Wilburrrr

I think those "horse whisperers" are just a bunch of nay-sayers.

you saw me standing alone

We get a blue moon tonight. As a luna-tic, I love blue moons. But as SOKOMC, let me remind everyone that blue moons are not all that rare. To happen "once in a blue moon" means "not all that often." But not "rarely." We get a blue moon about twice as often as Leap Day. It's a function of having a slightly imperfect lunar calendar (months are actually "moonths").

Enjoy it, and celebrate by doing something you seldom do!

And here's my favorite smart guy, Neil DeGrasse Tyson, on the subject:

A blue moon is just a second full moon. The average time the moon takes to complete a cycle of phases is 29.5 days. Every month except February can have a second full moon. Chances of a full moon on the first of the month, like we had this month, is about 1 in 30. So blue moons happens about once every 30 months. About 2 1/2 to 3 years. Not really that rare, my friend.

white trash tv

Little Honey Boo Boo is hoppin' through the forest, scoopin' up the field mice and boppin' 'em on the head.

You know it's happening.

I really wish we as a society would stay paying these people so much attention rewarding such behavior. But the show came up in work conversation today, and now that ditty is stuck in my head. I had to make a jpg to get it out.

Birthday!

So, 42 isn't really a milestone birthday, except now I expect to have the answer to everything.

Brother Mac gave me some sweet Starfleet Academy cuff links and a French-cuffed shirt with which to wear them—and I'm wearing both today.


Awesome Ellen sent me some pens she made at camp in her glass/ceramics class. He handmade some gorgeous color beads and some pig beads and made the pens for me.




I love the pigs. Love.

And then Ellen pointed out: "It's a pig pen!" get it?" Oh dear. Love more.


And here she is making them!


Happy birthday to me! Off for the final performance of Designing Women Live followed by dinner and possibly bowling at Mission Bowling Club.

you make me wet

From iO9's 10 Things You Probably Didn’t Know About Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

3) Lwaxana Troi was supposed to be a major recurring character In the DS9 bible Lwaxana Troi was described as a major supporting character, on par with Jake and Nog. Special emphasis was placed on her pursuit of Odo as a love interest, with her finding "reasons to come back and see him" on a regular basis. Says the bible: "He tries to discourage her: Ma'am, I turn into a liquid at night. LWAXANA: I can swim."

hot and cold

I've returned from the balmy bosom of a Nashville southern summer to the arctic death grip of a foggy San Francisco. OMFG it's so cold here I am been sleeping in flannel pajamas, and once when I got up in the middle of the night this week I thought I should turn on the Christmas lights and it took me a moment to realize it wasn't December. Brrr.

The Nashville week was intense, full of tumultuous emotion, some raw grieving, some visceral celebration, and a lot of ridiculously happy fun times.



But I am glad to be back. And this stone isn't going to grind itself.

I am looking forward to posting reports when I have the chance.

Love to you all. Well, most of you. Some of you can suck it. But mostly: love.

a rosebud by any other name

Romeo & Juliet, Act II, Scene II

ROMEO: Call me but love, and I'll be new baptized.

Annotation: "Butt Love" Romeo is into anal.

my card...

Those who know me or have met me in a dark bar, know I am all about the calling card. And being suited for every occasion. I have 24 different calling cards (36 if you count the holiday cards), and which one I hand you depends on who you are, the situation, and what I might want to convey. The titles and tag lines on my cards range from the simply respectable "Gentleman" to the fan favorite "Show me on the doll where the bad man touched you." with plenty more filling the range in-between.

Apple discontinued their MobileMe, iDisk and web hosting services, so the URL on my cards is now dead. I took this opportunity to print some more and update the look and lines.



Bring it on.

I've mentioned earlier that all it really takes is a solid esoteric Buffy/Firefly reference for someone to become an instant close personal friend. I also realized this year that any potential love interest of mine is going to have to have a strong nerd streak with a deep vein of Whedon. I'm going to start using Whedon lines as my glass slipper. Glass boot? Whatever. If you don't get it, you're not Prince Charming.

And after my encounter with the Handsome Babcock, who responded to my unconsciously cast line perfectly, I have found my glass slipper.

first day

In the "they grow up so fast"/"tug on the heart strings" category, my sister-in-law shared some photos of my brother walking my little nephew walking to the street corner to take his fist school bus ride to his very first day of school.

It's pretty iconic, and I can feel the emotions as heavy as the humidity on the August morning.

So beautiful.

And yet.... now I kind of want to give it a caption contest.  This just begs for a meme.

I heard the people sing

Last week Kevin and I went to the 25th anniversary production of Les Misérables at the Orpheum.

Accordingly, I purposely dressed in the blood of angry men and the dark of ages past. (That's the theater and show signage in the background.)


Our friend Randy got us amazing seats: third row, center orchestra. Here is an excited Kevin shortly before an usher accosted me for taking a cell phone shot in the theater, facing away from the stage, well before showtime. Whatever.


It's an interesting update to the show. I did recall years ago that they chucked out the Little People number, which I still think is a mistake which reduced Gravroche to a "who the hell is that?" character, and eviscerates most of not all of the emotional impact of his death. I did really enjoy the new set design, which loses the signature turntable in favor oaf period street scenes and interiors and some digital projection assistance.

There is so much more going on in this production, the ensemble is talented and active, so much so that the Master of the House number was so full of side antics that I felt like I was on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride. Peter Lockyear is a force as Jean Valenjean, and it's nice to see a hot, young, lithe Jean Valjean who can fill the notes and the role of a bull of a man. It's a shame they shaved his gorgeous head of hair just for the opening scenes as a convict, leaving him to wigs for the rest of the show. Don't get me wrong, the wigs are flawless, but having seen the shaved and carved head, the rest of the show you know these are wigs. The Thénardiers of this production are much more active and colorful than any other iteration I have seen, and wonderfully so.

Unfortunately for cast an audience, the producers seem more concerned with quantity than quality. The show is edited and ridiculously rushed for time. Half of the show is run through so quickly you might think Fantine accidentally left the iron on someplace. The result is that this show sounds like the cast album LP recorded for 33 RPM is being played at 45. The deep, emotional pleading of I Dreamed a Dream and On My Own are left harried and incidental. The actors talents lie wasted, and the audience cheated.

But even so, a great show.

Kevin had IM'd me a pic of these two fun ladies as he waited for me to arrive, as they too were in Les Miz theme of Red & Black. We met up with them at intermission and learned it was entirely accidental. However, they would be telling people from then on that it was entirely purposeful.


Good shows all around.

running mild

What's the best present you can give your friend three days after they ran the SF marathon?

Foot massages!



There's a new reflexology and massage place at 3420 Geary at Stanyan. They're not in Google yet (and the street view still shows the empty retail space), but they're pretty amazeballs. And a ridiculous bargain.

official song of summer 2012

Carly Rae Jepson's Call Me Maybe continues to be infectious, and unlike the other overplayed tunes this year I still smile when it comes on the radio.

Continuing the YouTube love of this song, here is a pretty awesome Call Me Maybe lip dub: The Chat Roulette Version! And the number of people who join in shows just how pervasive and widely loved this ditty really is.



Creepy, fun times.

the Doctor, the Master,

and the Nanny.

We should have noticed this sooner.

those neon lights

really did shine for Xanadu.


Thanks to Woodruff for pulling together an enthusiastic crew of devotees and virgins for a wonderful showing and surprisingly packed and participatory audience.

I only have to close my eyes, Dear, and suddenly I'm where you are...

love my San Franvillage

Sometimes living in SF feels like living in a great European city. I'm not the first one to say this, but there are times when I walk from neighborhood to neighborhood all lined with Victorians and interesting people, often speaking different languages or sporting different styles, and bright sunshine and cool air, I just have to sigh and smile.

Especially in this sort of season when I can walk a mere three blocks to a farmer's market and stock up on fresh veg and flowers from open carts, and walk home with it all in a canvas bag.


And the tomatoes are in season. Can't wait. Even my kitchen table looks happy to see me when I get home.

neon lights are gonna shine

There is a fun group of like-minded and clearly similarly-aged gay guys rallying around the centerpiece of tonights roller disco triple feature at the Castro Theater tonight.

I think our instigator and organizer Woodruff may be the only guy who loves Xanadu more than I do.  There may be glitter, but I don't think I will repeat the costume enthusiasm of 2007 Midnight Mass.

And it has been fun sharing photos and history stories of the Pan Pacific all day.

Hat tip to Neil for the Disney lesson.

Go Go Glasgow

The summer fun continued this week with an intense visit from Jan and her wife Paula, who literally kicked off their first weekend in the bay Area with the San Francisco Marathon.

After six hours of dancing at Sundance Saloon on Thursday. Ouch.

We partied most of the week, but when Sunday came I took them to the starting line around 5:00 a.m., then went back to bed, and had my own marathon of fun at Dore Alley. Special thanks to Michael Smith who took me out to the Dore after party Play T-Dance. I am usually far too tired from the day's events to go to these things, which are not really my scene anyway. I do love DJ Craig Gaibler, and I wound up having a great time. I may go to the next one, now that I know that when hot guys are rolling at the disco, I become all sorts of sexy.

Saturday the sun managed to burn back the fog for us to have pretty awesome tourist day. We had planned a happy hour at my place with Peurto Allegre to follow, but we never managed to leave the house. Watching the history unfold during the opening ceremony of the 2012 Olympics in London was made soooo much better with history teacher Jan proving some context and history lessons.


NBC as expected sucked epically and was painful to watch and shameful to watch in front of non-Americans. Shameful. Ugh.

We were pretty wrecked from Saturday morning, which was solved by coffee infusions at Spike's,

a lovely driving tour of the "other side" of town, a soul food lunch at Hard Knox,




and a stop at Mr. and Mrs. Miscellaneous,




Nice.

And of course more lovin'.