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Saturday, 30 June 2001 (cornets) 9:00am We did something last night which we generally try to avoid: we went to a movie on opening night. In this case, it was the rerelease of Monty Python and the Holy Grail. It wasn't quite as crowded as I was expecting, but I still got the feeling that a lot of guys were skipping their weekly D&D game to be there. They were fairly boisterous, at first, laughing almost by rote at every joke—almost every line, really—in spite of the fact that they, like me, probably already knew them by heart. Which is pretty much what I was expecting. Towards the end they quieted down and simply enjoyed the movie. Which has never looked better, by the way. I found the audience's behavior during the previews especially interesting. One was for a new anime film; after it, there was some laughter, but I thought it felt kinda forced. Like they didn't quite understand what they'd just seen but figured it was probably beneath them and should express it. The other was Hedwig and the Angry Inch. No laughter, no reaction at all. I have never felt an audience be so utterly uncertain about how they should feel. It was really quite amusing; I don't doubt that a lot of guys were thinking to themselves, "If I want to see it, does that make me a fag?"
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Friday, 29 June 2001 (heathen earth) 12:42pm Welcome to Miami Beach. Everything is cheaper than it looks. 4:37pm If our anniversary last year was a bust, then the Fourth of July was an unmitigated disaster. We only barely survived the day, and we never left the house. Well, I didn't leave the house. Maddy did, though she came back. It was bad business. We'd originally planned on going to Santa Cruz with barefoot and Rox, like I'd done for a number of years, except that in a fit of work-related stress they went to Las Vegas instead. To this day I haven't figured out whether or not that ended up being for the best. Maybe we needed that time to ourselves, to go through that particular set of roatating knives. I don't know. In any event, we're in a much better place now. Unfortunately, whatever we're doing will still be without barefoot and Rox; he says that she may have jury duty the next day, and even that falls through, she'll still have to get up early to go to work. Funny, I don't remember having to go to work the next day being an issue before, but, like, hey, you know, whatever. (Part of me wonders if has something to do with the kiss-blowing incident from the '99 trip. I've always suspected that something changed after that, even if I'm not sure exactly what.) We're going anyway. We don't have anything else in mind, and Maddy's been wanting to eat at the Hindquarter Bar & Grille., where we would usually eat on the Fourth. It's a combination of sentimental reasons—the first time I called her was from its payphone on that aformentioned '99 trip—and an utter curiousity about a restaurant which is, for all intents and purposes, called "The Ass." The Ex also mentioned a while back that they might be having a barbecue on the Fourth. I haven't heard anything else from her since, and I ain't askin'. If it does happen and she does invite us we may well go, but if it doesn't (or she doesn't), that's okay too.
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Thursday, 28 June 2001 (one by four by nine) 12:01pm So I was about to step into the lobby restroom when some exiting warned me, "Don't go in there. Someone hurled." Which brings to mind two questions: was that word used as a euphemism for vomiting prior to Wayne's World? And if not, how much of early twenty-first century slang will be attributable to Mike Myers? It's kinda scary when you think about it. Speaking of reliving my teenage years, I have a zit on my cheek. How nostalgic. I'll admit, I don't tend to get worked up over famous deaths. Frequently, they're people you didn't even know were still alive. While I don't deny John Lee Hooker's importance in shaping mid-twentieth century music (almost as important as Mike Myers to slang later on), I didn't even realize he was still alive until he wasn't anymore. It didn't affect me one way or another.
That said, I'm bummed about Jack Lemmon dying. I've
always really liked him, and had figured he still had some good work left in him. Granted,
his last few movies were lame comedies, but damnit, they were
with Walter Matthau—who, now that I think about it, died last year. Shit.
Still, if there's any justice in the world, during the tribute at the Oscars
next year they'll play Glengarry Glen Ross in its entirety. The show
would run spectacularly late, but for once it would be worth it.
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Wednesday, 27 June 2001 (dancing barefoot) 9:50am Sunday afternoon sfgoth went down, and it came back up early this morning. These things happen, and really, I don't mind when they do. It's still more reliable than hooked ever was, and costs considerably less. Hence, I don't see any point in complaining. Besides, it gave me a little break from this. Just goes to show how dedicated I am to my writing, huh? Unless there's a live audience, forget it. I wish I was smart enough to know what Marshall McLuhan would have thought, but unfortunately, I'm not. At least it gave me a chance to finish up the entry about Pink Saturday, which I started on Sunday afternoon and struggled with for the next twenty-four hours. Thank god for deus ex machina (no pun intended). Meanwhile, although everything else seems to be working, sfgoth's ftp server is down indefinitely. This should prove interesting, especially when the end of the month rolls around.
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Sunday, 24 June 2001 (ugliness is a form of genius) 12:19pm One of the sponsors of the live coverage of the Pride Parade is Bud Light, whose mindbendingly hetero commercials are probably the same ones being shown during the football game. No doubt for the benefit of the straight guys who were roped into watching by their girlfriends. 4:16pm Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr! Egads, but it was cold last night. Nothing unusual in that respect for a June night in San Francisco, but it was windy, too. Before we'd left I went back and forth about whether or not to wear my jacket, since I was wearing a short black velvet dress with red and black stripeys and after all one of the main reasons you go to (anything) in the Castro is to be seen, and what I was wearing wouldn't be seen quite as well with the jacket covering so much of it—but I made the right decision, since I was at least a tad bit warmer than those who were topless, bottomless and all the other forms of -lessness. And I still got compliments on my stripeys, which just goes to show that outside of goth circles people still think they're cool. What probably got us the most attention was Maddy's 15" Tiffany doll, aka The Bride of Chucky. (Not to be confused with the Tiffany doll I got her for Valentine's Day last year, which was a miniature.) A fellow was selling them from a table by Market and Sanchez, along with bits of drug paraphernalia and other fascinating items. Of course Maddy wanted one, but I had to talk her into letting me buy it for her anyway. Besides Folsom last year, this was her first big queer street party kinda thing, so she's not quite as accustomed to seeing local quasi-celebrities milling about as such hardened veterans as myself. Kitty Kastro, Adrian Roberts—who always makes my ego nosedive—the guys who run The Magazine, et cetera. (I did say quasi-celebrities, after all.) She'd also never seen the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence in person. The one that really got her, though, was quite by accident and unrelated to the festivities outside: killing time before the festivities, we happened to wander into the bookstore where Michelle Tea works. Maddy's heart nearly leapt out of her throat, an understandable reaction to unexpectedly encountering a favorite writer at what is quite literally their day job. Since Michelle was on the clock, we kept our distance. And unlike Folsom last year, we only ran into one person we knew—Chas, who not only saw me first, but must have recognized my back. It's always creepy to hear your name coming from behind, but not necessarily a bad thing. She was one of the donation-takers so we didn't talk long, but she did mention that Phred was around as well, though we never did see her. By the same token, I don't doubt Maggie and perhaps even The Other were there, though I never did see them. Hey, there were thousands of people within five or six city blocks. The odds were against it, and that's probably for the best. So we'd found ourselves a spare doorway in which to rest when a fellow with short hair colored not unlike Mina's tummy came up to us and said, "I know who you're supposed to be!" I'd already gotten one Siouxsie comment—which I chalked up as a compliment—and when I asked who, he said, "Death!" Again, I accepted it as a compliment. Much to our surprise, he asked if we'd read Johnny The Homicidal Maniac. I guess we look like the type, I don't know; anyway, I blurted out that I particularly liked the devil's cheerleader look. We discussed the comic a bit more, then he asked if we'd been to the "Tranny Table." Maddy and I exchanged a "How the hell did we miss that?" look and said we hadn't. He led us back up the street to a table run by someone who looked resembled Adrian Roberts doing Marilyn Manson, which is not necessarily a bad place to be. (I'm a bit too...um...shapely to pull it off, personally. That's ultimately a good thing, though I could still stand to lose weight.) Her name was Vinsantos, though I didn't discover this until checking out the URL on the literature (well, a flyer) for her group, Drag Flag. We exchanged compliments about each other's appearance, and she asked if I go to Trannyshack. I said that I did on occasion, admittedly a very rare occasion, and she said that I should go this Tuesday, because "I'll dazzle you." I wanted to reply, "I get dazzled every day just walking down the street. I don't want to be dazzled, I want to dazzle." I didn't. I probably won't go on Tuesday either, since in all likelihood I won't be remembered. Still, though, the group's logo is neat. Speaking of neat logos, on the top of Twin Peaks (which overlooks the Castro and all of Market Street) was a large pink triangle, and several spotlights illuminating the clouds. Very cool indeed. Then a sleeping Argentinean fell through the ceiling, followed closely by a dwarf dressed as a nun...no, wait, sorry, different story. Still, it was a fun night, and though we watched the following day's festivities on teevee rather than daring to venture into the heart of it, we discussed the possibility of joining a group (probably tranny-oriented) with which to march next year. We discuss a lot of things...
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Saturday, 23 June 2001 (rumour and dishonour) 3:47pm If passing means shopping at Target in a dress and not getting a glance (or a second glance, anyway), then I guess by that standard I pass. But I'm not declaring victory just yet. After all, I didn't have to speak to anyone, nor did any of the women have to contend with me in their restroom, which is the real test. That's the kind of thing that can get you arrested. So we're going to Pink Saturday in the Castro tonight. Maddy's never been, and I haven't since '97, when The Ex and I went with Pandora and Louise. While The Ex and Louise were in Image Leather, Pandora and I had our picture taken by Cheap TV's Rice Patte. Needless to say, I'm the one on the left. It's a picture which inspired me to many late nights and early mornings at the gym. (But not quite enough.)
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Friday, 22 June 2001 (raw mode of life) 12:16pm From Satellite News, The Official Mystery Science Theater 3000 Info Club Site:
The Tower Records at Bay and Columbus has a marquee which says "The Best Reason Yet to Own a DVD Player," with the name of the
current big release underneath. Currently it's Traffic; before that, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. I respectfully
disagree in both cases.
Which perfectly matches my feelings about organized sports. Every time I go past Pacific Bell
Park, I can console myself with the knowledge that it isn't my fault. I voted against the damned
thing.
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Thursday, 21 June 2001 (merely nodding) 12:16pm So there was a company-wide meeting this morning. The word "mandatory" wasn't attached to it, and there was both a webcast and a dial-in number for those unable to attend due to workload and/or distance. Neither condition really applied to me, but I still planned on skipping it. It was in one of the other buildings, and as Pike was leaving with the others he stopped by my office to let me know they were heading out. He didn't exactly say I had to go—and certainly he would have been well within his rights to—but after a while I began to feel guilty and I went anyway. The meeting was of course in progress by the time I arrived, so I stood in back. Which was fine by me, really; it reminded me a bit of going to church when I was a kid. The second half of the mass, at least. I don't know how many other Catholic churches did this, but ours had a children's service to which the kids would be dismissed about ten or fifteen minutes after regular mass started, and it was over when the priest finished the homily. We were so told by someone sticking their head in the room and saying "Father Negro has finished the homily." I never thought to ask what the homily was, nor why we were sent away during it; like most everything else about church I didn't care and I just wanted the whole thing to end. When I got too old to be sent to the children's service—which unfortunately didn't happen before I got too big, as from kindergarten onwards I was incongruously taller than my peers, adding to my already profound sense of discomfort with my body—I discovered that the main feature of the homily was the sermon, which even the adults found boring as hell. God, no wonder they sent the kids away. Even the grown-ups couldn't keep from fidgeting. If I didn't like getting up and leaving in the middle of mass because of what felt like the stare factor, I liked returning to our seats even less. Losing track of where whatever parent I was with that weekend was sitting was more than a little embarrassing, and it probably happened a few times before I wised up and simply didn't come back. I just remained in the back of the fairly large chapel (though it'd probably seem smaller to me now), occasionally drifting into the hallway or into the catefeteria to see what kind of cookies were being set up for after mass. (Usually sugar cookies, never chewy. Yuck on both counts.) I never quite had the guts to do what I really wanted, which was find a quiet corner and read. It wasn't divine retribution I feared so much as my parents deciding that I ought to rejoin them back at the seats. So long as they at least knew I was present and ostensibly paying attention, my odd desire to stand in the back was acceptable. At least, I assume that was their reasoning; I don't recall ever having discussed it with them. All things considered, the church we went to wasn't that bad, and being a progressive Catholic church it wasn't so much repressive as it was simply boring. Most of what I've learned about catholicism has come from Scorsese movies, not church. I have to give my parents credit for trying, though.
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