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The highlights of my day…

* Fixing a moderately complicated plumbing problem with only my bare hands, the world’s tiniest flathead screwdriver, and a well worn pair of Revlon tweezers. (And they say plucking isn’t butch.)

* Finishing a grant application I’ve been promising to turn in for a couple of months.

* Playing The Sims and having Michael Bachelor sex up everyone in the neighborhood, male and female. I’ve still not been able to get a partnered person to dump their spouse and move in with me, but I’m working on Mortimer. Will Bella ever speak to me again? (If you don’t understand a word of what you just read, I’m profoundly sorry. For myself.)

* Loving that adorable curmudgeon of a boyfriend of mine.

Other things…

* There is absolutely nothing on television this evening–not that I spend much time in front of the tube, but I like having my options, you know? Good thing Jonno and I have plans to catch a movie–thanks, in part, to a certain webmistress’ glowing review.

* One TV show in which I am a little interested is the new John Goodman piece, Normal, Ohio, on Fox. Apparently, the big lush (who’s got a big-ass house out in Old Metairie) is playing a big homo on the small screen. First we were niched for the clothing market (International Male, Tzabaco), then film (remember New Queer Cinema, my darlings?), and now television! Expect a bonafide 24-hour queer cable channel within the next year or so–if it’s not already running by the time this post goes up.

P.S. Yes, I think John Goodman’s kinda sexy in that big, klutzy, bearish sorta way.

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Um, okay, like does this guy look familiar to anyone? I mean, I could be wrong and all, but I think he looks suspiciously like a certain boy-band homo-in-waiting (whose pic was recently snapped on the dancefloor of Oz as he shook his post-concert ass )….

You know, I think it’d be great for little Lance to come screeching out of his walk-in closet–not only for our sake (a highly visible–if artistically questionable–role model for tomorrow’ homosexuals), but also for his own. I’m sure the first real lover he scored would put an end to certain promotional campaigns that’ll inevitably come back to haunt him.

Of course, it’d also be fun to watch as hundreds of thousands of squealing prepubescent girls’ faces twisted into expressions of confusion, disbelief, anger, deep sorrow, back to anger, despair, and finally morose acceptance. Crushing children’s fantasies–it’s what makes life worth living.

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Jeez, I’ve FINALLY caught up with my work–thanks largely to the recent hiring of a new staff member who’s taken over some of my duties. I think I’m going to relax now….

In the meantime, you might enjoy a new story I’ve posted in the Miscellaneous section. I think it’s kinda funny. Maybe you will, too. Or maybe you won’t.

Feh.

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Two Things

One

Brasilia. Beatrice Dalle. The Belle Stars. Holy Smoke. What do these things all have in common? Ample resources and seriously squandered opportunities.

Poor Kate Winslet. I’d have only needed to hear two words before I ran screaming from Ms. Campion’s office: “Harvey Keitel.”

Two

This evening Jonno helped remind me of something that I’d nearly erased from memory: back in high school, there was a kid one grade ahead with exactly the same name as me.

Now, ordinarily that wouldn’t have been so bad, except this particular Richard (everyone called him Richie) was slightly insane and extremely homosexual and claimed he had Rod Stewart’s baby in a shoebox buried in his backyard. In case you’ve forgotten, our story is set in Mississippi. Ergo, Richie was not the most popular kid in town. (Of course, I doubt his plight would have been much different had we grown up in San Francisco.)

So every year on the first day of classes, I’d have at least one teacher who’d never encountered either of us. Since his reputation preceeded him, the profs would ask me hesitantly, “Are you Richie?” And with all the vehemence of a teenage faggot trying to hide his love of uncut cock, I’d state with a mildly haughty toss of the head, “No, I’m Richard, actually.” And I believed it; I believed in our mutual exclusivity. So far as I was concerned, Richie and I had nothing in common….

I like to think I’m older and wiser now. At the very least, I’m older. When I go home and see Richie at the Hattiesburg gay bar (as I sometimes do), I should be able to walk over to him and laugh and buy him a drink, but I don’t. And I probably won’t. My inner hippie tells me I need to apologize to him, but really, how conceited is that? Richie probably doesn’t even remember who I am, and he seems to be getting along just fine without hearing the words “I’m sorry” fall from my lips. Why bother?

Sometimes I hate the 60s and the touchy-feely crap that followed in their wake. Hackneyed sentimentality. I mean, I’m no Kathy Acker, either–just cynical.

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I agree, Steve: teenpopbimbogoddessmonsters suck.

However, I do give props to Vitamin C, if only because Colleen Fitzpatrick was the whiny and moderately evil Amber von Tussle in Hairspray. Sure, it’s a flawed movie (frankly, my interest in John Waters tapered off after Polyester), but I can’t help smiling when one of Mr. Waters’ hand-picked freaks (e.g. Divine, Mink Stole, even Rikki Lake) makes a ripple in mainstream cultcha.

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…so then he just dropped his pants and started touching himself–right in the middle of the street! Good God almighty, Mabel, I near about had a stroke at the feet of Naomi Jeffcoat–and she never would have let me live that down, let me tell you. After that tabasco incident at the Easter bake sale, I absolutely refuse to trust that woman! Now don’t go getting me wrong: I adore the pastor, but sugar, that Naomi never has been nothing but trouble…

Are you listening to me, Mabel? …Well, all right then. I never heard you so quiet. What’s got into you? Is Ed at it again? Mabel, I tell you, you got to keep that man away from Dr. Chisolm’s office. He’s gonna kill you one of these days–along with half the church choir! He ain’t right! I just wish you’d been out back with us the other night after the service. Why, out of nowhere he just starts in on Shirley P., and you know how fluttery her heart is these days…

Oh, gotta run. Almost time for The Simpsons. I’ll talk to you later dear. Give Ed my love…

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I’m back where I belong.

I hope John Brown’s car is, too.

John, you see, was kind enough to take me out on the town last night. After a leisurely dinner (made slightly more leisurely by the fact that we were waiting in vain for my friend Kellum to show up), we wound our way to a bar called Mary’s. Of course, Zod–the one friend in Atlanta I’ve been unable to reach by phone–and his boyfriend Todd were the first people I saw when I walked in the door.

After the requisite screaming and good, honest hugs, we grabbed drinks, slunk to the back of the bar, and chewed some serious fat–meeting quite a few folks from John and Zod’s non-overlapping circle of friends along the way. Wonderful, warm evening. Good buddies. Nothing better.

(I am painfully aware that I just described the world’s sappiest gay beer commercial. Sorry.)

Anyway, being the responsible-to-a-fault kinda guy that I am and knowing that my flight left early in the morning, I had to call it a night around 1am. Rounds of hugs, kisses, then John and I stepped out into the parking lot. And, verily, we discovered that some tow truck-driving cretin had tried to cramp our style by hauling off John’s adorable little car.

If you’re reading this, Mr. Cretin, it would perhaps behoove you to note that neither of us were phased in the least. We simply stepped right back into Mary’s, intent on calling a cab, but Zod and Todd insisted on giving us a ride.

In Todd’s truck.

In Todd’s cute but compact little truck.

But no matter. Being from Mississippi the vehicular specifics were of little concern to me. Todd and John took the front, Zod and I grabbed our cigarettes and a cup of bourbon (to keep us warm) and lay down in the back (riding semi-drunk in the bed of a pickup is surely illegal, or at least very suspicious), and very shortly we were on the interstate headed back downtown. The night was cold but the sky was beautiful. The undersides of overpasses were sudden and startling and very, very funny.

Fifteen minutes after we’d begun, I bounded from the back of the truck onto the cobbled pavement of the motor court of one of the most expensive and overrated hotels in Atlanta (hey, I wasn’t paying for it), hugged everyone again, dashed upstairs, and crept into bed glowing from a really good night.

Except, I guess, for the fact that John Brown is probably out a hundred bucks. That sucks. But apart from that…

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Hey. I leave for Atlanta tomorrow. You ho’s out yonder drop me an email and lemme know your schedules. I gotta plan my Pernod intake, you know.