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I think I’m gay.

What has caused me to leap to such a startling conclusion, you ask? Well apart from my fondness for committing various lusty acts upon the bodies of other men, last night I dreamt of dancing with Liza Minnelli. We were at a fabulous party, and she was flirting heavily with me, lifting her kilt (yes, kilt) in my general direction.

Later on–after I’d been awakened by Jonno as he came to bed and laughed at by same after telling him of Liza’s appearance in my reverie–I had another, in which Queen Elizabeth II and I were dashing about a schmancy hotel, dodging the paparazzi. As we hid crouched in an empty, fluorescently lit hallway, the queen, who was looking very chubby and wore a bad Joan of Arc wig, pleaded with me to get her a cocktail–a whiskey somethingorother (sour? soda? mayosa?). About that time, my dog, Gaston, stepped squarely on my nether region, and that was all she wrote.

So, yeah, between Liza and the queen, I think I may be gay. Or maybe it has something to do with the sizeable quantities of coffee, beer, and Chinese food I consumed just before bedtime. Or the fact that I’m sleeping with my boyfriend. Who can say?

I’m not a big fan of folks who support John Kerry first and foremost “because Dubya is a bully.” These are men and women who, when seen on TV, have clearly spent most of their lives getting pushed around–largely because, like Woody Allen or Kirstie Alley, they give off a vibe so obnoxious that it incites hatred in complete strangers. In fact, if you could reach through the screen and across the ether, you probably wouldn’t mind smacking ’em around yourself.

No, if you’re going to hate G.W., hate him because he’s a total moron. Case in point: the following poem (forwarded to me by my friend Jason), pieced together from recent Bushisms:

MAKE THE PIE HIGHER

I think we all agree, the past is over.

This is still a dangerous world.

It’s a world of madmen and uncertainty and potential mental losses.

Rarely is the question asked: Is our children learning?

Will the highways of the Internet become more few?

How many hands have I shaked?

They misunderestimate me.

I am a pitbull on the pantleg of opportunity.

I know that the human being and the fish can coexist.

Families is where our nation finds hope,

Where our wings take dream.

Put food on your family!

Knock down the tollbooth!

Vulcanize society!

Make the pie higher!

Make the pie higher!

So I’m sitting here on the sofa, answering email with the TV on and muted, and I look up, and CNN is doing a special on Britney. Apparently, they’re comparing her to Madonna, because they keep intercutting footage from Britney’s concerts with stuff from Madonna videos and, of course, countless frames from their publicity stunt-cum-lesbotronic lip-lock at the MTV awards. And while I can’t hear the (inevitably banal) commentary, seeing the two over-preened pop tarts side-by-side, one thing is made abundantly clear: Britney will never be as interesting as Madonna because she lacks the latter’s–dare I say it?–gravitas.

See, with Madge (aka Esther), we know we’re looking at a costume; she’s always winking at us, as if to say, “You think this is outrageous? Just wait ’till next month!” When we look at Britney, though, what we see is what we get. She doesn’t have the edge, the intelligence, the otherworldly glamour of Madonna, because after the show’s over, we see her schlepping around in cut-offs and flip-flops. She’s no different from the rest of us.

And, fyi, Madonna would never be caught walking and smoking.

Um, okay, could I get any gayer?

Darling, if you’re looking for a bit of amusement this Saturday morning, may I suggest you pay a visit to the Bright Young Things site? The “Splendidizer” feature is simply too, too divine! Try it with America’s favorite dishwater-dull news source, CNN (“The blasted Olympics!”), the evil Mr. Buckley’s idiot magnet, National Review (“Kerry is, and I don’t want to be frightfully mean, lying about the frightful economy — the frightfully horrid Times proves it. Splendid!”), and, of course, the boyfriend’s virtual smut hut Fleshbot (“God bless Mary Carey: if the blasted gal didn’t exist, we’d have to take some cheeseburgers and a frightful stack of string bikinis and try to invent the priceless gal, darling!”).

And for those out of the loop, as the kids say these days, Bright Young Things is a film version of my second favorite novel in the whole, whole world, Vile Bodies. Of course, my #1 favorite would have to be Myra Breckinridge, which, as you all know, was turned into a fabulous, though quite unwatchable piece of dreck back before most of you were born. Luckily, Mr. Waugh’s work seems to be meeting a better fate. Huzzah!

So, we went out for dinner last night at Tommy’s–an unfortunately named restaurant that consistently serves up some of the best food in town–and after two hours of butter-soaked, crabmeat-stuffed delicacies, followed by a heaping bananas foster and copious amounts of vodka, I was ready for bed.

As you might expect, my dreams were somewhat flamboyant.

I found myself at an amusement park with John Kerry, Dick Cheney, my uncle, and Kevin James. The park, of course, was just as unusual as our group. Sure, there were roller coasters and hamburger stands and all, but it was a sex park, which, like Disney World, was divided into little mini-parks–in this case, based on carnal habits: there was a straight section, a gay section, one for bisexuals, and squillions of fetish areas.

That, however, wasn’t as weird as the costumes everyone was wearing, which were very reminiscent of Logan’s Run, with tunic-like things for the women and full-body, Star Trek-esque jumpsuits for men. I can only hope we checked our street clothes at the door.

Anyway, somehow Kevin and I got separated from the group and ended up in the bisexual area of the park. He was obviously nervous and started stammering something about how he’d “never done anything like that before.” Then along came a fembot–not one as real-looking as in, say, The Stepford Wives, more like Irona in the Richie Rich comics. And she started feeling Kevin up, and the next thing I knew, the three of us were in a cozy boudoir, and we were all rolling around in the sheets, and…well, I won’t go into details–never one to dream and tell, me–but afterward, Kevin was in no particular hurry to get back to Queens.

We had our first read-through of Bad Seed last night. It’s going to be very, very funny, but godDAMN that’s a wordy sonofabitch. If I could cut it down to one fat, non-stop hour of hilarity, giving everybody in the cast a couple of good moments in the spotlight, I’d be much happier.

In other news, here’s a haiku for today:

Is it just me
or are there others who’d like to
page Dr. Gupta?

Despite its reputation as a Euro-esque party town, New Orleans is a lot like other American cities. We have a troubled public school system, boondoggled by bureaucracy and led by nincompoops. Our political officials and business leaders make weekly appearances on the evening news, talking about how we’re poised to benefit from the next tech boom. And we host a thriving gay community, which has improved shoddy neighborhoods, boosted tourism, and continues to support a number of bath houses.

About that last bit: I’ve always wondered why lesbians don’t have bath houses or sex clubs of their own. I mean, they obviously enjoy being together in all-girl environments–just as fags like me enjoy being in all-guy environments–and they like having sex. But when I picture women in erotically-charged, single-sex spaces, all that comes to mind is that absurdly funny scene in Desperate Living, where Mink Stole goes to the restroom at the strip club and gets hit on by a series of women who thrust their boobs through twin, chest-high glory holes.

So, what’s the problem?

Part of it may be biological. When men finish doing the deed, they’re literally spent: after climaxing, their interests shift to sleeping, eating, or shopping. They cum and go. Women, however, aren’t so physiologically constrained. One of my friends–a lesbian who shall remain nameless–once joked that thanks to the female capacity for multiple orgasms and their ability to take a licking and keep on ticking, an all-girl bath house would be the human equivalent of a roach motel: girls would go in, but they’d never want to leave.

Of course, there’s also the question of hetero bath houses. If straights make up 90% of the population, why don’t they have more places where like-minded consenting adults can get their casual, no-strings freak on? I mean, sure, there are brothels–legal and otherwise–and there’s the occasional hetero sex club, but on the whole, breeders seem to be doing a pretty crappy job in the pleasure palace department.

Luckily, things seem to be changing on the other side of the globe. Screw Pokemon–I say we import this trend.

After about ten days away from New Orleans, it’s time to go home.

It’s been a great vacation–my first real break in five years. The weather’s been great (we managed to miss the hurricane altogether). We’ve had no lost luggage, no missing hotel reservations. And best of all, we’ve gotten to catch up with several people we haven’t seen in some time. Oh–and we saw our friend Ryan’s production of The Septic Wives. If any of you venture up to Provincetown over the next few weeks, don’t miss it.

Most surprising of all, Jonno and I have had a very pleasant time together. You see, under normal circumstances (i.e. during the course of everyday life), there are lots of spaces in our togetherness: I get up early, I spend my day at the office, we eventually see one another in the late afternoon, and then, as often as not, I run back out to rehearsal or meetings or something. Even when I find myself with an evening at home, we tend to separate, wiih him working on his laptop in the kitchen (his de facto office) and me on the sofa in the living room, watching TV and answering email. So, given the prospect of spending more than a week in each other’s company, with relatively few distractions, I was afraid we’d start to get on one another’s nerves. I was happily proven wrong.

I know happiness never makes for good reading–or good writing for that matter. I mean, there’s a reason the New York Times doesn’t run headlines like “EVERYTHING BETWEEN OTIS AND MAYBELLE IS A-OKAY!” You and I would rather read about death and tragedy and near-overdoses than smiling children and puppies. (NB: Oddly, it’s the other way around in advertising, where kids and kittens rule the day.)

Nevertheless, there it is. I’ll try not to mention it again.

Nothing much to do the past couple of nights in Provincetown, so we’ve gone to the movies. For those who haven’t seen it, The Manchurian Candidate is well worth your time–nice acting, nice story, and some seriously detail-obsessed art direction (down to cheesy crawls running along the bottom of TV newscasts). The Village, however… Not to spoil anyone’s fun, but, uh, basically, the monster is Santa Claus. Please save your money: we’re putting together a community fund to take out a hit on M. Night Shayamalan.