Faux Queen Interview and Drag Promo

Here's a little of what's been happening behind the scenes with me! Check out my interview at Corset Connection

AND

Here is my girl diva promo for Miss Oklahoma Diva USofA (drag promo coming soon!!).

Photo by Micheal Owens at Velvet Burnout Photography.

What do you think!??!!? Let me know in the comments below.

Drag Faux Queen Series: The "T" (In 25 Things or Less)

Think of this new drag series, The T, as your one stop shop of the ins and outs, how to's, and VIP access into the fabulous world of drag!

EVERYTHING that you could know, should know, and even some things you may NOT want to know about drag, performance, make-up, etc. will be spilled in The T. 

AND

you'll get all this fabulousity in 25 things or less?!??!

AH MAZ ING!I

"The T" series kicks off tomorrow with Drag from A to Z --a little over 25, yes i know. But i have never been good at following directions.

:)

Here's a little sneak peak:

Glamour

I L I V E for glam drag. Glam drag is my element, my niche. But the beauty about glamour is that it’s not definitive or universal for all. My drag glam could be completely opposite of yours, yet we can still both be serving glam fish. That’s because glamour is one of those rare things that you can find any/everywhere: celebrities, architecture, food, etc. And glamour can be found in all forms of drag: gender fuck drag, subversive drag, political drag, camp drag. You name it; it’s there. The best thing about glamour is that you define it because glamour isn’t just a look, but it’s also an attitude. It’s putting 100% into your art. It’s knowing and being the best goddamn drag queen you can be. Now THAT’S fucking glam OUROUS!!!

To read the full article tomorrow go to www.brandiamaraskyy.com or www.fauxqueens.com and click on the The T Series.

Brandi Amara Skyy Faux Queen Fabulous Musings Interview

Ever want to know more about how i came to be me?!?! Well here's your chance. Check out my fellow blogger and faux queen's interview about your favorite faux queen--ME!

Check it out here!

And while you're, there take a look around her blog. She is one FABULOUS MUSING!!!

Now go get your DRAG ON!!

Miss Diva USofA or Why i Have Been Missing From my Blog

i know, i know!! BAD BLOGGER!! IT'S BEEN OVER 10+ DAYS SINCE MY LAST BLOG!!

BUT

i have a really good excuse (i really do!).

THIS is why i have been a little bit absent as of late

Yep, that's right ladies, gentlemen, kats, kittens, and squirrels  The Miss Gay USofA system has (finally) added a female female impersonation circuit, i.e. faux queen, i.e. ME!!

Anyone that knows me, knows that i have wanted to be (and win) in a (what i call) a "big girl pageant" (meaning not a charity pageant). i love and have been a part of the drag and pageant circuit for so long and i still can't believe that i'm finally going to get to compete on this kind of MAJOR level. 

YEA!!!!!!!!!!!

This is the first year that USofA is doing a Diva division and there really are NO words to describe how uber excited i am. i'm doing Miss Oklahoma because there is not a prelim in Texas (yet :)) and it really kinda is a home away from home. Miss Oklahoma Diva is a prelim to the National Title, Miss Diva USofA. And, of course, i have made it my goal to be crowned the first Miss Diva USofA.

and THAT'S why i've been MIA. i've been slaving away in my drag sweatshop for the past couple of weeks working to make my number #1 dream come true: to be a real drag pageant queen. 

It's hard. i have no life right now. i'm getting high of E6000. i have glue stuck to various parts of my body . . .

BUT

it's all worth it and i wouldn't have it any other way. 

i am finally getting a chance to fulfill a lifelong drag dream--one that i wasn't sure would EVER happen--of mine and on March 31st i get show the USofA system the fruits of all my hard labor. 

But the best part is . . . 

i get to do it with other women who love and appreciate the art of drag as much as i do. 

This is a first in the drag community and all of the Miss Diva contestants will become a part of drag history and that in and of itself insures that NO ONE will walk out of this pageant a loser. 

i'll keep ya posted!!!

Drag Cap & Drag Snaps: Gaybingo Dallas, Bellydancing, and Miss Gay Dallas America

February has been an extremely busy month and it's looking like March is heading in that direction as well. In addition to my days in drag, i have also gotten back into bellydancing--Miabella at Crescent Moon Studios is one of the most loving and amazing women i have ever met.

Here are my favorite Drag Snaps from this past week. Enjoy!

Female Drag Queen Anthology (Originally titled: Faux Queen Anthology)

Hello dragsters! i am uber excited to announce a new addition to the female drag queen anthology family!!!!!!!

Kentucky Fried Woman is coming on as our burlesque editor! She is a fierce and fabulous performer, one of the co-authors of the "Bio-Queen Manifesto," and my new and AMAZING lifelong friend!!

Photo Michelle Yoder Photography

Here's a peak at all the dragtastical things she has done:

Kentucky Fried Woman is an Oakland, CA based danceer and drag performer/emcee/producer and social justice activist. She co-founded and performs with several groups including ButchBallet & ButchTap. She also played Hermoine Granger in Hogwarts Express: The Musical and collaborates with many bay area queer performance artists. KFW is known for her wacky events like the always themed Kentucky Fried Woman Show. KFW started performing in the queer cabaret community with the Santa Barbara based troupe the Disposable Boy Toys in 2000 and went on to found the Seattle-based ground-breaking, fat positive  queer performance group the Queen Bees before relocating to Oakland. She is available to speak, produce, perform and emcee events and also teaches classes and facilitates workshops on a variety of subjects related to bodies and identity.

i LOVE this woman and i'm so excited to have her on board!

YEA!

Netchick on Demand Show: Brandi Amara Skyy, 2 Fierce Dallas Faux Queens, and 2 Queens

Last night's Netchick on Demand show kicked off a VERY busy week for me: 2 full production shows, 1 commissioned blog, 1 pageant, 3 rehearsals, and the continuation of Project Nunway.

And if that isn't enough, i am still keeping up with my other blogs, editing the female drag anthology, transcribing my interview with the women of the "Bio Queen Manifesto," and writing my own piece.

*WHEW*

i'm one busy queen!

Check the pics of last night show plus scroll all the way down for a video!!

xoxox

All photos courtesy of LTF Productions (unless otherwise noted).

\

Photo Courtesy of Vanity Storm

So now that you've seen the pics are you ready to see the show?!?!? Check it out!!

Project Nunway Dallas and ME!

i'm so excited that i will designing for the 2013 Project Nunway show in April. The theme is "A Fairy's Tale" (i'm going to have LOTS of fun with that one!) and i've already been paired up with a sister. i'd like to introduce you to my new muse Sister Plenty O'Cleavage!!!

Get ready for some serious drag couture and bling! i'm going to be video blogging my progress on my brandi amara skyy youtube channel so be sure to check it out. (You can visit my channel here.)

Check out what all the hype is about. This is from the San Francisco Project Nunway show earlier this month!

Seriously. How much flawlessness can one person take!??!?!?!

New Drag Promo Shot!

2013 is going to be the year of the pageants! There are at least three that i'm looking to compete in: Miss CEBA Sweetheart, Miss Diva USofA, and the Rose Room Rising Star. With all this competing, i had to have a promo shot.

Enter drag mother extraordinaire Jenna Skyy and violià! Drag promo house down!This is my first drag promo EVER and i think it's FLAWLESS! What do you think?!?!

TA-DA!!!

YEA!!! Now i'm ready to take on the pageant world by storm!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Dallas Block Party-- A Faux and 3 Drag Queens

What an amazing and unexpected weekend!

Here in Dallas, we have what is known as THE block party the weekend before Halloween; the street closes down, everyone gets dressed up, and they drink, drink, and drink. It's something that everyone needs to experience at least once.

i didn't plan on going this year (i've gone to all but one since i've lived here), but the drag-verse had other plans. At the last minute (literally 20 minutes *gasp*), i was texted by Richard Curtain--GM & show director at S4/The Rose Room not to mention THE Edna Jean Robinson--reminding me of a performance that i had committed to early in the week. i hadn't heard anything about it so i just ASSumed it wasn't happening.

SOOOOO

i painted the quickest drag mug EVER and ran across the street--trying to part the seas of people that were everywhere--and was greeting with the news that i was going to be performing with, not only Edna herself, but two of the baddest drag bitches in Dallas: Jenna Skyy and Krystal Summers.

HELLO!?!?! IT DOESN'T GET MUCH MORE FLAWLESS FOR A FAUX QUEEN!!

And there i was: in front of thousands of cheering Halloweeners as one of the 4 fiercest and best dressed queens on the block.

Wanna see?!?!?

(It's not my favorite pic of myself, but hey--it captured a moment that otherwise would have lived only in my head.)

Me, Jenna Skyy, and Krystal Summers

(That's my legs on the left!!) We were number 7 of the 15 Best Costumes at the block party!

WERQ IT GOLDIGGERS!!!

Great night, great peeps, and the longest catwalk ever!!

Here are more fun block party pics



To see the rest of the pics, click here.

Ahhh...i love Halloween!

Cartoon Characters in Drag. Let the Dragulation Commence!!

So i thought we'd do something uber-fun today! i am a SUCKER for cartoons (in particular the Powerpuff Girls, South Park, Family Guy, and Jem and the Holograms) and watch them often. Yesterday i was fucking around on Facebook and i came across this picture:

Best Powerpuff Girl EVER!

Not only is Buttercup my FAVORITE PPG, but she's in DRAG!!!!!!!!!!! So i started thinking about other cartoon characters who have donned drag and *POW* this post was born. These cartoons are animation history that drag has been in our pop culture consciousness for quite some time. Here in one fabulous gender bending post are my favorite cartoon drag moments. Grab your Lucky Charms cereal and enjoy!

Disney's the Chipmunks

My favorite cartoon growing up (and still is) Jem and the Holograms--although i identified more with Pizzazz . In retrospect, i really believe that Jem was Jerrica's drag persona and Jerrica, like me, is a faux queen--second only to Miss Piggy. Take a look for yourself:

Day/Night Drag

i don't think it's possible to have a conversation about cartoon drag characters without mentioning the Queen herself:

Bugs Bunny - The original drag queen

Bugs Bunny was in drag SO much that someone got smart and created this (so true BTW):



FLAWLESS

And who can forget when our favorite foul mouthed character donned a wig, dress, and heels (proof that all these things don't necessarily make a drag queen):

Cartman in drag

And my personal favorite--i didn't want him to get jealous since i spotlighted his partner last week:

Kermit the Frog on the Ed Sullivan Show

i was determined to find one of Popeye in drag but it didn't happen. Whatcha think? Did i miss any? Any that you'd like to share?

Bio Queen Manifesto Interview

i am VERY excited to announce that i have the honor of interviewing the 4 AMAZING women who co-authored the Bio Queen Manifesto. The interview is being conducted in 2 parts and i finished the first half last night. What a liberating and exhilarating experience!

As a community, we have such a rich history that we do not necessarily know about because it's scattered all over the place. The Bio Queen Manifesto is such an important piece of our drag history and the manifesto itself is nowhere to be found on the Internet. The myspace page where i originally found it has since been taken down. So i have published it in its original form here. Go read it. It's good stuff. It's a piece of our history that i hope to capture panoramicaly in the interview; the final edited interview will be included in the Female Drag Queen Anthology.

I can't wait to share it with you all!!

Faux Queens the Book: Working Introduction

So with some tweeks of course, here is a sneak peak of the introduction to my work on faux queens.
___________________________________________________________________

    It’s a good thing I was born a girl, otherwise I’d be a drag queen.
                                                                                               Dolly Parton (qtd. in Stevens)


     I was seven years old and I was obsessed with Dorothy’s ruby red slippers. I watched The Wizard of Oz over and over again fast forwarding to the parts that featured the shoes. I needed those shoes in my life, and I was determined to have them.  I rummaged through the all-too-big hand-me-down heels my mother gave me when she was finished with them and found the perfect pair to prep for transformation: a caramel-latte-colored, faux snake-skin, three-inch heel. I asked my mother to take me to the craft store where I had her purchase five tubes of red glitter. Armed with this glitter and an unstoppable imagination, I layered the entire shoe with Elmer’s glue and then covered them completely with those tiny red prisms of magic until I had created my very own pair of ruby red slippers. Fast forward to 2009: I am playing a modern-day Dorothy in a drag show and I am watching my drag mother, Jenna Skyy, somewhat in disbelief, as she transforms a pair of white knee high boots in almost the same way I had: red spray paint, spray adhesive, and buckets of red glitter into those same shoes I had created for myself over twenty years ago. At that moment I knew there was no real distinction, save for biology, between me and my drag mother—I, like her, had always been a queen.


     As far back as I can remember, I have always had an affinity for all things considered to be and accepted as gendered feminine/female excessive. From Dorothy’s ruby red slippers, to my obsession and need to be Miss Piggy—the way she could change her look at the drop of a hat (sometimes literally), I have never been one to shy away from all things shiny, sparkly, and rhinestoned.  So I am not surprised to find myself surrounded by books on drag queens, hyper-feminine female performance, and any/all things excessively marked feminine. Still, despite however closely and deeply connected I was or might have felt towards the drag queen community, there was still one obvious and blaring question that I couldn’t escape: how and where does a biological female (cisfemale/ciswoman) who loves and feels she is all things drag fit into this gay male-dominated community? And then, on a randomly ordinary kind of day, I stumbled upon my answer: in the Wikipedia drag queen entry nestled in-between the various definitions and descriptions was a new term that I, in all my years in the drag, academic, and LGBT communities, had never heard: faux queen. “A faux queen or cisqueen is a female performance artist who adopts the style typical of male drag queens. A faux queen may be jocularly described as ‘a drag queen trapped in a woman’s body,’ though few are female to male transsexuals” (Faux Queen 1).  Needless to say, this discovery set me off on a firestorm of Googling, YouTubing, and endless searches for literature, pictures, articles, personal testimonies—ANYTHING that would manifest and deepen my understanding of this new subset of  drag. My searches led me to small bouts of victory and sporadic revelations: I learned there was a faux queen pageant in San Francisco that began in 1996 and ended 2005 (where was I!?!?) and that more cisfemales than I could have possibly imagined claimed, right along with me, to both feel and identify as a “drag queen trapped in a woman’s body.” But it also led me to more questions and new obstacles: why wasn’t there more literature and scholarship on us? Why and how could I have not heard about these gender performance rebels in all my involvement with my local LGBT and drag communities and academic pursuits?


     This work is an exploratory journey into the world of drag: the art, the illusion, the queens, and how the cisfemales who love them make sense in it. While ciswomen performing various forms of femininity, sexuality, and women’s roles is not new, cisfemales performing drag in the gay male drag world is emerging as something unique. Among the various forms of cisfemale drag are female dragging male—drag kinging, woman dragging woman—burlesque or neo-burlesque, and woman dragging man dragging woman—the faux queen. While I touch upon notions of burlesque, particularly neo burlesque, I am not equipped nor do I have the experience and knowledge in this art form to begin to hypothesize what female/drag performances and identities mean to other cisfemale performers of drag. While I take into account and believe these gender performances carry their own gender, political, and social connotations that bring with them their own unique perspectives and relationship to drag, I do so only in relationship to the drag world and to faux queens. What follows is a narrowly focused snapshot into the complex panoramic world of faux queens. My ultimate goal is to illustrate how the faux queen relates to and transforms drag and gender; I argue that the very act of a ciswoman performing as a gay man performing as a “woman” and the choice to more closely align and identify with a drag queen’s version of femininity (what I call flamboyant femininity) is exactly the kind of transgression that queer studies, academia, and the LGBT community need to embrace in order to expand their definitions and beliefs about gender construction, gender performance, and gender identity.  My work on drag is about carving out and creating new spaces between preexisting ones for myself and others that I could not find in anyone else’s theories, scholarship, and media that surveys women, gender performance theory, gender identity, and drag.  

Drag Queens on the Capitol in Austin, Texas!!

My friend, Kai Lee Mykels, and a group of other queens got together for the second annual Stonewall rally in Austin Texas . . . on the Capitol . . . in drag.

What follows is an amazing visual testament to the many sides and faces of drag: the glamour, the fun, the camaraderie, the celebration, and, yes, the political activism. Being political doesn't stop when we, as queens, put on some make-up, a wig, and a dress. On the contrary. Drag's very nature situates us within political and social contexts, commentaries, and statements. The queens in this picture embody and reflect much of the same political and social gumption and fearlessness that those queens who began the Stonewall riots did.

Texas is NOT an LGBTQ friendly state. Just because it's 2012 and we, on the surface, appear to be making political strides doesn't guarantee that in our everyday lives we, as a society, have progressed beyond the hatred, harassment, and homicide that was the reality before Stonewall. In March of 2012, mother Wanda Derby in Fort Worth Texas beat her son's boyfriend with a cane because they were gay. In the city that i call home and who's streets i roam as a flamboyant and PROUD gay, 2 men were attacked and beaten with BASEBALL BATS. Baseball bats, people. This past June in my hometown of Corpus Christi, young lesbian couple Mary Kristene Chapa and Mollie Olgin were shot in the head. Chapa was in critical condition and Olgin lost her life. The cops said "there was no sign of a hate crime."

And in the very city that these queens took this picture and on Austin's PRIDE weekend, Mike Soret and Andrew Oppleman were on their way to get pizza when a man picked a fight with them and began pounded them with his fists. This happened a week ago today. That could have been you. That could have been me. That could have very well been those queens who were photographed in front of the Capitol of Texas celebrating the birth of our movement that has allowed our community to be open and freely gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and/or queer and remembering that it wasn't always so. And reflecting on the fact that it's not always so now.

Let me clarify: i'm not saying that the trials and tribulations of LGBTQ people are exactly the same as they were back in 1969. We have come a long way. And yes, we are making strides. What i am saying is that hatred of LGBTQ people and the very real consequences of that hatred still exists.

So, as a queer lesbian gay drag faux queen i am thankful and forever grateful. Thankful to be a part of a lineage of bravery, sacrifice, camaraderie, and love. Yes, love. There is a lot of love in our rainbow village. Grateful that there are still queens, as well as others, who are willing to put themselves out there for ALL of us: flamboyantly queer, those who wish to assimilate, those just coming out, those still in the closet, and gay republicans. i am grateful for the queens of the past, the one's in the present, and the many more of the future for their endless bravery of putting on a dress and heels in a society (and a community at times) that doesn't always see drag queens as the invaluable and revolutionary beings that they are. 

This post didn't start off in the manner in which it became; my intention was to post an amazing picture of some drag queens that caught my attention on Facebook and that i connected to for reasons that i didn't quit understand.

i understand them now.

Reno Winston, Samira Sacriste Aguinaga, Robbie Foster, Althea Trix, Kara Foxx Paris, Nadine Hughes, Kai Lee Mykels, Pannica Tack, and Reagan Reynolds shine on you crazy diamonds! And thank you. i am so grateful for you taking that extra (flawlessly heeled) step.

i am humbled and proud to be a part of the drag family.

~b.

miss lifewalk pageant video

look what just got delivered to me!!
so excited to watch it!! yes!

fauxqueens.com forum is now open!!

yep! i'm so excited to announce that the forum at fauxqueens.com is now open and ready for business! that means register, create a profile, and then join in the posting fun!!!

it's been a long time coming and everyone who is already registered has been extremely patient! i'm uber excited and i hope that y'all enjoy :)

click here to join the conversation!!

xoxo
b

female drag anthology call for submissions - revised

so i have redrafted the call for submissions to the new drag anthology i'm editing. since i've redrafted it, i have received so many great and exciting responses. read the revised call below or click on the link.

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS - NEW ANTHOLOGY ON FEMALE DRAG PERFORMERS
Calling ALL Performers of “Feminine” Drag: Faux Queens, Burlesquers, Bio Queens, Femme Dragsters, Female-Female Impersonators, and Drag Queens![1]

Title: TBD

Who: We are looking for female identified individuals who love performing “feminine” drag including but not limited to: bio-queens, female-female impersonators, high femme dragsters, burlesque, faux queens, drag queens, etc. If you are performing as a drag queen or in woman drag, we want to hear from you!

About the project:  This anthology will explore drag from the not-often-written about or discussed female perspective. In majority of drag arenas, female performers are frequently over-looked, undervalued, and are often not  considered to be doing drag because of their choice to drag their birth gender as opposed to its opposite. But over the past few years, female dragsters have slowly begun to emerge, impact, and fashion their places in discourses of drag, gender performance, and queer consciousness. We want this anthology to create a tangible space in which we, in all our drag forms, come together to tell our stories, share our experiences, analyze ourselves in our art, and help pave the way for other female performers. Our goal is that this anthology ignites a dialogue that bridges us to one another, introduces us into discourses of gender performativity and gender identity, and ultimately deepens our connection to the fabulously flawless world of drag.

                                         

What we are looking for: Everything!! We want to engage with all aspects of women performing drag and highlight our diverse voices within it: our personal definitions, our relationships (if any) with drag queens, our lived and/or academic theories, our drag personas and how they developed, and our insatiable need to perform femininity on stage. But we also want to touch upon what goes on behind the scenes by considering questions pivotal to the female drag and drag community: is there something deeper that  bio-women need to understand before proclaiming, “I want to be a drag queen” and/or claim their place in drag? What does the emergence of female identified performers in the world of drag mean for traditional drag queens and drag theory? Is it necessary to be a lesbian and/or queer in order to perform drag? Some other ideas that could be explored:

·         Personal stories and essays on why/how you came to drag

·         Why did you choose the identifier that you did to describe your performance of drag?

·         What does drag mean to you?

·         How would you define the drag that you do?

·         Poetry about your life in drag

·         How have you been perceived by the drag community?

·         Your experiences in the drag community

·         Some of the reactions to your performances

·         Does the drag community in your area embrace what you do?

·         Funny stories, the craziest thing that’s happen to you on/off stage, worst performance, favorite performances

·         Do you believe there’s a difference between all the various female performances of drag, i.e. burlesque, faux, and traditional drag queen drag? Why or Why not?

·         Is your drag performance also your identity?

·         What inspires you? Who are your biggest influences?

·         When and how did you first learn about the female drag community?

·         Tips for those new to the world of the drag. Best advice?

·         Has your acceptance within the drag community changed because of the way you identify?

·         For the bio-female, can/is the desire to be a drag queen a transgender space? Why or why not?

·         Do you have a drag mother? If so, how did that relationship come about?

These are all just ideas to get your creative drag juices flowing! Please don’t limit yourself with this list! We want your experiences, your creativity, and your words. We would also love pictures of your performances, your drag mother, your first time in drag . . . send it all! (But please don’t forget to include your name—drag or real—and some detail about the pictures.) Please forward this call for submissions to any and every one you think would be interested.
               

Anthology information: Publication date will Summer 2013 with a to-be-determined publisher.  We will keep you posted on the project status.

Submission Guidelines: Please include a short bio of yourself. Email your submissions to: submissions@fauxqueens.com or mail them to: Female Drag Anthology, PO Box 195212, Dallas, TX 75219.

Submission Deadline: January 1, 2013

Please feel free to send any questions, comments, and/or ideas to:

baskyy@fauxqueens.com

For more information on faux queens and/or to join our virtual community, please visit: www.fauxqueens.com and/or www.facebook.com/fauxqueens.

---

[1] This call was originally titled “The Faux Queen Anthology.” However, we received a lot of emails about wanting to submit, but being unsure if this anthology included their performance or identity because they didn’t necessarily identify as a faux queen. So we have modified the call to reflect the anthology’s inclusivity that wasn’t adequately portrayed in the initial call. If you consider what you do drag, then we want to hear about it!!

http://www.fauxqueens.com/female-drag-anthology/

miss gay highland park america

YEA!!!
i'm soooo excited to be judging miss gay highland park america this evening! just finished male interview and it has me uber-excited about the competition this evening. seven wonderful and diverse contestants.

now i just need to figure out how many eyelashes i what to wear this evening . . .

brandi amara skyy - miss lifewalk 2012 talent

so i know it's been a while BUT...

i'm uber-excited to share with you a fan made video of my cosmic love florence + the machine talent.

let me know what you think!!!!

pics coming soon!!

full drag pageant mode

hello kats and kittens! i have been obsessing about my package for this pageant, Miss LifeWalk, for the last couple of months and i'm finally at a place where i feel that it's going to be unbeatable. right now i'm still amidst all the sewing, stoning, and rehearsing for both gown and talent. while i don't want to post too much until after the pageant, i do want to show you what i've been up to. here are a few pieces and parts that make up my drag package. keep in mind the categories: presentation, gown, fundraising, and talent.

well, we all know what these are, but what could i possibly be using then for?!?!? 

there's a lot more where these came from!

i didn't make this but this may (or may not) be a hint to my talent!!! adore!

and lastly, here is a peek inside my drag factory. this is my sewing area in my drag room:

please forgive my partner's fingers-always the jokester!

i can't wait to post everything in detail!!! i still have a lot of work to do but it's coming along flawlessly!!