Stories from a man who fails to meet media expectations of what it means to be gay:
white, frivolous, over sexed yet sexless, shrill, single, stylish, a clown, unimportant, et al.

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Hunky Shirtless Men with Ambivalent Attitudes.

aka: The latest entry that has nothing to do my vacation.

aka: I think I sense an unstated theme here.

It's a long, big one, so no intro, just entry:

Wednesday 08/08/01:

The Lion King has been playing at the Pantages forever now. Being Gay men, we bought tickets to see It months and months and months ago. Being picky man, John wanted really good seats. Unfortunately, good seats wouldn't be available for quite a while. Therefore, for a very long time, the Lion King was something that I knew that we were going to do, sometime WAY off in the future that is. Well, the future finally arrived. John, Kristen and I had dinner at Wild Time in South Pas, then drove through mucho traffic into Hollywood so we could finally see the dang thing.

I knew I was going to enjoy it and I did. I knew that people dressed as animals would walk up the aisles to the stage when the show started and they did. I knew the staging and costumes would be impressive and they were. I knew that there would be LOTS of kids in the audience even though it was an evening performance and there were. I knew that at least ONE of them was going to get really upset and cry their head off when Mufasa died and the young girl seated in front of John did. Quite loudly in fact.

What I wasn't expecting, were the shirtless, hyena, go-go boys who did a rather energetic dance routine in the middle of the song where Scar announced his sinister plan to ally himself with the hyenas and take over the pride lands. In fact, a lot of the male actors and dancers ended up shirtless at one point or another during the night. I'm not complaining, heck, I'm all for eye candy.

Considering how many gay guys were in the audience, I rather doubt I was the only one pleased by the site of hunky shirtless men on stage. Even if half of them were wearing flats of wheat grass on their heads. I'm surprised that there were never any tie-ins between the show and Jamba Juice. '-)

Thinking about, there were tons of gay men in the audience. Well, tons of gay men and families. A combination that only makes sense when you think "Disney."

My only other comment about the show is that the actor playing the adult simba was kinda hot.

Thursday 08/09/01:

Figuring that I wasn't going to get to bed till late due to the show AND that I wouldn't be in any mood to wake up on time, I took the day off work. A good thing, since I slept in until almost eight o'clock in the morning! OH MY GAWD! heh.

John had made arrangement to work out with Barb at her local gym down in Long Beach. Being lazy bum man, I didn't work out with them. Instead I went to Acres of Books, one of my favorite used book stores. Considering that it's one of my all time favorite stores, It's a shame that I only go there maybe once a year. Then again, considering that I always spend too much money when I do go, may not.

I only had an hour and half to go through the store before I was due back at Barb's, so I didn't buy as much as I could have. This time I only purchased an odd "alternative" architecture book, a random collection of determinedly queer essays, a couple of not well known comic strip collections I wouldn't have paid full price for, a couple of old gardening books and a book on mythology.

Unusual, only because I didn't get my usual vegetarian/macrobiotic/funky cookbook from the late 60's or some random ecology/gay lib/ whole earth type book from the early 70's. Yes, I'm a weirdo. In this case, I guess I can blame an ex of mine.

I owe my love of used book stores to my ex JonR. When we dated years ago, we would spend hours checking out different stores so he could indulge in everything from women's studies books from the early 70's to old incomprehensible engineering tomes. He may have been an ass, but I did learn to appreciate the feel, weight and history of old books from him. I also learned a lot about the art of making love from him, but that's not exactly a subject for my little PG rated site, so lets move on.

We hung out Barb's place for a while, then met up with Tony and Nicho for dinner at a new Mediterranean/Arabic restaurant on Pine ave. The food was good and since Tony and I were the odd men out (the rest all work/have worked together), we spent a lot of the night staring at each other while the rest of the group gossiped about co-workers. Actually, I spent most of dinner making faces at Tony trying to make him laugh. I was in a silly mood I guess.

Friday 08/12/01:

John and I spent the majority of the day running errands. We did stop at the Apple Store in the Glendale Galleria. Didn't buy anything, just looked around a bit. Compared to Chay's experience at an Apple store, mine was dull and not even worth mentioning, so lets move on.

Saturday 08/11/01:

I have been to soooooo many surprise parties in the past month. Come on people, you ALL have to come up with better party ideas... or I have get better friends and family. Which one would be easier?

This one was John's mother's retirement party, so at least it wasn't another birthday bash. The party was at John's folks and everyone had fun. Except me that is. I had a mild headache at the begining of the party and by the time that people were eating cake, I had a major migraine thing going on. I spent the second half of the party lying on the floor of the office with my eyes closed, while assorted nephews played with assorted hot wheels. Unfortunately, not the best time I have ever had at a party. Lucky for me, the headache died down by the time we got back home that night.

Sunday 08/12/01:

Drew of Ambivalent Attitudes was vacationing in Los Angeles, which gave us a good excuse to actually met in person. His version of the day is a fairly accurate and well written description of the day. We ate lunch (Gaucho Grill), looked at big art (Frank Stella among others), had some sorbet (It was very, very good) and talked a bunch (yup, a bunch).

One thing that Drew didn't mention in his entry, is that right before we met, an older man went up to him and started talking to him. The man was only asking for directions, or money, or something, but Drew had a momentary fear that I was in fact that strange, alcoholic looking man. This started me thinking, what if I had been lying in my journal? What if Drew had? Which is why I joked with him that the truth of our day (food, art, walking and talking) was far too dull and needed some spicing up.

So how should I have spiced up this entry? Which lie story should I have told instead of the truth? Should it have been story one, story two, or story three?

ONE:

I was amused when I found out that there was no Drew. That he was actually a rather tall, 40-something man named Vinnie. I could tell that Vinnie had once been handsome, but partying hard every night since his late teens had left him worn and raw looking. A life of constant "fun" had definitely taken a toll on him.

We stood talking on the street corner he had suggested meeting at for a few minutes, before deciding that we looked silly just standing there. After mentioning that I was hungry, we walked over to a nearby cafe to have some lunch. Unfortunately, lunch had less to do with food, as much as it did with Vinnie talking, no rambling, about all the famous people that he knew "personally." I sat there bored out of my mind. He was so self involved that I don't think he even realized that I had stopped paying attention to him and was openly staring at the track marks that ran up and down his arms instead. I decided that I was being rude and the least I could do was pay attention to him, he wasn't that bad after all.

I was wrong. After spending 15 minutes talking about some soap opera star who couldn't act her way out of a paper bag, he suddenly changed the subject and told me that he wasn't gay, but that he could be for the right price.

He smiled broadly, announced that he had to use the lou, then left the table. As he walked to the restroom, he kept glancing over his shoulder at me. Of course, once he actually went in, I took off like like nobody's business and high tailed it out of there.

I felt guilty for a entire minute, before deciding that this was most likely not the first time Vinnie had ever been left alone in the restroom.

TWO:

I knew that Drew would be cute. He had once posted a grainy picture of himself on his web site and from what I could could see, he was hunky. What I didn't realize, was that it was a really bad photograph. A lousy photograph. A terrible photograph. It did him no justice at all. In real life, Drew wasn't just cute, he was a SEX GOD. A total and absolute walking, talking wet dream. The man practically oozed sex from every pore and I almost hyperventilated because I was going to spend the entire afternoon with him!

Several people walked into me as we walked along the streets of Pasadena that day. They were so taken by Drew, they didn't even realize that I was walking right next to him. I could hardly blame them, after all, I could barely take my eyes off him myself. The few people who did notice me, just glared angrily. I know exactly why. They were jealous that I got to be so close to Drew and Dang it, I did stay as close to him as possible.

Just breathing in the slight scent of him in the air was enough to make my knees weak. He mistook my swooning as a sign of hunger and suggested that we eat lunch. Oh lordy, he was kind and sweet as well as handsome.

During lunch, when Drew suggestively licked a bit of barbecue sauce off of his fingers, I lost all self control. Conveniently forgetting that I was a happily married man, I leapt over the table and tacked him to the ground. I was surprised when the entire restaurant broke out into a thunderous applause as I ravaged him.

Somehow, I wasn't as surprised when I heard Drew softly whisper "Oh no, not again."

THREE:

I thought it odd when Drew suggested that we meet at a pet store in Tarzana. After all, he had written that he was staying with some friends in Marina del Rey on the other side of town. Wasn't he?

The store smelled of wet dogs and needed to be cleaned. It also needed staff. I was the only person there. I was worried that Drew wouldn't show and I was worried that the store may not have been the safest place to be.

After calling out a few times, I heard some noise from a back room. A few minutes later, a woman came out into the store. She was very, very large. She was barefoot. She was also about sixty years old and was dressed in a purple muumuu and an ill-fitting, hot pink, page boy wig.

I'm sure that I cringed when she asked "Are you Nico? Hey good. Hi there, my name is Mabel, but you probably know me better as Drew." The only thing that kept me from running out of the store screaming was the fact that "Drew" owed me money.

Actually, I'm glad I didn't leave. Mabel paid me back the money she owed and gave me an extra fifty bucks as well (She had done very well on her last visit to Vegas). She was an interesting person and decided to let me in on some secrets. It turns out that every famous gay male on-line diarist, from J*n J*n, to J*b, to T*m is actually a retired grandmother AND a member of Mabel's bridge club. It would seem that the gay journal internet community was a joke that got out of hand. For the life of me, I couldn't decide if I should have been appalled or relieved instead.

So, which should have it been?
Appalled, or Relieved?
Fact, or Fiction?
Reality, or Fun?

Real Drew?
Vinnie?
Sex Gawd?
or Mabel?
Any thoughts?

More later

nico

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