Did I ever tell you about that time I got punched in the face at a Lemonheads concert?

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Last evening my friend Mo Daviau, Girl Novelist extraordinaire, posted her feelings about a Spotify playlist called “Epic Indie of the ‘90s.” or something like that. Apparently, she hates The Lemonheads. She calls them the “most boring band” of the 90s, which she is free to do. I slammed Neutral Milk Hotel when I shared a post from Clickhole the other week, and we’re still friends. I hope.

Two things immediately sprung into my mind after reading her post:

ONE… Their version of “Mrs. Robinson” is easily in my Top 100 songs of all time. Whenever I get a chance to DJ, I throw it in. It is what one calls a “floorpacker.” Yes, I hang out with people who feel it’s appropriate to dance to The Lemonheads.

TWO… I got punched in the face at a Lemonheads concert back in ‘92. Continue reading →

Amo in bianco e nero della televisione italiana degli anni ’70!

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…in which I celebrate the 4th of July by watching a bunch of Italian television from before the Bicentennial.

A few years ago, when YouTube was just getting going, one of the first viral videos that really stuck with me was a performance of Andriano Celentano’s Prisencolinensinainciusol. It appealed to me on two levels. First was the song itself, done by the Italian singer in order to mimic how American-accented English sounds to people who don’t understand English. So while the song is complete and utter gibberish, it actually sounds like words. Also, many credit Prisencolinensinainciusol with being one of the first popular rap songs to become a hit.

But what has really stuck with me about that viral video was the actual video itself. Even though it was from 1974, it was in glorious black and white:

Continue reading →

Photo 101, Day Eighteen: Edge & Alignment

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…in which our hero doesn’t bring his book to the bar and is shown some nice edges in the neighborhood.

Last night I ventured down to the All-Request 70s/80s/90s Bear Happy Hour at Exile. I requested and heard both “My Kind Of Lover” by Billy Squier and “Gemini Dream” by The Moody Blues. In the past I have brought a book to this event. But my friend Damian in NYC said not to anymore because it was kind of off-putting. He should know as he is a well-regarded DJ and, therefore, see much human interaction. So, I swallowed hard and went to the bar without a book.

Amazingly, I managed to strike up a conversation with someone local. He said he had seen me for several weeks but didn’t feel safe approaching me until I actually smiled in his direction. I mentioned that before I headed home, I was going to wander around the neighborhood to snap some pics of things with edges.

He volunteered to take me and show me some nice, edgeful stuff.

Moral: Smile, get edges.

Window, Berry Bolt Works
NAPA warehouse
Route traversed: route copySongs mentioned:

Billy Squier: My Kind of Lover
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETFbV3zbjjU

The Moody Blues: Gemini Dream
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3QLFFVFpp0

Photo 101, Day Sixteen: Treasure

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The enameling studio, or I make vaguely modernist fridge magnets.

IMG_5313

One of these is a knob.

A few years back, my sister moved from the horrid suburbs back into Columbus into a 100yr old house with two garages on the property. One of these she converted into a craft studio whose highlight is an enameling kiln. Enameling is more rightly known as glass-on-metal and involves melting little granules of glass onto copper in an oven the temperature of some of your better white dwarf stars. This oven will burn all the hair off your body, and you will scream in murderous pain every time the door opens.

But it is worth it. Granted, not every piece is worth saving. The vagaries of oven temp, thickness of glass, or how much you thrash around when the door opens will affect outcome. There’s even something called fire scale that determines the final product. I’m not going to explain what fire scale is; I’m just gonna let you imagine how cool it is. Like it’s part of a dragon or something. However, there are times that a piece comes out that’s strikes a cord so primal that you can’t wait until you slap it up on the fridge. (Or onto the back of your apartment door where they will peel away so much paint when removed that your landlady will have what she claims is no choice but to charge you $200 to repaint the door.)

Then there the ones that are so perfect, they have to be given as gifts. Luckily, I have given away more than I have kept.

When I got to the enameling kiln, I hadn’t done anything creative in years –anything that I could point and go, “Look, me make pretty!” I was completely disconnected from that part of my brain. Times spent out there with my sis, listening to REM, drinking Mike’s Hard Lemonade, and smelling my burnt arm hairs helped reawaken that urge that years of brain fever and grad school had beaten out of me.

Pride Thought 2015: Your Brick and Mortar Pride

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Photo by Stonewall Columbus

Photo by Stonewall Columbus

The government cannot bestow dignity, and it cannot take it away.

–Justice Clarence Thomas (Yeah, I just quoted the second biggest judicial prick on the planet, and I realize that the above was surrounded by thought turds of the highest order. Please bear with me.)

STONEWALL NYC

IMG_1776

Copyright: ME

Yesterday as soon as the decision in Obergefell v. Hodges came down, my Facebook feed exploded into rainbows. Friends –the gay ones, the straight ones, and the ones whose whatever they do is none of my business –were busy expressing their approval. Rainbow filters got a work out, from profile pics to some idiot who decided the American Gladiators needed gayulating. As ton of my FB friends are gay guys who live in NYC, by far the most common setting for pictures was the street and park in front of the Stonewall Inn on Christopher Street in the West Village.

But for all the pictures with the bar’s facade in the background, not a single one was taken on the inside.

Zero.

Earlier this week the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission declared the building that houses the Stonewall Inn an OFFICIAL LANDMARK™. Apparently, this is the first building to be designated as such for its role in the struggle for LGBT rights, even though I’m told Fraunces Tavern regularly featured men in wigs and made a killer appletini back in day. If you are reading this, and you are not aware of the significance of the Stonewall Inn, stop right now and look it up.

It is incredibly heartening that Stonewall Inn is being recognized for its importance. Civil rights never move forward in a slow, steady fashion. There are flashpoints, and these physical flashpoints need to be preserved. Tearing down the Stonewall building and putting up condos called The Lofts at Stonewall would, for me, be the equivalent of tearing down the Edmund Pettus bridge in Selma and putting up Marty K’s Alabama River ZipLine Adventure in its place.

People need a physical place to rally and remember.

But don’t believe anyone who tells you that the bar called “Stonewall Inn” that has nested inside the building that held the bar involved with the Stonewall uprising has anything to do with pride. It may be a big part of PRIDE, but there is little pride inside. I do not hesitate to say that it is probably the shittiest gay bar in NYC. It’s cramped inside. Continue reading →

Photo 101, Extra Credit: Lakeview Cemetery, Cleveland (EVERYTHING ON MANUAL)

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I took a basic photography class last Thursday from Midwest Photo Exchange here in Columbus. I learned about my ISOs, apertures, and shutter speeds. It was a revelation and relieved me of my reliance on AUTO.

Yesterday, I reconnected with my friend Beth after a thirty year absence. And what better way to reconnect than to stroll around a historic cemetery? I have a thing for cemeteries and have posted about Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn in the past.

I like a nice memento mori.

So, the pics in this gallery are all taken in the “M” mode and manually focused. There are literally a hundred photos that don’t look like anything. I have not altered these in any way, not even cropping.

Buffalo Stance
No shrubs for you.
You know whose last name was Shumway? ALF, that’s who!
…and the lamb lies down.
Inside the Wade Chapel.
Random duck.
I have seen many dogs on grave markers… never a cat.
Probably my favorite tomb in the Cemetery.
¡SCHMUNK!
Crypt in the woods.
There’s a dam in the Cemetery!
Love the angles here.
Beth warned me not to get to close to this door.
More crypts in the trees.
Beth!
Overexposed angel from behind. But I think the overexposure works.
Same angel from front.
Close-up on angel’s face. I like how I caught the spiderweb.
Depth of focus with foot.
Why hello, President Garfield. You look good in this light.
Garfield from above.

Photo 101, Day Ten: Mystery & Lighting Effects

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Last night I attended my first Pride event in Columbus. Last time I lived in Columbus, I was a frightened high school kid who couldn’t even possibly imagine that someday he would be walking around being gay, gay, gay without threat of being shoved in locker.

I happened to attend the Pride Festival in Goodale Park at Magic Hour. Unfortunately I didn’t have my new Sony A5000 because I thought I’d be going to the bar afterwards. So, all of these pics are taken with my iPhone 6 (a little to a lot of tweaking afterwards on some)…

Gay mylar
No tweaking on this one.
No tweaking.
No tweaking.
Pride-a-Potties
Same tree, different POV
Good night.

March

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IMG_0308

…in which the author attempts to figure out where he fits on the spectrum, er, rainbow.

New York City

I insist that I had an awful Pride Parade that year. Sure, we were all supposed to be happy about the Supreme Court striking down DOMA. But the ruling came down in the middle of the week. That Wednesday afternoon, I had a Stoli Oranj and soda at Stonewall on Christopher Street and then a burger and another Stoli at Julius, a gay bar even older than Stonewall. Got my gay history on. But by the time the Parade rolled around on Sunday, it seemed all the DOMA decision meant was that “couples” –the kind that always have to remind you that they’re a “couple” –could make out with a leaning impunity, slurring things like “Our love is legal.” Because before Wednesday, the feelings you felt for this person were subject to a $50 fine and a summons. I, in turn, made plans to die alone in a bizarre DVR mishap.

Not everything was bad. I did get to boo at that mayoral candidate I disliked as she rode by looking like Cleopatra on her way to open a PathMark in Luxor. And I got to boo at that other mayoral candidate for his inability to take a decent junk shot. But after a while, it just felt like I was being pandered to by politicians and corporate outreach programs.

And the centerpiece of the Chipotle float was a skinny twink in a cowboy outfit riding a bucking foil-wrapped burrito. That appealed to many of my baser instincts involving jack cheese and bucking. But on every other float, the standard issue twink was provided with a whistle with which he could toot along to the Katy Perry vibrating out of rental loudspeakers.

And, it’s always nice hanging with friends at the Parade. My friends and I have a great place that’s not jammed up against a building, goes into the shade early, and is only a block from Julius where it only costs you the price of drink to use the bathroom. But one of the things about hanging with people is punctuality. People all need to be at the same place at the same time in order to hang. Texting does not count. Two friends, a “couple” crashing their way quickly from casual acquaintances towards being blocked on Facebook were over two hours late because of “train problems.” We all have “train problems,” but when I have “train problems,” I don’t answer a “getting close?” text with “stoped 2 get a beer.” No, you better show up winded and apologizing profusely for ruining the gay.

When a drunk Lesbian-of-a-Certain-Age tried to choke me with my Pride beads, I decided it was time to go.

Budapest

But at least I got to actually watch the parade, which is a far cry from what was afforded me when I showed up in Budapest in September 2009 on their equivalent of Pride. In NYC, we like say our parade is a “march,” with all the attendant meaning that goes with that word, but twink riding burrito. In Budapest, it’s so much a “march” that they don’t call it a “march” –it’s the 14th Gay Dignity Procession! Two years earlier, in 2007, far-right unfortunates attacked the 12th Gay Dignity Procession. Police then tried to cancel the 13th Gay Dignity Parade in 2008, citing “traffic.” The gays sued. They marched. Far-right unfortunates attacked the 13th Gay Dignity Procession. So for the 14th Gay Dignity Procession, the police came up with the perfect plan….

Berlin

Now you need to understand at this point that I prefer to travel alone. Continue reading →

121 More Valedictorians Than Dalmatians

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The high school from which I graduated just named 222 valedictorians; this former valedictorian is mildly chagrined.

This is NOT going to be an

This is NOT going to be an “everyone gets a trophy” rant, but…

On June 3, 1984 I spoke at my graduation from Dublin High School. At that time, Dublin had less than 4000 inhabitants, there was only one high school, and the sole traffic light on Sawmill Road south of I-270 was at Rt. 161.

That's my inspiration face.

That’s my inspiration face.

That day, my co-valedictorian and I gave what has been described as “an inspiring, well-prepared valedictorian speech” to a crowded set of football bleachers. Now Dublin has over 43,000 residents, there are three high schools, and driving on Sawmill frightens me down to my Shamrocks. My high school is now called Coffman, and the bleachers I spoke before are now the visitors’ seats at the shiny bajillion-dollar football “complex” they built on the other side of the school. Moreover, the school I went to is now invisible behind masses of additional wings.

Oh, and there are also 111 times as many valedictorians. From the Columbus Dispatch on June 3rd of this year:

Graduation ceremonies might still be going on if Dublin schools had asked all of its valedictorians to speak.

There were 222 of them.

That means two out of every 10 graduates at Dublin’s three high schools received top honors this year. Dublin Scioto had 44 valedictorians, Dublin Jerome had 82, and Dublin Coffman had 96.

Or to put it another way, the Dublin City School district now has 40 more valedictorians than it had graduating seniors in 1984. Yes, the district now has over 1100 grads, but at that same ratio, my class of 182 would have had 36 valedictorians.

Or yet another way, 121 more valedictorian than Dalmatians.

Even The Today Show’s toothy people who populate the show’s misbegotten third hour, had a laugh at Dublin’s expense. My alma mater is now a laughing stock.

This isn’t going to be some lament about how “everybody gets a trophy.” If you look at the comments section of the Dispatch article, a quick scansion shows approximately 850 mentions of that phrase. And, yes, I know I used “scansion” incorrectly. Would anyone but a valedictorian know it’s used incorrectly? I don’t think so.

No, my lament is about how this development cheapens one of my better cocktail-party lines. For some reason, mentioning this fact elicits a very pleasing “Well, isn’t that nice, but, again, please tell me what that has to do with Caitlyn Jenner?” Now I’m scared that dropping this tidbit will now only brings a cascade of “Me too’s” from the entire room. Continue reading →