tis the season!

Last week we were enticed downtown for Drag Queens on Ice, but we a bit disappointed to find one Guy In a Dress which does not a drag queen make. Two of the staff skaters had neon nylon wigs, and there were two Sisters, but that was about it. I have been spoiled by my drag elite in this City. Also sort of disappointing was that among my cohort, I was the only one who was willing to actually skate. But it was great seasonal fun and really put me in the spirit. And Union Square at Christmastime is ridiculously festive and totally inspires the jolly. Add me and mine and we totally make the yuletide gay. I'm not as sleek on my sakes as I once was, and while this rink was in fact frozen water, it was a both of a stretch to call it "ice."

But again, much fun and all holly jolly. And as I expected the Drag-Capades, I dressed accordingly.









After skating we took a little tour of the hotels around Union Square and had lots of fun with the over the top decorations, including the myriad of trees at the Saint Francis and the wonderfully enormous Sugar Castle.



I hear that the Fairmont has the largest gingerbread house. We had so much fun on this mini tour that we've planed a proper hotel decorations tour for this week. If we can stand the hike, we'll take Nob Hill. Clearly, we get into the Christmas cheer.






I tried to get a shot the Christmas Tree with the Starlight Room's neon sign but I had a hard time getting the exposure right, and staying still enough without a tripod. Still, some lovely shots, and good for monitor desktop backgrounds.


By the time the weekend came around, Coco and I were too tired, individually, to make the SantaCon massive thousand-strong all-day Santa-suited bar crawl across the City. The cold and the rain and the way-too-much-to-do didn't help matters either. My cheap Walgreens Santa suit will keep until next year. I do have to applaud this amazing Santa costume featured in Laughing Squid and the SFist. The photos look like a Photoshop filter was applied, but they are untouched. She calls this Desaturated Santa. So, so amazing. Santa from the black & white era!




(Photo credits BrodyQat and Tom Hilton, click through to their Flickr streams.)

This first weekend in December also brought the annual Elegantly Wasted birthday party (six years running now!), and opening weekend to the very funny drag version of the Golden Girls, the Christmas Episodes!




Go see it! Birthday girls & boys get a lap dance from Blanche.