JoyZeeBoy

The Washington Clown Show

2011-11-21T15:09:00.000-05:00

Oh, hai. I've been busy. I had foot surgery (on both feet, cause I'm a f*ckin' wimp and if I did one and it hurt too much I wouldn't have done the other -- so shut the eff up about it) and was home recuperating from it for a month and a half and couldn't be bothered.

But I'm back and some things have happened in the meantime that have really gotten my attention and knickers in a twist.

The first was Occupy Wall Street. These are a bunch of frustrated folks without a clear message. Personally, I think they should rally behind this message:

Yes, the rich are richer and poor poorer. We all know that. But the problem isn't unequal distribution of wealth. The *real* problem is unequal distribution of tax effects. The rich pay nearly next to nothing in taxes in terms of the IMPACT that tax burden has on them, as a class. Unlike the poor, who take a real body-slam, taxation-wise, compared to the rich.

We need to even out the effect of taxes on the classes so that if a poor person has to sacrifice the equivalent value of a loaf of bread to the tax man, then a rich SOB should suffer an equivalent burden, i.e., they should sacrifice the equivalent value of owning a 4-star restaurant. In Manhattan. Or Beverly Hills.

The second thing has been watching the spectacle of the Republican Circus-Clown Volkswagen as it disgorged it's content on national tv, seemingly every 3 days for the past 2 months.

If I hear the message clearly (and I think I do), it is this:

The Republican Party policy is: that we should live in an abortion and gay-free America, where everyone who earns less than $1,000,000 per year must marry and endlessly procreate for the purpose of providing illiterate, underpaid workers and cannon fodder who will die, in the harness or in the trenches, before the age of 50, thus saving the rich from having to keep them in their old age.

Have I misread that?

The "Real" America

2011-09-06T11:21:00.001-04:00

I grew up in the 50's, believing in the American Dream of working hard and getting some stuff to show for it and eventually retiring on a pension and social security.

Well, so much for that.

Now I believe:

That both political wings of the same old party that we vote for have edged further and further to the right since I was a child.

That the Republican Party is against education, unless it's to educate their own offspring to handle the wealth that they will inherit. That the Republican Party is, in fact, against educating the middle and lower classes, in order that they will have legions of underpaid, mindless drones to work in their factories and on their farms.

That this is the Republican Dream: to have all the money and to share it with no one. To keep what's theirs and what's yours too.

This is not the American Dream. Republicans do not believe in the same America that I believe in. Republicans do not believe in the America that my dad and his brother and countless other dads and brothers fought for in countless wars.

The current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are not being fought to fight the forces of evil afoot in the world. They are being fought to further enrich the already Republican rich.

This is America now. America is a place where a handful of people have it all. And that same handful people has every intention to keep it all. And they will do whatever needs to be done in order for that to happen.

I can't believe that it's taken me 63 years to wake up and to see America for what it really is, a semi-noble experiment gone horribly, horribly wrong.

I am no longer buying the bullshit. Are you still buying the bullshit?

My Despair

2011-08-01T10:33:00.000-04:00

I pissed away a small fortune back in the 90's. That's on me for being a drunk and believing a writer. But one thing I've done for my entire life, notwithstanding a few sabbaticals along the way, was to work. Since the week I graduated from high school, I've worked. Hard.

I grew up believing, because this what I was told, that in America, if you're a team player, and you work, you will get a protective covering when you retire, in the form of Social Security and Medicare.

I turned 62 last year and started "doing the math". The Social Security Administration started sending me yearly statements showing me "how much" I'd get if I retired at 62, 66 1/2 and 70 1/2. Needless to say, the big payday for me would come when I was 70. So I started mentally adjusting myself to the probability that I'd work until then.

But now, who knows what Congress has just given away to the far right meatheads who still fantasize that rich people create jobs. And what will be my new "plan B" according to them? Work until I'm 75? 80? Dead?

I'm not feeling the love from D.C. these days.

Maybe my recurring nightmare of living in a beat-up, 1966, all aluminum Airstream trailer, somewhere in the high desert 80 miles east of L.A., where atomically mutated ants come visiting at night, and you have to shake the scorpions out of your boots every morning, will come true.

It may not be much, but at least it'll be mine!

Thank you, Ronald Reagan.

And thanks, Mom, for naming me after that bastard.

Clueless

2011-04-21T11:36:00.000-04:00

How can you tell if someone is expressing interest in you? No, seriously, I mean it. How can you tell?

Being gay and of a "certain age" means having grown up without the benefit of acquiring the usual social skills that heteronormative kids get when they start dating in high school. While they were busy doing that, I was busy hiding in my bedroom waiting to be rescued.

Now, years later and without the benefit of drugs or alcohol, I find myself trying to decipher the words and body language of somebody I like. A lot. Who is cute. And smart. And an ex-actor like me. Yesterday, for example, he asked me what I was "doing for Easter." I looked at him blankly and said, "nothing." He then proceeded to tell me that he was going to a gay-friendly church downtown and how inclusive the place was and how comfortable he felt there, etc. I nodded and thought, "well, how nice for you -- Catholicism caused me nothing but self-hatred and guilt. But by all means go and enjoy! Who am I to criticize."

I thought, later, "You big dope. He was practically THROWING an invitation your way." I think. I'm not sure. Boy, wrap up some obliqueness with some low self-esteem, and you'll wind up like me -- clueless.

If any of the regulars are out there, I'd appreciate some advice.

STAT!

Shame

2011-03-28T15:26:00.000-04:00

That word, that FEELING, is probably the cause of more addictive behavior than just about any other word or feeling there is.

I remember my childhood filled with shame. I was ashamed about the drunkeness in my family. I was ashamed that I often had to stand in front of my drunken grandmother on the sidewalk to shield her from public view while she relieved herself... her urine stream running out to the curb between my little legs.

I was ashamed the first time I saw my 1st grade school bus driver. His name was Frank and I knew, the moment I laid eyes on him, that wanted to be alone with him. And I felt shame about that and KNEW I could never share that shameful thing with anyone else. Ever. I remember the feeling of shame that arose from desiring boys, instead of girls.

I remember the shame I felt at being a late bloomer, puberty-wise. I remember the feelings of inadequacy that I’m quite sure, now, that every boy must feel in the showers after gym class.

I remember the shame of not being able to perfectly, and intuitively, understand Algebra. Because of that, I felt inadequte, inferior, “less than.” I cut school for nearly a month because of that shame. Until I got caught. And I felt shame over that, too.

I remember the feelings of guilt and shame that I was going to be consigned to the eternal fires of hell.

Shame.

I drank over all that shame. I drank over my shameful feelings.

And yet, I had absolutely *nothing* to be ashamed of. I was absolutely perfect, just the way I was.

Religion, however, had another idea.

Which is why, today, I believe in God, but I don’t believe in religion. Not any of them. And I’m not ashamed of that.

I Dated

2011-01-07T11:00:00.000-05:00

I need to put it out there that I went out on a date last week. It was the first "real" date I think I've ever been on.

Growing up in the 50's and 60's didn't provide a lot of relationship-testing dating opportunities for a gay kid from the suburbs of Wilmington, Delaware. I couldn't exactly ask the captain of the football team to go to the prom with me. So I didn't go to my prom.

"Jack" is a guy I met a year or so ago at a 12-Step meeting I sometimes attend on Saturday nights over near the Willow Grove naval air station in Pennsylvania. He's fun and kooky -- and fairly new in recovery (more than a year, but less than 2). I hadn't seen him in many months when he resurfaced at the meeting about 2 months ago. He asked me if I'd be willing to help him with one of the Steps, to which I happily agreed. We never quite got it together to do the step work but he called me the week before Christmas and wondered if I'd go out to dinner and a movie with him. I didn't think anything about it, other than as an "activity" a couple of guys in recovery could do together.

But I talked about it, with my sponsor and with some friends and the feedback was all the same... that this was a "date."

As dates go, it was catastrophic. The service was terrible at the restaurant. The food practically inedible (Thai/Malay). The movie he picked, one of the "Fokker" flicks, was gawd-awful and his movie etiquette was abysmal (he yapped and commented throughout, much to the chagrin of me and everyone around us.).

But it *was* fun. And I did have a good time. And I do like him. Even if he wants to live in half a dozen cities and is converting to Judaism (whatever for? didn't he get enough guilt in his Catholic childhood?).

I went out on a date. With a guy. What next? A goodnight kiss? Cue Katy Perry!

Whodda thunk it?

Goodbye Yellow Brick Road

2011-01-02T09:38:00.000-05:00

And goodbye, American Exceptionalism. Hello, American decline.

And if there is blame to dole out for this, let it be spread, equally, among the left and right. But it should all be concentrated on one institution, the Congress, which perpetually runs for re-election rather than running the country.

Trillions of dollars which *should* have been spent on bettering ourselves, were spent trying to shove our brand of world-view down the throats of other nations. Other trillions were spent enriching people who needed no further enriching, i.e., the already obscenely rich.

We're sliding. Fast. China and India are rising. Equally fast.

What I find really sad is that the British Empire lasted twice as long as ours will have lasted.

Fasci-nistas

2010-12-03T11:50:00.002-05:00

Has anyone else noticed that while we're busy staying focused on all the homophobia behind the thinking of militarists like McCain and Jolly-Ollie North, the "grand issue" over repeal of DADT, in their minds, is not anyone's rights, or who is getting shat upon, but rather, the pristine preservation, at any cost, of the biggest wehrmacht, er, war machine in the world.

Ollie and Johnnie would've been right at home in ancient Rome or in Albert Speer's world capital, "Germania", where preservation of the Party and the State superceded any "collateral damage", which includes people, that might be incurred along the way.

They both envision a perpetually armed and alert America, prepared at a moments notice to spend every dollar and expend every life to impose our will on an unwilling world. They, like the Pentagon, argue that we must always be ready to fight the last war, even as we fail, miserably, to find solutions to our current ones.

They would call this "patriotism." I, of course, would call it Fascism. Unlike them, I picture an America at peace, not perpetually at war.

They picture an America steeped in ignorance, intolerance and war-mongering. I picture an America steeped in love, compassion and forgiveness.

Okay... which of those is the “Christian” view?

Hot Marines!

2010-11-08T11:17:00.001-05:00

That’s the new Commandant of the Marine Corps, General James Amos, over there. He just got the job 2 weeks ago.

“Combat,” Amos said, “is an ‘intimate’ experience without parallel in civilian life. We're talking about our young men — laying out, sleeping alongside of one another and sharing death, fear and loss of brothers," he said.

What he didn’t say, but was implied in his description of the living circumstances, was this: it is better to have no unwanted psycho-sexual nonsense “cluttering up” the battlefield between a bunch of over-sexed hotheads who should be focused solely on killing gooks and eating dead, burnt, babies, in Jesus’s name. Or something.

Amos, 63, said he was reviewing the results of a poll of military members and their families about the potential effects of lifting the "don't ask, don't tell" policy. He declined to characterize the findings. Amos said that, unlike other services, the Marine Corps requires many of its members to share rooms while in garrison. That complicates the issue, he said.

Yeah. No point in cluttering up the business of glorious, heroic, death with something disgusting and nasty such as life and love.

Unrequited (and self-centered) Love....

2010-10-18T11:05:00.000-04:00

A week ago today I found out, via teh interwebs here, that the very first love of my life died over a year ago in a small town in Central Illinois. He was 59. And he lived with a longtime (female) companion. It must've been quick because he died in an Emergency Room. Thank God for little mercies.

I met "X" in the Navy. I was 21 or 22 at the time. He was 19 or so. He was big (a bodybuilder) and typical of the sort of corn-fed, All-American, boys from the mid-West we had running around in the services in those days. It was 1969 or 1970.

I had never in my life, up until then, felt those sorts of feelings about another human being. In fact, I was pretty sure by that age that I was incapable of feeling feelings like those. I was convinced that, due to growing up in the emotionally traumatic situation I'd grown up in, I was too shut down to feel anything for anybody -- including myself.

For nearly a year I wanted to be near "X" all the time. But I knew I had to be careful. I couldn't let the Navy find out about it. I couldn't even tell "X" how I felt about him.

Of course, I was deluded. He did know how I felt about him. So did the rest of the little tribe of intellectuals we hung out with. I remember one Friday night, all of us getting bombed in my barracks room, and them staging a "fake wedding" for "X" and I.

So, yeah, he (and they) knew. One other thing was playing under the surface of all this, though. "X" hated the military and was willing to do, and say, anything to get out of it so he could go back home to west Central Illinois, to his mom and girlfriend, and have nothing more to do with the Navy. I had another goal. And that was to stick it out long enough to get honorably discharged so I could collect the GI bill and go to college.

When I saw his obituary on my computer screen last week, I realized that I still had feelings for him. Strong ones. But there was another feeling there, too. A feeling of betrayal because it dawned on me that "X" had studied me closely during our time in the service together. He made my feelings for him the grist for his eventual, dishonorable, discharge from the Navy. For the whole time I knew him, he was seeing a shrink in Washington, D.C. who was building a case for "X" to be discharged as a homosexual.

For 40 years I was emotionally invested in something that could, and would, never be. Worse, I was emotionally invested in someone who, like the people who raised me, betrayed my love by being incapable of returning it.

He didn't do this to me. I did this to me. I know that now. I have re-enacted my childhood pain by carrying torches for the most unavailable people (men) I could find. If someone actually wanted me... I'd leave skid marks trying to escape. If someone was aloof and remote... they were perfect. I could pine away on the inside... alone in my solitary splendor, rather than building a life with some nice guy who really cared about me.

How stupid am I?

Oh, and RIP "X". My heart still flutters a little when I think of you. A very little.

Defense Appropriation and DADT - 2010

2010-09-21T09:04:00.000-04:00

Today the full Senate is to vote on the Defense Appropriation (close to 3/4 of a Trillion dollars) for the next fiscal year.

Attached to that bill is a provision repealing DADT. John McCain has sworn to vote against it. Lady Gaga is all for it (she wants a new bill, directed against homophobes in the military, called "If You Don't Like It, Go Home"). There's no telling, as yet, how Maine senator, Olympia Snowe, will vote.

But this is how I feel about the hows and whys and whine and horse-trade and politicking that have gone on for years.... DECADES... about me and about my rights (or lack thereof) simply because I am a gay American (and I got this from Bill Maher):

"I am TIRED of being the chick you're banging but are too ashamed to be seen with in public."

You (Mr. Ms. Madame Politician) will be forced to vote, up or down, on this. And all of us gay people will be watching.

Have a day, you slimy, rat-fink bastards.

The Face of Evil

2010-08-26T11:10:00.000-04:00

His name is Ken Mehlman. I got this Photoshopped Purple Heart(less) from Pam Spaulding's website. I hope she doesn't mind.

This is the face of evil. It is the face of unbridled privilege, self-serving in the extreme. It was born with a sense of entitlement that knew no bounds. It saw what it wanted, it took what it wanted and it gave no thought or feeling to the consequences to other peoples' feelings or lives.

It lived only to serve itself.

Take a good look at it. You are staring into the abyss.

After trashing the lives of millions, it now seeks acceptance and forgiveness from those same people. My people.

If you see it on the street, do not hesitate to cover your children's eyes and to cross to the other side.

Shun this creature. It deserves it.

Odds and Ends

2010-08-11T10:23:00.000-04:00

This is really important. Is it just me?......

Or is Terrence Stamp in "Priscilla, Queen of the Desert" a dead-ringer for our very own Queen of the Desert, Arizona Governor, Jan Brewer?

I wonder how Terrence feels about illegal immigration?

Oh, and I pulled the trigger this week on a new toy. Four years ago I got my very first cellphone. Two years ago that contract expired. Verizon's been begging me to buy something else for some time now and so, at last, I did. Since it seems like Verizon will never get an iPhone, I ordered a Motorola Droid X, instead. I'll let you all know when it comes in, so you'll envy me for being the coolest kid on the block.

Blah-gging - Death on the Rails - The White House & Fox News

2010-07-29T14:44:00.000-04:00

For the last couple of weeks it seems that all the gay bloggers have been off terrorizing Las Vegas at NetRoots or buying new refrigerators in Chicago or baking themselves silly at the southernmost point in New Jersey (that would be me).

Aside from the Bus & Truck production of "Hate on Parade" starring Mz. Brown and Mr. Gallagher of NOM, which is packing them in by the 5's, things are pretty slow around here in the cyber-sphere.

The big excitement in my life this week (and the lives of about 60,000 other commuters in NY/NJ) was the unfortunate suicide of a 30 year old woman this past Tuesday who opted for a permanent solution to her problems by throwing herself in front of a southbound AMTRAK Acela train, which was doing 135 miles per hour at the time. That night my 1 hour commute from New York City to Princeton Junction took nearly 5 hours. But even at that, I still had a better day than that unfortunate soul had.

But it wouldn't be a good week if I didn't stumble across something that really got my knickers in a twist. And this is my knicker-twister du jour:

As you may recall, the dean of the White House Press Corps, Helen Thomas, was recently forced to resign after an outburst of anti-semitism. The WHCA is now getting ready to give away Helen's former front row seat in the Briefing Room to one of the other senior newsgathering organizations.

And here are their current choices:

1. NPR
2. Bloomberg News
3. Fox News

Needless to say I sent them an e-mail.

"It is my understanding that with the recent departure of Helen Thomas from the press corps, the WHCA is considering assigning her vacant seat to one of three organizations, Bloomberg News, Fox News or NPR.

I would like to urge you to NOT consider Fox News for this prestigious seat. I have no problem with either NPR or Bloomberg, but it is my opinion that Fox is not a serious news gathering organization but, rather, serves but one purpose, that being to generate profits for it's parent, News Corp, by callously agitating the American political right.

Please do not open yourselves to ridicule and dishonor by giving this seat to Fox.

Thank you."

Google "White House Correspondent's Association" and send them an e-mail expressing your views.

Mark Twain, the New York Times and American Imperialism

2010-07-27T11:07:00.005-04:00

Mark Twain knew all about being a boy in the early 19th century, growing up along the banks of the mighty Mississippi River.

Apparently he also knew a thing or two about American imperialism.

He died 100 years ago this past April 22. Now comes word that a large part of his "private" autobiography, held in confidence for the hundred years following his death, will be published this fall. In it, so rumor goes, he "names names" and calls a spade a spade regarding our American propensity for foreign military adventurism. It’s said, shockingly, that he actually referred to our armed forces as "uniformed assassins." We'll all have to wait until November to get the all deets on that.

Meanwhile, though, we can content ourselves with reading recently published secret documents posted first on Wiki Leaks and then again yesterday, in great analytic detail, in the New York Times -- documents detailing the horrors and failures of our 9 year war in Afghanistan.

The United States of America has involved itself in military actions, foreign and domestic, too many times to enumerate here. But you can check it out for yourself at the web site of Zoltan Grossman, a professor at Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington by clicking on his web-page, Here.

It is naive of us to believe that our foreign excursions are excusable because they bring goodness and democracy to other nations. We're not terribly interested in that, when our strategic interests are really to annoy some foreign power and to steal whatever assets we can lay our hands on... assets which will further enrich the entrenched military-industrial complex here at home.

Winston Churchill once remarked that we Americans "can be counted upon to always do the right thing ... once we've exhausted every other possibility".

It's a lovely thought, but untrue.

In fact, we only do the "right thing" once we’ve been shamed into it (we were happy to sit by while England was visciously attacked by Germany and, in fact, didn't get off our asses to really help the English until the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor). Our natural inclination is to do the wrong thing, time and time again. And by wrong I mean "that thing which will embarrassingly enrich a handful of ruthless plutocrats who have zero interest in either democracy or their fellow men."

It is those same plutocrats who, by virtue of their self-centered ruthlessness, cause wars which must then be fought and won by the flower of our youth, millions of young men and women who have no vested financial interest in the outcome of the war but who are conned into believing that it is their patriotic duty to un-do the damage done by handfuls of hateful old men and women who then sit back at home and reap the profits generated by our sons’ and daughters’ deaths overseas.

And yes, I do love my country. But we have hocked our future to the military and industry to the tune of trillions of dollars. Dollars we should’ve spent making America a paradise on earth instead of a bankrupt nation of deluded fools who haven't got a pot to piss in nor a window to throw it out.

The Irresistible Allure of Homosexuality!

2010-06-18T11:28:00.004-04:00

Let's face it. The "real" reason there's so much pushback against my (homosexual) rights is because of the deep-seated fear that once people try it (homosexuality), they'll REALLY like it (and who wouldn't) and never go back (I haven't).

Why is that, I wonder? Is it something as simple as "because a man knows what a man likes and a woman knows what a woman likes?"

Probably.

I've known straight men who, even after years of trying, still haven't got a clue how to satisfy a woman and vice versa.

But put a man into bed with another man, or a woman into bed with another woman and WHAM! Suddenly everybody knows exactly what needs to be done in order to make everybody else happy!

Look, I'm all for procreation. After all, not everybody is cut out for a life of spare cash, incessant sexual gratification, fine dining and tastefully appointed condos in New York and South Beach. Some people need the overall deshabille and slovenliness, not to mention excess tonnage brought on by years of junk-food-stuffing-in-lieu-of-sexual-satisfaction, which can only be achieved by a life dedicated to boring old man on woman lovemaking.

And it's not "all about politics" either. And, to prove my point, if you're a gay man which would you prefer:

This:

or this:

And, if you're a gay woman, this:

or this:

I rest my case.

Taps

2010-06-15T15:26:00.000-04:00

We buried my father last Thursday in a Veteran's Cemetary in Delaware.

It's the hardest thing I've experienced while sober. My mother died while I was still drinking and I was pretty drunk through the whole thing.

This was different.

There was a brief service at the funeral home from 9:00 until 10:00 a.m. Dad's cremated remains were in a box on a table to the right and, on the left, was a table full of memorabilia about my dad -- much of it from his Navy days during WWII in the South Pacific where he was a gun captain aboard a refueling ship -- the kind of ship the Kamikaze's loved to aim for because they made such nice booms. Dad would only say of his wartime experience that he and his crew had "shot down a couple of Japs."

I was detached and calm through that whole part of the morning. At 10:00 we struck out for the cemetary and were there in about 20 minutes.

As we disembarked in front of the reception building a single bell started to toll. A Navy man, in dress whites, stood in front of the building holding a wooden case containing the folded up Old Glory. As we entered the building, across the quarterdeck, an honor guard, all in dress uniforms, stood on both sides and rendered us a salute.

We turned the corner into the chapel, the back wall of which was solid glass, two stories high. Outside we could see the rifle squad marching out to a mound, followed by the bugler.

My siblings and I, with my step-mother between my brother and sister, sat in the front pew... the rest of the family and friends filling in behind.

The minister made some remarks about dad being called "by the Supreme Commander in the sky" and I just dissolved. It started with a noise I had never heard myself make before -- followed by a flood of mucous and tears and sobbing and more weird noises. I reached around under the pew, looking for a box of tissues, but they only had this wimpy little kimwipe type things that wouldn't hold an ounce of water. I looked down the pew and my sister and brother had also both lost it. We were all bawling our eyes out.

Then came the kick in the gut. After the rifle squad had fired their salute and the bugler had played taps and the flag had been re-folded into the familiar triangular shape, the Navy Captain ( an O-6 ), took the flag as shown above and knelt on one knee in front of my stepmom.

"On behalf of the President of the United States, the Secretary of the Navy ... and a grateful nation..."

WHAM! It hit me. I was feeling feelings I didn't know I could feel. I knew that I loved my dad and had always loved my dad even when I resented him and that I would miss him.

And deep down inside I knew that I had made a good decision 42 years ago, when I decided to enlist in the Navy.

As had my father. As had his father.

I am my father's son.

And at heart, we are all deep-water sailors.

Father's Day - In Memorium

2010-06-07T14:57:00.000-04:00

I've written here, over the past couple of years, of my troubled relationship with my father. Neither of us went fishing for trouble -- times and circumstances being what they were, we both got dealt a pretty crappy hand at the old father/son poker table of life.

Well, the old man passed away last Thursday (June 3, 2010) at the age of 83. It was not unexpected on my part. He'd been going downhill for the past couple of years. Physically, that is. He still had all his marbles. My step-mom, on the other hand, was sliding off into dementia. I recognized the symptoms in her because my birth mom had slid down that same slope, starting in the 1980's until she finally died in 1995.

Life just wore dad down and, finally, he just gave out. I spoke to him in his hospital bed in Florida last week and he said, "I just want to die. Are you alright?" "Yes, Dad. I'm alright." I found out afterwards that he'd had pretty much the same conversation with everyone in the family. He was seeking permission to let go, once he'd assured himself that we were going to be "alright."

I used to kid myself that I wasn't really close to my father. I didn't know him until I was a grown-up and, besides, he was a macho man, and I was a gay geek.

I was wrong. I miss my father already. I miss the "potential" that we still had, as long as he was still alive. So even though we were strangers to each other in many ways, there still loomed the prospect that things would get magically better between us. But now, even that prospect is gone.

Wherever things stood between us last week is where things will remain until, in due course, I follow my dad "into that good night."

With any luck, when that time comes, we'll be able to pick up where we left off. At least, that's what I'd like to believe.

Goodbye for now, Dad. I love you.

DADT - Gates & The Pentagon Dictating Policy

2010-05-20T12:11:00.000-04:00

From today's (May 20, 2010) Towleroad:

With today's official confirmation that Democrat Ike Skelton refuses to include "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" repeal language in the House's Defense Authorization bill, and reports are coming that Democrat Sen. Ben Nelson too has joined Democrat Sen. Jim Webb, and Republican Scott Brown in ruling out repeal in 2010. Their reason? They are listening to Bush-appointee and Obama holdover, Democratic Administration Secretary of Defense Robert Gates' recommendation to not to attach repeal to the Senate version of the Defense Authorization Bill. To anyone playing close attention, repeal seems hopelessly handicapped in 2010.

And mostly, by the White House's complete and total lack of leadership. Because of Gates' unprecedented presumption to set the legislative calendar for Congress, and Obama's total silence and disengagement on the issue, it is undeniably the Democrats who are destroying hope for repeal of the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy for 2010.

They are telling our community as they always have: to wait.

It's time for all LGBT's and their friends to let both parties know that there won't be another dime from us until and when Congress passes, and the President signs, the passage of ENDA and the repeal of DOMA and DADT.

It's very simple. Give us our full and equal rights under the Constitution. Give them to us now. You may NOT count on our continued support until you do.

Editorial Changes

2010-05-12T09:11:00.003-04:00

Everyone else is doing a fine job of trashing George Rekers (cousin of Home Rekers and rabidly anti-gay guy who recently hired a male prostitute to "carry his bags" in Europe --- like anyone over the age of 7 would believe that load of horseshit), so I'm not going to join in on the fun but I did want to point out one editorial change to my site.

Under the heading of "JoyZeeBoy Reads" I've changed the link from John Arsiotis' "America Blog" to his primarily LGBT blog "Gay America Blog." This also forced an alphabetization change which moved it down in the list.

I've also added a new site, Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters, produced by Alvin McEwan in which he analyzes and refutes claims, allegations and outright lies by the religious right. His motto is "Lies in the name of God are still lies." Amen, Brother.

These are slight changes, but they are designed to reflect my (slowly) growing militancy.

Good Lines overheard at 12-Step Meetings

2010-05-10T12:07:00.000-04:00

Just two this past week:

1. If everything you see needs changing then maybe you need to change how you see things.

2. Going to a meeting is like going to an orgy. I always feel better afterward, but I never know whom to thank.

Little Gratitudes

2010-05-03T13:26:00.001-04:00

I saw a musical tribute to Steven Sondheim entitled "Sondheim on Sondheim" at the old Studio 54 this past Saturday It was, of course, wonderful.

I used to see just about everything on Broadway, back when I was an active drunk and Type A personality because, if you are successfully busy maintaining a "front" of normalcy well, then by God, things ARE normal and there's nothing to see here -- no problems that need fixing because, you see, you are a "functional alcoholic", like me! And then I lost everything. And then I got sober.

And for that I am grateful.

And now I'm getting it back. Oh, not the tons of money I used to make, but enough to keep my life comfortable and cozy. With enough left over to take myself and a friend to a Broadway show now and then.

And for that I am grateful.

After the show we went to a French bistro in the theater district which we inhabited for years. To be honest, it was discovered by my ex, the lawyer, who took me there back in the very early 90's. Before things fell apart. It's a hole in the wall kind of place named "Chez Napoleon." It's on West 50th, between Eighth & Ninth Avenues (north side, closer to Ninth). You should check it out sometime. There is a link to its website. Click on it ... HERE. I started with a little endive vinaigrette and then had the veau forestière . It was wonderful.

And for that I am grateful.

After dinner I said au revoir to my companion of the day and struck out east to pick up an E train to Queens. As I crossed Broadway, all hell started to break loose. There were emergency vehicles coming out of everywhere, all heading to the heart of New York City, Times Square. I did not stick around to find out what was going on. I was trained by this city that when disaster even appears to have struck ... hit the road, Bub. And so I did. Eventually I got to my friends' place in Queens. We visited happily for awhile and then retired for the evening. They had been kind enough to offer me a place to stay for the evening.

And for that I am grateful.

Sunday morning I had an early appointment to speak at a 12-Step meeting on the lower east side of Manhattan. I made it with time to spare. I asked God to put the right words into my mouth, which He/She/It did.

And for that I am grateful.

The train ride home to New Jersey was noisy - there were tons of tourists aboard. But, by 2:00 p.m., I was home, ensconced in the big, comfy, chair, with a cool drink in one hand and the Sunday New York Times in the other.

And for that I am grateful.

I spoke with some friends, had a very light dinner (salad) and retired to my over-air-conditioned bedroom at exactly 9:00 p.m. By 9:30 it was lights out and I slept like a baby until the alarm went off at 4:30 a.m.

And yes, for that I am grateful.

If I remember, as I step through life, to keep my mind focused on the good things in my life, rather than letting the bad things weigh on me and pile up like so much undisposed of trash, then my life is complete and I am happy.

And for that I am grateful.

Arizona - Land of Lily-White Rich Republicans

2010-04-27T16:18:00.000-04:00

I moved to Seattle from Delaware in the fall of 1976. It very quickly became apparent the various ways in which the West was and is different from the East.

The West is the land of the rugged individualist (read: misfit loaner who's a danger to himself and others). The West is the land of live and let live (as long as you live the way everybody else does OR keep your big trap shut about how you actually do live). The West is the land of tolerance (bullshit).

I went to work for a couple of rugged individualists in Seattle. Father and son were sole proprietors of a thriving electronics supply company which ran a string of marine electronics repair shops all around the Gulf of Alaska, from Juneau to Adak, in the Aleutian chain.

On the surface they were nice guys. But underneath... the son was the chairman of the Reagan for President committee in Washington State (did I mention, this was 1976-77?). He believed in the western ideal of rugged individualism --- he also believed that as long as you worked for him, he pretty much owned you. One day he dictated that NO EMPLOYEE could smoke... on company property or off it and anyone caught smoking would be frozen in salary and position until they quit (smoking or their job).

He also made it abundantly clear that he wanted all employees to join a gym. The one he belonged to.

It was about this time that I started noticing the abundance of bumper stickers around town, celebrating something called The John Birch Society. Something about him being the first casualty of the next World War -- or some bullshit like that.

I didn't last long in the rugged Pacific Northwest. I hated working for Fascists, so I decided to move to the most liberal city I knew, New York City.

But I never forgot that stint in Seattle. I never forgot how they mouthed a bunch of platitudes about the freedom of the individual, even as they dictated the terms of conformity. As far as I was concerned they were a bunch of hypocrites.

Now, of course, we have Arizona or, as I like to call it, Deutschland. It is my understanding that the State Police (der Staatspolizei) are being signed up for Rosetta Stone beginner's courses in German so that they can rattle off "Dürfen wir ihre papiere, bitte?" ("May we see your papers, please?") like a native. This will come in handy in the days and weeks ahead, as they round up brown people, queers, Jews, and anybody who doesn't look like either their governor (Terence Stamp in "Priscilla, Queen of the Desert") or John "I'm No Maverick" McCain.

I encourage all patriots, by which I mean anybody not from Arizona, to boycott Arizona businesses until this Fascist charade is overturned.

Faith Trumps Reason (Ask Me How!)

2010-04-09T14:15:00.003-04:00

I ran into a piece over on Joe.My.God about a couple of Xtian wingnut groups coming up with a counter to GLSEN's "Day of Silence," scheduled for next Friday in many of our nation's schools. They're asking Christian parents to keep their kids home that day to protest the protest.

According to Joe, the Illinois Family Institute and Mission America have distributed a message to parents, to wit:

Explain to your children why you’re taking a stand:

a. Homosexual behavior is not an innate identity.

b. No matter what factors may influence homosexual feelings, freely chosen homosexual behavior is immoral and should be resisted.

c. Homosexuality is not equivalent to race.

d. Disapproval of homosexuality is not equivalent to racism; nor is it hatred; nor is it bullying; nor does it constitute an incitement to violence. It is permissible and ethical to express disapproval of homosexuality. Just because someone may feel bad when hearing that someone disapproves of homosexuality does not mean that disapproval is cruel or wrong.

e. No school should support a view of homosexuality that is unproven and controversial, and that is physically, emotionally, and spiritually destructive to individuals and society.

f. No school should allow instructional time to be politicized.

However, by doing a simple "search and replace" on it, I came up with the following:

Explain to your children why you’re taking a stand:

a. Religious behavior is not an innate identity.

b. No matter what factors may influence religious feelings, freely chosen religious behavior is immoral and should be resisted.

c. Religiosity is not equivalent to race.

d. Disapproval of religiosity is not equivalent to racism; nor is it hatred; nor is it bullying; nor does it constitute an incitement to violence. It is permissible and ethical to express disapproval of religiosity. Just because someone may feel bad when hearing that someone disapproves of religiosity does not mean that disapproval is cruel or wrong.

e. No school should support a view of religiosity that is unproven and controversial, and that is physically, emotionally, and spiritually destructive to individuals and society.

f. No school should allow instructional time to be politicized.

Why do they always pretend that they are right?

The Throne of Peter

2010-04-01T12:59:00.004-04:00

The Vatican has survived 2,000 years of turmoil and attacks through one tried and true method. Stonewalling and battering the victims. The Vatican is *very* good at both.

"If only those crazy-assed Jews had converted, the Holy Inquistion wouldn't have burned them at the stake."

or

"If only all those queers in cassocks had dropped dead, then those little male Lolitas would've been safe!"

or

"If only Galileo had admitted that the Earth IS the center of the universe, we wouldn't have had to ruin his life."

Notice anything about all this? Listen to the "defense" a guy who batters women offers. That he wouldn't have had to smack the bitch around if "she'd ONLY DONE WHAT SHE WAS TOLD." People stay in abusive relationships, with men, with women, with religions, with booze or drugs or any other crutch, because they're afraid. Afraid of the unknown. Afraid that the perp might be right, despite all logic and evidence to the contrary.

I do not believe in the divinity of Jesus. I do not believe that Mary was a virgin. I do not believe that Joseph was that stupid. I do not believe that the Pope is a God-chosen successor to the throne of Peter. I do not believe that he speaks infallably in matters of faith.

But I do believe that he's a lying sack of shit.

Happy Easter!

Health Care Reform and The AntiChrist

2010-03-24T10:37:00.005-04:00

The Teabaggers (and Fox) are losing their shit over the passage of healthcare reform. These are people who are afraid of their own shadows and who think, if they try hard enough to forestall change, any change, that life will be just like they remember it being... in 1787.

You'd think, from the reactions, that we'd just nationalized healthcare and jacked up income taxes to 70% of gross across the board to finance it -- like we were Sweden or something.

But what really re-fries my beans about the reaction from the right is this:

For decades they accused the Democrats of being the party of Tax and Spend.

And their solution, under Ronald Reagan (does anybody remember "Voodoo Economics"?), was to Borrow and Spend instead.

So that rather than taking money out of your pockets today to finance all their shit, they decided to take the money out of our grandchildren's pockets instead.

THEY are the reason the national debt now runs into the many trillions. Not the Democrats.

Am I the only person who remembers this?

Apparently I am.

I am *for* healthcare reform in this country. We've just spent bajillions of dollars on two largely unfruitful and incredibly wasteful wars (we disbanded the Iraqi Army, only to turn around and spend 29 billion dollars training their police force ... composed primarily of former Iraqi Army men) and whine about extending healthcare to more of our neediest citizens.

And to the Right I would ask: WWJD?

I'd guess that he wouldn't lose his shit. That's for damned sure.

Hell in a Handbasket

2010-03-17T11:26:00.004-04:00

BAM! The world has started falling apart.

1. Last August - diagnosed with prostate cancer.
Why didn't I cry with self-pity when told?
Started protracted on-line search for best surgical solution
Settled on Dr. David Samadi - Robotic Institute - Mt. Sinai Hospital New York

2. Robotic Prostectomy - October 14, 2009.
Two follow-up visits to date. Both blood tests indicate PSA < 0.01%
Why didn't I cry with joy at the result?

3. January 25, 2010 - My dearest English friend dies peacefully in his sleep. Age 80.
Why didn't I cry at the loss?

4. March 2, 2010 - Surgery to repair hernia. Out-patient (yaaayyyy!). Home that evening.

5. March 3, 2010 - Phone call from a friend in California. Another friend died of pulmonary
embolism as a direct result of having had Lap-Band surgery the previous week.

WHY DIDN'T I CRY!??

6. Excruciating pain from surgery. Gingerly take a prescribed painkiller. Immediately blocks me up. More pain until Thursday when I'm finally able to "move."

WHY DIDN'T I CRY?

7. A phone call on Friday, March 5th from yet another friend in NYC. After nearly 30 years of devoted service at a broadcast network, he was informed that, as of May 5, his services will no longer be required. He's contemplating moving back home to the midwest. He and I were college roommates, fer Chrissakes! I've never contemplated life without him in it, and him in New York.

AND WHY AM I NOT CRYING??!!!

8. Monday, March 8th - my 12th sobriety anniversary. I should be all cured by now.

AND STILL, I CAN'T CRY.

9. I called my old co-dependency therapist and made an appointment to see her this coming Sunday morning (there's something very calming about having a therapy session on Sunday morning).

I want to know why, after all these years of "recovery", I'm not able to cry over anything.

My 12-Step sponsor says that I'm a sexual anorexic. I say that I'm an emotional anorexic, still incapable of forming any meaningful attachments, even with myself.

We'll see what the therapist has to say.

Watch. I'll be in there for five minutes when I start blubbering like a baby.

I hope.

Army Chief Is Lap Dog of Religious Nutcases

2010-02-23T16:05:00.004-05:00

The latest front-man for all the right-wing, queer-hating, religious nuts opposed to the repeal of DADT (and pro keeping the fags in their place) is the Army Chief of Staff, General George W. Casey, Jr. (who gets paid $19,326.60 a month to defend the Constitution).

He testified before the Senate that he "has serious concerns" about repeal and that he supports a year-long "study" before the ban is repealed. What he really wants, of course, is to drag his feet long enough for the forces against repeal to find enough "problems" with it to forestall repeal indefinitely. He ain't kidding anybody. Well, he ain't kidding me. None of them are kidding me anymore.

Every day that this onerous law remains on the books is yet another day when an innocuous minority (mine) is deprived of the fruits of full citizenship, SOLELY FOR THE PURPOSE OF PANDERING TO THE RELIGIOUS BIGOTRY OF A HANDFUL OF ZEALOTS.

Repeal DADT. Do it now.

Sexual Anorexia

2010-02-18T09:32:00.003-05:00

There is such a thing. And I have it. Wiki defines it as avoidance of intimacy because of emotional brittleness. Okay. I'm risk averse. I know where that comes from. I had an alcoholic mom and an alcoholic grandmom whose major intramural sport was getting drunk, fighting with each other and waking me up in the middle of the night to answer the question "which one of us do you love more?"

I was 6 years old.

So I shut down and swore that no one would ever hurt me again. Not like that. I knew that I could be physically hurt -- there was nothing I could do about that (and I lived in fear of that, too) -- but I'd be damned if anyone was ever going to get close enough to me to emotionally scar me like that again.

And no one ever did. Not even when people moved away. Not even when they died.

The last time I actually cried over the death of someone I was 19. It was the same grandmother I mentioned above.

I drank because I was a drunk. Deep down, though, I also drank because it made it easy to have sex with people -- and why was that, you ask? Because when you're drunk you are not intimate. Not really. Physical, yes. Intimate, no.

Get it? I do. Now.

In a couple of weeks I'll have been sober for 12 years. And only now is this becoming clear to me.

Next up? How do I fix it?

Stay posted. More will probably be revealed and, as usual, it won't be good.

Growing up is hard work.

Navy Men

2010-02-03T15:19:00.006-05:00

I was a Navy man. My dad was a Navy man. My granddad was a Navy man. And Admiral Mike Mullen, 17th Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the Armed Forces of the United States of America, is a Navy man.

To the best of my knowledge (and it's only anecdotal, based on personal experience), I'm the only one of them who is gay, therefore I was the only one who had to "hide it" during my time in the Navy.

Yesterday something happened that I never in a million years thought would happen. Admiral Mullen sat at a table before the Armed Services Committee of the Senate and told that august panel of Senators that it is now time to put an end to the onerous law known to the masses as "Don't Ask, Don't Tell." Many were delighted. Some were chagrined. Most notably Senator John McCain, another ex-Navy man. Of course the good Senator has his own problems at home right now regarding this whole mess ... his wife, Cindy McCain (God love her!), has come out clearly on our side -- so you KNOW Johnny Boy ain't gettin' any these days! No wonder he's so cranky.

You would think (maybe) that some people would see the handwriting on the wall -- that the good old days of making political hay (and fundraising cash) out of fag-bashing are rapidly coming to an end. It would only make sense, I think, to bow to the inevitable and to sign up on the right side of history.

Like Admiral Mullen. Whom I would gay marry in a heartbeat. If he'd have me.

Thank you, Admiral Mullen. Thank you for being a real American.

I would be proud to serve under you, Sir. All kidding aside.

And the Nominees Are....

2010-02-02T10:49:00.004-05:00

It's nearly time for the Gay SuperBowl aka "Oscar Night" and today we had the preliminaries, the announcement of the nominees. Note that this year the rules have been modified to accomodate the plethora of fine motion pictures that came out this past year, and,7 therefore the number of nominees for Best Picture stands now at 10.

[drumroll please]

And the nominees are:

Best Supporting Actress
Penelope Cruz, Nine
Vera Farmiga, Up in the Air
Maggie Gyllenhaal, Crazy Heart *big surprise
Anna Kendrick, Up in the Air
Mo'nique, Precious

Best Supporting Actor
Matt Damon, Invictus
Woody Harrelson, The Messenger
Christopher Plummer, The Last Station
Stanley Tucci, The Lovely Bones
Christoph Waltz, Inglourious Basterds

Best Actress
Sandra Bullock, The Blind Side
Helen Mirren, The Last Station
Carey Mulligan, An Education
Gabourey Sidibe, Precious
Meryl Streep, Julie & Julia

Best Actor
Jeff Bridges, Crazy Heart
George Clooney, Up in the Air
Colin Firth, A Single Man
Morgan Freeman, Invictus
Jeremy Renner, The Hurt Locker

Best Director
James Cameron, Avatar
Kathryn Bigelow, The Hurt Locker
Quentin Tarantino, Inglourious Basterds
Lee Daniels, Precious
Jason Reitman, Up in the Air

Original Screenplay
Mark Boal, The Hurt Locker
Quentin Tarantino, Inglourious Basterds
Alessandro Camon & Oren Moverman, The Messenger
Joel & Ethan Coen, A Serious Man
Pete Docter, Bob Peterson, & Thomas McCarthy, Up

Adapted Screenplay
Neil Blomkamp & Terri Tatchell, District 9
Nick Hornby, An Education
Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Armando Ianucci, & Tony Roche, In the Loop *big surprise
Geoffrey Fletcher, Precious
Jason Reitman & Sheldon Turner, Up in the Air

Foreign Language Film
Ajami (Israel)
El secreto de sus ojos (Argentina)
The Milk of Sorrow (Peru)
Un Prophete (France)
The White Ribbon (Germany)

Animated Film
Coraline
Fantastic Mr. Fox
The Princess and the Frog
The Secret of Kells
Up

Best Picture
Avatar
The Blind Side *big surprise
District 9
An Education
The Hurt Locker
Inglourious Basterds
Precious
A Serious Man
Up
Up in the Air

Best Art Direction
Avatar
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
Nine
Sherlock Holmes
The Young Victoria

Best Cinematography
Avatar
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
The Hurt Locker
Inglourious Basterds
The White Ribbon

Best Costume Design
Bright Star
Coco Before Chanel
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
Nine
The Young Victoria

Best Documentary
Burma VJ
The Cove
Food, Inc.
The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers
Which Way Home

Best Editing
Avatar
District 9
The Hurt Locker
Inglourious Basterds
Precious

Best Makeup
Il Divo
Star Trek
The Young Victoria

Best Score
Avatar
Fantastic Mr. Fox
The Hurt Locker
Sherlock Holmes
Up

Best Song
"Almost There," The Princess and the Frog, Randy Newman
"Down in New Orleans," The Princess and the Frog, Randy Newman
"Loin de Paname," Paris 36, Reinhardt Wagner & Frank Thomas
"Take It All," Nine, Maury Weston
"The Weary Kind," Crazy Heart, T-Bone Burnett & Ryan Bingham

Best Sound Editing
Avatar
The Hurt Locker
Inglourious Basterds
Star Trek
Up

Best Sound Mixing
Avatar
The Hurt Locker
Inglourious Basterds
Star Trek
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

Best Visual Effects
Avatar
District 9
Star Trek

Best Documentary Short
China's Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of Sichuan Province
The Last Campaign of Governor Booth Gardner
The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant
Music by Prudence
Rabbit à la Berlin

Best Animated Short
French Roast
Granny O'Grimm's Sleeping Beauty
The Lady and the Reaper (La Dama y la Muerte)
Logorama
A Matter of Loaf and Death

Best Live-Action Short
The Door
Instead of Abracadabra
Kavi
Miracle Fish
The New Tenants

SOTU - STFU

2010-01-28T14:29:00.005-05:00

Fortunately for all of us, your devoted, if somewhat sporadic, blogger has to turn in around 9:00 p.m. on weeknights because he's an indentured servant of a bunch of lawyers in Manhattan, so he missed a live-view of last night's State of the Union address by the guy who was going to fix everything in 20 minutes, only he didn't.

Thank God for the internets! The high-point of the evening (well, amongst several) came, apparently, when Associate Supreme Court Justice Alito exhibited the "Joe Wilson Memorial Moment" when the President criticized the high court for it's finding this week that Corporations may now purchase Congressmen and Senators directly from MP3 sites for a nominal fee.

Here he is, an august member of the highest court in the land ... a land predicated on the rule of law, not of men ... clearly shaking his head and mouthing the words "not true. not true."

We have the finest government money can buy. You may count on it.

Meet Mr. Corporation

2010-01-22T10:55:00.004-05:00

Yesterday, January 21, 2010, the Supreme Court of the United States of America (SCOTUS) effectively declared that corporations (already considered, via a legal fiction, to be a "person" under the law) could donate money to political campaigns.

Let me back up for a moment. They've been able to donate money to political parties for a long time, but now they can donate money to specific candidates. Lots and lots of money. Millions, even.

Even Michael Bloomberg, billionaire mayor of New York City, wouldn't have enough money to counteract a Halliburton sponsored political opponent.

Do you want a Citigroup lap-dog running YOUR town? (not that you don't have one already, but I'm jes' sayin', is all.)

Corporations can now (and will) pack Congress with congresscritters to their liking. Congresscritters who will give even more blowjobs to big business, big oil, big pharma.

If you thought the United States was already fucked, you don't know jackshit.

So bend over and smile. 'Cause you ain't even gonna get kissed while you're getting fucked.

Oh, and it's only a matter of time before corporate America goes back to the Supreme Court to ask for a finding that they may VOTE, too.

But you will never see Goldman Sachs lining up for jury duty... or Citigroup rushing off to join the Navy.

No. That you will never see.

Corporations take, but they never give. Except to politicians who deliver.

News from the Prop 8 Trial in SF

2010-01-19T09:45:00.002-05:00

Mystery Shrinkage - The Pro Prop 8 Witness List: It turns out the Pro Prop 8 Professional Witnesses are a bunch of weenies, afraid they’re going to get punched out by ta queers:

Click HERE

Don’t Faint: Somebody on Fox News is in FAVOR of marrying ta gayz:

Click HERE

Pro Prop 8 Weenies want the evidence destroyed: Ask Judge to destroy videotapes of the trial so nobody can see their lies and bigotry in living color:

Click HERE

Watch This, You ******Guzzlers!!!!

2010-01-13T10:55:00.003-05:00

My new favorite TV show that no one is watching and will probably get cancelled faster than Conan can move to Fox is "Better Off Ted". The most recent episode concerned a memo with a typo which launched the most foul-mouthed television show ever filmed - and not broadcast. These outtakes are NSFW.

Ted Olsen - GWB's Solicitor General on Gay Marriage

2010-01-11T11:56:00.003-05:00

Ted Olsen is leading the courtroom charge to overturn California's Prop 8. According to the website JoeMyGod, Ted has an article in this week's Newsweek Magazine which purports that these words are Ted's:

So there are now three classes of Californians: heterosexual couples who can get married, divorced, and remarried, if they wish; same-sex couples who cannot get married but can live together in domestic partnerships; and same-sex couples who are now married but who, if they divorce, cannot remarry. This is an irrational system, it is discriminatory, and it cannot stand.Americans who believe in the words of the Declaration of Independence, in Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, in the 14th Amendment, and in the Constitution's guarantees of equal protection and equal dignity before the law cannot sit by while this wrong continues. This is not a conservative or liberal issue; it is an American one, and it is time that we, as Americans, embraced it.

Keep in mind that Ted was George W. Bush's Solicitor General. Keep in mind, also, that Ted knows a little about the subject of losing a loved one. His wife died on 9/11 in one of the planes that crashed.

Ted is also the news director and online managing editor of Christianity Today.

Not all Christians are raving, small-minded, bigots. Some Christians, it appears, espouse and try to live the teachings of Christ.

I'm hoping he's one of the latter.

Christmas Meme

2009-12-29T10:24:00.003-05:00

Blame Bev.

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags?
Depends. Single gifts get wrapped. Multiple gifts get wrapped AND bagged.

2. Real tree or artificial?
Okay, now starts the rant on indoor safety. GET THAT FIREHAZARD OUT OF HERE. Artificial.

3. When do you put up the tree?
Put it up? Didn’t I do my part by merely buying it? Now you want me to put it up? The road to Hell is paved with good intentions.

4. When do you take the tree down?
If it’s in the box the day before, it’ll still be in the box the day after – n’est pas?

5. Do you like eggnog?
Darn tootin’! Unfortunately, booze is out, and so is cholesterol. Bye, bye egg-nog.

6. Favorite gift received as a child?
Erector sets. I loved ‘em.

7. Hardest person to buy for?
My ex was the hardest person to shop for. Actually, anyone who is passive-aggressive and won’t come right out and tell you what they want. I HATE people like that. I theorize that the only reason people really have for not telling you what they want is so they can blame you later for the crappy gifts you give 'em.

8. Easiest person to buy for?
Me. Ask me what I want and I’ll fax or e-mail you a list to choose from. Better still, just check my name on Amazon.com. I have a wish list there at all times.

9. Do you have a nativity scene?
Nah. While I love the message Jesus delivered, I believe it’s a crime that we deified him.

10. Mail or e-mail Christmas cards?
Christmas cards. Nothing says lovin like a card. I try to pick cards with a message that conveys how I’m feeling that year. This year’s card was a sort of Zen message about “being that which the world is missing.” It made sense when I bought them.

12. Favorite Christmas movie?
A Christmas Carol – the 1951 English version with Alistair Sim.

13. When do you start shopping?
Right after Thanksgiving.

14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present?
Yes. Booze. Booze gifts get re-gifted.

15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas?
Turkey, stuffing and pumpkin pie.

16. Lights on the tree?
The tree is pre-lighted. Thankyewverymuch.

17. Favorite Christmas song?
“Santa Baby," the Eartha Kitt version.

18. Travel at Christmas or stay home?
Every year I drive to my sister and brother-in-law’s place in Delaware. That’s where my father’s clan gathers for the holiday. I love it. It's not that big a schlep -- about an hour and a quarter each way, turnpike driving all the way.

19. Can you name all of Santa's reindeer?
You’re kidding, right?

20. Angel on the tree top or a star?
A fancy-schmancy ornament I picked up about five years ago at the Museum of Modern Art store on East 54th Street.

21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning?
Morning. It’s more “Christmasy.”

22. Most annoying thing about this time of the year?
Crowds and holiday commuters on the trains. They all walk around the east side of Manhattan, especially around Rockefeller Center and it’s ubiquitous tree, with both feet planted firmly in mid-air and totally unaware of how they’re blocking traffic.

23. Favorite ornament theme or color?
I got a collection of great ornaments at the MOMA store that are pretty gay. Glass red ruby slippers, a Kodak camera, etc. Tchotchkes like that.

24. What do you want for Christmas this year?
Got it. I stayed sober for another year and got drenched in love every day.

25. Describe how you would celebrate the holidays if it was totally up to you and money was not a factor.
Fly my family and friends overseas and celebrate ‘CHRISTMAS IN TAHITI’! Now that’s what I’m talkin’ about.

12 Years A-Sober

2009-12-28T12:15:00.003-05:00

I just leapt (like the Lords in the song) through my 12th Sober Christmas. This week, God willing, I'll squeak through my 12th Sober New Years.

Not bad, considering I thought my life was over except for the dying part, 12 years ago.

That first sober Christmas was a scarey time. My friend Bev sent me an Advent package of little toys and goodies -- which meant the world to me. Every little thing in that package said "somebody cares" to me. This, at a time, when I didn't even care for myself. Bev and I have known each other since 1994 -- when we met on-line in CompuServe's Issues forum. She was a Section Leader and, later, a SysOp. I thought she was a nice lady.

She was. She is.

By the time my second sober Christmas came along, I was able to spend the day (mostly) with my family.

And now, I look forward to spending the day with them. They don't push any buttons. That's mostly because this family, which is not my family of origin, has no ideas where my buttons are -- they didn't install them.

This Christmas was the best yet. The former kids have all grown up, gotten married, and had kids. The grand-nieces and grand-nephews are at the perfect age (4-10) and still enthralled by the magic of Santa Claus.

Come to think of it, so am I. Santa brought me sobriety. Santa brought me Bev. Santa brought me hope. Santa brought me 11 years and 9 months of continuous sobriety. Santa brought me love.

It's good to be alive and to still believe in magic.

Belief

2009-12-23T11:26:00.003-05:00

It's a really big deal at this time of year for people to believe in something. Ask anyone.

For example: certain hard-core, anti-gay, types believe that I am going to hell. Furthermore, they believe that *I* should believe I'm going to hell, too. You see, it's not enough for them to believe it. It's absolutely essential that everyone else believe it, too. Especially me. And people like me. People who don't believe what they believe. People like me who believe that there is a God, but it's not their God. People like me who believe that God doesn't make garbage, and doesn't make mistakes, and doesn't dream up various "gifts" for human beings to spend a lifetime "trying to overcome."

I believe that people are free to believe pretty much whatever they want to believe. From a guy who floats around on a cloud all day, surrounded by Seraphim and Cherubim, to the Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus.

I also believe that I am under no obligation whatsoever to share in anyone elses sun-drenched, half-baked, crackpot beliefs. And nobody is under any obligation to believe in mine.

But I am entitled, despite anyone's beliefs, no matter how "core" those beliefs might seem to them, to share, on a fully equitable basis, in the contractural life of America -- and that includes the ability to contract with another individual for our mutual love and protection, i.e. "marriage."

There is no wiggle-room in there for anything else. Especially belief.

Merry Whatever It Is That You Believe!

Straight to Hell - Part I

2009-12-17T15:11:00.002-05:00

Apparently the following billboard is causing quite a stir in New Zealand. Let's see if anyone notices it here!

Christmastide - 2009

2009-12-16T09:28:00.003-05:00

I used to blog regularly -- well, fairly regularly. Owell. I've posted this before, but it never hurts to see it again.

Merry Christmas to all.

New York State Senate - Cowardice In Action

2009-12-03T15:19:00.004-05:00

Here's how it went down in the New York State Senate yesterday (my apologies and thanks to my friend Rob Byrnes, from whose website this is directly lifted):

Friends of the LGBT Community:

Eric Adams (D)Neil Breslin (D)Martin Malave Dilan (DTom Duane (D)Pedro Espada (D)Brian Foley (D)Ruth Hassell-Thompson (D)Craig Johnson (D)Jeffrey Klein (D)Liz Krueger (D)Velmanette Montgomery (D)Suzi Oppenheimer (D)Kevin Parker (D)Bill Perkins (D)John Sampson (D)Diane Savino (D)Eric Schneiderman (D)Jose Serrano (D)Malcolm Smith (D)Daniel Squadron (D)Toby Ann Stavisky (D)Andrea Stewart-Cousins (D)Antoine Thompson (D)David Valesky (D)

Enemies of the LGBT Community:

Joseph Addabbo (D) — NO James Alesi (R) — NO Darrel Aubertine (D) — NO John Bonacic (R) — NO John DeFrancisco (R) — NO Ruben Diaz (D) — NOHugh Farley (R) — NO John Flanagan (R) — NO Charles Fuschillo, Jr. (R) — NO Martin Golden (R) — NO Joseph Griffo (R) — NO Kemp Hannon (R) — NO Shirley Huntley (D) — NO Owen Johnson (R) — NO Carl Kruger (D) — NO Andrew Lanza (R) — NO Bill Larkin (R) — NO Kenneth LaValle (R) — NO Vincent Leibell (R) — NO Tom Libous (R) — NO Elizabeth Little (R) — NO Carl Marcellino (R) — NO George Maziarz (R) — NO Roy McDonald (R) — NO Hiram Monserrate (D) — NO Thomas Morahan (R) — NO Michael Nozzolio (R) — NO George Onorato (D) — NO Frank Padavan (R) — NO Michael Ranzenhofer (R) — NO Joseph Robach (R) — NO Stephen Saland (R) — NO James Seward (R) — NO Dean Skelos (R) — NO William Stachowski (D) — NO Dale Volker (R) — NO George Winner (R) — NO Catherine Young (R) — NO

Note the number of (D)'s who voted against us: Addabbo, Aubertine, Diaz, Huntley, Kruger, Monserrate, Onorato and Stachowski.

If you live in New York State, keep all these folks in mind the next time somebody wants your handshake, your cash and your vote.

Gay Marriage and New York State

2009-12-02T16:39:00.001-05:00

I posted this under my real name on my Facebook page, but I think it's worth repeating in the blogosphere:

"[I] think[s] that New York State legislators continue to exhibit all the spine and rectitude they have exhibited ever since they sat out the vote on Independence in 1776."

In other words, they were wimps then, and they're wimps now.

Gay Rights and New Jersey

2009-11-25T13:38:00.005-05:00

Haven't posted in a long time. Haven't needed to, really. Been recuperating from my surgery and re-adapting to my daily schlepp from central NJ to Manhattan and back.

Since last we talked, New Jersey voted out Jon Corzine (D) as governor and voted in Chris Christie (R). Anti-gay marriage Chris Christie. Anti-gay everything Chris Christie.

Here's what you need to know about politicians.

1. They lie.
2. They are opportunists who will promise you anything (or at least allude to promising you something) in exchange for your undying love, devotion, cold hard cash and vote.
3. They will repeatedly pull the rug out from under you and/or throw you under the nearest bus in order to keep you in a state of neediness so as to guarantee their re-election, time after time after time.

Look. Here's how it works. Let's say, for a moment, that you're the American Cancer Society. You're not REALLY interested in finding a cure for cancer. You're REALLY interested in making a living PRETENDING to look for a cure for cancer (keep those cards and checks coming!)

And that's how it is with gay rights and Democrats. They're not REALLY interested in getting us our rights. They're only interested in making a LIVING by PRETENDING to care about getting us our rights. A living they do not want to lose. Even if it means a couple (or a lot) of us get beat up or killed now and then.

And we're idiots if we imagine, for one second, that it's any other way.

In the words of the immortal Norm on "Cheers", "it's a dog eat dog world, Sammy, and I'm wearing Milk-Bone underwear."

And so are you.

Prostateless in Hightstown!

2009-10-26T13:36:00.003-04:00

I'm back. And missing a part. But what I've lost in pleasure centers, I've gained in incontinence.

Look, the cancer is mostly gone and that's what really matters. Right? Right. The surgery was a success, by any standards and I've got about a month off to sooth my ruffled feathers and to tighten up my boy-pussy so I won't piss myself every time I sneeze.

More to follow on my escapades in hospital (with a special, surprise guest -- my EX, who showed up unannounced, unbidden and mostly unwelcome, at my bedside), but for now suffice it to say I am well, I am happy and life goes on.

With time to kill I, naturally, spend hours every day surfing the nether-regions of the internets. Today I want to share with you my new, absolutely favorite, sleazy website, Awkward Family Photos dot.com [click HERE to visit the site]

And here's my selection from that site for today. Notice how prepared Jennifer is for Christmas. Only problem? It's October!

Off-Line

2009-10-13T15:22:00.003-04:00

Tomorrow I'm having my prostate removed by a robot. Okay, it's got help in the form of a surgeon, Dr. David Samadi at Mount Sinai Hospital here in New York City.

I have to be there at 10:00 a.m. Surgery is scheduled for noon. I expect to be discharged on Thursday. I'll be living with friends in Queens for about a week, until they remove the catheter. Then I can go home to New Jersey. I'll be out of the office for anywhere from 3 to 6 weeks.

I'll post when I can over the next week, but I doubt if it'll be regularly.

If anybody out there is the praying sort, I'd appreciate it if you'd shoot a prayer towards whatever Higher Power you believe in to smile favorably in my direction over the next couple of weeks.

Take care and hug somebody you love and tell them that you love them. Don't put it off. Do it right now.

Gay Lib - 2.0 or It Don't Take a Weatherman

2009-10-12T15:49:00.004-04:00

I lived to see it with my own eyes. I refer, of course, to the re-boot of gay lib this past Sunday.

I got involved with gay lib along about version 1.00 (1971-1976). Version .75 was Stonewall itself and it's immediate aftermath (1969-1971). Prior to that, in the late 50's, early 60's there were the Daughters of Bilitis and the Mattachine Society (versions .25 and .50).

Version 1.00 was when the movement went "viral" (a term we didn't have in those days) and spread like wildfire on college campuses up and down the east coast and on the other side of flyover country, in California. "Out of the Closets and Into the Streets" was our mantra in those days. Those were the times when we blended liberation with anarchy. Yearly "Pride" marches started, first in NY, then in other cities.

But I burned out on it. And I'll tell you why. I saw a future in which I had two choices. Either I could become a "professional homosexual" like Frank Kameny or Barbara Gittings (and before you pelt me, I loved those people -- and still do), or I could succumb to my baser instincts and have a 9-5 job with a big paycheck. I opted for the latter.

And I was always mildly discomforted by some professional homsexuals. There was an air of bitterness to a few of them that I didn't like.

Today we have other professional homosexuals. Like Andrew Sullivan, Joe Solomnese and Barney Frank. Luckily for Barney he has a day job as Congresscritter.

I'm not questioning the motives of any of them. Do they serve a purpose? You betcha (to quote a former Alaskan governor).

But here's my problem with them. What would happen to their livelihoods if, magically, we got everything we were seeking in terms of equal rights -- tomorrow?

And, knowing that they would be instantly unemployed if that happened, who's to say that their actions and politicking aren't somehow or other flavored or colored by that certainty. Are they somehow or other just slightly less eager to have my total best interests at heart... if that would mean not having their total best interests at heart?

There's a reason, I believe, why the Founders never envisioned a professional class of politician in our republic. It's the same reason why I inherently distrust professional homosexuals.

What's that got to do with what happened this weekend? Plenty.

While the HRC was breaking bread with the President, as he mouthed the same old political stump speech he made a year ago, motels and campers and buses all over town were being camped out in by college kids and bloggers and their friends and families because they were there to make a difference, and not to have a rubber-chicken dinner with the Status Quo.

The Professional Homosexuals have every reason to fear what's about to happen, because in very short order they are going to be unemployed.

And if the President and his flunkies don't get off the fucking dime and start delivering some of the shit they've been promising, they too are going to quickly find themselves out of office.

It don't take a Weatherman to know which way the wind is blowing.

Hatred Comes to Blue Jersey

2009-10-09T16:39:00.003-04:00

I live in New Jersey. Despite the fact that I have a douchebag US Representative (Republican Chris Smith who, only yesterday, voted AGAINST the Matthew Shepherd Hate Crimes Bill), it's a largely "blue" state in terms of it's overall politics.

However, red has reared it's ugly head.

Bill Marriott, of the hotel chain, talks about his and his company's separation of religious views from business conduct:

http://www.blogs.marriott.com/default.asp?item=2284808

and yet, the virulently anti-gay New Jersey Family Policy Council is tossing a soiree featuring Carrie Prejean at a Marriott Hotel in Whippany.

http://www.njfpc.org/html/defenders-of-family.asp

You might want to call the hotel and let them know your feelings about this … and while you have them on the line, mention Bill Marriott’s publicly stated position.

Return to Anesthesia

2009-10-06T13:14:00.003-04:00

It's on.

Tomorrow I have a nuclear stress test at 7:00 a.m. (to satisfy my absolutely useless cardiologist, whom I've come to hate) and a go-see with my internist (whom I still like) at 3:45 p.m. It is my HOPE that both of them will immediately sign off on my upcoming surgery.

If, God willing, they do then a week from tomorrow I'll arrive at Mt. Sinai hospital here in Manhattan at 10:00 a.m. for a radical prostectomy performed by Dr. David Samadi, using the da Vinci surgical robot.

I can't think of anyone, among my male friends, better suited to this than me. Sex has become nothing but a bitter memory of how I routinely sold myself short over the years.

God has actually done me a big favor.

Republican Healthcare in America

2009-09-30T11:58:00.003-04:00

The public option got shot down in committee yesterday. It may (or may not) get resurrected down the pike. If it does, you can be sure it'll be in some watered-down "blow-job to the insurance companies" form.

I can't take credit for this, but it's all over the internets in various forms today:

It's the Republican Healthcare Plan.

1. Don't get sick.

and, if you do get sick,

2. Die quickly.

That's the gist of it.

And here's my valentine to the Republican Party today:

MEME - September 28, 2009

2009-09-28T10:24:00.003-04:00

I'm too lazy to come up with anything on this Yom Kippur (the office is as a dead as a dodo), so I'm stealing this meme from my friend Bev

1. What bill do you hate paying the most?
Gas. We use entirely too much gas.

2. Do you miss being a child?
Nope. Not a single, solitary part of it. Although I do act out childishly at times – and entertainment-wise I’m stuck in the 6th Grade (still love horror movies and amusement parks).

3. Chore you hate the most?
Cleaning the bathroom.

4. Where was the last place you had a romantic dinner?
What’s romance?

5. If you could go back and change one thing what would it be?
I would prevent my mother from meeting my father.

6. Name of your first grade teacher?
Some unfortunate, less than 30 year old, nun. She had a roomful of screaming 6 year olds to contend with. I think she wound up having a nervous breakdown. I don’t blame her.

7. What do you really want to be doing right now?
Exactly what I’m doing.

8. What did you want to be when you grew up?
I never had a plan. I grew up in an alcoholic family. We weren’t big on planning, so I never learned how.

9. How many colleges did you attend?
One.

10. Why did you choose the shirt that you have on right now?
It was the next one in the rotation.

11. What are your thoughts on gas prices?
I sense that they’ve dropped a couple of cents a gallon recently. That’s a good thing.

12. First thought when the alarm went off this morning?
Here we go again.

13. Last thought before going to sleep last night?
I never remember the last thought. I drop off pretty quickly.

14. What famous person would you like to have dinner with?
Bill Wilson.

15. Have you ever crashed your vehicle?
No, but I have been crashed into.

16. If you didn't have to work, would you volunteer?
Yes. I would become a professional recovering alcoholic and spend all of my time attending committee meetings and answering phones at call centers. I would become a Spiritual Star. This is why God never lets me win the lottery. I still have a lot of growing to do, and a lot of humility to obtain, before I’m ready for a life of leisurely recovery.

17. Get up early or sleep in?
The alarm goes off at 4:35 a.m. every weekday. On weekends my internal alarm let’s me sleep in until at least 5:30.

18. What is your favorite cartoon character?
Bullwinkle J. Moose.

19. Favorite thing to do at night with a guy/girl?
Heh. You’re kidding, right?

20. When did you first start feeling old?
At 25. I sobbed through the entire year. I was crushed at being an entire quarter of a century old.

21. Favorite lunch meat?
Smoked turkey.

22. What do you get every time you go into WalMart?
What’s a WalMart? Is that like Sam’s Club? I always buy crap at Sam’s Club, which is why I limit my visits to Sam’s Club.

23. Do you think marriage is an outdated ritual?
“Marriage” is a religious ritual, specifically designed to gussy-up the ancient businesslike matter at hand – the co-joining of wealth and property among, generally warring, factions. Personally, I’d like to see us adopt the European model, left to us by Napoleon; i.e. a lovely, but superfluous, religious ceremony followed by a trip to City Hall for the actual signing of the contracts.

24. Favorite movie you wouldn't want anyone to find out about?
I don’t have any secret vices, movie-wise. Certain movies I will always stop to watch while channel-surfing include: “2001 A Space Odyssey” and “Gosford Park”

25. What's your favorite drink?
Crystal Lite – Raspberry Ice. I luv that stuff.

26. Who from high school would you like to run in to?
Nobody. High school sucked and I’m glad it’s over.

27. What radio station is your car radio tuned to right now?
101.5 in central NJ.

28. Sopranos or Desperate Housewives?
Neither. “Mad Men”, “House”, “Fringe”, “American Dad” & “Lost.”

29. Worst relationship mistake that you wish you could take back?
Telling Rick Zimmerman that I didn’t love him. I did. That was my disease talking. That was 36 years ago and there isn’t a month that goes by that I don’t think about that.

30. Do you like the person that sits directly across from/next to you at work?
Kathy? Yes. She’s a pisser.

31. Have you ever had to use a fire extinguisher for its intended purposes?
Only during training exercises in the Navy. The Navy was very big on firefighting skills – for everyone (including admirals).

32. Last book you finished reading?
“Sunnyside.”

33. Do you have a teddy bear?
Yes. Two. Both given to me while I was recuperating from my open-heart surgery in 2004. One’s brown, the other white. I love them both.

34. One thing you couldn't live without?
The internets.

35. Do you go to church?
Not since I gave up being a Catholic – well, not intentionally. I still get shanghaied once in awhile to weddings and funerals.

36. How old are you?
61

37. Can you take apart a motor, put it back together, and have no extra parts?
Ask me the same question regarding a PC.

38. Are you for or against the death penalty?
Against. If we, as a society, use it then we are, as a society, no better than the criminal we are using it against. Period.

39. If there is a God and you could ask him/her one question what would it be?
What the fuck were you thinking?

40. Do you think it’s possible that there is life on other planets?
I’m still awaiting proof that there’s intelligent life here.

The Gayest Show on Television - GLEE

2009-09-24T11:58:00.004-04:00

In case you haven't seen it yet, do tune in. It's on Fox, no less. Rupert Murdoch doesn't really care where the money comes from, the extreme right in his news businesses, the moderate left (us) in the entertainment field. Just as long as, well, to quote from "Evita", "the money keeps rolling in, from all directions."

If they'd had sports like this when I was in high school, I might've gone out for some teams.

Meltdown

2009-09-21T12:25:00.004-04:00

I had a meltdown last Friday which lasted all weekend.

I was a complete douchenozzle for some of the time (I was pretty well-behaved on Saturday night).

It started on Friday when I got home from my job in NY and found two packages I could've done without. One was a letter, with affidavit, from the NYC Transit Authority, wanting me to tell them the entire story of the transit fare card incident at 53rd & Lex on August 24th. The other was a packet from my surgeon wanting all kinds of tests and clearances, from my internist and from my cardiologist, prior to my upcoming robotic prostectomy on October 14th.

In and of themselves, they were nothing. I was out about $58.00 with the MTA and the other stuff would kill a couple of vacation days during the next few weeks.

It could be much worse. These are high-quality problems for somebody who, 11 years ago, didn't have a job and was virtually homeless.

Somewhere along the way, my gratitude, which ordinarily colors most of my thinking, flew right out the window.

What saved me was having a schedule and sticking to it, of meetings and forced association with other recovering drunks like me.

I arose Saturday morning, grunting with resentment, and dragged myself to my local 12-Step, 7:00 a.m. meeting. Then, I dragged myself to a 10:00 a.m. meeting in Princeton. Then I took myself to see the new Matt Damon movie (GREAT!) and capped it by driving 80 miles (round-trip) to a gay 12-Step meeting in Pennsylvania with a couple of beginners in tow. That was good. It kept me focused on them, and not on myself.

Sunday, I was a grump again. A fax machine in Atlantic City kept attack-dialing my home phone number, starting at 6:30 a.m.. I did a reverse look-up on the internet of the number and got an e-mail address and phone number for the company. I sent an e-mail and left a voicemail, basically threatening them with physical violence if they didn't subdue their lousy fax machine. Eventually it gave up.

I went to my usual Sunday 12-step meeting, sat in the back and growled at everyone, including my sponsor.

I fled the meeting, went to the supermarket, went home and spent the afternoon isolating, napping and generally feeling sorry for myself.

This morning, I attended my home group meeting at 7:30, got to the office, took all the steps to "do the next, right, thing" and suddenly life is worth living again.

I owe this mostly to a) God, b) the program and c) people who care about me.

We have a saying in 12-Step programs which is very annoying:

"This too shall pass."

It did.

What's Really Eating Them?

2009-09-15T15:55:00.002-04:00

Change.

Change you can believe in.

Change for change's sake.

Change or die.

Anything that isn't the way things were ... oh, like, never.

That's what has them in such a lather. That's what's pissing off the Right, the Birthers, the Teabaggers, all of that lunatic fringe on the other side of the aisle.

If it's change, it's bad. If it's change proposed by someone who doesn't look exactly like them, and is therefore inherently untrustworthy because people who look and sound like them ARE totally trustworthy -- like George Bush -- it's really bad.

No more Government Giveaways. No Socialized Medicine (and keep yer cotton-pickin' hands off of my Medicare and Medicaid and Sociable Security). No abortion on demand between classes in high school! No more third-graders being forced to attend gay weddings in San Francisco!

Have these people no idea just how idiotic they sound? Do they not care that they're fear-driven, knee-jerk, assholes?

Is that how I appear to them?

Probably.

For decades my party was the party that was "lost in the wilderness" and every time my party, or I, tried to make a point, I/we was/were told to quit being such a cry-baby(ies) and spoiler(s) and left-wing, knee-jerk liberal(s). And I, and my party, were good little boys and girls and we did what we were told.

And we most certainly did NOT yell out at Bush, when he actually was lying from the podium in the well of the House, which happened a lot, that he was a liar. Unlike that attention-seeking, obviously middle-child, grandstanding, wimpy Klansman from South Carolina.

But the Republicans ARE the party now lost in the wilderness. And the best, the very best they can do at this point, is to rally their lunatic fringe while the majority of the country wrings it's hands in fear.

But Maureen Dowd said it best the other day, in her column in the NYTimes, after the Wilson outburst in Congress. What's really eating them... and what was really implied in Joe Wilson's outburst, was this:

"YOU LIE ..... BOY!"

Racism. That's what's really at work here. The rapidly shrinking WASP population, comparatively speaking, sees "its" nation slipping out of its control and feels helpless and fearful.

I Have Made My Decision

2009-09-14T10:03:00.005-04:00

The search for an oncological/urogenitary surgeon is over.

But first, the background. After my dreadful experience at New York/Presbyterian on the Friday before Labor Day, I snooped around on the interwebs over the long weekend and found a surgeon at New York's Mount Sinai Hospital. His name is David Samadi. Here is his picture:

I called his office on Tuesday morning to ask for an appointment, fully expecting to be told a) he's not taking new patients or b) we can squeeze you in next year. Instead I got an appointment for last Friday at 11:00 a.m.

Okay.

The next morning (Wednesday) I went to my usual 12-Step meeting at 7:30 a.m. in CitiGroup Center here in NY. The speaker was someone who had recently joined our group and she had a fascinating story to tell which ended with her changing careers and winding up working for a doctor at Mount Sinai. I think you know the rest of the story.

Here's Dr. Samadi's wiki:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_B._Samadi

My Higher Power was working overtime that day, believe me. My new friend emailed me the forms I'd need for the Friday visit. I showed up 15 minutes early on Friday, filled out one additional form, was introduced to Dr. Samadi and was escorted directly into his office. He looked at my test results and pronounced me a good candidate for the surgery. I asked him if he believed in God. Then I said that I did, and that it was my belief that things happen for reasons.

I absolutely believed, at that point, that it was intended for me to have my surgery done by this man.

We stepped across the hall and he did to me what I've only let several thousand other men do to me. Then he sent in his nurse to talk to me about pre and post-op stuff.

Scheduling set me up with a date of October 14th at noon. I should be discharged the following afternoon. I have friends who actually want me to come and recuperate with them, here in New York. I'll have a catheter in me for a couple of days. They'll remove it in the office early the following week. I can then go home. Family members have already said that they'd drive into the city to get me and bring me home. I'll be out of work for anywhere from a month to six weeks.

I have to do Kegel exercises until the surgery. This is to tone up my sphincter(s). I didn't have the heart to tell them that, as a gay man, I'm intimately familiar with contracting and relaxing my sphincters. TMI, I suppose.

Oh, and Dr. Samadi will be using the da Vinci robot.

When I got back to the office on Friday I called Memorial Sloan-Kettering and cancelled my appointment, scheduled for this coming Wednesday. I didn't need to look any further. Not only had I found the gold-standard surgeon and hospital for what I needed to have done, but I'd also found a doctor whom I could trust.

And at the end of the day, that's what really matters.

September 11, 2001

2009-09-11T13:50:00.003-04:00

My recollections of the day began as we held hands to close our usual Tuesday morning 12-Step meeting at St. Thomas' Episcopal Church, at the corner of 55th Street and Fifth Avenue in New York. That meeting always ends promptly at 8:45 a.m.

At 8:46 a.m., the first plane hit the north tower. (click on the picture to greatly embiggen it.)

Joe Wilson - Republican Douchebag from South Carolina

2009-09-10T14:59:00.003-04:00

South Carolina is a lovely state, with many lovely citizens, no doubt. This guy, above, is not one of them.

Unfortunately, he represents the 2nd Congressional District and his name is Joe Wilson. He's a total douchebag. He heckled President Obama last night, during a prime-time speech, televised, to a joint-session of Congress, from the well of the House.

Not since the 1850's, when it was common for our national legislators to routinely horsewhip and cane each other mercilessly, over the issue of slavery, on the floors of their respective houses, have we seen such a spectacle as we saw last night, during the President's speech on healthcare reform.

Regardless of where you stand on the matter, during a President's speech, especially if you are actually THERE, the very least you can do is to keep your fuckin' mouth shut.

After all, the Democrats kept their fucking mouths shut all during the Bush years when the (then) President spouted all kinds of crazy-assed, wingnut, bullshit to joint sessions of Congress.

At any rate, I was delighted to find out that it was possible to actually DO something about Representative Wilson. And that something is to donate money to his opponent. So I did.

You can, too. By clicking here.

You could also try visiting Representative Wilson's congressional website to register your displeasure with his outburst... except that the nerds on Capitol Hill had to shut it down because so many millions of people were trying to do exactly the same thing today.

Oh, Ya Got To Have Friends!

2009-09-09T15:35:00.004-04:00

She's the one who started it all. The Divine Ms. M, Bette Midler, in the fall of 1972. Her debut album. And the cut that still resonates in my head to this day is the first cut of the "B" side, "Friends."

And I do. Have friends. After my hideous experience at NY/Presbyterian hospital last Friday a friend of mine, who just happens to work there, took me out to keep me company until I crawled back in from the figurative ledge. This same friend had already told me that I would come and stay with him and his wife after my surgery until I was well enough to travel home from New York to central New Jersey.

And it didn't matter which New York hospital I used. I would still be welcome.

Then on Sunday, out of the blue, a friend of mine from Baltimore called and announced that he and his partner would "love to have me come and recuperate with them" if I chose to have the surgery done at Johns-Hopkins. How many people have friends who would invite them to come and be an invalid with them, for however long it took to get well?

I have friends like that.

I don't remember ever doing anything to earn friends like that, but I seem to have 'em.

Oh, and here's the kicker on all this. Yesterday morning I called a surgeon's office at Mount Sinai and made an appointment to see him this coming Friday morning. He's performed over 1,000 prostectomies using the "da Vinci" robot. This morning, at my daily 12-Step meeting, our "guest speaker" was someone who worked in medical administration --- for a doctor who specializes in cancers.

Take a guess.

Yup. We spoke after the meeting. She works for the guy I'm seeing on Friday. The paperwork (and insurance) is all being taken care of.

I am being taken care of.

I've got friends.

2 Down, 2 to Go

2009-09-08T16:26:00.003-04:00

This is a prostate cancer update.

I had my appointment with the surgeon at Weill-Cornell/New York - Presbyterian Hospital last Friday at 3:00 p.m.

I showed up on time, signed a paper, got my blood-pressure checked and was seated in a waiting room. In about 10 minutes I was taken to an examination room.

I sat in there, unattended, with no one dropping in to check on me, for 70, that's right, SEVENTY minutes, before I got sick and tired of waiting and walked out to see what was going on.

"Oh" some flunky exclaimed. "Didn't anyone come in?"

No.

I went back. It was another 10 minutes or so before I was finally escorted into Dr. God's inner-sanctum by one of his flunkies in a lab coat. She began the interview, only to quickly be joined by Dr. God, Himself.

I maintained a civil tongue but made my displeasure at being treated so badly abundantly clear.

I ran through my list of questions, which he promptly answered. I terminated the interview with, "I'll let you know."

I thought about it over the weekend and concluded that the actions of the staff were indicative of the mind-set of the teacher. That they treat people badly because he tolerates them treating people badly.

I would, under no circumstances, consider urological surgery at Weill-Cornell/New York - Presbyterian Hospital. In case anyone cares.

Next stop, Mount Sinai this coming Friday morning, followed by Memorial Sloan-Kettering a week from Wednesday.

I'm tired of doctors. I'm tired of surgeries. I'm tired.

Republicans Are Sexual Hypocrites (yawn).

2009-09-03T10:42:00.010-04:00

First, from the Afghani war zone, we have this:

these are employees of the Wackenhut Corporation, which provides private security for all occasions (baptisms, weddings, bar/bat mitzvahs, occupying forces, etc.) This is an actual photo (amongst many) taken of Wackenhut employees enjoying a little "down-time" in Kabul, Afghanistan. They are there, ostensibly, to guard American interests, specifically to provide security for the American Embassy in Kabul. Technically they are contractors of the US State Department. Be sure to drop Hillary a line today and let her know what you think of the fine job her contractors are doing in projecting a moral, straight-arrow image of America to our ~~defeated enemies~~ foreign allies.

The entire collection of photos shows, clearly, the inately homoerotic nature of most male hazing activities. Not only tolerated, but encouraged, as a way of "bonding" men in combat. Meanwhile, of course, really bonded guys (and gals) are being tossed out of the services left and right because they are gay.

Go figure. And when you have, please let me know, because I'm just fucking dying to know how the Government rationalizes this bullshit. Thank you.

And speaking of bullshit...

On to South Carolina. Man, are we missing out, or what? This sleepy little Southern backwater has, it turns out, been a seething cesspool of roiling, boiling carnality -- and we never knew it! If I'd only known what I know now, I would've moved there years ago! (and you should've too!)

First, there's Governor Mark Sanford. You know, the one with the Argentinian girlfriend in Buenos Aires (not to mention a wife and 4 boys back home).

Then, two days ago, Mike Rogers at Blogactive.com outed the Lt. Governor, Andre Bauer (40 year old "bachelor", and check out THIS gayface):

And to top it all off, the head of the Board of Education, Kristin Maguire, an ultra-conservative, evangelical Christian Republican, appointed by Mark Sanford to head the SC Board of Ed, yet who steadfastly refused to send her four daughters to public school and home-schooled them, instead.... got caught writing salacious porn on the internet. She has resigned "for family reasons."

Here's the hypocrite:

(Oh, wait, that's right. There's not even a wiki on this unqualified beeyatch, let alone any photos.)

Where's the outrage? Remember Howard Beale in "Network"? Isn't it time for us to don our grungy old trenchcoats and to stand up in front of the cameras and yell, "I'M MAD AS HELL, AND I'M NOT GOING TO TAKE IT ANYMORE!!"?

Yes. Yes, it is.

Medical History

2009-09-02T09:36:00.004-04:00

In 2004, as I sat on a gurney in a paper dress at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick, New Jersey, the handsomest surgeon in the state of New Jersey explained to me that I was a "ticking time bomb" and, in rather short order (two weeks), he performed what's known in the business as a "CABG" (pronounced "cabbage"), which is to say I had quadruple coronary-artery bypass grafts. I have lovely scars all over my upper torso and left arm to prove it, including the infamous "zipper" running down my chest, over my rib-cage.

In 2005 I was (again) told that I was a "ticking time bomb" and I had what's known in the business as "bi-lateral endarterectomies", which is to say they sliced open the sides of my neck, pulled out portions of the arteries feeding the brain, sliced them open and squeezed out the congealed cholesterol in both of them. I have lovely, matching 2" long scars on either side of my neck as souvenirs of that one.

In early 2006 I was diagnosed with Type II Diabetes. Type II Diabetes, it turns out, is not a disease, it is a big-business. There is a cure for Type II Diabetes which Big Pharma does not want you to take. It's called "Gastric Bypass Surgery" and I had it in early August of 2008. I lost 65 pounds and the diabetes (and the co-pays for Glucophage and Test Strips and a lot of other hooey and hokum which is totally unnecessary and is probably killing more people than it helps). That particular surgery, laporascopically done, left a bunch of little scars all over my belly.

Then, a week or two or three ago, I was told I have prostate cancer.

God only knows what sort of scars I'll come out of this with . But I do know this:

Despite the "big-business" aspect of all my hospitalizations and assorted medical effluvia, I thank God that I had pretty good insurance which covered pretty much everything.

Today, I am the Six Million Dollar Man (for those of you old enough to remember the non-Stone Cold Steve Austin) -- in more ways than one.

HOT FLASH!!! Half of South Carolina is Gay!!!

2009-08-31T16:21:00.004-04:00

Check out this link to Mike Rogers' website today. He's officially outing South Carolina's Lieutenant Governor, Andre Bauer.

Apparently it's no secret that the President Pro Tem of the SC Senate, Glenn McConnell, is also gay.

And everyone over the age of 7 with an IQ over 100, which automatically rules out most of the citizens of SC, knows that Senator Lindsey Graham is officially "light in the loafers" (as was Mark Foley, another fine example of Southern Manhood and Good Old-Timey Down-Home Pederasty).

Jeebus, are the voters of SC complete idiots or just in total denial? We know all their politicians are queer as folk.

Prostate Update

2009-08-28T11:36:00.005-04:00

I saw my urologist last p.m. He confirmed what I already suspected, that the cancer is localized to the prostate and it will have to come out.

Good news. Bad news. But news.

Now the ball is in my court. He was solicitous and concerned. He answered my questions truthfully. He assured me that he wouldn't feel "two-timed" if I snuck around and saw other doctors behind his back. In fact, he encouraged me to make appointments and to get other opinions.

I've been given names of doctors at New York Hospital-Presbyterian, Memorial Sloan-Kettering and Mount Sinai in New York and at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore.

Some of them use the robot, others do not, preferring instead to do it the old fashioned way, through a 3" incision.

My guy at home in NJ has done 600 removals in his career. He does them at a non-teaching hospital in New Brunswick, NJ (St. Peters). His rationale is that the operation is so delicate he doesn't want to have surrender any portion of it to resident surgeons, i.e. "rank amateurs." I liked that.

There's a good 10-15% chance that post-removal I'll still have to have some sort of follow-up therapy, probably radiation. Hey! That leaves a good 85-90% chance that I WON'T.

I'll be incontinent for awhile. A month, maybe two. As for "male potency" (don't you love the euphemisms we come up with for "hard ons"?), well, it'll be about as good as it is now within 6 months. I can wait 6 months. It's already been years.

Ordinarily I'd be on the phone this morning, rounding up appointments, arranging for time off, coordinating everything. But the weather is crappy, and I need a good scary movie... "Ultimate Destination" would do.

I'll deal with cancer next week. Promise.

p.s. But be assured that I know this ... I am loved. A lot. And that is going to make all the difference in the world.

His Name is Roger....

2009-08-26T09:53:00.004-04:00

A friend of mine sent me a link via email today and I want to share it with you.

There is a certain film critic of reknown, from Chicago, who blogs. Fair enough. What I didn't know is that he, too, is in recovery.

His name is Roger E. and [click here] is the entry which I find truly inspiring,

and on a lighter note, here's a birther, or teabagger, or Blue Dawg Democrat, or some other kind of illiterate douchebag, trying to explain healthcare reform:

[VIDEO DELETED DUE TO EMBEDDED ADVERTISING BY DOUCHEBAG ON-LINE SO-CALLED UNIVERSITY NAMED AFTER A CITY IN ARIZONA]

Prostate Cancer

2009-08-17T12:43:00.004-04:00

Before I left town on my last vacation my urologist had me drop by his office one night for a "minor procedure." It was to biopsy my prostate.

My PSA readings (a blood test) had been varying for years but recently, in the last year, they had been consistently hovering above the number generally recognized to be worrisome by the medical profession.

He took his samples (you don't even want to know about how he gets them, suffice it to say you have zero dignity during the procedure) and I went, gaily, off to the beach.

Well, last Thursday I had my follow-up with him. His face a mask of concern, he told me that it was cancer. 60% of the samples were infused with cancer cells over 90% of their surfaces.

I have no idea how others handle this, but I do know how one person I know handled it -- my ex had prostate cancer and had his prostate removed in 1991. They filleted him like a fish to do it. Afterwards he had to inject his penis with a syringe full of something in order to get a half-assed erection. He did not take it well. Sex was a lot... everything to him. I might as well have been a hole in the mattress, for all the (BITTER, PARTY OF ONE)... but I digress.

Not that I'm exactly worried about that. I haven't had sex with another human being in ... a decade? Two? Well, it's been a long time, and nobody is beating my door down and, to be honest, I have been deliberately NOT looking lustfully at anyone since 1984 or so.

So I'm not really worried about that.

No... it's the pain I fear. I remember how much pain the ex was in. It was bad.

My RN friends assure me that the pain is much more manageable and bearable than the gastric bypass was last year.

That's good news, I suppose.

But what about AFTER the removal? What then? Will I have to have chemo? Radiation? Will I be incontinent for the the rest of my life? Or even a month?

There's a new machine, Da Vinci by name, which is a surgeon-controlled robotic octopus which, according to the hype, does all of it's work through one teeny hole in your gut and which does NOT damage, the way old-fashioned surgery does, the delicate nerve bundle which surrounds the prostate and which contributes to a male's intense joy at the moment of ecstacy.

Shit. Look, I'm scared. It's cancer and I'm scared. I wasn't scared at quadruple-bypass surgery or bilateral endarterectomies or even gastric bypass -- but this time I'm scared.

I need help. Gods, yours and anyone else's who is willing.

Oh, and yes, I plan to not drink over it.

I'M BAAAAAaaaacccckkkkk .... with Jason Mraz.

2009-08-11T13:09:00.005-04:00

In my dreams.

But I am back from the Delaware shore. And I threw my back out in the process of unloading the car after a nearly picture-perfect week at the beach. Sigh.

All the news that's fit to print mostly has to do with Wingnuts, Freepers, Teabaggers and Birthers gettin' their knickers in a twist over the proposed healthcare reform legislation (Obama Death Panels passing sentence on everyone over the age of 30, etc.) WTF? I say leave the Death Panels where they are now, at the insurance companies which routinely make life or death decisions and deny people all kinds of treatment. Assholes.

Rather than joining that fray, I found this little item on Andy Towle's site. I happen to be in love with Jason Mraz and his cute little hat and his cute little bod and his cute little voice and his cute little ass.

Take a look at this and see if you don't agree with me... for a "straight guy" he sure is pretty gay-friendly.

Down the Shore - 2009

2009-07-30T16:29:00.004-04:00

We're heading back down to our old haunt, Rehoboth Beach Delaware, for our annual outing. This year we are officially four, with various and sundried drive-by couch-surfers who'll be crashing with us throughout the week.

Here we are:

Just kidding. This is an old snap of the beach patrol in Dewey, the next beach town south of Rehoboth.

Not that I've been very good about posting lately but I'll probably be even worse between now and August 8th, when we return.

Stay out of trouble while your father and I are away and we'll bring you a nice, big box of Dolle's Salt Water Taffy and a stuffed bear from one of the boardwalk arcades.

And keep out of the liquor cabinet.

Love,

Mom

Swimmer Butt

2009-07-28T15:48:00.007-04:00

Aside from the Blue Dog Democrats who are effectively and substantially eviscerating anything even approaching universal healthcare in this country, and the Senate Judiciary Committee which finally got off it's collective fat-ass and nominated Sonia Sotomayor for the Supreme Court, there isn't much else in the news except this:

A swimmer named Ricky Berens had a "wardrobe malfunction". And here are the pictures to prove it, above and a close-up, below:

See? There is a God. Sigh.

Borrowed Time

2009-07-27T13:15:00.004-04:00

My heart attack is 20 years old this month.

I was on a Metroliner from Wilmington Delaware to New York City at the time. It was a Sunday afternoon. I'd been on vacation that week in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, where I ate badly, smoked like a chimney and drank like a fish.

In other words, business as usual.

A few minutes after the train pulled out of New Brunswick, I caught sight of the (late) Twin Towers of the World Trade Center some 30 miles off in the distance.

That's when I first felt it. A tightness in my chest. It felt like someone had balled up their fist and was shoving it straight up under my sternum. I didn't know that that's where the heart is actually located. I thought "how odd. it must be indigestion." What did I know about heart attacks? Nothing. I thought you were supposed to feel a shooting pain up your arm (I didn't).

It didn't go away.

I got back to New York and I got home.

It didn't go away. I slept fitfully that night.

It was a hundred degrees in New York that July. My ex and I went out to dinner because it was too hot to cook. We went out that Monday night, the next night (Tuesday) and the night after that (Wednesday). We went to dinner at the Post House (a chop and steak joint) that night. I had the prime rib (large), with a baked potato and lots of butter and broccoli with hollandaise sauce (yeah, I know).

After dinner, we decided to walk over to the Lex line from the west side. We got to Astor Place. I collapsed on the platform.

The doctor said I should've died. He said I'd had a massive coronary. I needed a cigarette and a drink when he said that.

I kept drinking and smoking for years afterward. I didn't care. Even though I was a high-powered Wall Streeter at the time, I was very unhappy and wished, deep-down-inside, that I was dead.

I would eventually lose everything (Wall Street, the ex, etc.) I would get sober in 1998. I would have quadruple-bypass surgery in 2004 and quit smoking at the same time. I would have bilateral endarterectomies in 2005. I would be diagnosed with type II diabetes in 2006 and eventually have a stomach bypass in 2008 to fix the diabetes.

Twenty years ago I had a massive coronary.

Twenty years ago, I realize now, God was very busy saving me from myself. Time and time and time again.

I don't doubt it.

Miracles happen. I am one.

North Complicit in Slavery (Film at 11:00!)

2009-07-17T15:35:00.003-04:00

Today's title is actually a headline over on CNN right now.

I wonder to myself "what bright young dingbat just found this out?"

As anyone over the age of reason, who has seen the movie "1776", knows:

"Molasses to Rum to Slaves" was sung by Edward Rutledge from South Carolina and directly refers to the triangulation of north/south/caribbean economics in the 18th century.

But even non-musical types have a general knowledge that the North and the South were heavily divided on the issue and not always along geographical lines (Mr. Dickinson of Pennsylvania being a prime example), and that it took all the genial diplomatic skills of Benjamin Franklin himself to eventually broker a deal on the matter, primarily between John Adams of Massachusetts and his followers and Rutledge and his followers. The Virginians, by the way, were ambivalent on the matter.

Franklin could probably not have foreseen just how much long-term damage that deal would inflict on the country, but then, he was faced with the more daunting (and immediate) problem of creating a United States of America, and not merely preserving it.

We were a work in progress then, and we remain so now.

I'm Mad As Hell and I'm Not Going to Take It Anymore!

2009-07-01T11:19:00.003-04:00

I am finding more and more support amongst my friends (and here in InternetsLand) for bringing up our collective rage at the sorry state of affairs in this country for LGBTs. I watched President O'Bama do his dog-and-pony for the assembled (unelected) "gay leadership" at the White House, excuse me, OUR White House, on Monday afternoon (early enough in the week to bury it before Friday). The words were comfy and warm however the real support, backed up by actions, was nonexistent. You can go find the video yourselves. The Pink Pussycats (my new term for wimpy "go-along, get-along" Log Cabinish, kiss-ass bloggers and "gay leaders") have the video on all their sites.

David Mixner in his blog today, July 1st, 2009 , said this:

“For me to be a free man doesn't mean I have to make everyone in America like me. In fact the Constitution protects an unpopular minority from the tyranny of a majority.”

This is what he called it: Gay Apartheid

This is what it is: Gay Apartheid

Politicians can mouth off, Religiosos can mouth off, The Powers-That-Be can mouth off, but the net-net is... gay apartheid. Separate, and mostly unequal.

Enough.

And here's Keith Olbermann interviewing Dan Savage last night on the subject of DADT.

Wait for the payoff at the end. Keith swears up a blue streak and it's absolutely worth the wait.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Sour Pride

2009-06-29T10:32:00.005-04:00

I waited until after the weekend to talk about this here, even though I did mention it over on Facebook.

Have we come a long way since that mythic night in 1969, when the Queens fought back against a routine Vice-Squad raid of a Mafia-run gay bar on Christopher Street in Greenwich Village? Yes. Undoubtedly.

Background check of my bona fides:

I'd turned 21 the week before. I was in the Navy and had just reported for duty after a year of boot camp and electronics schools, to the Naval Air Test Center in Maryland. It was weeks before even a hint of the events in New York managed to filter down to where I was. And where I was was alone and lonely inside my own skin, absolutely convinced that I was doomed to a lifetime of secrecy about who, and what, I really was. I remember being thrilled to hear that there had been a "queer uprising" of some sort in New York City. It gave me a teensy bit of hope that maybe the future might be okay for me, after all.

Long story short, I got out of the service and came flying out of the closet, got very involved in gay lib on a grassroots level at the University of Delaware, got burnt by same, swore off gay lib and gay politics -- moved to Seattle -- moved to New York, attended a few early Pride Parades and most importantly... I saw where it was all going.

It was all going to a party.

The early parades were rag-tag events, scheduled mostly by word of mouth in those pre-internet, pre-email days. Mouth and pamphlets and underground newspapers.

They didn't need no stinkin' permits to march. Everybody just "showed up" on Central Park West and started organizing themselves behind banners. There were no "floats" or flatbed trucks full of scantily-clad party boyz and blaring disco music, tossing Mardi Gras beads to the gawkers along Fifth.

The cops didn't interfere because, to be honest, there were about a quarter of a million of us and about 10,000 of them.

But then, and rather quickly, the marches got sold out. To corporate interests and the aforementioned flat-bed trucks loaded with Party-Boyz.

And Pride stopped being political.

Look, I like a party as much as anyone else. But there is a time and a place for it. And Pride Parades are NOT it. NOT yet. When we have achieved our political goals of full, unbridled, equality before the law ... then, and only then ... can we "reward" ourselves with a parade with floats sponsored by Bud Lite and American Express.

Until then, there is work to be done. Political work. Hard work. In your fucking-face work.

Our lives are at stake here. And a once-a-year, blow off some steam, Disco-on-Fifth, is not a fit way to demonstrate against discrimination and in favor of civil rights for LGBT peoples from coast to coast. All it is is just a fucking bone thrown to us by an establishment with a vested interest in keeping us "uppity faggots" in our place.

A minor annoyance to the majority and a battered-wife reliable cashcow to the Democratic Party.

And if that don't piss you off, then just what will it take?

==============================================

I seem to have struck a nerve with a few people with my post, both above and over on Facebook. My friend Robin posted something remarkably similar on her website. You can jump directly to her post, here. I've also added her to my list of Daily Reads under "Here's What I Don't Get." Check it out. Eclectic, feminist and po'd at the status quo. Like me!

The.Best.American.Musical.Play... EVER!

2009-06-25T14:39:00.003-04:00

I'm a big, ol' musical queen. And I've seen a ton of big, ol' musicals over the years. I was even IN a few of them, in college and community theaters, along the way. I'd always thought I'd seen 'em all, and knew 'em all.

Well, I'm here to tell ya, I didn't know jack-shit.

I saw "South Pacific" at Lincoln Center on Tuesday night, and I'm here to tell you, it is the best American musical play, ever.

It beautifully captures the mood of a robust, vigorous nation at war, a country flexing both it's impressive muscles and it's small-town naivete. Yes, it also has bald-faced capitalism (Billis), bald-faced racism (Lt. Cable and Nellie Forbush), worldy sophistication (de Beque) and altruistic heroism (Cable and de Beque).

This show is loaded. Mostly with America, warts and all, with a smattering of ex-patriate France, just the way we all were in the 40's.

The overture starts, as many B'way overtures do these days, small and tinny, sounding more like it's being played on a synthesizer across the street at Juilliard, until... the music builds and builds to the crescendo in the midst of the "Bali Hai" section when, suddenly, like a giant wave pulling back from the shore, the entire stage floor swiftly retracts upstage to reveal an entire Broadway orchestra, the way B'way orchestras used to be ... BIG. 25 or 30 seats, at least. Only then did I really appreciate the lushness of the Robert Russell Bennett orchestrations and the true value of Rogers' brilliant score.

I'm sorry for waxing ecstatic over it, but I was just blown away by it. The cast is great, not a miscue among them. The sets and costumes are perfect and not overdone.

If you see nothing else on Broadway, this year, or ever, by all means go see "South Pacific" at Lincoln Center.

Contuining in a Musical Vein

2009-06-23T15:28:00.003-04:00

Because it's my birthday week I'm not going to let anything detract from my enjoyment of it -- including the shenanigans of all those d-bags in D.C. who are now busy sucking up to a few rich queers in the hopes that the rest of us will fall into line, like good little lgbt boys/girls/others, and back the fuck off and shut the fuck up and kill ourselves, like in the good old days.

And right about now my attitude is that they can all go fuck themselves, the lying sacks of self-serving shit.

On a lighter note, I'm going to see "South Pacific" at Lincoln Center tonight. Here is a clip of Mary Martin and Ezio Pinza singing "Some Enchanted Evening" which is one of my earliest recollections of b&w television. This is from the days when these broadcasts of scenes from Broadway shows and operas were considered so culturally important that they were simulcast on all of the television networks, and paid for by one sponsor, to an estimated audience of over 80,000,000.

I Feel Love....

2009-06-22T12:47:00.004-04:00

Today, June 22nd, is my belly-button birthday. I was born in the decade in which we fought and won WWII. I'm a boomer. I am not aging gracefully. My motto remains, "It's never too late to have a happy childhood."

But if anything, I am a child of the 70's. The disco era. I came out of the closet when I came out of the Navy. And I immediately started hitting places in Philadelphia with names like Oz, Allegro and The Steps, and places in New York like Barefoot Boy and Uncle Charley's.

This was pre-Studio 54.

Then I moved to Seattle. And in those days (by now it was 1976) if you wanted to dance in Seattle you either went to Shelley's Leg or the Boren Street Disco.

I went to both. I made a lot of dance friends. We had a great time. We loved Grace Jones and Sylvester and ABBA. But the Queen of Disco was her Majesty, Donna Sommers.

And for our money, this was the song that defined her and defined the era.

Abusive Relationships

2009-06-18T14:34:00.004-04:00

Not that any rich queers read me, but if they did or, if you think that you're rich enough to qualify, I would like to ask any of you who donate to the DNC (Democratic National Committee) to:

1. Immediately cease making donations to the DNC.

2. Cultivate local gay and gay friendly politicians by donating heavily to them, instead.

It is CLEAR to all but the blind that the DNC regards the LGBT communities as nothing more than minor annoyances with major bank accounts.

The DNC has absolutely no intention of giving us what it is that we seek, full and equal rights under the law. Not now. Not then. Not ever. And why should they?

If we got what we wanted, we would have no further use for them and would, possibly, stop donating to them anyway. It is in the best interests of the Democatric National Committee to insure that we remain disgruntled enough to think that we have no choice but to back them, no matter how badly they treat us.

In psychobabble this is called "an abusive relationship." We, my friends, are in an abusive relationship with the Democratic Party. Oh, sure, we get beat up in the back alley by the Republican thugs, but our good friends the Democrats are all over us inside the bars, like a cheap NY hustler, smooching up to us and telling us that they can't live without us, until we get them home with us for an evening of raw, hot sex. THEN they get viscious, beat the crap out of us, take our wallets and leave us for dead.

And, fools that we are, a week later we're out there once again, looking for them in all the bars all over town ... thinking to ourselves that maybe "this time it will be different."

Yeah. Well, take it from an alcoholic who thought that every time he drank it would be different ... it's never different. Until we fight back.

I know abusive relationships. I've had 'em. With guys. With booze. With politicians.

What really works with an abuser is to knock the cocksucker flat on his ass.

It's time for the LGBT communities to knock the DNC flat on its ass.

I used to like this guy....

2009-06-15T10:22:00.003-04:00

I'm doing more and more posting over on FaceBook these days ... and less and less here.

But I did want to pass along my growing annoyance and discontent with the current administration. Watch this:

Last week, the Department of Justice argued before the Supreme Court IN FAVOR of keeping DOMA ... and in its brief, used the old incest/child-molestation stereotype.

It is clear that this administration has gone from gay friendly to gay hostile... on the assumption that we will always be there for them, like a lover in an abusive relationship.

And trust me, I know exactly what it's like to be in an abusive relationship. I was in one for 15 years, until I got sober.

Maybe it's time for the LGBT communities to get sober and to wake up to the fact that politicians do NOTHING without either a) being bought or b) being publicly humiliated.

I am planning on showing up for the March on Washington in October. I urge every other LGBT person to do the same.

Marches didn't necessarily end the war in Viet Nam ... but they sure made the evening news -- night after night after night.

The Tonys - It Don't Get Any Gayer Than This!

2009-06-08T09:58:00.004-04:00

For those of you missed Neil Patrick Harris' big closing number at the Tony's last night...

Well, like he says... it don't get any gayer.

The Weather Forecast

2009-06-05T14:46:00.000-04:00

'Cause this is how it looks from NY/NJ these days:

Dear Mister President....

2009-06-02T12:36:00.003-04:00

Won't you please start keeping some of your beautifully phrased campaign promises?

Why the Belief in Homosexual Choice Matters

2009-05-28T16:17:00.004-04:00

It matters to me because I've never been anything other than homosexual. There were no "incidents" in my childhood. There was no pattern of anything. There was only, from very early age, a yearning, a drive, a need ... for the loving companionship of males, hopefully to culminate in a romantic and sexually fulfilling relationship with one.

I remember being asked, in college at an open-forum Psych class where I was one of the "star-performers" that night, when, exactly, I had "decided to be gay."

I was astonished that anyone would even think that there was some element of choice involved. There was never a moments doubt, from age six on.

Now, many decades later, I know why that question was asked. I also know, now, why it's so important for so many people to believe that I chose.

Because if I didn't, then their whole belief system comes crashing down around their ears. It means that God... their God... doesn't make mistakes, and doesn't make garbage, either.

Worse, if I didn't choose... and they did... then it means that there is a lot of suppressed anger in a lot of people, because they chose badly, and they know it.

Personally speaking, I believe that so many people are angry about this because a.) their God doesn't make mistakes and they know it and b.) they chose wrong, and they know it.

It's enough to piss off the Good Humor man. And Fred Phelps. And Maggie Gallagher.

Memorial Day

2009-05-26T11:59:00.005-04:00

I called my dad on Sunday to see how he's doing (not well) and to thank him for his national service during World War II. He was grateful on both counts.

My dad never talks about it, but he was a tail gunner aboard an aviation fuel refueling ship in the South Pacific during the war. It was the kind of ship that Kamikaze's loved to dive-bomb. Dad got a lot of practice shooting Kamikaze's out of the sky.

His dad, my grandfather, was in the Navy in the 1920's. Pop-pop was stationed aboard a battlewagon, the USS Delaware. He was a Boilerman. But his real job was to be the coxswain for the Navy's championship rowing team. He led the Navy team to something like 4 victories. The Navy was heartbroken when Pop-pop bailed out at the end of his second enlistment in 1927.

I was born under a water sign, Cancer. I came from generations of Navy men. It was inevitable, I guess, that I would go to sea.

I never stroked a championship team, nor did I blast Jap Zeros out of the puffy-clouded South Pacific sky. But I did serve my country, honorably, from 1968 to 1972. I was an aviation electronics technician. I spent most of my enlistment ashore, in boot camp, electronics schools and, for a two year stretch, attached to the Flight Test Division of the Naval Air Test Center located in Lexington Park, Maryland.

I love working there. The best and the brightest of both officers and enlisted members of the services were sent to the NATC. Our test pilots all had "the right stuff." Our enlisted personnel were either on their way to becoming officers or else they had turned down commissions due to their feelings about the Viet Nam war.

Eventually, though, the time came for sea duty, and I was sent to Lakehurst, New Jersey, were I was assigned to HC-2, The Fleet Angels, a Sea-Air Rescue Helicopter Squadron. After six months of non-descript duty aboard the base I was re-assigned to a detachment leaving for six months of sea duty aboard the USS Franklin D. Roosevelt, CVA-42.

Rosie was a WWII relic. Rather like dad. She wasn't as fast as the newer nukes. She was smaller than most of the newer carriers. But she was feisty. And she was comfy. She had a "lived-in" look and feel that you couldn't find aboard newer ships. If you look real close at the arresting gear, my bunk was under the the #3 arresting wire. You have no idea how loud a 40,000 pound jet aircraft slamming into the deck at 150 miles per hour is, when it's just six inches above your face.

Rosie had character. I like ships with character.

I don't expect anyone to ever thank me for my duty. It was a great time in my life. I met some great guys, got drunk a lot, and learned how to play well with others.

And do you know that, to this day, I still fold my socks and underwear exactly the way I was taught to do it in bootcamp?

Catholic school was good training for the Navy. But the Navy had much cuter guys.

========================================================
UPDATE: California Supreme Court Upholds Proposition 8. Existing same-sex marriages to stand.

Tell me again why I should be grateful to this country for all it does for me?

DADT

2009-05-21T12:35:00.005-04:00

Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. It’s about being forced to stay in the closet if you’d like to serve your country.

One dirty little (and undiscussed) secret underlying the policy is our national wish that all queers, lesbos and other disgusting misfits would also stay in the closet… out of sight and out of mind.

But in the military, it’s not merely about pandering to the homophobic panic of redneck teenagers who form the backbone of our fighting forces.

DADT is really about something that never gets discussed, even at the highest levels of power within the forces, because it’s too explosive a subject for even them to handle.

It’s about Sparta.

No, I’m not kidding.

The Spartans deliberately set out to create an army of lovers, the theory being that a soldier would be far more willing to die for his country if he was also to die defending the life of his soul-mate. It was terrific military policy, to create an army that was at the very least bisexual. You can see how well it worked by looking at the battle of Thermopylae – when a measly 300 Spartans (and a thousand or so other Greeks - who never get mentioned) held off the entire Persian Army of Xerxes for quite a long time, comparatively speaking. The Spartans went down… as it were… defending the lifeless body of their King, Leonidas, who, according to all reports, was quite a hunk of Greek manhood.

Can you imagine what it would be like if we had a national security policy enforced by a military composed of millions of happily queer couples?

Can you imagine what it would be like if we had a hunk of burning Greek love as a Commander in Chief?

I can.

Parental Love

2009-05-18T13:00:00.005-04:00

I drove down to Dover, Delaware on Saturday to spend some "quality time" with my father and step-mom.

All families are complicated, each in their own unique and often horrifying way. Mine is no exception.

My birth mom and my dad were divorced while I was still gestating in the womb. Throughout my childhood my mother, a bitter young woman with a severe drinking problem, used me as a pawn in her relations with her ex husband, her mother and anyone else who got in her way. I know that, and I forgive her for that. It ruined me in many ways, but there's no going back and undoing it. I am nearly incapable of having trusting intimate relations with sexually desirable people as a direct result of that childhood. When push comes to shove, I can't let anyone in... and more importantly, I can't let myself out.

But still, I try.

Eventually I did meet my shadow family consisting of my dad, my stepmom whom I love dearly and my should-have-been siblings, my sister and our younger brother. Over the years we have gotten closer and more loving.

As my sobriety has ripened, I have learned more and more about the important things in life, such as family and friends.

Dad has started having more and more hospital episodes over the last couple of years. This year my siblings had to fly down to Ft. Myers in Florida to literally rescue the folks and drive them home because dad was physically incapable of doing it.

Mom is no help. She never bothered to get a driver's license and, recently, her memory has started to go. She really needs to be watched at all times now. This will only get worse. In fact, both of them are only going to get worse, and to be honest, it will be in very short order.

After they came home from Florida my sister suggested that each of us go to Dover to spend some quality time with them. I knew what that meant. It meant my sister suspects that the end is near for one or both of them and now would be a good time to show them that they are still loved and that they are still a relevant part of their children's lives. I know, from personal childhood experience, what it means to feel like a fifth wheel in life.

I prayed all week about it. I asked God to take charge of the visit on Saturday and to help me keep my mouth zippered shut, to smile, to be loving and considerate and compassionate, to not have any agendas, and to be of service however I could.

Well, God held up His end of the bargain. I sailed through the day, even though were trying times at the drug store and supermarket. I showered them with affection, verbally and physically, whenever the opportunity arose.

Maybe I am learning about letting people in a little bit. Or even better, maybe I'm learning how to let myself out.

I dunno.

But I do know that I'm going to cry like a baby if... when anything happens to either of them.

W.W.J.D.

2009-05-13T15:37:00.005-04:00

From the steamy streets of West Hollyweird comes our photo du jour:

What Would Jesus Drink (on a steamy LA day)? A vente iced latte, of course, before heading off to a hard day of saving souls.

And you can tell it's Hollywood because out there even the Starbuck's have kleig lights in the windows.

Maine Governor Signs Gay Marriage Bill

2009-05-06T13:03:00.002-04:00

New England is shaping up very nicely.

And as goes Maine ... so goes the nation.

Asshole of the Week - Rudy Giuliani

2009-05-04T11:12:00.005-04:00

Remember this:

Joe Jervis over at Joe.My.God does a much better job eviscerating Giuliani over his latest, shameful, conduct than I ever could.

Rudy Giuliani, "America's Mayor", is a totally disgusting, opportunistic, political pig.

Period.

HR 1913 - The Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Act

2009-04-30T11:45:00.004-04:00

It passed. Thank God. But not before the wingnuts took to the floor of the House to try to kill it -- and like good Holocaust Deniers everywhere, they even attempted to deny that Matthew was a victim of a hate crime. The worst of the worst, though, was Representative Virginia Foxx (R-NC). Her speech in the well of the House was astonishing by the depth of it's political demagoguery and utter lack of truth. If this woman is a parent I pity her children. It's bad enough she gets to vote on legislation of national importance. She should, if she had a decent bone in her body, immediately resign her position in the House.

I'm grateful that Keith Olbermann is on the air -- and isn't afraid to take on wingnuts like her. Last night he took on three. For an appetizer he devoured Michelle Bachmann (R-MN), who is just plain batty. Then, for an entree, he chomped into Rupert Murdoch. Finally, for dessert, he lacerated Ms. Foxx (at 2:43).

Keep in mind, the legislation passed in the House. A Senate version has already been introduced by Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA). The speed at which things are changing in this country can be breathtaking at times -- which makes the wingnuts even wingnuttier than usual.

I thank my Higher Power, whom I call God, for having kept me alive long enough to see a day when things seem to be really changing for me and people like me.

Here's Keith's "Worst Person in the World" from last night (04/29/09).

Weather We're Havin', Ain't It?

2009-04-27T15:00:00.005-04:00

It was about a thousand degrees here in the east over the weekend. Or so it seemed after an endless freezing cold, wet spring.

In true Noo Yawk style, the inhabitants of the greatest city on the face of the earth (except, of course, for wherever you come from - or live in now - or lived in sometime and still have a soft spot for) stampede into the great park at the center of that city, designed by Frederick Law Olmstead and Calvert Vaux over 150 years ago - in order to divest themselves of as much clothing as is decently possible and to cool off, play, read, pitch some woo and relax amidst the greenery therein.

Here are some shots from the weekend - most taken in and around the Sheep Meadow of fabled Central Park (click on the photos to embiggen them):

And, of course, the twinks were out in force:

Fear and Torture

2009-04-23T14:54:00.003-04:00

I just watched the YouTube clip of Shep Smith of Fox News going ape-shit over the subject of torture. "We do not f*cking torture" he screamed.

Shep's kind of cute and if I were still drinking I might hit on him. But I'm not. However, I do agree with him. The United States does not f*cking torture.

Look, I was born at night, but it wasn't last night. I know the world is a nasty piece of business and we need to be on our guard all the time and sometimes we might have to resort to some pretty nasty tactics in order to preserve, protect and defend our national interests.

But we do not f*cking torture.

I cannot wrap my brain around the idea of us having a high-handed attitude of righteousness as we lovingly shove human rights and democracy down other people's throats (whether or not they want it) on the one hand, as we "faux drown" terrorists in extraterritorial hellholes created specifically for the purpose of being beyond our laws and Constitution, on the other.

We do not f*cking torture. If we do f*cking torture we can give up all pretense of being what we claim to be. If we do f*cking torture then we are no better than the zealous religious idiots who flew their planes into the World Trade Center towers, the Pentagon and the fields of Pennsylvania.

We may have lost the most recent battles for our national soul, also known as "The Bush Years", but it is not too late to win the war for it.

We all know how far up the chain of command that nonsense went (all the way). We all know that Condi and Dick and Rummy and Georgie-Porgie signed off on it. We all know that for 8 years the White House suffered from a dual-diagnosis of stupidity and eagerness.

Prolonging our national nightmare by revisiting these matters in Congress, when there are far more important and loftier things we need to be doing, would be a further waste of our national wealth and psyche.

I think that it is time to move forward and upward, out of the muck and into the light.

She Lit Up My Life

2009-04-21T12:43:00.004-04:00

Tharon Musser passed away last Sunday. She was born on January 8, 1925 in Roanoke, Virginia. Her dad was a clergyman.

Her name will, most likely, mean little to you unless you're a real afficianado of the Broadway stage. Tharon was a lighting designer, which is a little like saying that Picasso was a painter. Both are true but there's a lot more that could, and should, be said about the subjects.

Tharon lit the shows of my youth. Not incidentally, she also lit the shows of Stephen Sondheim. She lit "Follies." She also lit "A Chorus Line." And "Dreamgirls." She won Tonys for all of those. She also designed the lighting for "Applause", "A Little Night Music", "Pacific Overtures", "The Act", "Ballroom" and "42nd Street (original stage production - 1981)". I'm here to tell you, this woman could paint a stage in light. And she painted a lot of them.

She was an innovator. "A Chorus Line" was the first B'way show to use a computer to activate the cues. It was considered radical at the time. She used computerized lighting more and more as the years went by. Anyone who saw the original production of "Dreamgirls" will instantly recall the 4 giant, castered lighting towers that whirled and spun around the stage during the show -- uncredited chorus members who danced from beginning to end -- the entire show being (mostly) lit by them in computer-controlled, lightning-fast changes that dazzled the audiences of the time as much as Jennifer Holliday's rafter-rattling rendition of "And I am Telling You (I am not going)".

Tharon Musser did that. And today, 27 years later, the hairs on the back of my head still stand up as I recall that knock-dead evening of theater. Thank you, Tharon, for being a part of it.

Tharon is survived by her life partner, Marilyn Rennagel, who is also a lighting designer.

Meme du Jour

2009-04-19T08:07:00.005-04:00

Courtesy of my friend Bev over at Funny the World, comes this meme du jour:

1. What color is your toothbrush?
Blue and white (it's electrified!)

2. Name one person who made you smile today.
My 12-Step sponsor, Luke.

3. What were you doing at 8 am this morning?
This.

5. What is your favorite candy bar?
Payday. It's got nuts.

6. Have you ever been to a strip club?
Yes. And before you ask, it was a straight strip club -- I was still working on Wall Street at the time and it was considered part of my job to "entertain" clients. So shut up.

7. What is the last thing you said aloud
"What is the last thing you said aloud." My lips move when I read.

8. What is your favorite ice cream?
Hands down, Butter Pecan.

9. What was the last thing you had to drink?
Coffee. I'm having it now.

10, Do you like your wallet?
I do. It's a Coach. I've had it for about 4 years, but I've had the same model of Coach wallet for about 25 years. It's a tri-fold. It's perfect.

11, What was the last thing you ate?
A turkey and cheese on whole wheat.

12, Have you bought any new clothing items this week?
Probably. I'm on a shoe-buying binge. The old ones are getting disgusting.

13, The last sporting event you watched?
I watched the Yankees get their asses handed to them by Cleveland yesterday afternoon, but I turned it off after the third inning.

14. What is your favorite flavor of popcorn?
Just plain, preferably with butter. Just like my hero, Bev.

15. Who is the last person you sent a text message to?
I don't "do" text.

16. Ever go camping?
Yes. Every where from Baxter State Park in Maine (where the Appalachian Trail begins) to the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia. I actually like camping.

17, Do you take vitamins daily?
Yes. Centrum Silver plus a Biotin pill and a B-12 sublingual.

18, Do you go to church every Sunday?
For what? Look, let's get this straight. I believe in God, I just don't believe in YOUR God. Okay?

19, Do you have a tan?
Nah.

20,Do you prefer Chinese food over pizza?
No. I'm an equal-opportunity vomiter.

21, Do you drink your soda with a straw?
Soda is out because of carbonation. I drink a lot of Crystal Lite.

22, What did your last text message say?
I don't "do" text.

23, What are you doing tomorrow?
Work.

25, Look to your left, what do you see?
The window looking south towards Peddie School. It's a nice view.

26, What color is your watch?
Black band, stainless case, black face with white numerals.

27, What do you think of when you hear Australia?
"Priscilla, Queen of the Desert" and Olivia Newton-John. I'm pretty gay.

29, Do you go in at a fast food place or just hit the drive thru?
I don't "do" fast food.

30. What is your favorite number?
Whichever number will cause me to win MegaMillions.

31. Who’s the last person you talked to on the phone?
My friend Richard T. He called last night around 7:30 p.m.

32. Any plans today?
Yup. A 12-Step meeting in Plainsboro, NJ, then maybe a quick trip to Sam's Club.

33. How many states have you lived in?
Seven. In chronological order: Delaware, California, Tennessee, Maryland, Washington (State), New York and New Jersey.

34. Biggest annoyance right now?
Summer traffic on Friday afternoons on the NJ Turnpike (does EVERYONE in New York City have a beach house down the Jersey shore????)

35, Last song listened to?
"I'm Yours" by Jason Mraz. It's ubiquitous these days. I like his voice so I hope he doesn't become a "one-hit wonder."

36. Can you say the alphabet backwards?
Bwahahahahahahahahahaha. No.

37. Do you have a maid service clean your house?
Only when we rent a beach house. I don't want foreigners to know how we Americans really live.

38. Favorite pair of shoes you wear all the time?
My Jack Purcell blue canvas sneakers. I would wear them to work if I could.

39. Are you jealous of anyone?
No. It's a pointless waste of energy based, primarily, on self-pity.

40. Is anyone jealous of you?
I would hope not. See 39, above.

41. Do you love anyone?
Yes. Dozens. Am I "in love" with anyone? No.

42. Do any of your friends have children?
Yup. My friends seem to fall into two categories, either "Scorched Earth" or "Be Fruitful and Multiply", but almost nothing in between.

43. What do you usually do during the day?
Oh, blog, read other blogs, blog some more, cop an attitude when asked to actually "work", blog some more, read some more blogs...

44, Do you hate anyone that you know right now?
No. Wow. That's a change. I don't hate my ex anymore. I wonder when that happened?

45. Do you use the word ‘hello’ daily?
Yes. Part of my duties include answering phones.

46. What color is your car?
"Arrest Me Red."

47. Do you like cats?
I'd better or my friend Jan would stop talking to me.

48. Are you thinking about someone right now
Yes. My friend Jan.

49, Have you ever been to Six Flags?
Are you kidding? I live about 20 miles from Six Flags Great Adventure -- I LOVE bodacious roller coasters and Six Flags has got 'em. But the crowds can be overwhelming.

50. How did you get your worst scar?
It's about 12" long and runs down the inside of my left forearm. It's where they harvested a vein (and they were clearly in a hurry when they did it) during my quadruple-bypass surgery five years ago last month. That scar is a constant reminder to me of how badly I used to treat myself and how lucky I am to be alive today.

Up the Lazy River

2009-04-14T12:35:00.006-04:00

Today's title refers to the Amazon, of course, as in Amazon dot com. Specifically, it refers to the flapdoodle that arose this past weekend over the de-listing of LGBTQQ titles from their rankings.

Apparently this is important. I don't know why exactly, but it is. I know this because my friend Rob Byrnes (aka FARB) ~~had totally lost his shit~~ was somewhat discomfited over it. And any ~~enemy~~ discomfit of Rob Byrnes is an ~~enemy~~ discomfit of mine. He was particularly ~~incensed~~ discomfited by it since he just had a new book (fabulous... you should read it... called "Straight Lies") published and, let's face it, authors these days count on e-tailers like Amazon to really move the merch.

So after I read Rob's ~~rant~~ piece (love the [lack of] alliteration) I delisted my shopping cart and wish lists from Amazon and sent a sternly worded email to some faceless drone in Mumbai who poses as their Customer Service Help Desk.

A scant 24 hours later I got a reply.

Then I posted this on Joe.My.God's blog:

"You wanna know what I think? I think that, for economic reasons only, the cataloging was outsourced to a country where ... well, let's just say that there's a totally different cultural bias regarding subjects such as "gay" and "lesbian" and "bisexual" and "transgendered" and "queer" there. A place where, in fact, the entire population remains largely skittish on the subject of sex in general.

And nobody in corporate bothered to double-check the work.

That's what I think. (the Amazon form reply was signed by Gajalakshmi S.)"

I stand by that theory. I think it was nothing more than the finance department trumping the editorial staff.

It's worse than a global conspiracy.

It's capitalism run amok. As usual.

Post-Christian America

2009-04-08T10:19:00.009-04:00

The cover story on this week's issue of Newsweek is about life in what it terms "post-Christian America", i.e., an America which has moved well beyond the old-time religion of our forefathers.

As we all know, of course, there never was such a place. Rhode Island, the article points out, was founded by dissidents from all the other major religions as a place of safety from the tyranny of Massachusetts (Protestantism) and Maryland (Catholicism). We were always a mixed bag of beliefs (and non-beliefs). There is nothing new about that.

What is new, though, is that Americans are moving away from organized religions towards individual theologies based on a belief "in a Higher Power" but without the need for any human authority to act as God's muscle here on earth. We are far less religious these days, but far more spiritual.

This sounds suspiciously like every 12-Step Program I've ever heard of. The grandaddy of 12-Step programs, Alcoholics Anonymous, began in 1935 in Akron Ohio. One of it's founding tenets is the need for it's members to develop a belief in a "Power Greater than Ourselves"... leaving it up to the individual member to decide for him or herself exactly what that Power is.

This is very bad news for the RRR (radical religious right) aka "fundies" (fundamentalists) who would like to impose a born-again, literal fundamentalist theocracy on the nation; to outlaw abortion on demand (and, eventually, all contraception); to drive all LGBTQ people back into self-loathing closets and to "restore" our nation to it's pristine, newly-founded, condition. Which, by the way, never really existed.

Despite the outcome of Prop 8 in California last November, last Friday's unanimous vote by the Iowa Supreme Court and the outcome of the votes of the Vermont legislature and senate yesterday have triggered a seismic shift in America's thinking on the subject of gay rights in particular and fair play and full equality in general.

I believe that the culture war is over (or nearly so). The Right has lost (decisively).

Next subject?

===================================================
UPDATE!! Anti-Gay National Organization for Marriage Launches New Campaign in wake of recent events.

--- more update: it turns out they're all actors. somebody turned up the audition tapes and posted them on Youtube, too. Gee, you can't even trust Christianist Fundamentalists anymore.

Catholicism 101

2009-04-07T11:31:00.002-04:00

Get your own Poll!

Painful Truth

2009-04-06T16:12:00.008-04:00

I hate admitting when I'm full of shit. Doesn't everybody? But there's no escaping it. I am.

I went to FARB's book-signing last week (see: "Famous Author Rob Byrne's" blog in my preferred reading list, below to the right). It was in a gay bar in ~~Hell's Kitchen~~ Clinton, here in New York City. Ordinarily I don't go into gay bars because I'm in recovery and, as I often tell myself, I have "no business being someplace full of people who drink." That's one thing I tell myself. Another thing I've been telling myself for the past 11 years is that I'm not dating because I'm "afraid of repeating past mistakes" in terms of picking the wrong people to get involved with.

Lies. All self-deluded lies.

I realized, almost as soon as I arrived at the bar, that I was exceedingly uncomfortable. Not because other people were drinking and I wasn't, but rather because I was in a roomful of gay men, without the benefit of a 12-Step structure (i.e. a "group" or a "meeting") and I had nothing... absolutely nothing... to buffer me from the prospect of having a regular conversation with regular guys.

An "on-line" acquaintance of mine, a gay woman whose name is irrelevant here, walked in and I practically threw myself into her arms, I was so relieved that at last there was someone I could talk to without the added pressure of that person being a male.

Unfortunately, that didn't work out so well because, it turned out, she was there on a mission -- to check me out as possible dating material for another gay male friend of hers. I wanted to scream when she told me that.

As I was trying to find Rob to say my "goodbyes" for the evening he tried to introduce me to a couple of other friends of his, male of course, and by then the pain was so great I practically sprouted wings and flew down the steps and out the door. Talk about being "light in the loafers!"

Humor aside, the next few days have been painful. I am not the person I thought I was (I always thought of myself as Mr. Gregarious). Yet without the benefit of loud music, a dance floor, cigarettes and gallons of booze, I simply don't know how to act around gay men.

I've been sharing about this at all my 12-Step meetings since last Friday (including an LGBT meeting I attend in Pennsylvania on Saturday nights). I've been sharing about this with my sponsor, too. And with other members of my so-called "executive committee" of close recovery friends (all men, all straight, all married -- another friggin' clue that I might have "issues" with gay men).

Sigh. Yet more work to be done. I am a work in progress. And as we're fond of saying, it's Progress.... not Perfection.

Straight Lies

2009-04-02T10:45:00.004-04:00

I don't know too many famous gay authors (I do know a couple of ostensibly straight ones), but I do know Rob Byrnes.

Well, he has a new book which was published this week. Here it is:

Tonight, April 2, is the launch party for his latest opus. It's being held at the Ritz Bar and Lounge, 369 West 46th Street, from 6:00 PM and 9:00 PM!

I intend to be there. If you're in the NYC metro area, you should be there, too.

Hell, you'll get to meet lots o' writers & bloggers and gawd only knows what else.

See ya there!

West Side Story - A Review

2009-03-30T10:01:00.000-04:00

Background. I'm a show freak and mighty damned proud to admit it. I've seen everything, over the years. Twice (if not more). With one notable exception, that is. West Side Story. Music by Leonard Bernstein, lyrics by Steve Sondheim, book by Arthur Laurents. Choreographed and directed by Jerome Robbins (with the able assistance of Peter Gennaro).

It opened on Broadway in 1957 and was movied in 1960. Like many, I grew up knowing the show only on the basis of the movie. And although it was shot on the mean streets of upper Hell's Kitchen, on the very site where today's Lincoln Center stands, it was, well, it was a movie. I love movies. You can do things in movies which you can't do on stage (CGI). But the theater is my first love. It's real. Once that orchestra starts playing, come hell or high water, the SHOW MUST GO ON. And you've only got one chance to do it right ... for the audience that night. You can't beat the immediacy of it.

And so it was on Friday night. When they posted the opening notice last November I was all over the box-office website like a bird on a June bug, and booked two seats for the front mezzanine for last Friday. Not bad for a week after the opening.

How was it?

Indescribably wonderful. Artie Laurents (at 94, God bless him) did a great job of re-creating the show from memory.

The leads were adorable, able and sweetly (nearly) adolescent. Maria is beautifully played by Josefina Scaglione who is a 21 year old from Argentina where, apparently, she's enormously popular and operatically trained (it shows!). In addition to being quite beautiful, she was fragile, vulnerable and highly expressive. Matt Cavenaugh (Tony), is a ruggedly handsome young man who has got a phenomenal vocal range (it's a very tough role to sing -- Bernstein liked to murder his male ingenues voices), and he acquitted himself beautifully with a pure, sweet upper range, when required.

The other roles were handled with the sort of professionalism you'd expect from a Broadway show.

But the real hero of the evening, as far as I was concerned, was Joey McKneely, whom you've probably never heard of. Well, it was his job to do the nearly impossible, i.e. to recreate, as exactly as possible, Jerome Robbins' complicated choreography. And recreate it he does. Before this he did "The Boy from Oz", the story of Peter Allen which starred Hugh Jackman, a few years back. Somewhere along the way he had become friends with the late Jerome Robbins who, apparently, taught him all the dances.

Because everyone has heard about it, I want to talk a little about the infusion of Spanish into the show. Rest assured that it's not a distraction, it's an enhancement. We all know the songs inside and out, so that when Maria bursts into song with "Siento Hermosa!", we all know that her new-found love is making her feel as beautiful as our first made all of us feel. There is some Spanish in the dialog scenes, but you never have the sense of missing out on something. You always know what's going on.

I knew I was liking the show because my "butt alarm" didn't go off once during the nearly 3 hour long performance. I was transfixed, held, illuminated and entertained from beginning to end.

There was only a single sour note in the whole evening, and that didn't even occur on stage.

After the show, my friend and I waited outside the stage door to say "hi" to a friend of mine in the orchestra. As we waited patiently by the curb, the Co-chairman of Fox Films, Tom Rothman and his obnoxious clan, pushed me and my friend off the sidewalk into the busy street so that they could crowd around their lousy brat who, apparently, was one of the Jets.

Fans. Sheesh.

If you're planning on coming to NY, try (desperately) to get tickets to see "West Side Story". You won't regret it as long as you avoid the stage door after the show.

Tonight, tonight....

2009-03-27T13:21:00.003-04:00

won't be just any night, tonight I'm seeing "West Side Story" at the Palace theater on Broadway. (Friday, March 27, 2009)

Many years ago I heard the late, great, Jerry Orbach say, "the two most beautiful words in the English language are MUSICAL COMEDY". And the show he was in when he said it was, "42nd Street." Beside the point. He was absolutely right.

It is certainly the most vibrant art-form of the 20th century. Keep your painters and sculptors. Keep your depressing playwrights. Give me a composer, a score, a chorus, dancers and tons of giant production numbers, and I'll be happy.

I'll try to find time to do a full review over the weekend.

I'M CURED!!!!!

2009-03-20T10:00:00.003-04:00

It's official, I'm cured! I took this on-line test, which proved it!

Disorder	Rating
Paranoid Disorder:	Low
Schizoid Disorder:	Low
Schizotypal Disorder:	Low
Antisocial Disorder:	Low
Borderline Disorder:	Low
Histrionic Disorder:	Low
Narcissistic Disorder:	Low
Avoidant Disorder:	Low
Dependent Disorder:	Low
Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder:	Low
-- Personality Disorder Test - Take It! -- -- Personality Disorders --

I would've taken the dating quiz but our office IT department is administered by the Department of Truth / Division of Big Brother and our blocking software tossed me out with the admonition that I was visiting A DATING SITE which, apparently, IT is against (as well they should be -- those nerds haven't had dates in years).

It's the first day of Spring, it's snowing in New York and it's Friday.

The weather can do whatever the f*ck it likes. Mother Nature cannot stop the calendar.

July will happen.