what’s the weirdest thing that has caused someone to assume/guess your gender?

This is kinda piggybacking on your Q, hfamiliaris – don't wanna offend, and if this does offend, I'll promptly delete it. But my lil vent just might fit in here…

I'm an old cis-hetero guy, in a conservative boondocks of the US South, and lately, nearly housebound. Sooo… my interaction with lgbtq folks, IRL, is roughly zero. Alas! Still, I've been aggressively educating myself via Reddit, YouTube and elsewhere on the queer community in its diversity, and I'd like to feel I'm an ally. Trans folk in my perception mostly get dealt a difficult hand from life's deck, despite which, most live with a brave authenticity and even nobility rare among cis folk. Largetly, we get a free-ride with all kindsa invisible gender-privilege.

tl;dr: Now, the meat of my "vent"… lgbtq folks navigate below the radar in my neck of the woods. Wish it were otherwise, but this is reality here. I look for them. Don't see them. Until… Bam. At the service desk of a big-chain supermarket I saw this woman. Blonde, 50-ish, about 5ft.10", slender, in denim short-shorts and a delicate floral blouse. Wasn't giving her a second thought, but then it's like sirens rang in my brain… some weird intuition was yelling, "Hot sh¡t, she's a trans-gal!" What clued me in? Damned if I know. She sported over her blouse a thin, loose neck-wrap, like a taffeta muffler. She had narrow hips, and looking closely (while doing my utmost not to look like I was looking closely), her arms and legs seemed kinda sinewy. But nothing screamed nor even whispered AMAB. Nothing! I never heard her speak, and felt too awkward to engineer a convo. So that was that. We parted ways, unmet strangers.

This was all of maybe 2mnths ago, and I still think of that near-miss from time to time.

/r/asktransgender Thread