The Fight for First

Everybody likes to be the first at something. For example, there is a pretty good chance that I was the first in my family to vote for a Democrat.

In an attempt to avoid pulling together a report for work, I decided to learn more about the Boston Common. I referred to Wikipedia which is, admittedly, full of errors. That's when I found this fun one:



Notice, highlighted in yellow, that the Wikipedia entry describes the Park Street Station as "the first subway station in America." I don't think that is necessarily true. There was, likely, at least two stations that can claim that place in history because one subway station wouldn't do you much good. Where would you take the train if there was no other place to stop? Did they really build a subway that is nothing more than the Disneyland Railroad, looping around the city? I don't think so.

A Smile from My Past

Like any person trapped in unsatisfying office jobs for the better part of this millennium, I am enrolled in the major social-networking sites. It all started with Friendster a few years ago (I signed up in June 2003). Last year, I gave in and signed up for MySpace and have been shocked out how interesting the MS community can be.

Granted, I think these sites are best for stalking learning about new friends. I'll confess to going home after meeting the gentleman friend and doing a quick "background" check. Single, check. Employed, check. College educated, check. Naked photos... dang!

Any time any "real life" friends go on a date, typically a link to their beau's MySpace preceeds any details about the actual date. It's great. I get photos, movie and music preferences. A little peek deep into their soul without the boring details of what appetizer they ordered.

Today, I was greeted with an email from my kindly Friendster administrator letting me know I had gotten a "smile" -- their version of virtual flirting. Naturally, my interest was piqued because not only did I have no idea who would be sending me the smile, but because I thought Friendster had become a little passe.

The message was from a fellow Westsider. The fun part -- I know this guy. I've met him lots of times through a mutual friend. I've known him for years... and really did not like him. He seems vain, shallow, and indifferent to the world around him. He's one of those guys who won't bother to remember your name but can recall the "labels" of every part of your wardrobe. (The fact that I just referred to clothing as "part" and that most of my labels are simply "Gap," "Old Navy," or Target's beloved "Mossimo" should tell you how well we hit it off.)

I haven't seen this guy since I lost over 30 pounds. I haven't been out with that crowd in some time. Lord knows what's going on in his world. But I imagine that he doesn't recognize me at all. Why the sudden interest? Who knows? (Maybe the 30 pounds?)

But I promise the gentleman friend has nothing to worry about on this front. My life already has enough shallow, vapid people in it. One. And he's sitting at my computer typing this blog entry right now.

I'm What?

According to MySpace, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch and is thus the authority on all that is righteous and decent in the world, I am invalid. Invalid!

It seems, at least for the morning, that I cease to exist in the MySpace world, and since MySpace is really better than the real world, I barely exist at all. It's like in the movie Back to the Future when Alex P. Keaton sees himself disappearing from photos.

I am assuming that this is probably a broader MySpace glitch, as some other friends appear to be "invalid" right now, too. Of course, most of them are known homosexuals so maybe there was a purge over at NewsCorp. Maybe all those Republicans figured that they could get rid of us gays in real life -- after all, who would design their tailored suits, style their hair, decorate their homes, oh, and write, produce and star in all the movies that make them all their money -- so they decided to exact a virtual holocaust on the gays.

UPDATE (10:12 AM): Turns out that the march on Washington, the resolutions from the UN Security Council, and pleas from His Holiness the Dalai Lama have paid off. MySpace (kind of) restored the account. Must be a bug in their system.

Things You Should Know

Yesterday y'all got to see the big haircut. I really like it. It takes no work to maintain. And the price was just where I like it: Free!

So, here's the deal for all of you living in my world. I like my hair. I'm happy with it. I don't need everyone telling me how great it looks. I like compliments, but they need to vary a little. Therefore, I expect to hear a "have you lost weight?" or "I love your tan" for at least every "your hair, wow, I like it" that I have to endure.

Also, big blog news. I just found out today -- a week after her first post -- that Amy Witry, that bitch, has started a blog. I'll add her to the blogroll soon. Go check it out. Her first post may sound a little familiar, but I promise we did not collaborate on it. We both just love this city.

Perspective People, Perspective!

First, I apologize for the blog diarhea of recent. It seems I'm getting the bug, writing multiple posts in a day and then making you wait for days for the next post. I'll try better to spread them out.

I've been in a slump recently. I've found ways to deal with it and, honestly, I'm really happy when I take the few seconds to put everything in perspective. Oh, and when I shave my head. This weekend, taking a hint from all the great woman-scorned movie cliches, I locked myself in the bathroom, blasted the stereo and shaved my head. It really was quite therapeutic.

I used to have a friend -- maybe for a future post -- who would talk with me about perspective. It seems we had some friends who always seemed miserable. As in, the neighbors to their 3 bedroom townhouse at the beach always parked funny. Or, when they took their Lexus in to be serviced, the bill was $100 higher than expecting. We would say, "You really need a healthy perspective on your problems."

So, I'm sad. Reading funny stories cheers me up. Trolling the Internets for some funny stuff I come on this blog archive. This woman is really funny.

The archive is from 2002, so I wonder what's happened with her recently. So I go straight to the regular URL.

She hasn't updated it in a year. But from reading it, you might be able to figure out why. There's a good chance my new friend Natalie is in prison. For up to three years. Oh, and her husband left her leaving her and her three kids -- one of them under 5 -- homeless. I guess she was living with her dad for a while, but she eventually had to leave. Oh, and she had to take a job in constuction.

Really, it puts things in perspective. Makes me feel a lot better about my own lot. I still have awesome friends (I even get to see Jen Mac in a few days), a fantastic hobby, a killer house, and, well, less hair. Hair grows back. Friends come home. It'll all be okay.

Is the fat one still fat?

Today's big news is that Lance Bass is coming out -- not of retirement but out of the closet. Who's Lance Bass? Lance Bass is "the gay one" from N*Sync. Aren't they all "gay ones," you might ask. In fact, no they aren't/weren't. As anyone who fell into the horribleness that was turn-of-the-century-boybandedness can attest, each member of N*Sync, in fact, has a unique identity.

• The cute one was Justin Timberlake. Still just as cute.
• The talented one was JC Chasez, my personal favorite.
• The old one was Chris Kirkpatrick. He was more than 10 years older than the youngest member. (He doesn't have a web site of his own. Hmmm.)
  
• The gay one was, of course, Lance Bass, who confirmed our near decade of suspicions.
• And, ironically enough, the fat one was Joey Fatone. How's that for self-fullfilling prophecy?

Now, Lance coming out is big news. Really, even if no one cares about him at all these days, it's still big news. Gay celebrities need to come out, especially if they are trying to pursue the "gay lifestyle" anyway. Little closeted kids seek out anything to identify with to help them understand what they are going through. If they don't have a cool gay uncle like me or Jason (Jason's Room is one of my new fave blogs), then they turn to celebrities like Ellen or Rupert, or characters on TV and in movies like Dawson's Creek's Jack, the many 'mos of the Real World, or the entire cast of the Broken Hearts Club. If they aren't exposed to those elements, then they get depserate and turn to the whack jobs that pop-up on Jerry Springer. Having an openly gay, happy with his lot in life, former pop star to identify with can only be a good thing.

Of course, this also comes back to that classic little N*Sync story from my days at Paramount.

"Papers, please. I'll need to see your papers."

I shouldn’t eavesdrop on people’s conversations. On one of my flights home from Aruba – the Miami to Dallas leg – I was sucked into the conversation of the three people behind me. I’m gonna name them.

Cyrus was a native of Texas. I think you know what that means. In addition, I believe he was the distant cousin of Larry the Cable Guy. Or maybe not so distant.

Opal was a vacationing school teacher from Arizona or Nevada. I couldn’t quite figure it out. Where ever she’s from, it ain’t Phoenix or Las Vegas. She was wearing wire-framed glasses and a turquoise tye-dye jumpsuit to match her turquoise jewelry.

Clive was a globe-trotting product manager for Perry Ellis, who apparently handles the licensing for a bunch of Nike products, living in downtown Los Angeles and working in Irvine. Clive is from Cleveland, Ohio. As I learned from the Drew Carey Show, “Cleveland Rocks!” Drew Carey, however, lives in Los Angeles.

The threesome spent about 45 minutes talking about how horrible Los Angeles is. They started, at the suggestion of the Texan, with the air quality of all things. While Los Angeles air in the heat of summer isn’t pristine, it certainly can't be much worse than Houston. And as someone who is smart enough to live near the beach, I can testify that our air isn’t that bad at all. Only those idiots who live inland really see the brown stuff up close.

One needs to ask why is our air quality poorer than say a city like Cleveland or Dallas. Two things are at play here: 1) a lot of people want to leave here so its congested and they want to live here because it's a cool place to live, and 2) those really cool mountains that give us lots to do like hiking and camping and skiing trap the bad stuff in, unlike say in Texas where it's flat as shit for hundred of miles with no diversity of view!

Naturally, any criticism of Los Angeles has to include the traffic. Clive is losing it with the traffic. Of course, he’s chosen to live 70 miles from where he works, but clearly that is the fault of the city planners – and I am assuming the planners of all 100 or so cities he has to commute through on that journey.

I have spent some time in Portland, Seattle, Baltimore, New York, Philadelphia, New Orleans, Boston, and San Francisco. Everyone single on of these cities has, by my experience, traffic as bad as or worse than Los Angeles. It’s what you get when you live in a city.

I will not tolerate people from Cleveland, Texas and somewhere in the middle of the desert ripping up Los Angeles. My home isn’t perfect, but it is nice. It’s definitely the most diverse city in the country, and for some of us blue-staters, that’s a plus and not a minus. There is a lot of opportunity, whether for your career or your Saturday afternoon plans.

But what amuses me most about these types of people, the LA-haters, is that if the city is so horrible then get the fuck out! We don’t want you here. You are just using up our thick, brown air and overpriced housing. You’re clogging our slow-moving freeways and filling up are vapid, useless nightclubs. And for every one of you that “want” out, there are probably ten that want in.

It’s not communist East Germany. You can move freely around this country. Try it. Get out!

Born Different

This is really cute and important. Check it out. (Click on the drawing if you need to.)



Were you born different, too? I bet you were!

Long May it Wave

I understand the world. For years, we Americans have heard how we are hated. The “terrorists” hate our way of life – our freedom and “democracy” – and so they target our planes and skyscrapers. The Republican Party has built an entire platform on this Ameri-phobia.

I figured out, on my recent trip to the Caribbean, that it isn’t our freedom they hate, it’s the little things. The pushiness. The cheapness. The vulgarity.

Our family spent 2 weeks in Aruba. It’s was a very relaxing vacation and I love the Arubans. That being said, most places in the Caribbean aren’t that exotic. There are parts of Los Angeles that are more exotic than Aruba. I’m less likely to find an employee at the McDonald’s near work who speaks English than I will find a busboy in Orjanestad that speaks Enlgish – and Dutch, Spanish and the native Papiamento.

Vacationing in Aruba is a little like hitting a classy version of the Jersey shore. More guidos than you can shake a stick at. It’s still a lot of fun, but even the Aruban government admits that nearly 70% of the tourists in Aruba are Americans. It’s an island of just under 100,000 residents that gets nearly 1,000,000 tourists every year. Divide those tourist by 12 and multiply by 70% and you’ll find that about 1/3 of the people on the island at any given time are Americans.

The locals know this and they cater to it. I told you they all – even the least educated (which is by Dutch standards so that’s puts their least educated on par with our, well, President) – speak four languages so as to cater to us. They can convert their native “florin” into American dollars and back all in their head. The hotels – many owned or operated by American companies – fly the American flag outside. So, why did some redneck feel it necessary to bring their own American flag with them and post it on their hotel-room balcony?

I shit you not. I won’t even mention that the flag was hung in violation of accepted standards, having been secured by all four corners. But this ass – clearly a red-stater – brought his flag – surely one of many – into a foreign land to fly it, as if he had laid claim to that hotel room for the great imperialist power that is the United States. God Save the Queen!

I love this country as much as anyone, but we need to get a grip. Americans need to learn that there are 300 million of us and 5.7 billion of them. We’ve already pissed off most of the Middle East, Russia and much of Europe. Surely we have few friends in Africa. If we can’t even play nice with the Dutch West Indies, we’re gonna be in trouble when they all come looking for us!

NEWSFLASH: Thor identified!

Remember Adventures in Babysitting? I loved that movie. While catching up on my blog reading, I noticed on Pen15 Club that Disney is remaking the movie. They're gonna do it all "The Wiz" style with black folk -- former Cosby-cutie-turned-Disney-Ho Raven Symone will play the babysitter.

The post had a little nugget I never put together. The garage attendant who fixed the station wagon was played by none other than Vincent D'Onofrio. You might remember that Sara, the girl being babysat, was obsessed with comic-book hero "Thor." When they showed up at Dawson's Garage, she instantly confused Vinnie the Mechanic with the Nordic stud Thor...

What has happend to poor Mr. D'Onofrio? Growing up, I remember thinking "Thor" was hot!

Absence... Heart... Fonder... or something?

"Absence makes the heart grow fonder."

I've decided I'm in transition.

Today is my first day back to work from a 2 week absence. I don't sense that anyone is any fonder of me today then when I left. For that, I am relieved. I couldn't stomach these leeches trying to befriend me all of the sudden.

The living sitch it a little weird with the sudden departure of one of my roommates. It's definately better having her gone, but the house is a little more empty -- absent some furniture. We need to figure out if we replace her and with whom. (Do you know anyone looking to live near the beach?)

And the weeks before the vacay, I started seeing this boy. He left for a job out of LA on the same day I left for vacation. We only dated for like 6 or 7 weeks, but I miss the bitch! I hate being vulnerable.

Of course, you don't read this because you care about me. You want to hear about the whack-jobs I encounter regularly.

Upon my return to work, I was greeted with the envelope of cards to be signed prior to our monthly potluck. There are some farewell cards for employees leaving and birthday cards for the month. The whole thing is arranged by my nemesis. (I love having a nemesis, you should get one!) And her birthday is this month... and she put a card for herself in the mix! Is that a new level of patheticism, buying your own birthday card?

Why? Whhhyyy? Whhhhhhyyyyyyy?

Why do I find Johnny Knoxville hot? I'm sitting here with the roomies watching The Ringer, and all I wanna do is go spend some alone time... damn he's hot!

An Unfortunate Absence

It's been a little while since I've blogged regularly. I'd apologize and try to come up with some excuse, but really, I already give you so much and you give me so little in return. So you'll just need to learn to accept that you, my friend(s), are not my single greatest priority.

My reason are good. I promise. A little teaser: I met a boy. He is wonderful and kept me occupied for the past 2 months. He's kind of gone now -- in the gay navy for 6 months -- and I will probably blog more and be at work on time more.

I'm also in Aruba right now. Ain't technology great.

This little Caribbean vacay is giving me lots of stuff to right about. For example, tonight we are going to Texas de Brazil for dinner. It's a Brazilian Churracaria, or as I like to call it, Meat Sizzler.

The idea is good and I am sure in Brazil, they do it up right. Delicious meats slowly cooked to perfection on a skewer and served quickly. There's a place at the Farmers Market on 3rd that does it right. You buy the plate of food.

These places -- like the one I'm going to tonight -- are the bastardized American version where we eat ourselves into a food coma. I hate watching fat people eat. That's why avoid Sizzler. This is worse because its expensive and therefore people feel like they need to "get their money's worth."

I'll let you know how it goes.