a 45 minute discussing 13 plus issues I needed to address. We both handled these issues in a very professional demeanor. There was no arguing, tears, shouting at each other as sometimes these meetings rise to out of hand levels.

We are still clearing the other and it won't be cleared for another few days until we have a full staff meeting. He knows where I stand and I know where he stands on the above issues. I'm still not a happy camper yet, but the air was cleared to go further in our working relationship.

EnRaged!!!

I am so enraged right now that I could spit nails. Yesterday I contacted the Triangle Speakers about talking to schools about being gay and having HIV/AIDS.

This was their response:

Hi, Mikey. I'm responding to your phone call about our training tomorrow.

Our panels speak primarily about GLBT issues, period. Some closely related issues also get discussed, such as family, coming out issues, same-sex marriage, etc. AIDS has certainly been mentioned in passing on panels. But we are not an HIV/AIDS speaker bureau and do not want that to be the focus of any speaker's presentation any more than someone would focus on any other GLBT issue. Our speakers speak from our own experiences; we do not lecture on facts or ideologies.

So I suspect we may not be a good venue for the kind of speaking you would like to do. In case you are interested in "just" speaking on GLBT issues, I am forwarding training details. If you plan to attend, please reply to this and I will send you some advance material that you will need before tomorrow's session.

Either way, thank you for your interest in Triangle Speakers.

I do have HIV/AIDS you fucking idiot. It will be my own experience!! Are they so deft thinking HIV/AIDS is not part of the GLBT community? Are they trying to be so Santa Cruz politically correct that they are ignoring HIV/AIDS? Right now I'm like a tiger in a cage waiting to pounce my claws into the nearest victim who pisses me off. Fuck Santa Cruz and it's being so politically correct. This group must want the spread of the HIV/AIDS virus!!

The Interview And First Step

Yesterday I had my interview with the collage student discussing HIV/AIDS. What I liked about this student was that he came prepared with questions. I helped out another U.C.S.C. student doing an interview and they had no questions in hand and very unprepared.

We were able to use one of the rooms at S.C.A.P. He set up the recording device and we talked for about a hour. He checked the recording device and oopsie it didn't record anything of the interview of the full hour. So he was able to get the device to record and talked about my experience dealing with HIV/AIDS for another hour and a half.

I really love speaking to people about HIV/AIDS. His project is only suppose to be up to eight minutes long. He has a lot of editing to complete and a huge amount of information. He also thanked me for being so open and knowledgeable about HIV/AIDS. Most people in his mind, would have only given yes or no answers to the questions and not be truly open to educate.

I took my first step to public speaking about the HIV/AIDS virus. There is a volunteer, private sector group known as the Triangle Speakers who go out to schools discussing issues in the gay community. I placed a phone call to them asking for more information about public speaking.

Was HIV/AIDS Developed For Bio Warfare?

My new roomie turned my onto Firefox's stumble. So as a topic, I typed in HIV/AIDS to see what I could find. I happen to come across this government document which talks about HIV/AIDS in 1969-1970 before the epidemic spread worldwide .

I'm not sure how I feel about this document. Is it real or is it bogus. It talks about government funding for the defense department for depopulation from the House Of Representives. All I can say is read this document and judge for yourselves. My emotions are very confused after reading this document.

Oh What A Feeling

I'm so happy today that I'm as giddy as a school girl in heat. I went to the doctor today to get my lab results. I waited patiently for my doctor to arrive in my room and give me my results. I'm always nervous when I have my labs drawn never knowing when I'm going to take a turn for the worst.

Well my doctor pulled up my numbers and I almost keeled over. He told me my T cells had jumped over 120 points. They are now at 608. This is the first time they have been over the 600 mark. This is almost 10 times what they were a little over three years ago. I started this journey with only 65 T cells.

As for my viral load, it was at 62 which is very good. It's only 12 points from being undetectable. I have been undetectable and this small jump doesn't worry my doctor. He was quite happy with my results. Your viral load is considered undetectable when it is less then 50.

OMG oh what a feeling, I want to do the horizontal dance with someone right now on the ceiling....to celebrate. hehehehehe

And Here's To You...Mikey

This has been a truly weird week. It's been so up and down I don't know where to start. Let's see, things that happen to me. My boss and I had a two hour meeting Monday so I didn't get my duties done. I've been playing catch up all week. The videography is going to be an audio and slide show instead of a tape. I made a pot of coffee and forgot to turn on the coffee maker.

Our part time receptionist had carpal tunnel surgery. She showed up at the salon for work. Well I had to the bank for my boss, the receptionist asked if I would take car and fill it up with gas. I took her car and the gas station I was going to go to was closed due to construction. (It wasn't when I rode by in the morning to work. I went to another gas station and gout out of the S.U.V. I went back to the gas tank door and pushed on the side to open the door. It's didn't open so I pushed on the top, the bottom, then the other side. Still the door didn't open. So I took something blunt on her key chain and try to pry it open and still it didn't open. I was thinking "How the hell do you open this gas tank door?" Then it struck me it might have a hinge inside the car cabin. I open the driver door and looked down and there it was in it's full glory. DUH!!

Valentines Day was alright until the last three two hours of work. My boss decided to ride my ass about an issue. He put more duties in my hands and I still haven't gotten my raise from over a year ago. He needs to start throwing me some nice bones like weekly bonus, or getting me some nice stuff if he can't afford giving me a raise.

Right after that, the owner calls asking me when she got back if I would run to our supplier where she was at for they screwed up our order. So I did go back to the supplier getting everything handled.

After I came back from the supply house, my boss had a client in my chair who isn't in my top 10 of favorite clients. She is a 90 year old woman who looks like she's 65 and acts like a 30 year old. Well this LOL PITA (Little Old Lady Pain IN The ASS) started hitting on me. She complimented on how I was dressed. She kept going on and on how cute I was and that she wanted take me home and eat me up (Ewwwwwwwwwwww.) I'm so not into women!! I asked her "Are you trying to seduce me Mrs. Robinson?" She just kept going on, and on and would leave me alone. So I kept calling her Mrs. Robinson until I left work.

Then she had the audacity hinting that she wanted me to take her dog for a walk. She also asked me if I liked her dog. (I just kept my mouth shut and walked out of the room. We allowed her to bring her dog into the salon one time. The fucking dog pissed on the floor and I had to clean up the piss. I never told her about the piss.)

After I left the room, I completed my duties and asked my boss if I could leave. He said sure and I changed my clothes and got my ass out of there as fast as I could get my ass out of the salon. Last night I was so pissed, and frustrated. I wanted to go out to bar, get a stiff drink, raise my glass toasting "And here's to you...Mikey! You give and give and get shit upon. You give and give and yet you receive nothing but aggravation in return!!"

Report And Video

A few weeks ago I went to the Ryan White Santa Cruz Aids task force meeting. At the meeting, I requested the 2007 report for all the HIV/AIDS statics for the county of Santa Cruz. It arrived today and I have some reading to complete.

I'm also going to be starting the videography next Wednesday. I'm stoked to put the message out on tape about HIV/AIDS even if it is a college project.

Living With AIDS

I'm still reeling from finding out I'm always going to be considered to having AIDS and not HIV. Saturday night I really could have used someone in my bed holding me all night. I was upset and couldn't sleep, but I never totally broke down for those days are over.

Sunday I went down to work hoping to be alone and do some of my duties. The only major duty I was able to complete was washing some hairpieces for the cancer society. You see the owner was there and going to be there all day doing permanent make-up. She needed to concentrate so she could work on her clients with very little distractions.

I came home from the shop and needed time to think. I finally ended up at the lighthouse by the harbor just watching the bay thinking to myself. (We have two lighthouses here in Santa Cruz.) Sitting there thinking, does this information change my numbers? No!! Does this information change how I feel? No. All this information did was to throw me a nice mental mind fuck.

It might take me a few days to bounce back from knowing I'll always be considered having AIDS. I've bounced back from worse things then this information. One person asked me "How did you manage to go on and not just want to lay down and die?" Some days I truly feel I would love to just lay down and die. All this disease has done is giving me heart ache and pain. Granted, I've been able to help others from educating on the net and the real world. How about something nice for me once? Let it come to me easy too instead of everything always being a fight.

Guest Speaking Part 2, AIDS, Videography

So yesterday I was a guest client speaker for a Santa Cruz AIDS Project volunteer training. I sat there all day waiting for my turn to talk. I asked the presenters not to disclose my HIV status until I talked. They were nice enough to do so and I learned somethings I didn't know. Even us people who try to educate about HIV/AIDS can always learn from others. Well they were running late and the meeting went over it's time. I was suppose to have a half hour to talk. That was cut down to 20 minutes. I made my presentation in 15 minutes. There were a few important items I wanted cover but missed. I hope the new volunteers got a lot out of my presentation.

One of the things I learned was, when you are diagnosed with AIDS. Meaning your T cells are under 200 you stay an AIDS patient even if your t cells go above 200 like my T cells. I always thought you reverted to being HIV positive and I was wrong in my thinking. So today, I found out technically I'm considered to have AIDS. Needless to say, I had the presenter reiterate that statement. Then I had to walk out of the room from this shocker. So instead of having HIV, I have AIDS. I brought up this shocking point during my presentation.

After the training was over, some people came up to me thanking me for sharing my story. I did my presentation about an hour and a half after finding out technically I have AIDS. One young gentlemen approach me asking if I would be his subject for a videography for a class project. I'm granting his wish to be his subject for his video.

Guest Speaking

Today I'm guest speaking about my story living with HIV/AIDS at a Santa Cruz AIDS Project volunteer training. I'm so stoked to be public speaking. This ones going to be really fun too. I'm going to be sitting during the whole meeting acting like I'm a new volunteer being in a Jedi mode.

Then the person who is doing the presentation will ask me to get up to speak. In the middle of the presentation I'm doing, I'm going to reveal that I'm HIV positive. This will blow their minds for they will have been sitting in a room with some who's positive not knowing I'm positive. This will sink in and blow their minds. I love my life sometimes. hehehehehe

Community HIV Update

This morning, I want to do a generic posting on the Community HIV Update forum I attended last last night. This forum was truly something I needed to continue my educating on the net. The person heading the forum placed in prospective, layman's terms the replication of the HIV/AIDS virus. He also informed us how the antivirals work inhibiting replication of the virus, new medical guidelines for starting treatment with antivirals.

Other information he passed on to us were such things as:

• Long time survivors having rabid aging

• Structured interruptions also known as drug vacations don't work

• There are at least four new antivirals being developed soon to be released by the FDA.

I found some other statistics very interesting. According to him, the CDC will soon be releasing that 30 to 60 percent of people living with HIV/AIDS don't know they have HIV/AIDS. This is up from 25 percent not knowing when I was diagnosed. I was one of those people not knowing they had the HIV/AIDS virus.

This statistic blew my socks off. Taking a three drug regiment today, most people have an undetectable viral load in 6 years. With as sick I was when I was diagnosed, (and taking more then three drugs) I have become undetectable in less then 3 years from a viral load of 555,221 and a collapsed immune system (my t-cells were at 65.)

Yes, I did ask this gentleman a few questions I wanted answered. The first questions was:

Me- " With doctors overdosing people with AZT when first released, do you feel it is now causing the other health issues in long time survivors?"

His answer - "We had millions of people dying at the time, the health issues also could be from the drug Zerit."

That skirted around my question not answering yes or no, but this ones skirt was much better.

My question "In February of 2005, the "Super Virus (which was drug resistant) hit New York City. Does the CDC fear that we will again be hit by the "Super Virus?"

He talked about the importance of taking your meds so the virus wouldn't mutate. He never did answer that question or talked about safe sex and condoms.

My last question was "Last month there was an article about a German scientist finding a protein in semen that enhances the HIV/AIDS virus 100, 000 fold, what are we doing here in the states about this find?"

He said stating "State researchers are looking into this finding and drug companies are looking into ways to combat this finding."

Little did I know sitting in this forum was one of the co founders of the Santa Cruz AIDS Project. He made it a appoint to introduce himself to me acknowledging how up to date and knowledgeable I was about HIV/AIDS. I informed him, I try to educate on myspace and my blog to the best of my ability about the HIV/AIDS virus living with it daily. I nearly fainted from his acknowledgment of my work educating about the HIV/AIDS virus after he left. I'm going to have a shitty ass grin on my face all day from meeting him.

Footnote: I'm still decompressing from last night and I took a lot of notes. I'll be posting more information in later postings.

Dell Product (RED) Laptop

Today I called Dell about their product red laptop. I wanted to know more information and cost so I could save up to purchase one of these sweet laptops. When I called I asked about the price and features. Their no frills model XPS M1530 starts at $1150.00 dollars. They also told me that fully loaded would run anywhere between $3000.00 to $4000.00 dollars. As mush as I would love to have one of these laptops right now, it's going to be quite a long, long, long, time till I'm able to get the laptop I desire. They also didn't tell me about hidden charges such as shipping and handling and such.

Open Mouth, Insert Foot

The other day I was at the AIDS project and noticed what I thought was a very handsome Afro American gentlemen. After the young gentleman left, I went up to his case worker and ask "Who was that, for he was a real cutie?" It turns out he wasn't Afro American but Jamaican. He is also going to be my new roommate. I'll just open my mouth and insert my foot now. Go figure, this would only happen to me. Ughhhh!!

Please Read This Posting

Today I want to pimp someone else's blog for I feel it's a very important posting. Here I am on the world wide net, myspace, and the bloggers sphere trying to educate about HIV/AIDS, and living daily with HIV/AIDS.

LGBT Revolution e mailed back and forth with someone who was ignorant and abrasive of their information about the HIV/AIDS virus. LGBT Revolution blogged the conversations and responses they had with this person.

I had to walk away from LGBT's posting a few times. I really couldn't believe my eyes what I was reading. It was so disturbing to me it got my knickers in an uproar. LGBT's posting is something everyone should read.

Thank you for doing that blog posting LGBT. To read this amazing and disturbing post, please click here. If you are the person who had this conversation with the LGBT Revolution please delete yourself IMMEADATLY as my friend on myspace. You are no friend of mine and I do not want you as a friend on myspace or in the real world.

Make * A * Wish For Adults Part 2: A Response

When I wrote "Make * A * Wish For Adults", I was frustrated that I couldn't find an organization to grant wishes to people like myself with chronic illnesses. Never in my life did I ever expect a response from the founder of the "Dream Foundation" on one of my blogs. This small act shows me that the work I'm doing on my blog and myspace is starting to pay off. That I am educating people on the net. Though this wasn't as good as one of my wishes being granted, it was almost as good as one of my wishes being granted. Respect and notoriety is amazing to me supporting an illness in my opinion will never be cured. I do feel we will develope a vaccine for the HIV/AIDS virus. Below is the comment I found on one of my blogs today. I'm as giddy as a school girl winning home coming queen.


Hi Poz Mikey,

My name is Thomas Rollerson, Founder of the Dream Foundation. In 1994, after a battle with AIDS, my partner/soul mate of almost 10 years died. Just prior, I phoned wish granting organizations to bring him some comfort and joy. Like you, I was frustrated when I learned that many organizations existed for the final wishes of children, but nothing for adults. I had a choice, to lose myself in my frustration, anger and grief, or use it, towards making a positive change. Additionally, the love I had from friends and family and the eternal love of my partner was much stronger than my grief. So, I focused my frustration, which manifested into passion, and set out to pay the love forward.


I never dreamed of serving the numbers we do today, and yet, as you pointed out the need is still great. I don't think any organization, certainly not Dream Foundation wants to exclude anyone enduring life's challenges. We simply don't have the resources to serve everyone, and as you can imagine, procuring support for adult wishes has it's challenges. With limited resources we do have to make some tough choices, and when I began, I chose to focus on those with the shortest life expectancy. With two small offices and budget, honoring the final wishes of all adults at end of life is not possible by one agency, let alone expanding to serve the millions of adults living with Chronic illness. Of course, it is my dream every human being could realize their dreams.


When I began Dream Foundation the E.D. of the LA Make A Wish shared she was happy they at last had somewhere they could refer all the adults that called. Perhaps someday I'll be able to say the same for all the calls we get from those living with Chronic Illnesses.


I hope you understand when I say, I'm glad you are blessed not to qualify for Dream Foundation, and with all my heart I hope YOU realize your dreams too!


Thomas W. Rollerson
Founder/President
Dream Foundation
www.dreamfoundation.org
(805) 564-2131 office

That is the response today that blew my socks off and out the door. Please support the Dream Foundation. Adults with terminal and chronic illnesses have dreams too.