Working Out

It is a Thursday morning, I put on a sweater that reminds me of one reason I go to the gym. I had not worn this sweater for a while and it was expecting to be worn by someone who is more pear shaped than I now am. All around the mid section the sweater bags, in the belly region especially. It bags out and collapses in all at the same time, as though it is looking for the rest of me that is no longer there.

It is 5:30 as I walk out the door. It is a half hour walk to the gym, I like this walk, the city is either asleep or just waking. It is a good warm up for the gym and in some way a better wake up stimulant than my morning pot of coffee. The streets belong to the homeless and delivery drivers. It is a quiet time, a place I can be by myself and can find some space inside my head that is just for me. It is still the darkest time of the year and the sun won't put in an appearance for another hour. I am glad I put on the sweater regardless of its misshapenness, it is cold out and even baggy sweaters are warm.

I use my electronic key and let myself into the gym, walk up to the desk and swipe my membership card and exchange my keys for a towel. Down to the locker room. I open my locker, strip and begin to put on my gym clothes. I have been doing this for over a year now. 5 to 6 days a week I worship at the altar of physical fitness. It drives my buddy the Buttermonkey a little nuts that I am never satisfied with the results. “Male body image studies are grossly underserved.”, he says to me one day.


I think about this while I am lying on the floor, my butt pressed up against the wall, my legs straight up. I am doing crunches. I am isolating my lower abs. I have never had a washboard. A few short weeks away from 52, I know I never will. Slowly up, slowly down, smooth steady motion 25 times. I have the iPod cranking, Eurythmics “Missionary Man”. I start out with squats using the hack press. I am not doing free weights today. My knees feel a little sketchy and I am not looking for any further setbacks.

The usual morning crowd is straggling in. It is always fairly deserted here in the morning. Most of my gyms clientele is college students because the place has the 2 virtues of being cheap and clean. These kids tend to come in later, they are young and like to sleep late, so it is a strange mix of old farts like myself and the seriously fit, getting a jump start on their day. We nod or say hi, acknowledgement. It is a cordial crowd, but not social. We are here to work out. I nod, I say hi, I head upstairs to the machine room. It is a gym, so there are mirrors everywhere. I look at myself, and try to see me. Not the me that I hate the look of, but the me other people see.

It's a machine day and I am a free weight guy, but I am not at an age where I can afford to argue with my body and my knees are making unhappy sounds. Sports injuries seem to hurt more and take longer to recover from. Hector has forgotten to turn on the radio that is always tuned to a station that I find irritating which gets pumped through the sound system on all the levels. From my personal gym mix Evelyn “Champagne” King start singing “Shame”, as I begin lowering myself and then contracting my butt, standing back up. 12 reps.

I have gotten tired of hearing “Oh you were never fat!” I bring in a picture that was taken a couple of years earlier. I am standing in my garden wearing a polo shirt and some old khaki pants. The shirt bulges over my belt and it is obvious that it is not just the shirt that is bulging over. I show it to a couple of people at work. “Oh, you weren’t that fat.” My co-worker Lisa picks it up. “Jesus Christ! What in the fuck were you thinking? You looked like somebody’s grandfather.” I think I love her.


My waist is 4 inches smaller, my chest is 4 inches bigger. I have thrown out my old pants, they bagged at the ass and had to be cinched in with a belt. I am getting rid of some of my old shirts, they are getting tight under the arms and are no longer comfortable. Signs of progress.

I belong to the community garden that is in my neighborhood. It is a clear early summer day, and I have been working out all winter. I am feeling a little better about things because I do not have a roll of fat that sags over my belt all around. I am even not horribly embarrassed that I am talking with one of my neighbors with my shirt off. It’s hot and I’ve been weeding. Another gardener walks up to us. He is friend of my neighbor. One of those good looking friendly guys, he has always been cordial, but has never looked at me twice. He starts talking with his friend, looks over to me. “Dude, look at you! Man, you’re pumped.” I guess I look surprised, uncomprehending. “Seriously, very nice. You ought to get your nipples pierced.” I am embarrassed and pleased. Mostly though I am now in a tight little world of red hot embarrassment. I excuse myself and go back to my weeds.

I move over to the quad machine.. I load on 65 lbs., down from the 70 which I have been doing, I have been away from the gym, a combination of having had a cold and holiday malaise. Hector turns on the radio, and I crank up the ipod to drown it out. I should be up to 75 lbs., but.... setbacks. In my earphones Jimmy Somerville's eerie falsetto begs "Don't leave me this way" I concentrate, don’t kick, use your quads to lift with a quick even motion. Lower with a slow even motion. I dismount, leaning against a machine I stretch, standing on one leg, gripping my other ankle I pull and stretch my quads back out.

T tells me I look great. T thought I looked great when I was 30 lbs overweight. We have been seeing each other for a few years now. We met in the park across the street, I invited him over, better than standing in the mud in the reeds. He is a lovely man, with his Ivy League education and his accomplishments and his modesty. Our relationship began with sex and that was all that it was about. But things change when you begin to talk with the people who you are sharing your body with. Now it is an easy friendship that involves sex, but is about books, and gardens and whatever topic of interest is on our mind. T makes me feel funny and smart and sexy. "Don't you love the way you can feel the blood filling your muscles as you are working out?" he asks. T is 15 years older than I am. 66 and he is still as sexy as when I met him.

Back to the wall. Lift your shoulders off the floor, use your lower abs to raise your torso off the floor, isolate. 25 times. The Fine Young Cannibals are now singing "Suspicious Minds" Roland Gift’s voice is as odd and beautiful as an exotic bird, a rare orchid. I concentrate, keeping the movement slow and steady using the muscles in my belly.

The crowded Green Line car pulls up to the platform, and people struggle to get out as those on the platform push their way onto the train as if afraid the car will pull out before they have a chance to board. Among the shovers is an old boyfriend. We have not seen each other for what, one maybe 2 years? We are both awkward, but 20 years of country manners have never quite been beaten out of me, even after 30 years of city life. I ask how he’s been and we begin to talk. It’s the small talk of people who really have nothing to say to each other. "You ought to shave that beard off. It makes you look old.", he says to me. He finds my beard, now white with streaks of grey, upsetting. When I first met him, my beard was black and I had a full head of hair. He also doesn't like that I shave my head now, either. There is no point in explaining that my hair has become so thin that even keeping it short only emphasizes that I am loosing my hair in a way I find more pathetic than honest baldness. We had tried to be friends after we broke off, but it was too high maintenance. He needed to be called all the time to be reassured that we were still friends and left alone all the time because he was in a funk and needed to be left alone. He has been dyeing his beard. It is that unnatural almost black, with brassy highlights where the dye has imperfectly taken on the grey. I do not mention this. I do not tell him he might look better if he stopped dying his beard. I am only looking for an escape route, away from the litany of woes that seem to make up his life. Non-stop drama. I finally arrive at my stop and tell him I have to get off the train. "Give me a call.", he calls after me, as I start my way to the door. We both know I won't and I walk down the platform feeling mean and unkind.

I lie down on my side on the mat and tuck my heels up under my butt. I put my right hand behind my head and place my left on my side. I concentrate and use my obliques to lift my torso up. 25 reps. I roll onto my right side and repeat the process. Ce ce Peniston is singing “Finally”, as I see if I can cinch in my waistline a little more, create that beautiful curved muscle that is a sensuous line like melted wax on the bellies of young men I sometimes see at the beach.

“Are you keeping up with the gym?”, he asks. I am talking with Wahbags. It is not an accusation, but an inquiry. We have known each other too long for that sort of thing. We are sitting in Starbucks, not my favorite spot but Wahz likes it there. He is retired now and it is part of his routine. I can walk into that location any morning between 8:30 and 9:00 and find him there, reading the paper or holding court. I love Wahz. He has been my friend for almost 30 years. He is all the good parties I have ever been to, he is our nexus, the connection point where so many friends first met. I remember when I met him, he was just entering his mid thirties and so handsome and hunky. We slept together once and have been friends ever since. In later years he started to gain weight, which depressed him and he ate more and became more depressed. In the past couple of years since he retired he has lost 100 lbs. He is happier than he has been in a long time and feels better than he has in a long time. It makes me happy to see him this way. We keep track of each other’s workouts and compare notes on routines. It is a way for us to let each other know we are looking out for each other.

Calve presses. I start with 65 lbs. I am taking it easy and only doing them straight on. No repositioning of my feet to get all of the muscles in my calves, just enough to remind my muscles that they are there. Gnarles Barkley is now singing “Crazy” to me. I lower my heels and then contract the muscles in my calves. 12 reps, I am feeling better about things and throw on 10 more pounds and then lean forward into the wall to stretch. “Crazy” has ended and now Donna Summer moans, “love to love you baby”. My hands are on the wall and I lean at a 45 degree angle. I bring one foot forward and keeping my feet flat I lean, calf muscle stretching. I bring my foot back, and switch. A slow motion hokey-pokey, danced to 1970’s disco.

“Dabunny didn’t believe me when I told him how old you are.” It is shortly after I have started my new job. I am talking with Buttermonkey who is going to turn into a friend. He is 20 years younger than I am. We have already hit it off. I like this guy, he is funny and intelligent and brave. He has worked for the circus, and for the ice-capades. Now he works in an office and is working on his masters degree in psychology. I make “yeah, sure.”, noises. “No, I figured you were maybe 40.” I tell him I am old enough to be his father and I look it. “Stop saying that! No one who’s old enough to be my father gets to be in as good shape as you are. When you’re at work, you don’t get to be any older than 40!” It makes me laugh, and I want to hug him, because he’s young and thinks he can give me back 10 years that I have already used up.

Calve curls. I adjust the bar on the machine. Setting 1. I am short and my legs are very short. 26 inch inseam, even for someone 5’3” that is short. I am told that is why I have such thick leg muscles, why it is easy for me to keep my legs in good shape. Low center of gravity. The machine itself looks like some sexual device. A bench you lie face down on, butt raised by the shape of the bench. I am struck not for the first time that so many of the apparatus in the gym resemble medieval torture devices or strange sex appliances, though in a way that is exactly what they are. I move the pin, select my weight, lie face down, lift, don’t jerk, I feel my hamstrings, my calves. Too much weight? Too little? Or is it like Goldilocks and just right?

“Looking good.” It is my friend Mike. I have just taken my jacket off. I was running late having allowed myself to fall into that fugue state in the gym, where having achieved a certain rhythm, I just kept working out and lost track of time. Looking at the clock I ran through the shower, yanked on my jeans and headed out to meet Mike still wearing a muscle shirt. I just look at him. “You just got out to the gym, huh?” I tell him it’s not nice to make fun of old people. He gives me a curious look, says okay and we talk about other things.

Back to the mat. Hands cupped behind my head loosely, knees raised, shoulders raised off the mat. Contract your abdominal muscles lifting your back and your pelvis off the floor. Slow and even, concentrate on using your abs and do not use your hands to cheat and pull. The Weather Girls are singing “No One Can Love You More Than Me”. Martha Wash sounding like she is singing a gospel hymn to love, to a vain man, contorting himself into unnatural positions in an attempt to fight off that enemy of gay men, flab.

FB comes over. He is in his late 30’s and he is in some ways my favorite sex date. He is a very sweet guy, sometimes he brings candy or some small silly gift as though he is courting me. He thinks I am sexy and doesn’t belabor the point. Having once stated it he feels that is enough and that actions speak louder than words. We visit a little and then a couple of hours later, we talk some more. As far as he is concerned, by virtue of our having sex, he is letting me know about my desirability in his eyes. He is slim and sexy, and the sex itself tends towards the slow and intense. We talk and have a few laughs and then he leaves as though he has been somehow intruding on my life, almost embarrassed. I don’t know why, but there is a wall between us that neither seems to get over and it stops any real friendship from developing. I hope that someday that wall will come down.

More ab work. I have my shoulders on the floor, my feet are on the bench and I arch myself up. I concentrate on muscle contraction, which, ideally, will lift my shoulders approximately 1 inch off the floor. You need to keep your body straight from knees to shoulder, not letting your butt sag down. It is tricky, and Robbie Williams sings that he is the king of bongo-bong. “Hit me when I come, baby!”

I am brushing my teeth and watching the spare tire around my mid-section jiggle. It is like some vestigial middle aged limb that I have acquired which nothing short of surgery will remove. I am in the shower room at the gym and I am wearing a towel. Suddenly, I see Michael in the mirror, checking me out. “All that ab work is paying off.”, he says. I am looking at him trying to find the handsome young guy that I met in another lifetime. A heartbreaker with reddish hair and an air of shy confidence, I had such a crush on him that I would have committed murder to be with him. Grey haired, he no longer lifts weights. I see him occasionally in the gym, where he does cardio. What is more disturbing is the palpable absence of the confidence that he once exuded. Now there is only the shyness. Have we reversed rolls 25 years on, a quarter of a century and now am I the object of desire. He the pursuer, me the pursued? I for a moment look for the beautiful young man who once fired me so, then I realize he is still beautiful, and I want to somehow reach out and touch him, tell him he is still in there.

The thing about the gym is you cannot get away from mirrors. I am not sure what other people see when they look at me. I see a short bald sad sack. There are dueling scars, the bully on steroids cousins of wrinkles, appearing around my mouth and on my forehead, frown lines my mother used to call them. Sometimes I see the scrawny teenager, who was too short, too geeky, too weird. Other times I see the lumpy middle aged man that I had let myself become, too depressed by the inroads of time and life to get off the sofa, other than to fetch more food to keep me company while I read. Now I persist. This is my means to fight, to not give up to some middle aged torpor. This is not to deceive myself into the belief that it makes me look younger, but is a stopgap to keep myself from getting too old too fast. If this were about how I look, then it would be a moot venture. I already know I will never be happy, no matter what the results, with my appearance. I seem to find men who I like, who will take me as I am and if I was out to attract other men then I would go out of an evening, instead of remaining at home with the cat and my books. I think it is, in the end, proving to myself that I can do it. Not to make myself more muscular, or hotter or whatever you want to call it. The point is to work on in the face of my dissatisfaction. This is about discipline and taking pleasure in accomplishing a task. It is about taking care of myself.

Another day, another workout, I go off to the showers, towel off, brush my teeth and then shave. I put on my clothes, cell phone, check, ipod, check, backpack, check, turn in towel, claim keys and walk out onto the street. The sun is up and the sidewalks are now crowded with people getting on with their day, getting on with their lives. I wade out into teaming humanity at the corner of Boylston and Tremont and, with Cheryl Lynn singing “Got to Be Real”, I join them and head off to work.

Good Morning

Today has begun more auspiciously than yesterday. I woke up early on this the only day of the week I am free of the tyranny of the gym and decided to get some things out of the way. I threw a couple of loads into the washer, changed the sheets on the bed and managed a blog entry. Then to my joy and surprise, I received a booty call from FB (a much more welcome advance than yesterday's) so I sprinted through the shower and he showed up right on time.

We haven't seen each other for a while but it was a couple of hours before we could do any catching up. (It's not polite to talk with your mouth full) Their wasn't any earthshaking news on either side, but it was pleasant just to spend some time with him. At any rate, we are considering a field trip to Connect-a-dot to check out Logee's. FB has suggested we try out sex in the greenhouse, but I think he was only joking.

At any rate he trundled off and I am preparing to head out with my buddy Clint to go to the discount pet supply store for a sack o' kibble for Alice as well as a bucket of shitty litter. We are also considering the wisdom of trying a new pastry shop in J.P. that Clint claims might be as good as Athan's, in Brookline. Athan's is a vice, it is evident simply by virtue of the fact that nothing that artery cloggingly delicious can be any better for your morals than it is for your waistline. Gluttony, true gluttony is highly underrated as a sin. Not the MacDonald's super size burger meal with the oil drum of Coke variety, but the eating that one beautifully crafted, incredibly bad for you symphony of sugar, butter, cream and other forms of cholesterol of the finest quality that will cause you to weep because you really can not eat even one more. Is Creme Anglais really not a beverage? Deep sigh. I'll let you know how it was, and besides I'll be heading back to the gym tomorrow morning to pay for my sins.

update: Sweet Christopher's lived up to the hype. I must now try and beauty nap off some of the effect of chocolate mousse, light and yet satisfyingly rich layered with chocolate genoise and covered in ganache that was my selection. C. went for the lemon mousse and coconut variation, sans ganache. (Truly fab, extra calorie burning tomorrow.)

What color is that?

On my way home from the gym yesterday morning, I was walking by a flower vendor on Boylston Street. These calla lilies caught my eye and I wound up stopping and picking up some cheap cheer for the house. I have been trying to decide exactly what shade the callas are. I found myself thinking "Aubergine". This reminded me of a conversation I once had with my daughter and her then husband.

We were driving up to my parents and as we were navigating our way out of Boston, we were cut off by a Volvo. My daughter's ex, who I will refer to as Numbnuts, said something to the effect of, "What the hell was that purple car thinking?"

My daughter said,"Honey, it's not purple, it's periwinkle."

Numbnuts looked at the offending car, then at me. He turned around to look at my daughter who was in the backseat with the kids.

"Periwinkle!", he said, "God, you can tell your father is gay."

Curiouser & curiouser

I had decided to pack it in and just head off to the gym after thoroughly FUBAR'ing my blog this morning when I thought I heard someone knock on my back door. It's an old building full of strange and misleading noises, so I ignored it. I checked my bag and was just about to put on my jacket when there is was again. By this time Alice was staring intently at the back door.

I went to the door, opened it and when the alcohol fumes cleared I saw a not unattractive young man. He was looking very nervous and I was wondering if he had somehow gained access to the building and was trying to..... who knows? He began to explain that he lived in the building and saw the light under my door and I was waiting to hear the, I'm drunk and can't get back into my apartment story. He hemmed and hahed a bit and then blurted out, "Well I live here, see and I'm bi-curious." I was a bit startled at this declaration, and unable to stop staring at the quart bottle of Bud that he was clutching, tried to politely explain that I was just on my way out the door. He looked truly crestfallen, and started off towards the elevator. I am still kicking myself, but I relented enough to say, maybe he should come back some other time. Why? I think it is largely because I am a sucker. I hate to see people miserable. Maybe it's because I want to tell him he needs to rethink his approach. Tell him, don't go around doing things like this while you're loaded. There are bad people, who unlike me will take advantage of a situation and you may not be happy with the result. At any rate I showed the good sense not to try and talk to him while he was in a rather advanced state of inebriation. Having had drunks for parents I learned early there is no reasoning with a drunk.

Now I am asking myself was I ever that young, that stupid or that drunk. The answer comes yes. I have been pretty lucky and had only a couple of times in my misspent youth found myself in situations that got out of control. These types of life lessons are not necessary, they can be avoided with the exercise of a little common sense. Though sometimes if you are young and confused or scared, common sense can be pretty thin on the ground. I guess it was his vulnerability, that prompted me to make this poorly thought out offer. The thing is I don't want to have sex with him. I only want to sit him down and find out what he's looking for and then, if I can, point him off in a more appropriate direction. With any luck, he will wake up with an enormous hangover and a huge case of embarrassment and that will be the end of it. If not I can only hope that the drunkenness was an attempt to bolster his courage for this experiment and that he is not a chronic lush. I have had to put up with enough alcoholics in my life and I don't need to go out and adopt any more. What am I doing?

It seemed like a good idea....

I, having woke up early and having some time on my hands decided to dick around with the old blog. Blogger has been nagging me to upgrade to their new and fabulous template, and I have been toying with the idea of feeding comments through haloscan. So off into the depths of internet hell I merrily tripped. After a certain amount of vigorous swearing, I was able to implement the changes. Ooopsie! Where the f##%$$# did all the f*%$$@&&ing comments go? Let me caution you, read the boiler plate. If I had read the fine print and caveats I would have seen that my comments would not import to haloscan. In order to restore them is going to require a certain investment in time, cutting and pasting. I apologize to everyone who has been commenting on my blog (Even Anonymous) since I wouldn't be indulging in this low level narcissism if I wasn't trying to find out what other people think. I will be trying to restore things to there proper place in the blogosphere in the coming days. For the moment, I am heading off to the gym and will try not to dislocate my shoulder while I am doing shrugs. Oh BTW, Anonymous, skinny? Really? Cool!

The Monster

I started to work on an entry about going to the gym. It has grown out of control, and now is 7 1/2 pages. What do I do with it? Monkey has invoked the 500 word rule. "A blog entry should only be around 500 words, people don't sign on for more." That said he has read it and likes it. If anyone would like to read this thing, email me and I'll be happy to send it out for comment. Brief synopsis, it is about what goes through my fevered little mind while I am at the gym. I realize this is a pathetic cry for help, but what are you going to do?

What Fresh Hell...

It started out so well. I dragged my perfectly formed ass off to the gym at the crack of dawn against my will and wound up, against all expectations, having a really good workout. I headed off to work with the 'pod cranking out some of my favorite songs, stopped at my regular morning coffee place and had my paper cup handed to me before I could get the money out of my wallet. Service with a smile. The commuting gods were smiling on me as I came down the stairs and walked straight onto a train.

It was all a cruel joke. I didn't even make it through the door before I heard someone calling my name. I spent the rest of the day hearing my name. The problem with being the go-to guy at work is that people go to you. And on days like today, they all show up in shifts, all with a bad case of the "I wants"oblivious to the line forming behind them. Some days it can be very rewarding. You feel like you have helped people out, job well done, you're a good man Charlie Brown. On days like today when they gang up on you, you wind up fantasizing about scorpion pits.

5 o'clock finally arrived and I bee lined out the door. The walk home was no improvement as SUV's demonstrated that traffic lights do not apply to them and cyclists on the Mass. Ave. bridge who refuse to ride in the bike lane sped down the sidewalk, impatient with the damned pedestrians who persist in using the pedestrian walkway. Once again safely on the Boston side of the river I am then harried by Mommies with those SUV's of the sidewalk and the store aisle, the stroller the size of a Buick sedan as they perambulate their spawn, forcing everyone out of their path by the shear force of their entitlement. By the time I get home I am cursing anything on wheels.

As I check my mail, there is a mystery envelope from my friend Clint. He has sent me some crack and peel reproductions of some stamps that were a feature of the book "Going Postal" which he Photoshoped into some snazzy stamp sizes, suitable for decorating envelopes (do we ever really get out of 5th grade) and for the first time since I stepped off the train this morning I had a smile on my face. I got in the house and gave him a call to thank him, and the conversation drifted around to other topics, and finally he said "Oh, I checked out your blog, I didn't know you even had one." (I suffer from blog shame) But I had told him that I had been linked by that blogger, and so he checked my blog out. "Yeah, I read the whole thing." I asked what Clint thought with a bit of trepidation. He is cursed with honesty, and is not going to hand out praise if he doesn't like something. "I didn't know you could write", says he "Very slick."

Okay, maybe the day wasn't such a complete waste.

In the Headlines

It's been an eventful week. Our new governor will be inaugurated today, the former governor, officially snuck out yesterday because the inauguration will not be taking place at the state house and he did not want to miss his photo op of walking out of the state house into the adoring arms of his supporters.

The carpet bagger in chief leaves behind the mess from his shameless manueverings to place himself with the presidential hopefuls. Same sex marriage is being tossed in the hopper because our spineless legislature caved on the issue. "This is an issue for the people to decide." It would seem that our current law makers have never read the articles of federation or choose to ignore the section that admonished those taking up the reins of government that the purpose of the government is to insure that the needs of the few are not subject to the tyranny of the many.

We are also being saddled with what I predict will be a nightmarish mandatory insurance law that seems to be geared as a punitive measure against the low wage earners in the commonwealth. From what I have seen so far, anyone who does not assume the financial responsibility of taking out their own insurance will be fined $295.00 a month. Businesses with 10 or more employees who do not provide insurance will be fined $295.00 per employee per year. Sounds fair, huh? It seems we don't want to interfere with businesses ability to do business. The logic is that irresponsable 20 somethings are refusing to get health coverage because they are less likely to be ill, and everyone else who is not insured can easily afford insurance. They seem to have closed their eyes to the working poor with families, and anyone else who will be overburdened by insurance costs. Once again, I say our legislators need to start paying for their own health care and get dumped into this broken system. If they had to negotiate the health care nightmare they would be enacting a socialized health system so fast your head would spin. As it stands, I can forsee a mass exodus from the state of lower income people, who no matter how unsightly we are, are necessary to do all of those tedious jobs that the well heeled cannot be expected to do for themselves.

Our new guv, Deval Patrick has already created controversy over his spending on the inaugural ball and has had shots fired over the bow by the legislature, and the man hasn't even been sworn in yet. He ran on a campaign of inclusiveness and a message of reinvolving the disaffected voter. It's great to send out a message of hope, it's another to act on it. I have lived in Massachusetts a long time now and I predict it will just be more politics as usual.

I wish our new governor luck. He is off to a rocky start already and I think he's going to need all the luck he can get

no subject

This morning when I logged onto my computer at work, I cruised over to my favorite blog Joemygod. Imagine my surprise when I found out he had linked one of my posts to his site. However it has left me without a topic for the day. I was going to write a piece on the fact that approximately 3 people read my blog. Today I got more traffic than I usually see in a month. This is great and my pal the Monkeyboy summed it up best, "It's like having someone ask you to come and sit at their table for lunch."

But where is my topic? That heartless bastard has taken away my inspiration! I was already to write some insightful piece about why I continue. I was going to do the backstroke through an exceptionally maudlin lake, nay sea of misunderstood self pity. It was going to be very touching. I think you would have cried. I was prepared to shed a couple of tears myself. Instead, I am now being forced to go around shouting Woooo Hooooo. You're a bunch of heartless bastards.

I have to go now, and email the niece and tell her she's famous, or my beard's famous, or maybe it's my dick, I'm not really sure.

Hello moon

On my walk home across the Mass. Ave. bridge this evening I was treated to both a beautiful sunset in the west and a beautiful moonrise in the east. Note to self. Get camera that does not suck.

The New Black

me:"Where are my sneakers?"

niece:"Which ones are they?"

me: "The size 11's."

niece: "Jesus, you really do have big feet!"

She gives me a look and I know where this is going.

me: "Keep your funny remarks to yourself."

niece: "I'm just sayin'...."

me: "Let's just say that when I was younger I was very popular."

And it's true. When I was younger, and fags were fags and jeans were tight, the most effective piece of artillery I had when I sallied out onto the lists of love were a tight pair of 501's and no underwear. I may not have been the prettiest girl in the class, but I wasn't starving for company either. The real problem was that in later life I figured out that these guys were dating my dick, and would eventually get tired of me tagging along. The years have gone by, fashion has changed and now with baggy pants, everyone just takes their chances.

I give my niece this little synopsis, then pause and add, "Though I think my beard is my new dick." I find myself having to explain. I have not been enjoying terrific success in the wonderful world of hooking up, much less dating. However, since the facial sagebrush has been allowed to run wild, for some reason I am starting to have the "Daddy" effect on younger guys. Not that I am all that into younger guys, and also younger is a relative term. Mostly men in their early to mid 30's. A couple of times guys in their early 20's have come sniffing around, but that just sent me off screaming in the opposite direction. Just 'cause okay!

It seems like every year they announce what color the new black is. Usually, against all predictions it winds up being, well, black. It seems for me this year, that my beard is the new dick. Now the question is what they'll be attracted to, and what they wind up dating.

New Year's Day

It was a cold rainy day in dear old Beantown. I met Wahz for coffee at Starbuck's his preferred hang out and we exchanged our good wishes over coffee. Not that I hadn't been over at his place last night eating Chinese take-out, but what the hey. I spoke with Clint, my parents and then the niece and I headed over to the Buttermonkey's and Dabunny's new condo for a combo housewarming New Year's Day celebration. Waffles are the traditional fare, and Monkeyboy outdid himself, venturing into savor waffles this year. Bacon, potato, cheddar waffles. Mmmmm, just hear those arteries slam shut.

Having finished "From Boys to Men", which is excellent by the way, I am working my way through "The March of Folly", a timely read. I am currently reading the section on the renaissance about the break up of the Holy See and the rise protestantism. The inbuilt self destruct of government is discouraging and a little frightening considering the state our own country is in. I am also trying to gear myself up for the return to the gym, work and the daily routine. It is nice to fantasize about a life where I could do as I please, but I am not sure how well I deal with only unstructured time, so perhaps it is a blessing that I have to mold my life around my obligations. At any rate, I feel like I have got off to a good start for the new year. Monkey's house is beautiful and he and Dabunny are happy and in the full flush of homeownership, and it make me feel good to see then in such a happy state.

Me, it is just gratifying that things are going as well as they are, and who knows, things might get even better as the year progresses. I have stuck with the gym, I have stuck with the blog and I have ridden out a lot of doubt and weirdness at work, so who knows where this new year will take me if I am willing to do the work and persist.

New Years 2007

I went out this afternoon for a walk and got to see the preparations for the big night. The media, funny hats and of course, what is New Year's without... French Fries and Fried Dough? Did I not get the memo?

The Purse

I was talking with friends and we were swapping stories about P'town. It reminded me of what has always been one of the quintessential P'town experiences for me. I was spending the summer working there, this must have been '79 or '80. In tourist towns, if you work there, you tend to pick up casual friendships pretty easily which are tried on, worn for the season. So it wasn't surprising that I was with a large group of people when we went to the White Party at the Boatslip. I don't particularly remember the party. It was pretty much of a piece with the other blowouts of that time, and Provincetown was a much funkier place. After a lot of drinking and dancing and drugging, the party ended and people began the trek down Commercial Street, either off to Spiritus or to trysts at a guest house with the flavor of the evening. It was one of the summers where there had been a lot of trouble with the local teenage boys bashing gay men.

As we moved down the street, trying to decide whether to attend the fire sale at Spiritus, or just head off to our respective homes we were checking out the other people straggling on ahead of us. Directly in front of our group was a drag queen in full Diana Ross. Big johnny mop wig, green sequin mini dress, matching clutch bag and 3 inch heels, girlfriend was magnificent. Ahead of her were a couple of LaCoste queens, all summer slacks and polo shirts with upturned collars, holding hands.

Miss Ross was an object of much more fascinated interest to us and we were vowing that if she stopped for pizza that we were going to have to talk with her and pay homage to her fabulous ensemble.

A pick up truck that was cruising slowly up the street stopped just short of the LaCoste boys, and 4 teenage boys leapt out and attacked the LaCoste's. It was so sudden that for a moment we were frozen in out tracks. Not so Miss Ross. With a wild battle cry and an amazing turn of speed for someone in stilettos she began swinging her evening bag like some avenging fury, a battle crazed Walkure, and laid waste to the enemy downing them with blows to the head from her bag and then kicking seven kinds of shit out of them with her fabulous pumps!

By the time we made it there to offer any support, Miss Ross had already subdued the ruffians and the cops had, surprisingly, already shown up. The LaCoste's more shaken than injured were comforting each other, one of them crying and Miss Ross the avenging angel stood there eyes blazing, chest heaving as if waiting for anyone to challenge her. The cops had asked us all to stay, so that they could get everyone's version of what had transpired, so we stood there not knowing whether to laugh or cry. Finally, my pal Paul leaned forward and gently touched Miss Ross on the arm. "Honey, what ARE you carrying in that bag?", he asked timidly. "Baby", she said haughtily, "I got my brick in my purse. I'm from New York, and a girl does NOT leave the house unless she has a brick in her purse."

Weekend reading

I am planning a quiet New Year's. New Years Eve will be an early dinner with friends, per tradition, Chinese take-out. Otherwise I will be reading, I will probably finish "From Boys to Men" which is an anthology of coming of age, not to be mistaken for coming out, stories by gay men. It features pieces by Joe Jervis, a.k.a. Joe.My.God and Alexander Chee. I have really enjoyed it so far and can honestly say that half way through, there hasn't been a clunker yet. I also would like to try and get through "The March of Folly", by Barbara Tuchman. I have loved all of Tuchman's other books and find her histories engrossing and entertaining. She is able to take a moment in the past and make the events and the prime movers live again for the reader. "The March of Folly" seems like a timely read, since it's focus is on 4 different historical events where governments pursued policies that were clearly not in the best interest of the countries. Sounds all too familiar for anyone who has not been stranded on a desert island or living under a rock for the past 4 years. Food, friends and books! What could be better?

Bad start

I got up this morning filled with determination. I have been letting my workout slip the past couple of weeks, between a cold and holiday malaise. This morning I arose at my usual obscene hour made coffee and was out the door by 5:30. As I walked out the door a few snowflakes hit me just as I was beginning to wonder if this was going to be the snowless year, and began my walk downtown.

I made it as far as the block between Berkeley and Arlington when I spotted someone pulled over trying to change a tire. This young guy had obviously never changed a tire before. He had already jacked the truck up and was trying to loosen the lugs. I almost walked on, but my better impulses stopped me. I asked if he wanted some help, and he gratefully accepted. I lowered the car, broke the seal on the nuts and jacked the car back up. Things would have been fine after that except for the spare. A curse on General Motors and on all engineers. Some genius had come to the conclusion that mounting the spare under the car was a good idea. I have had to struggle with similar arrangements before but never with a tire that was suspended by a single bolt. A single bolt I might add that was rusted solid after a few New England winters of road salt. So, taking further pity, I went to CVS which I knew was open and bought a can of WD-40. This in itself was an adventure, since I was in line behind a woman having an altercation with the cashier because he wouldn't accept her credit card without further proof of ID, because she hadn't signed her card. If that wasn't enough fun. There was a couple in front of me and the woman was tweeked out of her mind. Jumping up and down and back and forth. Jumping forward grabbing things out of the displays on the counters and then putting them back. All the while accompanying this with a loud running commentary on how long it was taking. The first woman at this point has become thoroughly if unjustifiably offended and is demanding to see the manager. She is being dissed and doesn't have to put up with this. At this point the manager actually walked through the door and got to have her turn with being haranged. Finally, one of the store slaves opened the self-serve and tweeky and boyfriend leapt to the machine, which she had no idea of how to operate. Fortunately, some kind soul moved in and helped her process her purchases, and I, who could feel the milk of human kindness curdling in my breast, swiped my stuff and headed back to the stranded motorist. I once again crawled under the truck and this time sprayed the hell out of wing bolt and spent several minutes whacking at it with the tire iron. Finally, I admitted defeat and asked the kid if he had triple A. As it would happen he did. Now some of you may be saying to yourself, why didn't he just call AAA right off the bat. I asked myself the same question, but at the same time, it is hard for me to fault anyone who is making the effort to solve a problem by themselves. Still I left feeling frustrated and as though I hadn't done enough, or had somehow failed. By this time it was too late to go to the gym and make it to work on time, so I walked to the nearest T stop and took the next train back to my neighborhood. Once home I was placing my faith in the efficacy of hot water. A hot shower would make the world right again. This was when I discovered that I had ice cold and ice cold running water. I did my best with a chilly sponge bath changed into clean clothes and went off to work.

I guess what I am wondering now is why I persist in believing in luck and fate and karma. In spite of having a run of what could be considered ill luck, what real significance does it have? It wasn't luck, it wasn't fate or karma. It was brownian motion in action. I was merely being propeled through my little part of the universe by forces of time and motion. I am not controling my life and neither is some great cosmic force. Sometimes faith in the nitrogen cycle bites down hard.

The Feast of Stephen

Ah the post holiday let down. I am beginning to understand why other countries take the day after Xmas as well. It gives you a chance to recover from a certain amount of enforced conviviality. I suppose that there are those who would also like to have one day where they could gloat over their Xmas swag. My holiday was pretty gift free, which as I get older is something of a relief. My niece sent cookies and she and her boyfriend gave me an Amazon gift certificate, which is even now speeding 3 books to me. A collection of short gay fiction, one of the few things of Barbara Tuchman's that I haven't read, "The March of Folly" and a replacement copy of "Our Mutual Friend" which somehow disappeared off the bookshelf and hasn't been seen since. I also indulged in a new cell phone. The old Nokia was actually perfectly good. A solid cheap phone that took a great deal of abuse and kept working, but was unfortunately the size of a brick. I got one of the new slim candybar phones from Samsung. I am assured that as long as I don't carry it in my back pocket (how stupid do have to be?) that it is pretty darned sturdy. While the jury is out on that aspect, I have to say that it's a nice phone and so far I am happy. Other than that, I have not felt any burning need to add to all of the crap that I have in my house. I really would like to find a way to get rid of about 60% of my possesions so that I can start streamlining my existance. What ever possessed me? It is past time to purge. Maybe that will be my new project for 2007. Clearing the house until there is only what I really need left. What would that leave me with? In the end what would it say about me as a person, if I had only those things I really needed and valued? What would those things be? Well I will have to overcome some of my natural inertia to see what that would be. Still who knows, I never thought I'd loose weight and I did it. I never thought I'd escape from my old and hated job and I did that as well, the new day can always bring a suprise, whether you're ready or not.

A Merry Little Xmas

I spent the afternoon with friends. Wah-bags once again outdid himself. Roast goose, red cabbage and chestnuts braised in red wine, asparagus, wild rice and snap peas. Oh, yeah, and several bottles of Veuve Cliquot of which all partook liberally. One of the guests brought her partner, who being jewish had never actually taken part in a Xmas celebration. I explained to her how Santa used Rudolph's nose to guide the angels to baby Bejeezus and then had a three way with the wise men. That's why they brought along the incense and the oil. It also explained why Santa is so jolly. She said, yeah but Xmas only comes once a year. I said, what the hell do you think he's doing with all those elves up on the north pole the rest of the year. All in all it was a very nice day and I am now drinking copious amounts of water so that with any luck I will not drop a dumbell on my head while I am attempting tricep extentions tomorrow. This is why I don't drink any more. Merry Xmas to all and to all a good night!

The Godfather of Soul

I tuned into NPR this morning to some sad news. James Brown, the hardest working man in show business has died. Controversial, outrageous, love him or hate him, James Brown was probably one of the most important figures in music in the past 50 years. You think of James Brown and you think of someone who put everything into his show. I know I will always think of the time that he dropped to his knees so hard during a show that he limped for the rest of the performance. We seem to be loosing a lot of the figures that loomed as giants in the music industry during my youth. So put on your copy of Santa Claus, Santa Claus and pause for a moment in remembrance of the godfather of soul.

Red toy car

One of my earliest Christmas memories is playing with a red and white toy car. It was a 1958 Ford convertible that the top went up and down on as you rolled it across the floor. My Uncle Burt had given one each to my brother John and I.

Burt was my mother’s brother. He came up from Connecticut every weekend to spend the weekends with us, as well as holidays. He was divorced and I think had pretty limited access to his 2 sons, who he adored. The visiting arrangement was not one I think my father was very happy with. In later years talking with my mother, she told me of how as children, Burt who was older than her had always looked out for her, so as adults she felt she had to look out for him.

Burt had served in WWII as a radioman on a bomber. He had been stationed in England and flew some impossible number of missions over Germany. One night he was pulled off of duty because he had a cold that was affecting his middle ear. If you fly in a marginally pressurized airplane you can’t expect to be able to hear if your Eustachian tubes are blocked. That night the crew he had flown with every mission was lost over Germany. My mom said after that he was never the same.

According to my mother, before the war Burt had been “full if the devil”. He was someone always ready to go out dancing and have a good time, funny and with a wicked sense of humor and always ready for a joke. I would not have recognized this man. My Uncle Burt was to be succinct a bit nuts. He was so full of tics and rituals that it is a miracle that he ever made it through a day. Among the childhood memories my brothers and I share are Uncle Burt hogging the bathroom while we were hopping outside the bathroom door in desperate need of relief. He had the same toothbrush for years. “The bristles on new toothbrushes are too stiff. They’ll just wear the enamel right off your teeth, this one I have broken in just right.” Once when Mike and I were in the kitchen peeling oranges he came in and flew into a panic. “Always use a spoon to peel an orange! They are just full of acid and if it gets under your nails it will just eat it’s way right down to the bone!” He was as eccentric as a cage full of monkeys on hard drugs, and yet an incredibly kind man and he loved us. I think if he were diagnosed now, he would be described as suffering from PTSD and obsessive compulsive disorder. Back in the 60’s he was merely nutty. Among Burt’s obsessions were, an encyclopedic knowledge of every automobile ever manufactured by Ford Motor Company, the big bands and Gilbert & Sullivan operas. In short he was the perfect uncle for a young homo.

In a lot of ways Uncle Burt was my savior. My father loathed me as a child. I was not a real little boy. I liked to read, draw and watch movies My interest in wildlife was to study it or try and draw it, not blast it off the landscape with a gun. I was more interested in the musicals of the golden age of Hollywood than any sports. Probably the only male interest I had as a kid was automobiles which fascinated me, but since my old man didn’t share that obsession, it didn’t count. All in all I was a thorough sissy, which ultimately resulted in my serving the purpose of emotional and physical punching bag for the old man. Dad was an alcoholic and a bully. If he spotted a weakness, he would exploit it. His idea of a joke was to expose you to something which terrified you and then laugh at your reaction. If you didn’t think it was the funniest thing in the world you had no sense of humor, and if you continued to be frightened, you were just a big sissy. Either way, he became angry with you and it was your fault for making him angry. I managed to earn regular thrashings over the years in this way. I know that a lot of kids that grow up like this spend their entire childhood trying to win the love and approval of this kind of father. I don’t know if I had a shallower learning curve than most, but by the time I was 11, I hated my father as much as he hated me and spent the next 7 years of my life trying to avoid contact with him as much as possible. The fact that avoidance was an option became clear to me because of the boat.

One of my father’s friends had a boat that he kept all summer at the lake. He gave Dad the keys and permission with the boathouse so that the old man could use the boat any time he wanted when Mr. Bran was not using it. So every weekend during the summer we would go out in the boat. I hated it. I am still not comfortable around water. It probably goes back to the time that my older sister pushed me off a diving board and if my cousin Buster hadn’t pulled me out, I probably would have drowned. I am not a strong swimmer and tend to sink like a rock rather than float. Whatever the reason, I, did not then and to this day, do not like being on the water. But as I was saying, after downing a 6 pack, the old man would load the family into the car and off to the lake we went, and then Mom, my brothers, more beer and I would get into the boat for a relaxing afternoon of my father attempting daredevil stunts with the boat and me clinging face down to the deck whimpering and on occasion screaming. Among his favorite things was on days when the lake was rough, to turn into the waves and gun the boat eventually getting it to skip from crest to crest. Then the cycle would begin. Having reduced me to near pant wetting terror because he found it so funny, he would then become infuriated with my cowardice. Finally, my mother couldn’t stand the conflicts any longer and she made arrangements for me to be dropped off with grandma while they went off to the lake.

Around 1962, Uncle Burt bought a house about a mile away from us. He moved my much loved grandmother and my very scary town drunk of a grandfather into it and after that, continued to come back to Vermont from Connecticut every weekend, but now to his house, though at least for us kids it was never Uncle Burt’s house it was Grandma’s. From then on after the mandatory 6 pack, the rest of the family went off to the lake, and I was dropped off at Grandma’s. Those were quiet Sundays, and I remember Grandma having me read poetry aloud from her collection of books in her little bookcase, but what I also remember was Uncle Burt taking me up to his room where he had his stereo and playing music for me. Why I am not now an expert on the bands of the 40’s I don’t know. I heard more Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Bennie Goodman and Glenn Miller than probably anyone born after the end of the Second World War. If that portion of my childhood had a sound track, it would feature “String of Pearls”. He was always buying more music, adding to what in the end was an incredible collection of the music from that era. Now in case some of you are slow on the uptake, my Uncle Burt was a closet case. If you are waiting to hear a lurid tale about how he took advantage of my youth and innocence you are only setting yourself up for disappointment. Burt’s tragedy was perhaps even sadder in it’s own lonely way. He was, I think, so repressed that he completely sublimated any sexuality he had and put all of that pent up energy into his obsessions. In a way, while we were small children it gave him some means of communication, because he was one of those people who knew how to talk to little kids. If he provided a safe haven for me, then we boys gave him some hold on the world, a human contact that most people have with other adults in a harsh real world. Burt lived in a world of his own construction and it hadn’t changed since he had gone dancing with his little sister and his friends to the big bands playing at the Casino out on the lake before the war.

Time however marches on, and the 60’s steamrolled over us all. The ramifications of assassinations, the Viet Nam war, and social upheaval were felt everywhere, even in our sleepy little part of the world. Adolescence hit the Pelletier boys at the same time and if the world seemed to be going up in flames our family also was in an upheaval that none of us survived unscathed. Uncle Burt was good with small kids, but was clueless about teenagers, and had no insight into how to deal with the churning emotions that make up that transition in a persons life. So it was that we started to grow apart. And so it was that Burt began to retreat more into himself. Then his younger son was drafted, shipped off to Viet Nam and returned home a heroin addict. Burt didn’t have the emotional equipment to deal effectively with the crisis but he tried. His older son, always a bit of an emotional basket case, started to turn into a pale and even sadder form of his father. So his children slowly at first, then quickly and deliberately began to drift away from him. Burt’s reaction was to become even more obsessive and for lack of a better word crazy. I somehow made it through the 4 years that was a combination of bullying and boredom that was high school. I went to college for a year, dropped out and moved to Boston. As I began to bloom in more fertile new ground, Burt went into a downward spiral. The drug addict son kicked his addiction, found Jesus and excluded his father from his life. The other son went on his way, only maintaining contact with his father when he needed financial assistance.

In those sad years my mother fell into more and more of a role as caretaker of Burt. Things finally reached their nadir when my mother received a call from a mental institution in Connecticut. Burt who had become increasingly erratic had been sending letters to his boss. They were as it turned out odd and rambling, but the boss had found them threatening. I am not entirely sure about the content of these missives but whatever they contained they got Burt dismissed from his job. Burt then sent the boss a letter telling him he would be coming to settle matters. Whatever was in the letter, it was enough to convince the police that they would be there to meet Burt when he arrived and take him off to the booby hatch. So it was that Mom got a call from Burt, telling her where he was. It took a few phone calls and some threats on my mothers part with legal action to get Burt sprung. The situation was further hampered because Burt was determined to stay put until he convinced the doctors that he was not disturbed. If ever the adage that a lawyer who represents himself has fool for a client was applicable this would be an outstanding example. I have to hand it to Mom, she got him out and that was the beginning of Burt’s retirement. After that he moved to Vermont premanently and began life driving my poor grandmother crazy on a full time basis.

After that things quieted down a lot for Uncle Burt. He spent more time with his siblings, and his cars, and fretting about his health and everyone else’s, dispensing crazy advice and making pronouncements on the best way to treat or avoid illness. Grandma went into the hospital to be operated on for stomach cancer, had a stroke after the surgery and never went home. After she died, the house, which I think Burt kept against the day when he hoped his mother would return, began to seem too big. He sold the house and moved to a retirement community which had been developed only about a 10 minute walk from my parents and he would come to visit even more frequently to advise my mother on the error of her ways, which was anything that she happened to be doing at the time that Burt felt with his greater experience of the world, she could be doing in a manner more acceptable to him. It drove Mom sort of crazy, but she also would laugh about it. His ideas and rules had developed into such an arcane fetish, that there was no way to take offense, or at least to stay angry for too long. Then Burt, who had never drunk or smoked developed stomach cancer. He had one surgery, and then another. During the ordeal Burt remained the same. As his illness progressed he developed theories about the accuracy of his diagnosis, his treatment and whether his own cures which he developed by a means and reference known only to him would be more efficacious than anything medical science had developed. It was a cruel death after such a hard an unhappy life. As the disease reached it’s late stages Burt started to waste away and became even more difficult. My mother, never the most patient of people somehow managed to maintain her patience with Burt. Selfish as Mom can be, she truly loved her brother and he was probably one of the few people she has ever allowed herself to be close to and she at the end was all he had left.

When he died the funeral arrangements and burial were left to my mother. His sons came, cleaned out his place and left, and that was the end of Burt. My mother is now the only one left in her family and I think it has turned out to be as lonely of a life for her now as it had been for Burt. I rarely go to visit, though when I do more often than not we will talk about Uncle Burt. If Mom is having a good day, the conversation will turn to when they were young and what they did. How they would get into and out of trouble and it will be all sunny summer days in a world of radio programs and boys who wore short pants and Christmas trees that had real candles on them.

As for me, every Christmas I think of this man who must have struggled every day to get on in a hostile world, but who was able to give me a red toy car which after nearly 50 years I still remember with such joy and who for a while anyway provided me with a safe place to be.

Early a.m.

It is Xmas eve morning. Alice dragged me out of bed to get her breakfast. It's amazing how sounds of kitty destruction around the apartment will get you up. I have made myself an apple breakfast dish, that Clint gave me the recipe for. It is as yet untried, so I am volunteering as guinea pig. I will have to let Clint know what it's like. I am also going to try to finish a story I am working on about my Uncle Burt. He was a strange and rather sad man, who when I was a child gave us the best Xmas presents. He is one of my earliest childhood memories of Xmas and a happy one. I am not sure how it will turn out, and I don't think there is any way to put some sort of uplifting spin on the end of the story. Life may imitate fiction, but it is rarely the Disney version.

The Anti Claus

To get myself into the holiday spirit I decided to wear black, but with a Santa hat. The Buttermonkey told me I look really good in this outfit. I told the Buttermonkey that I look like a 2 dollar whore, who's having a fire sale. I should have waited till his mouth was full of coffe though.

Holy Cow

Clint wasn't exaggerating! I just feel that the photos don't do justice to the display, and display seems like a pale word for this extravaganza. I haven't seen this many Christmas lights since Playland closed down. Actually, it was fun. There were lots of gawkers and everyone was, well just being nice. Folks made and effort to not get in the way of people taking pictures and we even got to perform a good deed. Clint found a cell phone. He gave it to me, as though it was some sort of venomous snake. He has never owned a cell phone, knows nothing about them and treasures his ignorance on the subject. I figured I would call T-Mobile and see if I could get the phone traced, but as I walked through the door of my apartment, the phone started to ring and the name Mom came up on the caller ID. After a brief conversation, I gave directions to my place and the college student and his phone were reunited. A happy ending for a fun and silly evening.

Xmas tech

Getting new office equipment is always risky. Especially if the boss isn't around. We got a new copier that also functions as a printer and more importantly a scanner! A full color scanner. A full color scanner to be misused by bored support staffers. Anyhow, don' it just say Merry Xmas?

It is probably a good thing that word came from on high that the office is going to close at 1:00 tomorrow. I hate to think what we could have been reduced to by 5:00.

Gettin' in the holiday spirit

I am sooooo... excited! My pal Clint is picking me up after work and we are going out to West Roxbury. Now West Roxbury may not seem like an exciting destination, but we go with a purpose. There is a home owner on V.F.W. Parkway who has managed to enrage all of his neighbors to the point of their trying to get a court order out against him because of the excessive manner in which he has decorated his house. Clint went out once this week already and had to report in, knowing my fascination with over the top tackiness when it comes to any holiday decoration. From what he said this display would make a Mardi Gras float of drag queens look like a coming out party designed by Martha Stewart. I am going to bring a camera and a tripod, so I hope to be posting later this evening. Latest word is that the electric company has had to go out there and upgrade the infrastructure because he is creating to heavy of a load on the existing lines. I'm not kidding.

Sorority House

The next new thing is on it's way in Boston. Gay only condo's. I'm not sure how I feel about this having been exposed to so called inclusive organizations. The ongoing cat fights that would come brimming to the surface will probably be heard all over the city. While I can understand the desire to live among like minded people, I am reminded of a conversation I had with a fellow Vermonter when she was questioned as to why she lived in a very mixed neighborhood instead of a "nicer" area.

"If I wanted to be around people that were just like me, I would have stayed in Vermont."

It'll be an interesting story to follow, and I will be fascinated to see how things shake out. I forsee all sorts of housing discrimination problems dogging this.

Cookies!!

I love my niece. Aside from being funny and smart and witty and just generally a lot of fun to hang out with, she sends me cookies every year at Xmas. I went to the post office yesterday to pick up this years offering. I gained 20 lbs. just opening the box! Inside were, eggnog cookies, candy cane cookies, 2 kinds of fudge, biscotti, macaroons among other lovely fattening treats and just for me nut brittle. I am the only one of the folks that she sends these care packages off to that actually likes the stuff. Actually likes is a bit of an understatement, and this year I get to rot all of my dental work out with cashew brittle. It doesn't get much better.

Every year I am hugely impressed by this expression of generosity. If you've never baked cookies, I have to point out it's not something that you can do in 10 minutes. This takes time. Literally hours. I also should point out the girl is a busy professional and so this is a real sacrifice of time and if you've been to the grocery store recently you will also realize this ain't cheap. The only insight I can offer as to why the niece takes the time and puts the energy into doing this is, that like me she loves food. One of the things I enjoyed about having my daughter live with me when she was in high school was that I had someone to cook for. I think that is a big part of it, at least from my point of view. Food is for sharing, it is a way of communicating. You know, communion. That said, there is a lot to be said for guilty pleasures as well, which more often than not are best enjoyed in privacy. I will probably spend a good share of my time over the next couple of weeks with my nose buried in a book and one hand in a bag of delicious homemade cookies. Hey, I have the rest of the winter to work them off at the gym.

Holiday giving

Over on JoeMyGod there is a good piece on homeless gay youth. For those in a charitable frame of mind there is a link to a homeless shelter for gay youth, the Ali Forney Center. If you are thinking about a way to spread around some of your Xmas swag this is a good cause.

Check out Joe's post.

I'll be homo for Xmas

Okay kids, let's try another open thread. I will spend Xmas day at a friends house eating myself into a coma. What are your Xmas plans?

The morning news

I was clutching my coffee mug this morning, listening to NPR, when I heard a report on a couple of Baptist ministers that have gotten themselves in trouble for doing naughty things with little girls. At this point the sexual misconduct of the clergy is sort of a yawn. The biggest recent splash was everyones favorite born-again homo, Ted Haggard.

It has got me thinking though. Mostly about how things are perceived in this country. Prior to the new scandals about protestant ministers getting up to hijinx with members of their congregations, I can't help but feel that the country had come to consider this type of behavior as the sole province of Catholics! I actually, during the height of the shitstorm that surrounded the Boston diocese, had friends inform me that this type of thing would never happen in other sects because the pastors were answerable directly to their congregations and not to some centralized bureaucracy. In vain did I try and tell them stories that I had heard from friends in my youth about what the local pastor was doing with the boy scout troop.

I have to admit to a certain amount of smug self satisfaction. As a former Catholic, I am not very sympathetic to the mother church, but I have noticed here in Boston a very strong anti-catholic sentiment, and I hear some pretty strange ideas about what it is that Catholics actually believe, and how they practice their faith. Admittedly, a lot of Catholics give people some pretty strange ideas themselves. I guess what I am pointing out is that it is simply by virtue of the otherness of Catholics that leave them open to suspicion. Somehow, like Jews and Islam, you really can't trust those people.

Well, now everyone gets to join in the fun. Choose your perversion. You can be a televangelist, who has a thing for call boys and meth, or a small town pastor, who likes 8 year old girls and you too can wind up in the news. Frankly, I find this new story about these dirty old men in the south as news worthy as "The Hag" and his misbehavior. However since these guys had not had the forethought to bilk a larger audience out of millions of dollars for their ministry, all the while getting their butts plugged by muscle boys, I am not sure how much attention this is going to get. Besides it was just a bunch of little girls! What's to get excited about?

You bug me baby

I often try to explain to people about my mother’s inability to let anything go, and how that even though her children are all grown and by and large into middle age, she is incapable of treating any of them as though they are any older than14. So I usually fall back on this story to demonstrate my point.

This story starts back in 1967. My older brother was in the full flush of a newly minted drivers license and pride of ownership in his first car. The car in question was a rather scabrous, gold, 1957 VW, but for John no more beautiful car could have existed.

It was one of those beautiful summer days that only exist in the recollection of childhood and my brother was performing one of his least favorite duties. Watching my brother and me. Aiding and abetting him in this was his best friend Pat, who was also drunk on ownership and driving privileges. They were having one of those teenage bragging contest that runs on excessive testosterone and the topic of course was who was the better driver. The discussion managed to move from an ad hoc pop quiz from the Vermont State Drivers Manual, to their innermost familiarity with their respective vehicles. While Pat was explaining the exquisite oneness he had achieved with his Rambler Ambassador, John was countering with the intuitive, nay spiritual understanding of every rattle, creak and flatulent backfire emanating from his Bug. This heady braggadocio only ended with my brother making the fateful statement, “Oh yeah, well I know my car so well that I could drive it blindfolded!” Pat seized this flung gauntlet, and at an age where word is close to action, John, Pat, my brother Mike and I as well as 3 of Pat’s brothers were packed into the Volkswagon and almost before we knew it were maneuvering our way out to the back field.

The property that my parents bought in 1960 was an acre of land, complete with a house, carriage barn, well house, wood shed and privy. All of the structures took up about 1/3 of the property and the rest was a field at the back of the property. Running along one side of the property was a thick patch of raspberries and milkweed and on the other side a hedgerow of trees at the center of which was an enormous and ancient oak. The field itself had been innocent of anything other than tall grass and wildflowers until John bought his car, and then for a short while, until John got his license, it had been the home and driving track for the VW. There was by then a well worn, roughly oval track out in the field that bore witness to John’s experiments in mastering the art of driving so it was on that familiar route that the Bug bounced past the barn and the outhouse and the old man’s garden to its appointment with fate.

Once the car was positioned at the head of the field, John was blindfolded and after a certain amount of argument over whether he could actually see or not, John put the car in gear and we, acting as navigators, all began to shout instructions as to whether he should be turning left or right or going straight. John actually made it about ¾ of the way around the field before the shouted directions and the distinction between left and right got blurred and the VW sailed slowly and with as much majesty as an ancient VW beetle could manage, into the oak tree amidst a frantic chorus of stop, stop. Now admittedly we were only doing between 5 and 10 mph, but it made an impressive crunching noise and jolted us all in good shape. We piled out in a wild state of excitement to survey the damage, John certain that he had totaled the car. Actually, it came out of it’s confrontation with the tree in pretty good shape, except that the front bumper was bent in the middle and almost touching the body of the car. For those unfamiliar with the old style bug, the bumpers were set out away from the body of the car by a good few inches. The bumper which was ordinarily one smooth curve, now described 2 arcs joined in the middle like a child’s drawing of a bird in flight. All we could think of was what would happen when our parents got home, in particular the manner in which indiscriminate justice would be dealt out by the old man. Action was called for and if the Pelletier boys were anything, it was resourceful.

Now, among the many hats my father had worn in the work world before he finally found the rut he was to occupy for so many years working in facilities at the local college, he had worked as a steeplejack. Luckily for us, my father is one of those men who are incapable of throwing anything away.
Therefore, neatly coiled in the carriage barn was the steeplejack tackle my dad had used while working at a job that required climbing telephone poles, trees and from what I can gather anything else that was vertical. What was best about this was the rope that he had used, which was very, very long and about 3 inches in diameter. We went up to the barn and dragged the rope back down to the scene of the crime and proceeded to wrap one end around the tree, which had a diameter, that if it had been cut down, you probably could have parked the car on. The other end was tied around the center of the bumper. Very slowly, and with lots of yelling and wild hand signals, John began backing the car up. After a lot of “just a little more, no, no, NO, STOP, the bumper was finally bent back into shape, the only evidence left, a small dimple about the size of a dime in the center. It was in a much more sober frame of mind John drove the car back up to the front yard and parking the car in front of the house. We then waited for my parents to come home. I don’t remember John even having to threaten us with painful retribution. I think we all realized that if the old man ever found out about this it would not have turned out pretty for anyone involved. The parents eventually made it home and as far as we could tell my father, who for a man who rarely drew a sober breath was incredibly observant, never noticed it. And that was about it. It was a rare moment of solidarity between my older brother and I, who generally were always on the look out for any excuse to rat one another out. If for no other reason than this unspoken truce this incident would have stood out in my memory.

Now, flash forward 30 years. I had gone up for one of my rare visits to my parents and as it turned out both of my brothers visited that day as well. We sat in the living room and as the conversation turned, we boys began remembering all the things we had done that we had somehow never got caught at. Among the stories were tales of bad teenage behavior with cars and John remembered about the VW. Between the three of us we started piecing the story together and my father who has grown a lot more easy going, was laughing like anything about it. My mother on the other hand just started to purse her lips. Mom is one of those people that the angrier they get the smaller their mouth gets. By the time we had about done with our story, Mom’s mouth had entirely disappeared and she had gone bright red.

“You God damned kids!” she finally yelled, and proceeded to harangue us with what would have happened if she had only found out at the time. This only got us laughing harder, which only seemed to make the old lady angrier, and go into greater detail about how she would have made our father beat the 3 of us to death, which only made us laugh harder making her angrier. It was as though we had done this 30 minutes, not 30 years before. If she could have she would have sent her 3, now middle aged sons, to their rooms. This is my mother all over. She has nursed every offence against her to her bosom like a sick kitten. I think that she was most vexed because she had been deprived of 30 years of dragging this crime against parental authority out to beat us with whenever the mood moved her. As you can gather, our mother is difficult, and over the years we all have finally gotten to the point of just rolling our eyes and saying “She means well.” Though that will be a terrible thing to have on her headstone. I think for our part, this childhood memory has become even funnier, because there is the event itself, which is a sterling example of youthful stupidity, then the long overdue aftermath that gives us yet one more example to exhibit when trying to explain our mother to others. It’s also a good prod if we are feeling mischievous, and want to get the old girl going! Now if we could just remember some of the other things we got up to…..

Great line

Overheard the other day:

Oh my God, HIM! He's like a combination of Nora Desmond and Al Pacino.

Field trip

I went on a field trip this evening. I took a couple of grad students and our undergrad office assistant for a walk up the Commonwealth Ave. mall to look at the lights. Unfortunately, my camera is not very fast so most of the photos came out blurry. I will have to get out my tripod and go out on my own. I wanted to show the fabulously tacky display on one of the townhouses. I am sure it sends the Back Bay Association absolutely crazy and they put it up every year! I don't know who these people are but I love them. I promise I'll drag out the tripod and get some good shots.

The nicest thing I've heard all week

I was in bed with a humpy nice looking young man this weekend.

How old did you say you were?

51.

God, I hope my ass looks that good when I'm 51.

Sometimes life is kind.

(It was pointed out to me that I forgot to mention I was wearing chaps at the time, oh and boots and a cockring.... that's all.)

QOTY

There is a fun poll going for the "Queer of the Year" on JoeMyGod's blog. People are suggesting candidates for an award for the person that they feel has helped move forward the gay movement in the past year. Currently I am voting for the country of Canada, who have dismissed conservative PM Stephan Harper's call for a referendum on gay marriage in Canada. It's nice to know at least in Canada they don't think it's a good idea to take peoples human rights away from them, once you've signed them into law. I can only hope that Massachusetts will follow this sensible example

Bells are ringing

Ah, listening to the news in the morning. It's always good for a laugh. Life just gets better and better. Now aside from being protected from our self destructive impulses to sit down and eat a plate of margarine and Crisco in a restaurant somewhere, we can talk ourselves into a state of imbecility without worry. After all of the studies that have shown that talking on cell phones will cause our brains to leak out our ears, because of the low level radiation they emit, surprise, surprise, there is a new study showing that, no, in fact you can gabble inanely as long as you want with no side effects on your new RAZR or whatever hip communication device you choose. What are all of those folks that have pissed away money on bluetooth devices, so that they could have the sound quality of 2 dixie cups and a string going to say? Probably not much, since there is the whole, "I am so much cooler than you are, because I have my wireless earpiece that glows blue." factor. I have become much more in favor of handsfree add ons as of late, even if it does mean that you walk down the street looking like you are talking to yourself like a crazy person, but I'll stick with the wired earbud until they finally get the bugs out of the wireless sets, thanks all the same.

I guess the point of this whole rant is that, in spite of being warned, cajoled and frightened with specious theories loosely based on science, the fact is that all of the experts are self styled and really are only spouting theories on dangers that have all of the substance of swamp gas. Somehow, suggesting that people exercise common sense just doesn't have that same thrill of suggesting whether you are talking on your cell phone or eating a donut that you might as well be bungie jumping into a pit of vipers with your pockets full of bricks. But don't worry kids, by the time another week roles around there will be some new percieved danger out there that will be adding a soupcon of danger to what would ordinarily be an everyday activity. God only knows what chemicals that keyboard your typing at as you cruise the web is leaching out into your system.

Oh Lardy, lardy

The food nazi's are winning. New York has just enacted a ban on transfats! What is worse, it may be coming to dear old Boston. It would seem that Boston, not to be out politically corrected is now considering similar legislation. It really is time to move out of this benighted country. Don't get me wrong. I am all about eating in a responsible and healthy way. I have managed to diet and exercise myself into pants that are 3 inches smaller around the waist and I got myself off of cholesterol medication. I, however did not require the assistance of the state to do it. I simply convinced myself that there was a difference between being hungry and being bored. However self discipline and personal responsibility are sooo 20th century. So start pounding back those Dunkin' Donuts honey, they may not be around much longer. The only hope is that all of this frankenscience that gets spouted, like oatbran, green tea, ginko and god only remembers the last food fad, will turn out to be yet more poorly thought out research. After all, not that long ago chocolate was so, so bad for you. Now, lo and behold it is just chock full of antioxidents. So hang tough America. In a few years they will discover that donuts and cheese doodles are the key to longer life.

Pearl Harbor Day

It is Worlds AIDS Day. I had wanted to write a piece about my best friend Larry. It won't come. I cannot seem to write anything that in my mind does justice to him. I can tell you that he was born on May 25, 1945 and died December 7, 1984. That in those early days of the epidemic, when hysteria ran high and people were abandoned by friends and family, Larry's friends and family rallied around, arranged care rota's and there was always someone with him and caring for him. Those are only facts, what I can't seem to write about is that he was the best friend that I ever had. How he made me feel loved and valued in a way I never felt before I met him, and never have again since he died.

I can tell you that there is a six and a half foot tall whole in my life that will never be filled and will never really heal over. I think about Larry every day, and miss him. Occasionally I will still cry when I think about the fact that I will never see him again, and about all the things we never got to do over the past 22 years and all the things that we will not be able to do together in the future. Life goes on for the living, and I know Larry would not want me to spend my life grieving it away because of his absence and I don't. But on this day it will be hard not to feel sadness and longing bite down a little harder. I'm just happy that I was wiser than I knew at the time, and always let Larry know how much I loved him. I still do.

Age appropriate

Today is my first open thread. I will be asking the question, is it all right for me to be seen in public dressed like this? I was inspired by a conversation I had yesterday with a visiting faculty member. We were talking about people of a certain age wearing clothes that were designed for people younger than themselves. So, should I be wandering around like this, or should I be keeping myself decently covered?

What a waste

Waste has been in the news for the past few days. If it hasn't made the headlines, it has at least been on NPR. I heard a report first on food waste, appropriately enough, on the day after Thanksgiving. It would seem the average American throws out 600 lbs. of food a year. They tracked people who did not consider themselves to be wasteful. Among the top items to be thrown out were fresh fruit and vegetables. It seems that these are people who like to think they eat healthy, so they buy fresh fruit and vegetables, because that is what healthy people eat and then wait for them to go bad and throw them out. Part of the problem it seems is overbuying. The other is the days on which people shop. It seems that I, who consider myself to be fairly thrifty, shop on the best days. They advised people to do their shopping late in the week. The other item was the portions that were prepared. Plan your meals and only prepare what you are going to eat. That doesn't work so much for me, since the people they were working with have an aversion to leftovers. I, if I am cooking more food than I will eat in one sitting, do it on purpose so that I will have something that doesn't require preparation the next day. Roast chicken and meatloaf, just to site a couple of examples of how I try to get out of cooking meals every day, especially on work days. I am in a minority, but I kind of like leftovers. If I am going to cook, why not make something I would be willing to eat 2 days in a row.

The other item was consumer electronics. We are being overburdened with electronics that are designed to wear out, something the manufacturers admit, so that we will go out and buy the replacement. The real problem with the electronics is disposal. Once you make these things, you have to find some responsible way to dispose of something that is chock full of hazardous materials. Some environmental groups are trying to get the designers and manufacturers to plan their products so that the components can be recycled. The reasoning is that companies would save money on the production of these ephemeral consumer goods and would at the same time be a lot friendlier for the planet. Needless to say, these businesses are very resistant to the idea.

If you think about it we throw things away constantly. I know that my office is far from paperless, though most of my work is done on a computer. We receive packages all day long, and the boxes that they arrive in have to be disposed of. Then most of the products in the box are in boxes, quite often with blisterpack on the actual item in the box. Germany has very strict packaging laws, and vendors there would never get away with the excessive and difficult to dispose of packaging solutions that we embrace in this country.

It seems like a pretty simple equation. Stop buying so much, and stop buying things you don't need, stop buying products with the life expectancy of a mayfly. It seems simple, but after a lifetime of exposure to my fellow creatures and several years in retail, common sense never prevails and so we are going to continue to waste things until there is nothing left to waste. The only things left on the planet will be waste. Humanity had better hope the space program moves ahead with plans to start settlements on the moon and Mars, cause we're gonna' run out of room down here.

Funny hats

I have learned something interesting. If you want some attention, wear a silly hat. Among the activities I pursued during my week off from work, I updated my Manhunt page. I have had an account with Manhunt for over a year now, and to be frank, it hasn't been all that successful. I was innocent of some conventions, so my first mistake was to list my actual age. I have learned subsequently that you automatically add 5 years to anyones profile. So in Manhunt years I am 56 years old, which is rushing things a bit. While I can see 60 looming on the horizon, it's not quite that close. I have also learned that home naked shots are not as easy to take, even with a camera with a timer, as one might think. All I can say is that it's a good thing no one can see into my apartment easily, when I am taking new photos for the add. Then there is the profile itself. Some people, most of them delusional I might add, manage to toot their own horn. The list of people and things they are not interested in is staggering. I have also had to learn a whole new shorthand of 3 letter acronyms, a.k.a. TLA's. I never knew that so many men are VGL (very good looking) and it would seem that all of the men in Boston are hung like horses. I had also been hitherto unaware at the number of men in Boston that had access to professional photographers. (Either that or scanners and a staggering collection of pornography) I have had to struggle along with my digital camera and all of my physical faults. All in all, after a few months I have come to view the whole thing more as a source of entertainment, rather than an alternative to the bars for, if not dates at least some cheap sex. I did meet my FB Flip through the site so it wasn't a complete waste, but it is not the bottomless well of sexual gratification that it has been touted to be.

Having developed a sense of humor about the whole thing, I decided on Black Friday to do a holiday posting, so I put on my Santa hat and a cock ring and posted a picture of myself. I have, it would seem discovered the better mousetrap. I have had more men hitting on my site than even I know what to do with! Now, honesty compels me to admit that most of the hitters are not exactly prize winners. I think it must be the jolly fat man thing, because the vast majority of the hits have been from, well, ample guys. But that seems to be my fate usually anyway. I am a magnet for the overweight. I am not just talking about bears here either. One of these boys profile stated 5'8", 230 lbs. Yikes! There have also been some guys that have been pretty nice looking and at least in chat, don't seem to be suffering from any bizarre psychosis, other than being attracted to men in Santa hats.

For me there are a number of reasons for trying dating sites. I really don't enjoy going to the clubs anymore. Even on nights when I contemplate the virtues of going out, I usually fall asleep before I make it out the door. On the increasingly rare occasions that I do manage to go out, I never spend that much time at the club before I get bored and leave, after having had a couple of very expensive bottles of water. So online dating is the answer. Sort of. I also get bored with that and will go weeks, and during good weather, months without signing onto the site. Usually because, like the bars, I don't enjoy all that much success and if the weather is nice and the days are long, I'd rather spend my time out in my garden.

Which brings us back to silly hats. Have I found the secret to success? Is what has been missing from my life all this time been silly hats? Maybe a whole holiday theme motif for the future. Little wings and a bow and arrow perhaps for Valentine's Day? I'm not sure, but I have New Years and Valentines Day coming up to do further research on my theory. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to write back to a nice young man who wants to sit in Santa's lap.

later that afternoon

Well, I can say that Daniel Craig is a great Bond. I cannot say that Casino Royale is a great Bond movie. I spent far to much time squirming in my seat wondering if they were just going to get on with it. Don't get me wrong, it was well cast and acted. It was just long. Too long. Still if over the holidays you find yourself with some downtime you could do worse. Just go to the cheap matinee.

On the other hand, I have been playing Robbie Williams album "Rudebox" like a 14 year old. It is rude, funny and you can dance to it. Perfect music for the gym and a nice antidote to the bland offerings on commercial radio.

So, I can honestly say I am starting to wind down. I could get used to this taking time off idea. Think I'll listen to Bongo Bong again, just for the hell of it. Hey, I'm on vacation.

Time off

I am on day 2 (officially, weekends don't count) of some much needed vacation time. So far, so good. Though I do have to admit it is a bit of a struggle to not try and schedule everything. I have managed to have dinner with the niece and niece v.2, who was up from Georgia for a visit. I got to give my FB Flip a rather vigorous send off before his sojourn out to the midwest for family Thanksgiving. I am seriously sore from working out at the gym as well (hyuck, hyuck) having the luxury of taking as much time as I want to exercise.

Right on time I got a shipment from Amazon. Neil Gaiman's "Fragile Things", Barbara Tuchman's "The Zimmerman Telegram", which I had read years ago and loaned out, and never got back and promptly went out of print. It has been reissued and is an exciting read. Tuchman takes the final event that brought the U.S. into WWI and makes it read like a spy thriller. It is exciting and Mrs. Tuchman's asides about major historical figures are very funny. I also got "The Gentle Art of Making Enemies" by James Abbot McNeil Whistler. Another loaner that never came home to Poppa. Whistler was a talented essayist as well as painter and I can suggest to anyone who has every wanted to air an opinion to read this book to get an idea of how to do it with style.

I'm headed off to see the new Bond film and then lunch with a my pal Clint. Ah the joy of not having to do anything.

Oh, BTW if you switch over to Blogger Beta, you have to go into settings to allow all comments, it automatically defaults to "members only". WTF is that about? More later.

Home on the range

Okay, this is too good, even if it is at my expense. Our student worker was late and I said something to the effect that as long as she blamed her tardiness on George Bush, I would accept it. This led to me ranting about everything that I find unfair being George Bush's fault. "Yeah, I said, and when I was young, chocolate wasn't fattening, that's George Bush's fault too. Buttermonkey looked up.

"When you were young honey, nothing was fattening. You were wandering the plains."

I'll make a queen outa' that boy yet!

I like Mike

As most of you, who haven't been living under a rock know, Mike Jones is the hooker who blew the grotesque Ted Haggard out the water with his revelations about Haggard the homophobe's meth fueled love fests with said call boy.

What you may not know is that the so called "gay community" or those claiming to represent us, have been offering their loving support by covering the pure guy in little round bruises by touching him with 10 foot poles.

However, one of my favorite bloggers Joe.My.God has set up a paypal account for Mike Jones. The guy is unemployed, probably unemployable for the near future and in legal trouble. I don't care if you agree or disagree with the choices Mr. Jones has made about how he made his living, but if the organizations that are suppose to be working to safeguard the rights of gay people are too tight assed to offer assistance to someone who was willing to put themselves on the line, and expose a hypocrite like Haggard, then I invite you to go to Joe's website and pitch in.

I realize approximately 3 people read this blog, so if you know anyone who you think would like to contribute, email them Joemygod's link.

Thanks,

Tony

I just can't get tired of saying it...

Donald Rumsfeld resigned....Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned,.... I just can't say it enough, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Sorry, it still hasn't gotten old. My head is going to explode, okay! The only thing that might be even better is that Nancy "San Francisco Liberal" Pelosi will be the speaker of the house. Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, Donald Rumsfeld resigned, don't mind me, this is just going to go on for the rest of the day.