Monday, October 14, 2002

Batter up

Jill and Jackie have adjourned to powder their noses -- you can sue me, but I find it thoroughly precious when a gal as butch as Jackie actually uses that phrase. "I feel bad," Jeff turns to me and says as soon as the women have left the table. "I should have gotten Jill a gift. This is a big birthday for her. I'd like to give her something."

This last nearly makes me choke on my wonton but, fortunately, Jackie returns just then with Jill -- who I see has collected a fresh round of beers from the bar -- close behind. "She loved the card," I whisper back before she takes her seat. "It's enough that you're here and sharing the gift of your sparkling personality."

This dinner has been months in the planning, and not simply to toast Jill's 35th. Just when I think it might not, the conversation tilts to the prescribed route when the third round of drinks arrives.

"So you're not moving to Chicago after all?" Jackie asks. To my surprise -- and practically everyone else's -- Jeff recently turned down a job in what he claims as one of his favorite cities.

"No," he says simply. "I need to stay put for a while. I'm basically happy at work, my friends and family are all here, and I just like the stability. I don't need to do anything to really shake up my life right now."

Jill catches my eye with a slightly stricken look on her face, but I've already considered this data point. I give her the smallest nod; it's safe to proceed.

"Well, speaking of changes," Jill says, "we have some news." She meets Jackie's eyes.

"We've decided we want to start a family of our own," Jackie says. "We want to have a baby."

"That's fabulous!" Jeff says. "And it's about fucking time!"

"Wow," I say, pretty convincingingly, I think.

"Yeah," Jill says. "Wow."

"And Jeff," Jackie says, "we'd like you to be the father."

There follows an incredibly long silence, during which Jeff maintains his composure about as well as Don Knotts facing down a stampeding herd of cattle. After much stammering, he finally turns to me, noticing I seem unusually placid. "You knew about this, didn't you?"

"Well..."

"You might as well know, we asked Brad first," Jill says, "but from the beginning, you were both tied for our top choice. You're our best guy friends and no matter what happens, we want you both to be a part of our child's life."

"You're both incredibly important to us," Jackie adds, "and you each have qualities we'd like our child to have."

"Right," says Jill. "Brad, you're smart and funny and generous--"

"Hey!" says Jeff.

"And Jeff, you're good looking and you make a lot of money," Jackie finishes.

My turn. "Hey!"

A pause.

"You turned them down?" Jeff asks.

"Actually, we had some tests done. It turns out my little guys can't swim any better than I can," I say. To Jill: "By the way, I never want to hear the word 'motility' again, please."

There are two more rounds of beer before Jeff can really speak in complete sentences again. Jill and Jackie have to go. "We love you very much," Jackie says. "Just think about it, let us know if you have any questions. We'll get together again soon, yeah?" Of course we will.

"What do you think?" I ask. We're sitting in the parking lot and there's another long pause. "This could be the most important thing you ever do."

"I know," Jeff says finally. "I know. And...I think I want to do it. I--I'm not sure, but I think I do. How..." He gets quiet again.

"It's pretty simple up front. You go to the clinic, there are some tests, nothing you haven't done before," I say.

Jeff takes my hand. "Am I grown up enough to do this? Father a kid? If I go through with this, you're gonna have to help me."

I smile, squeeze his hand, and I know he'll scoot past his doubts soon enough. "Help you? Hon, they've got dirty magazines at the clinic for that."

Friday, October 11, 2002

A Conversation From the Bar Scene

Brad: Wow.

The Other Jeff: Wow indeed.

Brad: He's...I mean, wow. Look at those arms.

TOJ: Woof.

Brad: Woof indeed.

TOJ: Straight.

Brad: Yes. But comfortable.

TOJ: Yes.

Brad: He's like the Brawny guy. Times ten.

TOJ: There's your pick-up line. "You're Brawny. And I can be quite absorbent too."

Thursday, October 10, 2002

I’m a rocker. I rock out.

Somebody told me last night that the "theme" for National Coming Out Day this year is "Being out rocks!". Honestly, I couldn't stop laughing for half an hour.

Thursday, October 03, 2002

I remember

Scurrilous supposition and rumors to the contrary aside, I did not spend that entire weekend at the tubs. A boy has to eat sometime, and egg salad sandwiches from a bathhouse vending machine are far dodgier prospects than any of the goings-on elsewhere thereabout.

According to The Rules of the Baths (#32), if after you leave you can recall the title of what was showing in the "rest area", you did not have a good time. I can assure you, however, that I do and I most certainly did.

Friday night, 3:32 am: Discovery channel documentary about Navy SEALs. Three viewers, one languidly smoking, one making a cell phone call, one drifting in and out of sleep.

Saturday night, around 2 am: I Love Lucy, the episode where Lucy and Ethel work on the candy conveyor. Two viewers, apparently acquaintances, discussing the travesty that was Mame, the movie.

Sunday night, just past midnight: Ab-Roller infomercial. Deserted.

Monday afternoon, 2:15 pm: Oprah and Dr. Phil. Thirteen viewers devoting full attention to the screen, except for the blond number in the jockstrap licking his own bicep.

Well, it was Chicago, after all.

Wednesday, October 02, 2002

Best laid plans

This was going to be the day, the night. It was the one island I could spot in the sea of busy, a little laundry, some TV, picking up a book and playing with my dog, then earlier to bed with a vain hope to be healthy, wealthy and wise, or some subset thereof.

But the phone tickles my waist as I'm about to turn onto the interstate and, as I curse myself yet again for becoming one of those people, I fumble to flip it open and attempt, at the same time, to keep from causing a five-car pile-up. It's not a number I recognize flashing on the screen and I know as I glance to my left that if I were the guy in that Celica I'd be flipping me off about now.

"Hello?"

There are days and weeks at a time when, despite the fact I can't actually see over the pile of paper on my desk, I feel as though I can see around corners, can lift a ton, that I walk on earth so solid beneath my feet that it might as well be forged steel. These are days and weeks I feel invincible, that my world is in order, that my life is changing in all the right ways and my family is safe and my loves are assured.

And two martinis later, that world is questions and doubts and the ground not so much steel as tin that crimps and bends and threatens to give way.

I know my friends so well they could easily live inside my flesh and sometimes it feels, in every way that's holy, like they do, and still I can be surprised. Saddened. Speechless.

"Yes, I can be stricken speechless." Not aloud, but two empty glasses between us and another round on the way and in my mind I'm already parrying the quip from Curt or Jeff that I know will come in another hour or so when I relay the news.

The Twins are splitting up.

"Spending some time apart" is how he put it, almost casually even as he was on the verge of tears, an utterly devastating thing for a man to say of another whose side he hasn't left for more than a day in almost 15 years. He won't cry, not here, not in this place that isn't the sort of place where two men hold hands, although I reach for and grasp his anyway. You wouldn't think he'd cry at all, but I know my friends so well, and each of them wears a tough guy uniform that contains a creature too gentle to live among even the noblest of we savages.

The last time I held a man who cried, the last time I was grasped by the shoulders as my body shook with my own sobs, the matters were sickness, mortality, the injustice of a game that no one can win. This, this "spending some time apart", seems just as grave, but he leaves before I can offer a comfort of arms and understanding. He will cry later, he will cry alone. It's what tough guys do.

It's been a tough year in certain circles. One of us left, one of us is leaving, two of us fell in love and two of us just fell. Jobs and money got lost. One of us made a life, and one us, finally, made peace with himself. They say the world changed around us, and certainly, a lot of our world changed within us. We danced and we sang and we drank and we kept right on living, kept right on denying that we couldn't stay just the way we were.

And now the Twins are splitting up.

Tuesday, October 01, 2002

A Conversation From the Bar Scene

The Giant Queen: What are we doing here again?

Brad: We thought it might be fun to try someplace new.

Jeff: You thought that. We came along because you agreed to buy a couple of rounds.

Erik: This place is...

Jeff: Awfully working class.

Brad: Oh, come on!

Erik: Quite a few women here.

GQ: Too many midriffs, not enough mooks.

Brad: I'll concede there're more mullets than one typically sees in a gay bar, but--

Erik: Is that the cast of Petticoat Junction in the corner?

Jeff: Petty cash, you mean.

Brad: Guys, we've only been here a minute and a half.

Jeff: And I've already spotted two of Brad's exes.

Erik: Ah, you go for the...er, "tradesman" type, eh?

Jeff: Rough trade men, you mean.

Brad: I'm going to the bathroom. If you three cause a bar brawl, you're on your own.

Tuesday, August 20, 2002

Sign here

It's only eight months or so late, but it turns out this was prophetic. It turns out that the Five Man Electrical Band was right: "Everywhere, there's signs." The trick is in knowing which ones to heed.

And it's only just begun. Goodbyes and butterflies, indeed.

Thursday, August 15, 2002

I been everywhere, man

Friends, I've been all over the world and, if I may paraphrase Gerty, a gay bar is a gay bar is a gay bar. Milan or Milwaukee, San Francisco or St. Louis, Toronto or Tallahasse, there's a template from which these establishments are cut and any distinction is really just a variation on the general theme.

In St. Louis, for example, I'm pretty sure there is a zoning regulation stating that all barrooms and nightclubs patronized by homosexual men and women must have walls and ceilings painted black, incorporate corrugated metal and exposed ductwork in their decor and -- this is key -- feature inadequate cooling and ventilation systems.

I was espousing my observation of the fundamental sameness to be found in the gay watering holes of the world to a friend last weekend. He vigorously insisted that the bars of his city were different and suggested that it was the patrons themselves who made them so.

The patrons, I insisted with equal vigor, tend to be even less distinctive place to place than the environs. Once you run through the list of types (they're stereotypes, I guess, but only if two of them are standing side by side at the rail) -- club kid, daddy, tweaker, twirler, mature perv, etc. -- there's nothing new under the dim, diffuse lighting.

All of which is by way of saying that the bars in Los Angeles (by which I mean West Hollywood) are no different than the bars of Louisville. Close your eyes and you could be anywhere.

Until some guy comes up to you and asks, with absolutely no trace of irony or sarcasm, "What's your sign?" Happened to me three times. Keep those lids closed, if only so he won't see your eyes rolling back in your head. You're in California. No doubt about it.

Tuesday, August 13, 2002

Interior Monologue From a West Hollywood Bookstore

Wow, heads really turn whenever that little bell on the door rings, eh? No pressure. Nope. Good lord, that book was awful. Nice call end-capping it. Mmm...cutie by the stroke books. OK, cool. Things are looking up. Nod. Hey. Nod. Hey. For what it's worth, kid, I agree with you: Freshman is probably more interesting than me, today at least. Eh. They're still printing that? Wasn't he indicted? This much printed porn means the Internet hasn't really reached its potential, I guess. Seen it. Seen it. Seen it. Oh, videos! God, look at my hands. I need some lotion. I hope I didn't say that last bit out loud. Falcon videos are proof that God loves us and wants us to be hap--hey, is that Jeremy Piven over there? He looks like Jeremy Piven. Ah, Jeremy Piven is hot. Wait, when the hell did I start being turned on by Jeremy Piven? Who cares? He's hot! That's not-- Nod. Hey. Nod. Hey. Yeah, not Jeremy Piven. Nice calves though. I wonder if you could consider any bookstore that doesn't have a children's section an adult bookstore. What would that mean zoning wise? Geez, where do I come up with this shi-- Whoa! Hello, little Bel Ami boy. Well, maybe he's the second-string Bel Ami boy. Nice eyes. Nice pack-- Nod. Hey. Nod. Hey. Stare. Really nice eyes. I should prob-- I have no idea what you--what is that, Spanish? Eh, keep staring. Nod. Hey. OK, then. Yeah, sure. Right on. It's a universal language all right. Yeah, heads turn when the bell rings, especially when you walk out with him.

Monday, August 05, 2002

Welcome! Now go.

Without exception, everyone I met in Los Angeles had two questions for me: Why are you here? When are you leaving?

The first question was simple enough to address, once I realized it was not being posed in the metaphysical sense. During the first of my interrogations over five days, my reply was, "Well, why are any of us here, really? I think we're put on earth simply to be good to one another, to grow and to learn."

It turned out folks were interested in a more succinct, essential "business or pleasure"-type response. Well, pleasure, certainly. Yes, please. The more the better. My host was more than capable to provide that aspect, facilitating certain introductions over the course of the long weekend that were, shall we say, tactilely enjoyable, at the very least.

The second question was more troublesome, though. It was asked jocularly enough, but the frequency with which it was repeated was disturbing. It was almost like being clasped by the arm in welcome with one hand and urged toward the door with a pat on the tush with the other.

When I answered that my return flight to St. Louis departed on Tuesday evening, there was an almost measurable sense of relief on the part of the questioner.

After five or six inquiries into the duration of my stay, I finally realized the truth: People in Los Angeles are deeply, deeply afraid of visitors. They are apprehensive of strangers.

They want you to leave before there is any chance that you, evil outsider, will take their job or, worse, their parking space.

Parking is an art in Los Angeles, which is fortunate, since the movie industry has pretty much ceded any pretense of being about art and L.A. needs all the culture it can get. Even if it's simply the subtle craft of wedging between red zones and sorting out five seemingly conflicting regulation signs, it's art and it is practiced nowhere with more alacrity or finesse than in L.A.

When embarking on an evening's entertainment, the primary concern of all parties involved is not how long it will take to get there, how much it will cost, how one should dress or who one might expect to get off with at the end of the night (and how much that will cost). No, the first question to be resolved, upon which all other decisions hinge, is "How's the parking?"

Well, actually that's the first question for natives. For visitors, it's the third. Right after "Why are you here?" and "When are you leaving?"

Tuesday, July 30, 2002

Lessons in Los Angeles

One I learned and one I'll leave behind.

Lesson number one: Context is all. Spitting on a cop can get you sent to jail. Spitting on a top (at just the right moment, natch) can send him into orbit, and take you along for the ride.

Lesson number two: Go for it. Action is almost always preferable to inaction, and waiting for sure things means you're stuck in the lobby while the future is taking the express lift for the penthouse suite.

And here's a bonus tip: Friendship is not diluted by time nor distance, but every now and then, you just have to make time to take a trip and wave the flag in another territory, the "geek flag" though it may be. I am tired, I am blessed and I'm definitely going to have to make time for a return trip sooner than another four years.

Monday, July 29, 2002

A tip

If you're quite lucky tonight (or if you happened to be logged in on Sunday night, you naughty, naughty kids!) you might see me lounging about Chi Chi LaRue's Live and Raw Hotel. And thereby hangs a tale...

Wednesday, July 24, 2002

A Conversation From the Bar Scene

The Giant Queen: Where have you been?! You were supposed to meet us two hours ago.

Jeff: I have just met the man of my dreams. The man I'm going to spend the rest of my life with. I am in love!

GQ: Splendid. This is Damon, who has come to us all the way from Atlanta --

Damon: Alabama.

GQ: -- whatever. He'll be attending school here in the fall. Damon, this is Jeff.

Jeff: Didn't you hear me? I've fallen in love.

Brad: Jeff...

Jeff: Sorry. (shakes Damon's hand) It's a pleasure, I'm sure. It's just a pity a pretty young thing such as yourself had to fall in with this bitter crew.

GQ: I hope you'll excuse Jeff, dear. He often mistakes rug burns for love's fire.

Brad: Oh boy.

Jeff: I will have you know that this is quite serious. Just because you can't get laid to save your--

Erik: So! Where did you meet this wonderful man?

Jeff: At the gym, of all places! He's a personal trainer, charming, blonde, built like a marble shit-house. We met by the free weights -- I had just finished my workout -- and started chatting. Well, right away I knew there was a connection. I'm telling you, this is the one! I just came by to tell you all I couldn't stay for drinks. I'm meeting James at the Coffee Cartel in a few minutes.

Brad: James is the guy?

Jeff: Yes! James. (pause) Jason? (pause) No, James!

GQ: (rolls eyes)

Jeff: Anyway, I've got to go. Damon, run while you can. Erik, call me. Ta!

Erik: Huh. Who knew?

GQ: Oh, please. He's not in love. He can't even remember the boy's name. He's headed for caffiene and a quickie, that's all.

Brad (to Damon): You get used to this.

Erik: No, I mean who knew Jeff actually worked out at the gym? I thought he just hung out in the steam room.

Damon: So maybe he's mistaking love's fire for hot tile.

Brad: (spit take)

GQ: Oh, Damon. You are going to fit in around here just fine.

Friday, July 19, 2002

From the Management

I'm away this weekend and next (still plenty of time to sign on for "Break Bread with Brad" in Los Angeles!), so expect continued sparse activity hereabouts through the end of the month. But there'll be some changes made -- and how! -- come August. Keep watching this space!

Wednesday, July 10, 2002

Memo to self

When a guy in a bar asks you if you enjoy "facials", try not to look disappointed when he turns out to be a cosmetics consultant at Famous & Barr and hands you a coupon. Despite your tendancy toward absurd, vulgar euphemisms, not everyone plays along.

Tuesday, July 09, 2002

Libraries are good

I've always been a supporter of libraries, those great repositories of human knowledge, those massive monuments to literacy and achievement. Until they started building one across the street from my office.

Now, while I am still favorably predisposed to appreciate miles and miles of shelves lined with books, I am souring on this particular library. The rumble of trucks and equipment entering and leaving the site rattles my teeth and the dust kicked up, combined with the sweltering temperatures and dousing humidity, are utterly stifling.

I will, however, cease all complaining, for I discovered yesterday that the workmen have begun installing the building's utility conduits and lines, closing the public sidewalk on both sides of the street and, as a consequence, insuring that the only safe route to the pool is right by my window.

All day, lithe young men in skimpy bathing costumes toting towels saunter by and, a few hours later, return by the same path with wet curls plastered to their foreheads and browner skin than when they first appeared.

In every cloud of dust, there is a Speedo lining.

Thursday, June 27, 2002

Almost there

It's been a particularly stressful couple of weeks, but enough projects are either completed or have reached a manageable state that I no longer feel I am laboring under the sword of Damocles all the time.

The butter knife of Damocles, maybe, but that sword is right out of there.

Wednesday, June 19, 2002

A Conversation From the Bar Scene

Thom: What do you think of Justin?

Brad: He reminds me of an Oprah book club selection.

Thom: What?

Brad: He's thick, cheap and easy to read.

Friday, June 14, 2002

Finders

Last week over dinner, we were talking about the "old days" (for us, meaning a period ranging roughly from the nadir of WHAM! to Madonna's "I'm Breathless" album) and somebody mentioned Boyd Harris. "Good lord," exclaimed The Giant Queen. "I haven't heard from him in years! Whatever happened to Boyd?"

There were a few moments of silence and head scratching and, finally, quiet consensus that we had among us no idea. One of The Twins was pretty sure he'd moved to Denver -- or was it Atlanta? -- at some point in the 90s, but beyond that, not a clue.

I suggested we call International Male and ask where they were delivering his catalogs.

I was only half joking. I mean, I've wondered for quite a while how that company stays in business. I never see anyone actually wearing the clothing featured in their glossy catalogs. Only once, over a decade ago, did I ever order anything from them, a mesh shirt that I promptly returned when it was immediately clear it did not make my chest look like that of the model on page 26.

Even so, I have received the catalog ever since. In fact, I have changed residences six times in the past 15 years, never leaving a forwarding address except on a few postcards sent along to friends and business contacts, and always, without fail, a properly addressed International Male catalog is the first piece of mail I have received upon settling into a new home.

It's uncanny. I have no idea how they find me. But after the third or fourth time this happened, I began to believe that clothing sales was the wrong line of business for International Male. If no one was being duped into buying the $400 creme linen suits or the shirts made out of knotted up dental floss, clearly they needed a new profit model.

Clearly, International Male is ideally suited to function as a gay missing persons bureau.

If you've lost track of an old friend or former trick, or perhaps a male relative with a flair for entertaining and an affection for divas with only one name, you could call up International Male (1-900-PIRATE-SHIRT) and ask for their current address. Easy peasy, and they wouldn't even have to change the name. "International Male," after all, implies that this service works globally.

Of course, they would still have to send out the catalogs, since a means to constantly correct their mailing list would be essential to the new modus operandi, but that's OK by me. Even if I have no need of a crocheted Central Park Knit shirt with a johnny collar and a straight hem -- I swear to God that's an actual item -- the catalog works quite well as soft porn for all us kids who grew up ogling underwear models in the Sears Wishbook, another aptly named mail-order enterprise, since I hated the clothes but always wished for the models.

So International Male can keep flinging ads for faux fur "Millennium Jackets" and "Hermosa Retro" Midcut swim trunks my way, even if they don't decide to become a worldwide homo locator. Any company which sends out catalogs using the line "Check out our featured bottoms!" on the cover with no trace of irony whatsoever is...er, tops in my book, however they choose to make money.

Thursday, June 13, 2002

Bobby and Brad

I was in Washington, DC last week for the Stephen Sondheim Celebration at the Kennedy Center, seeing the musical Company. That show has always had a particular appeal to me, since it's about a man -- Robert -- who finds himself on the outside of relationships looking in and constantly questions on which side he belongs.

The poster for the show, seen in the thumbnail here, shows a single male wedding cake figure set apart from several bridal figures. That's me peeking over Cake Bobby's left shoulder in the larger photo (duly submitted to The Mirror Project) reflected in the glass of the Kennedy Center marquee.

Monday, June 10, 2002

Some Gross Generalizations Which I Have Found, Nonetheless, To Be True In My Experience

• Men who own cats or describe themselves as "cat people" tend to be bottoms or, at least, very "versatile".


• Men who have seen Cats more than once are definitely bottoms, whether they know it or not.


• Men who are in the cast of Cats flip over more quickly than a Suzuki Samurai on a wet, curvy road and are easier to get into than a community college.

I'm just sayin'.

Thursday, June 06, 2002

A Conversation From the Bar Scene

Tagert: So did anyone answer your personal ad?

The Other Jeff: I got one response. I was running an ad for a roommate at the same time and got six responses, four of which wanted to have sex with me. So it evens out.

Brad: He got better response with the ad in Missouri Corrections Department Weekly.

The Other Jeff: Yeah, but I don't like having phone sex with convicts. It's so tacky. I prefer to wait until they get out and have them over to the house. I do have some standards.

Brad: And no good silverware.

Wednesday, June 05, 2002

Lawbreaker

It is against the law in the state of Missouri for gay people to have sex.

It's true. Missouri is one of a couple dozen states where consensual, same-sex sexual relations are a crime. It is particularly annoying, since the specific statute is part of a broader law criminalizing rape and the like, under the ominously titled "Sexual Misconduct Law".

(While gay people are sexual outlaws in the Show Me State, here is no law prohibiting bestiality in Missouri because it was not deemed to be a serious enough offense to warrant a punishment. Faggots bad, farm sex OK!)

In 1986, after the United States Supreme Court ruled, in the amusing to say Bowers v. Hardwick case, that there was, in essence, no right to personal privacy in the the land, a group of concerned citizens in Missouri set upon the task of overturning the gay sex prohibition portion of the Sexual Misconduct Law.

At one community meeting where various legislative strategies and tactics were debated I, who had been asked to lead a team brainstorming public relations and communications efforts, suggested only half in jest that we all just turn ourselves in.

That is, I proposed that we choose one day and encourage gay people throughout the state to swear out affidavits affirming that they had violated the law, then go to the police station and demand to be arrested. Law enforcement, we would contend, could hardly fail to uphold the law. (If nothing else, I thought, this campaign would appeal to those who, while not generally considering themselves "activists" at least held a uniform or handcuff fetish.) The resulting volume of "criminals" would temporarily overwhelm the system and, as a consequence -- because you know I'd call the media -- call attention to the utter absurdity of the law.

I suggested we call it a "Day of Civil Obedience".

Unfortunately, the idea didn't catch on and today, over 15 years later, the offensive law is still on the books. Although seldom enforced, it is nonetheless trotted out all the time to justify not enacting gay civil rights legislation. After all, the reasoning goes, if gay sex is a crime, why should criminals be granted equal rights with law-abiding folk?

Still, every June -- the traditional month when gay and lesbian pride is celebrated throughout the land -- I think somewhat nostalgically of myself at that time, so confident that bold, brazen acts would bring down the walls, and I consider swearing out an affidavit just for myself.

It's the sort of thing I could fold up, stick in my pocket and present as credentials at the various bars, nightclubs, baths and other gay emporia. "Hey baby," I could say, whipping out my papers. "I'm a sexual outlaw. Wanna come back to my place and help me violate RSMo. 556.090?"

When's the last time you heard that pick-up line?

Friday, May 31, 2002

Super Mario

The university is in the midst of a bit of a construction boom, the latest project being a five-story library building going up just outside my office window. It's not slated for completion until the autumn of next year and, already, the noise and dust are driving me insane.

I must say, however, that it seems to be going quickly. Over the past couple of weeks, the workmen have erected a latice of structural steel that currently spans four levels. There are half a dozen red ladders scattered between the beams, and hard-hatted workers scurry up and down them all day.

Right now, the whole project resembles nothing so much as a life-sized game of Donkey Kong. All that's missing is a giant gorilla and a few rolling barrels.

Oh, and in real life, Mario is tall, blond, muscular and hot.

Tuesday, May 28, 2002

Coping strategies devised for eventual use upon discovering the beginnings of a bald spot

• resolve to hang out only with people shorter than self


• convert to Judaism, pledge to wear "perma-yarmulke"


• change name to Bo, join NBA, shave "B" into top of head


• purchase bushy red wig, lobby fashion press to hail Carrot Top as a trendsetter


• begin developing detailed list of friends' flaws and shortcomings to point out as diversionary tactic