The Question of Manhunt
a few weeks ago, i happened to read an article in Out magazine about the online "hook-up" site that has somehow permeated contemporary amercian gay-culture ... if you don't instantly know what i am talking about you must either be NOT gay or living under a rock. what but no other than manhunt.net is what i am referring to. being no manhunt "novice" myself, my interest was immediately piqued by this article which in short argued that manhunt was systematically "destroying" "gay culture" ... through a self-inflicted methodology of de-humanizing gays inside out, through the ways that gay men see each other as sex objects and/or as simply other gay men. by becoming a veritable "EBAY" of gay sex and gay "looking for sex"... the article argues ... manhunt has made it easier and easier for gay men to objectify each other into nothing more than a list of "stats" : height, weight, race, dick size, sexual position, interests, etc, etc.
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now to me, this is one of those questions, that sort of answers itself ... i mean ... manhunt is a sex site ... a site that clearly and relatively honestly from the get-go comes across as a virtual meeting place for men who want to meet each other for relatively "no strings attached" sex. now to argue that it is "dehumanizing" gays amongst themselves ... well come on, its a rhetorical statement isn't it? i mean, NSA sex to me is nothing if not "de-humanizing" by its very nature. this is not to say that people are necessary always mean, malicious, manipulative or discorteous (or otherwise de-humanizing) in the process of nsa sex (although many are) ... but the way this article frames manhunt ... it almost seems to suggest that manhunt "should" have been something more than just a hugely popular online sex site ... because of it very attractability (which is based on NSA ...ergo de-humanizing .... sex mind you) ... it could have been a medium for a real gay "social" connection ... a bringing together of our "gay" brothers ... an understanding and motivation beyond our carnal lust for each other .... to a higher level of social conscientiousness .... blah blah blah ... very ala mid 80's gay social reactionary stance to the then fresh AIDS epidemic. unfortunately, most gays who log on simply ... as the logo of the site on teh front page declares ... "sign on ... get off".
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so boohoo .... manhunt is legitimizing the meat market mentality of gays and ng manhunting into a "re-closeted" activity. yes, gays may be out and open, but our dirty sex lives are still kept behind closed doors and firewalls apparently .... thanks to manhunt! well... hello ... its sex! it should be behind closed doors ... honestly .... your raunchiness and sexual proclivities is not tea time conversation. so go manhunt all you want ... but remember, there is "real" life in the sense of the way one acts just to interact with the rest of the world (which, if you'ev forgotten is actually straight) ... and there is "another" life ... that should be in a sense somewhat more ... discreet. completely as legitimate as the "real" life mind you ... but hey ... staright people get sent to jail if they fucking on the streets ... and oh my god ... a lot more gay people seem to get away with public sex than straights! (we kind of have it lucky!)
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the real kernal of value though in this article's view on manhunt in my opinion, is the nuanced discussion of how gays even amongst themselves don't seem to discuss manhunt or manhunting ... as if online hook-ups were still taboo in someways. get with the program people ... a poll in 1990 revealed that 2% of gay "first" experiences were thanks to the internet, 10 years later, the same pole revealed that 78% of gay "first' experiences were thanks to the internet. for better or for worse ... internet dating .. internet fucking ... IS ... a way of life. so what's with all the hush hush?
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because we don't want to look like whores. we play with whore jokes all the time, but you know those are jokes about other people or even if as half serious jabs at ourselves, are aimed to keep a levity of general mood and not an entree into a serious introspection into our sex lives. we like to think of ourselves as lucky enough to run into wonderful people in our various stops in our social circuits ... the hollywood inflected bumping into each other at the super market or coffee shop, etc... which leads to instant attraction, a spark ...a chemistry ... that leads to the classic 3 dates before sex, that leads to a real "relationship". well ... i think that does happen still ... but i would argue, a similar, multi-setp, equally as valuable process is also evolving through manhunt ... despite the volleys against it as a dehumanizing EBAY of dicks, asses, biceps, and other delicious male body parts.
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what i think people forget is that NSA sex is part of the quest for ... something more .... and i would think has always been. i think there is the impression that in the past it seemed like people didn't have to try so hard to find "the one" ...because there just weren't that many ways to find "the one" ... ergo, a smaller selection set. if technology and just general advancement of civilization has had any "detrimental" effect on our mating habits , it may be just that it has made it that much more easy to find something ... but that much harder to find the "one" thing that we actually want. so, in this day and age we have to laboriously sift the ever growing end of season bargain bin, to find the slightly scuffed but otherwise immaculate Prada bag that "we've always been looking" for. on such a sift though, we of course had to feel up tons of other bags ... but hey ... nothing worthwile is easy right?
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manhunt. net is a tool ... sure a tool that can be used just for nsa sex (and there's nothing wrong with that either) ... and it can be a tool to find "love". it is a veritable swiss army life of gay sex and love. the possibly de-humanizing aspect of the site ... to be simplistic about it ... are the users. in real life or virtual life, there will always be "players" who have programmed themselves to see other gay men as "conquests" and not as real people who have feelings and dreams ... manhunt makes their lives somewhat easier ... so maybe that service to the slime of the earth is not one of the website's moral selling points. but also in real life and virtual life, there will be the "good boys" who have although grown up with the internet cable stuck into your butts and have probably experienced the whole spectrum of gay sex via the internet (lots of NSA fucking!)... still ... deep inside ... yearn for "love" or some new fangled approximation of it (thats another musing all-together). manhunt is just a too ... a tool as sharp, as dull, as exacting, as indiscriminate ... as its user.
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on that note, i'd like to mention that i have been lucky enough to have a found a man that i have consistently (and singly) dated for now almost a month now. not really near "boyfriend" territory yet ... but well, its in a territory i haven't seen in quite a while. and i have manhunt to thank.
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manhunt may be destroying gay culture, but it may also be helping me find the man of my dreams. i'm gonna be selfish ...
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Queer Eye for the Gay Guy
Since it seems OK for me to now post blogs that are almost a month old, i guess i will writ e a little bit about my relatively recent trip to NYC to visit robert. the purpose of this trip was hatched one drunken night during my gaycation in key west, robert having informed that he was finally moving out of that shoebox he was living in in the upper east side. now, robert would be a denizen of the more colorful neighborhood of SpaHa ... or Spanish Harlem. i'll give him definite props for moving to a more characteristic neighborhood for sure. so in the month between the end of gaycation and the actual new york trip to queer eye a fag, robert and i exchange quite a number of phone conversation and emails working out various details of how to decorate his new place. .
i took it as a real "job"... one of my sort of freelance interior design efforts ... and overall, it was fun. i think we both walked away from it a little frayed at the edges, but it was fun nonetheless to see a good friend and to share in this momentous in his life ... that is finally getting a "more" grown-up place.
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eventhough i had seen pictures of the place before going, walking into robert's new place still was an eye-opener. the neighborhood was definitely more colorful, having a "walk-thru" mcdonald's on the same street and colorful latin american street food vendors everywhere (that robert refuses to patronize ... haha). however the signs of gentrification are obvious ... a very nearby shee shee bistro where you can get a great lamb shank! anyways, inside robert's apartment ... my first impression was ... hmm, good bones ... this place has potential ... but in its nakedness and slight delapidation i was thinking ... hmmm... color ... we need color.
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i think one of the tense points during my visit with robert to help him with his place, was my constant insistance on color and using lots of it. i think in the end we came to various compromises. for instance i would have loved to see every room painted ... but realistically i don't think we had the time, and we also went back and forth on some color choices. ultimately i think we were both satisfied ... robert did love the light blue in his bedroom and the tan we painted in his study/ guest bedroom he fell in love with. we had a slight tiff on the color of the dining room, but it was mostly egged on by robert's growing reluctance under stress meets my growing impatience when under stress ... i wanted some thing to be done, robert wanted to widdle waddle. but we got a color up there ... personally not the most dramatic i would say for a dining room ... but still nice ... sort of builder's beige ... you can't go wrong can you?
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other than painting, one whole day of our time was spent at IKEA. robert dropped $1000 on various knick knacks. funny, in the end, you think, god ... that was $1000, what did we spend it on! our big ticket items were mostly the guest loft bed frame (that I put together) a wardrobe (that i put together) and in addition to that various IKEA shelves and two fabulous lamps, some basic end tables ... and a swanky mirror (that in the last 10 minutes before my taxi came, we tried to hang ... but to no avail ... i hope robert has some friends who are a bit braver in DIY than he is!). seriously ... where did all that money go? it would have been nice to get a dining table, chairs, cupboards, and a dresser ... part of the "plan"... but i understand budgetary constraints ... so c'est la vie ... till the next paycheck.
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like mentioned before, a big chunk of our time was spent putting the IKEA furniture together and of course, going to the holiest of DIY places ... the Home Depot ... New York style ... in a high rise building ... no lumbar department mind you but still a good selection of various things any urbane DIY'er would be expected to undertake ... i.e... no heavy construction or installation. I think the most showy piece of work at the end of the three day endeavor ... were the new light fixtures i am SO GLAF I convinced robert to get .... they are SO MUCH an improvement from the well .... crap that emited light before. robert called them antiquish and historically interesting ... they were typical crack hotel lights .... haha. i can only cross my fingers and toes that he will jump on the ball and actually order that special order chandelier we identified at home depot ... because seriously ... THAT makes the dining room!
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i did do a tad of carpentry surprisingly ... installing a chair rail to robert's dining room wall. i knew the jig saw i brought would be handy! so basically that was about it ... a full day of shopping, lots of painting, lots of putting IKEA funriture together, installing new lights (robert did one actually ... wooo wooo!), and just in general setting up a new furniture arrangement (please do not bring in that ridiculously over-sized cofee table back into the living room robert!), and in the last hour going to see some new curtains for the bedroom (at the store he was reluctant, a day later, he told me he went back and got them ... uh... i told you so ... trust the professional! haha) ... that rounded out an actually busy visit to my friend.
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now we did do some "fun" stuff of course. robert was an excellent host paying basically for everything during my stay so props for him for that. but on the same note, thats why i felt the need to be so pyscho insistent on getting stuff done. at times it was like dragging around a kid, but thats to be expected i guess. all in all it was fun and we were able to have a relaxing dinner, and also a night visiting jay and hunter's new place in w-burg ... which is ultra new and ergo ultra conventionally "new york" style noveau riche. whatever ... it was a nice place ... lacking in any crusty old character and individuality but still nice and shiny ... to each his own. we went to this trendy w-burg gay bar where the crwod made me feel old and fat ... but that is williamsburg for you where male anorexia is chic and 25 is geriatric.
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i wonder what his place looks like now, almost a month after my weekend warrior style make-over? at the very least i hope the furniture hasn't broken or the wall shelves i installed fallen down ... and maybe with any luck ... there is a sparkly new chandelier in the dining room ... all that's missing is a table and some chairs. haha.
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Farewell Good Friends
another post that is slightly old. well, basically, kahl and andy have left our little circle of friends, now for about a week, and i have to admit, i keep myself busy so i don't have to "deal". hmmmm ... i was in nyc this past weekend (which i will blog about) and i spoke to my friend robert about how losing really good friends especially those that helped you acclimate to a relatively strange place, making it feel more like "home" ... how losing those friends, is kind of like a break-up from a romantic relationship. there is not the same, but a similar sense of just ... emptiness ... or, more in this case ... what am i going to do now ... and small musing about running away from the whole thing and re-casting your life anew, you yourself picking up and going.
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i dunno, i am not going to go into a long bout regarding kahl and andy. i think i have done enough of that in the preceeding entries. our last night all together though i thought was appropriately done via the independence day celebration i threw this year at my house (and funny enough, i think that was the first house party of mine that both of them came to ...exactly one year before). it was a long day, and even longer two days in preparation for it ... but so many times over the course of that party, i saw all my friends, laughing, eating, and having a good time, that it made me feel so good ... in the midst of something really great. and as the evening came to a close, it made me feel well, in moments where i know a feeling of loss could pervade me, i think my habit is to hide my emotions and to just shut down ... so i don't have to deal. so despite the fact that kahl appropriately hugged me for what felt like an intermittable amount of time, i just couldn't let my reserve go. i dunno, guess i just don't like to share my negative emotions with people.
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there absense ... its something that i will just have to get use to. but forever the optimist, i look forward to mpre good times, strengthening the friendships i still have with me, and hoping that such friends as kahl and andy have been, will again stroll across my path in life. till then.
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Another Place, Another Time
this is actually suppose to be an old post in the sense that i wanted to write about it when it happened, but of course, like many things in my life, never got to it. so now, it's about a month or so old. anyways, i just wanted to mention meeting an interesting man. i may have mentioned this before, but one or twice a year, i usually meet a man that intrigues me particularly in some way beyond the usual caliber of men i meet, if indeed i am meeting any man at all. when this does happen, i am usually astounded by how well the man i meet pulls off the overly exacting "checklist" i have when it comes to a man's desireability ... a checklist that may be crippling any possibility of meeting a "real" man i have come to realize. the last man i ran into that sort of "blew me away" was a pretty random situation, having spent only a few hours with him, but still feeling like he was "perfect". yes, i know ... putting a man on a pedestal.
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that is why i think the most recent such man i have met stands out in some regards. he's not mind blowingly handsome, nor does he comes off as scintillatingly cosmopolitan or ivy league well-read. but what he does exude is simply a kindness and "fun-ness" that i think i haven't seen in a while in guys. in again the short time that we spent together, i like to say that there was a bubbling chemistry between us ... yes, an instant attraction, a good feeling, but one a little more subtle than the falling head over heels type that i often fall prey to. no, this chemistry was slower, and in some ways, kind of sexy because of that. we met, we went out ... on an actual date of sorts... that is dinner and great conversation, we walked around town, he showed me interesting spots in the city, he really tried to entertain me and show me something new. we kept talking , conversation relatively moving easily from one to the other. i spoke about things i cared about, he spoke about things he cared about. and actually, i might dare say that even being a first date, we both made statements that actually, really made the other person stop for a moment ... and think. like really think and deal with emotions and intellectualism at the same time. definitely not usual first date territory.
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in short, i had a great time going out with this guy, and when i asked if he wanted to "come home" with me, i have to be honest i didn't know how to take his reply that he thought he should probably go back home and get to bed ... but ... BUT ... that he wanted to see me for lunch the next day. what? haha. i guess if you're reading this you have to realize first that i met this man while traveling outside of houston, specifically about four hours drive, where i went to take a short weekend study course at a university, staying only one night in a local motel. this "date" in all honesty (to me at first) really was more of a pretense for a hookup (actually, i had a feeling it would be a "date" too, and i was cool with that ... i was just suprised when the date didn't get "consumated") ... so when he refused my offer to spend the night but suggested seeing each other again ... so soon ... it threw me off ... wondering ... wait, you realize i don't live here right? and that i'm only staying this evening?
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i don't think it was a bit after, finally back in houston, that i realized, that actually i may have saw the situation in too crass of a light. because in my mind, it started off already as a hookup, or at most a hookup "date" ... i guess my confusion arose when neither of those options presented themselves. i short changed the possibilities basically. and in a way, it gets me thinking ... am i a little jaded now of dating, after a few pretty bad ones, or at the best dismal or unpromising ones? maybe. jaded to the point that even when a date is good ... and because it is good ... in a real sense ... a feeling of restraint "should" be exercised ... that kind of date , becomes so alien?
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i go around saying, oh my god, why are my dates so bad? and why do guys just want one thing and even if they do, apparently don't try very hard to at least give some credible semblance of a real "date"? i ask often ... what has happened to real "dating"? i think in some ways this sitaution illuminates the fact that "real dating" is indeed in the eye of the beholder. if you are open to it, you easily recognize it, and you see the beauty that it is naturally.
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sigh, but if i let myself see the beautiful fact that here i went out with a man that makes me smiles and makes me laugh and that i'm attracted to ... and here's the kicker ... everything vice versa too! on one hand, it makes me joyous that yeah... there are good guys out there who are funny, and cute, honest, smart, and straight - forward. yeah on that hand, everything is happy go lucky and i would tell myself, finally ... second , third date material! but of course, my life has a beautiful in itself knack of being ironic. of course ... a man i would love to date... lives four hours away from me, and i would never have met him, but of only the whim to take a weekend study course in some random city not very close to houston.
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but i did meet him, and we spent a very fun, and inspiring evening together. and i guess that's ok for now. maybe there will be more ... in another place and another time.
My Sex and My City
last weekend my houston peeps and i went to watch the long awaited premiere of the movie Sex and the City, the movie version continuation of a beloved (by women and their gay friends, or gay men and their straight female friends more like it!) tv series. for the event, in classic alex style, i felt the need to go out on this special occasion with a little more ... hmm... pizzazz? so of course, i dressed up in drag .... in something of a simulation of "asian carrie". according to silly personality tests, i align most with carrie's personality, out of the fabulous four archetypes from the series. the get-up was well... worth getting up and taking a second look. suffice it to say i survived the night without any thrown beer bottles, a few compliments from strangers, plenty of weirded out looks, and only three blisters from the four inch heels i was wearing. fabulous! the movie itself was quite entertaining i thought ... a probably medicore film that simply because it came from a series so LOVED, it turned out to be a stupendous movie..my life has been a bit of sex and the city this past month or two i have to say. and what do i mean by that ... well, basically ... lots of sex and lots of attempts at finding a little more za za zoom in life .. the real, maybe lasting kind. a few posts ago, i said that it appeared i was "getting back into the game" ... going on a small handful of dates and looking forward to potentially some more. at this moment that i am writing this, unfortunately i have to report that there has been little real za za zoom, but a lot of sex ... so, maybe that is worth something? getting back into dating has been overall fun ... there has been actually some fun dates and maybe some not so great dates. there has been a little bit of thinking about what i want, but to be honest, i'm running a little bit on instinct right now ... very carrie bradshaw as she lunges into situation after situation that a thinking person might avoid ... because she "feels" her way into things. and we know how feelings often get you into trouble ... but hopefully trouble that teaches a thing or two.
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so who, where, what, when, is this string of guys that i have gone out with this past few weeks? well, there were three or so that i mentioned before ... two that were a bit younger than me (that has been one interesting development of this dating season ... that is dating YOUNGER guys) ... one who panned out to be pretty much a flake and the other one ... a promising candidate. let's call promising candidate "apple guy" ... because well, he works for apple. haha (no i am not dating him just to get a discount!). anyways, he's 25 but we've had two dates so far and each has been filled with a good amount of talking; he's articulate, which i've discovered is a necessity for me, handsome, reasonably smart, and there is a bit... a bit.. of that all elusive "chemistry" with him. we're suppose to go out again, but he travels as much as i do, so we haven't been able to make it ... hmmm... i dunno.
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i had also mentioned a guy that i thought was gorgeous ... he's blond (which is strange since i don't usually go out with blonds)... sky blue eyes. just very cute ... and he's NOT in his 20's. sounds like a winner huh? well, we went on a date, i shelled out TONS of money, and we went back to his place and did the nasty ... hmm, twice. haha! it was "fun" and all but to be honest, strangely again ... here is a cute guy who you can have "OK" conversation with, but for some reason ... its just a bada bing bada boom ... not so much the za za zoom. well ... at least we did it twice ... making up for the money i shelled out for this dude ... i insisted though so its not like i feel really bitter about it or anything. this guy is one of those i'll put in the back pocket to screw around with ... and, maybe because i get the feeling he has the same attitude, maybe that is where the lack of "chemistry" stems from.
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post gaycation, i've gone out with maybe 3 more guys ... well, to be honest, one guy was just a plain hookup... so ok, two guys. one guy i have been chatting with on and off since last year but because i wasn't really into dating for a while, kind of blew him off continously . anyways, i finally went out with the dude ... and from the GET GO ... like when he got into the car ... it was a mediocre experience. i wonder sometimes if it would be REALLY rude if you just expressed your first impression and asked your date if you "really" wanted to give it a go or not. i mean, through the whole date, conversation felt forced and there just wasn't any real connection. maybe i was just preoccupied from having a shitty day at work that day but i mean, i just couldn't get into this guy. i mean, i even "needed" a drink to feel more into it haha. and i hate to say this .. i actually started flirting with the waiter ... sooo bad. but again, i think the feeling was mutual, hence my question of if it would be rude to just nip it in the bud. would carrie have done that?
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in contrast, the other date i went on (now on the other side of the age spectrum at 40) was stupendous! i LOVED talking with this guy! he was funny, animated, all around conversant! he was "OK" looking ... a bit different than his picture would suggest .. but not bad for a 40 year old. anyways... the conversation was great ...we had beers then dinner and then came the time to say goodbye. i'm really bad at feeling out the situation in things like this so i tend to just let the other guy lead (well... i mean if i feel like i want to jet i make it obvious, but its usually when i like or kind of like the other guy for whatever reason, that i let him take the lead). to be honest, i think i would have gone home with him if he asked ... to make out you know, nothing really serious. but he was "gentlemanly" i dunno, and said goodnight, we had a short peck on the lips and went our own ways. not sure how to access the "success" of the date ... he gave me a text the usual three days later that said he had a good time but in general was vague and didn't suggest a second meet ... i replied with an equally vague text. i mean, he'd probably be no more than a friend i think ... there was a conversing "connection" but not one where i'd really want to throw him down and do him. which makes me wonder what then if the beautiful blond boy was just a physical connection?... he did have a sweet ass it turned out though ... haha!
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so there you have it ... a little sex and the city drama. you might be wondering ... god alex... just how many dates have you gone out on in the relatively past few weeks? well, i've always told people that my sex life (and my dating life) is often like rains in india ... drought... and then monsoon. and well... it's raining men here in houston.
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but any good sex and the city fan will know, that "sex" is really not at the core of what the show is about. it's about friendship. no not the fuck buddy situation friendship ... the real kind, the relationship between your peeps where you stand up for each other and support each other when you're down and depsite being potentially separated by vast distances, still believe that you are hearts beating very close to each other.
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in contrast to all the "sex" or lack of going on in my life, one thing has proven very consistent ... and that is my great friends. unfortunately, two of the best have decided that their stay in houston is coming to a close ... and god, there choice of new residence... i DO NOT UNDERSTAND. so kahl and andy are moving to saudi arabia.. well, technically they will be living in Bahrain and andy will commute into Saudi to work for Saudi Aramco. anyways... we have known for a "little" while that this was in the works, but when they dropped the bomb that they would be leaving at the begginning of July ... not even through the summer... that hit a little hard. i confessed something to kahl the other day and told him that i realized that maybe part of the reason i had so inactively tried to date... despite being probably well over ron by then ... was probably due to the fact that i was having so much fun with my friends, and felt such connection to some of them, kahl, andy, hector (the core) that having man to myself... really wasn't necessary. i mean i probably complained about being single, actually kind of bi-polarly if you look through previous post, but i think inside ... i really didn't feel the "need" to find "someone".
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it makes you think if my enthusiasm for dating of late is nothing more than something of a prescriptive maneuver subconsciously ... since i know that my social life will be significantly altered sans andy and kahl, that i'm searching for ...well... basically ... a replacement. maybe there is some validity to that... who knows.
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i do know that i feel like i will miss them horribly though. when i get into the mood of looking at strange coincidences in my life, i see things like how i was introduced to kahl and andy while my relationship with esau was going to shit, a few months after i broke up with ron, and now... almost strangely a full year after i became acquainted with them, they are leaving. maybe they were in my life for some purpose because for a long time i have to be honest, i haven't had friends that i wanted to do so much "for"... you know? i loved how they returned just as much warmness and hospitality and just friendliness as i felt i dished out. it was just great all around. and another thing was how the two contrasted each other so much yet in some strange way youc ould also easily see them as just one entity. despite having its ups and down, i think their relationship is one to envy or if not envy, take note of ... here was a gay couple that at least to me contrasted to all the other couples where you knew of less than hmmm.... traditional... things going on.
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i guess out of my relationship with ron, i had some serious doubts about how love worked ... maybe... if anything, knowing kahl and andy gave me a little glimpse of that. its just a shame they are leaving is all. they have been really good friends. this upcoming week, the whole "group" is having a going away dinner for them... and not to sound sappy, i actually want to "say a few words" or what not ... ala psuedo wedding reception almost. i think sometimes friends don't actually say out loud enough times how much the relationship means to them. it would be nice to say it at least once with these two.
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but yes, like the girls who became women on sex and the city, their lives have taken them in various directions, one of them not even physically on the same side of the country anymore, but their hearts are always in the same place ... no, not new york city per se ... but in some strange ether that binds the hearts of friends together.
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i remember a silly saying i put on my senior page in high school ... another time in my life where i made some friends i feel i will keep a lifetime ...
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The act of friendship is where another person gives you a piece of his or her heart to fill up the hole left from gim him or her a piece of yours. We shall not be alone. We shall not be afraid.
Hot Tranny Mess : Gaycation 4.0
even though i haven’t been watching the latest season of bravo’s project runway where the phrase “hot tranny mess” apparently is accumulating great cache, my small knowledge of the workings of reality tv would suggest to me that the phrase “hot tranny mess” would not have half its cache unless it was uttered by certain person … in this case, a flamboyant young designer named Christian. Christian in a sense has become a "realty tv character" and being such embodies or typifies the whole cast of "characters" that were hodge-podged together into a “hot tranny mess” , aka my vacation to south beach and key west with two very good friends, who in a small attempt at protecting the not so innocent, i shall come up with pseudonyms for. so without furthere ado … the following is an account of the adventures of alex, carl, and eric. carl and eric decidedly will know who they are after reading the decidedly delicious recounting of a week of debauchery.
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pre-op tranny : the days leading up my vacation were characterized by a whole slough of weird occurrences. on the work front, it was somewhat bi-polar. since i left in the middle of the work week, i didn’t have the end of week rush but of course with my luck was still hit by an emergency that reared its head on tuesday at 4:00 pm (tuesday was my last work day that week mind you)… unfortunately, on the same day i also had a billion and one things to do, such as delivering my dog back and forth from the vet, dealing with a pest removal guy (i have raccoons in my house!), driving to Chinatown for lunch because i needed to do some personal paperwork with my accountant at the same time, having dinner with hector, packing for my trip, doing laundry for the trip before packing of course, and baking a freaking cake, etc etc ad infinatum. ok… so yeah the day before leaving for key west was a certifiable fucking hot tranny mess! i eventually got to bed at around 4 AM just to have to wake up 3 hours later to get to the airport … so undoubtedly the flight to Miami was pretty much a snoozer ... and thank god for that (also thank god that there were no delays or weirdness in flying as there often is with my luck).
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however, before i jump right into tranny operating, i will have to give an update to the slight change of lifestyle i was alluding to in the last blog entry. previously, i had mentioned three guys that i have sort of been “dealing with”… a clingy 21 year old, a refreshingly normal 25 year old, and a disastrously beautiful 32 year old. so i’ve gone out on two dates with the 25 year old and i have to say, there is a smidgen of connection, a decent chemistry on both a physical and personality level. i'm not sure if its exactly reciprocated though ... one of those, i dunno how he feels situations. its more than can be said for the 21 year old though, who unfortunately, i have to admit was “only” a decent lay … other than that, i really have no inclination to be around him. i’m such a louse of a man … but hey, i am a man right? anyways… 21 years old i realized really is a bit too young ... personality wise that is. furthermore, a recent occurrence has made me question even more if i’d really want to deal with the 21 year old further, but i’ll let you know about that in good time. i think i’d be up for another date with the 25 year old soon enough … but thats sort of complicated so we’ll see. and finally, even though i sort of lost track of the beautiful … and i mean beautiful ... 32 year old when i went on vacation, i immediately upon coming back re-connected with him. unfortunately, i found out that he is moving out of Houston soon! but he still wants to go on a date … so hey why not … i think he is very hot! and its not like i’m attached or anything! so i've got that on the cooker, we'll see what that will produce. AND … if you aren’t tired of hearing about this yet, i’ve met yet another hot young mess, aged 24 years, who i am going out with supposedly friday … he’s friendly, southern (from Tennessee!!), cute, and quite a sweet heart … so far. (oh yeah... so it's past friday now that i'm continuing to write this blog, and the said friday date never happened ... he's a bit weird and like many guys you meet off the internet ... your bullshit meter goes off a lot .... we'll see)
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the first cut is the deepest : upon getting off of the plane in miami , and walking out of the airport for a smoke, i immediately took in the amazing sight of sunny clear skies and palms trees up the wazoo … fuck it even smelled tropical. felt like i was in a fucking “tropical scent” air freshener commercial! i thought to myself, this vacation is definitely starting off on the right foot … i mean at least the weather is agreeable. since i was on the earliest flight into Miami out of the three muskateers, i had to wait for carl for about an hour or so. he finally got in and after our hello’s and it’s been so long’s, we immediately caught a cab, and gabbed about our lives while we were driven to our hotel. we found our hotel easily enough and upon checking in, we were refreshingly impressed about how non-disastrous the room was. now, the reason being for our concern was that on the website to which we made reservations, some of the comments of previous guests were quite well … vicious. so honestly we didn’t know what to expect. but you know, it wasn’t the four seasons but then again we didn’t pay $400 a night. the room was more than adequate. after settling our things down, we had a few hours to kill before eric came to, so carl and i made our way to the streets of south beach. basically we did some light street flanerie, walked on the beach, felt the warm sand around our toes, walked to the water’s edge and dipped our feet into the waves. man, is this paradise or what? we went back to the happening ocean drive, found a quaint little bistro, and had a snack and the first alcoholic drink of many many many that would follow.
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oh and of course, immediately, we noticed boys. boys boys boys! cute cute boys and well maybe not so cute ones as well. as the vacation developed, carl, eric, and i began giving nick names of sorts to the people we met on our vacation … and believe me, we ran into a ton of colorful characters as mentioned, ones that definitely deserved nicknames. anyways, the first hot boy (guy with red shorts sexily showering) was gorgeous … classic Miami latino gorgeousness and hunkiness.. then there was a disastrously cute waiter who unfortunately wasn’t serving us (instead we got the sketchy burn victim guy.. you see what i mean about nicknames?) carl and i eventually returned to the street, walked around some more, somehow came about a cute little pedestrian street called Espanola Way and summarily plopped ourselves down and had some more drinks. at this time in the trip i still thought it might be worth having some reserve about drinking (at least during the day)… but i would realize soon enough that that was a pipe dream. after Espanola Way, it was getting close to the time eric would be coming in, so carl and i decided to head back. a little funny story happened along the way that entailed me talking about how disgusting it was that people walked barefoot on the street and then 15 minutes later, have my own flip flops completely bust and therefore be forced to go barefoot … for 10 blocks. this was also the moment i think, that i learned of the phrase “hot tranny mess”. i was for sure, a hot tranny mess sans cheapo flip flops. we got back to the hotel and summarily decided to drink some more being inspired by others on/in the “solarium” of the hotel (it was a roof deck with a jucuzzi and some tables and chairs).
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we were soon joined by eric and after some hugs and hello’s and its been a long time’s, the three of us took showers, pimped ourselves out in uber gay fashion, and then headed to a fabulous dinner. dinner was indeed fabulous i have to say … with really delicious conversation … of distinctly sexual coloring. let’s just say that we learned new things about each other that i don’t think we ever expected. i specifically remember what carl said he did in savannah … OMG! haha, the idea of TMI totally went out the window during the vacation. i mean usually, i don’t personally give it too much deference because i don’t find sex in its various permutations (amongst mutually consenting sane adults) to be shameful or weird at all, so i therefore tend to share maybe a bit to much about what i’ve done and what i think. but with this trip, i think it was strategically used to learn all the shit and nasty on my two vacation buddies … at the end of the trip, i might wager that i was the one who walked away a proverbial angel! haha..
so after a fulfilling dinner and a really strong lychee martini, we went to this bar called "halo" that eric knew of its sister incarnation in DC. halo was cute, not too packed ( i mean it was wednesday night) but there was some talent ... especially the bartender. yum. after a few drinks, we then moved to a bar/ club called "twist", which again was eric's suggestion. it was amusing seeing how eager eric was about going to some places that he had "researched". anyways... twist turned out to be well... interesting. concept wise it was kind of cool, basically seven bars strung together via sketchy little corridors. most of the bars were pretty dead except the back bar filled with hunky dancers all in black speedos. what made this bar interesting though was not only did the dancers show off their stuff on stage, apparently their rotating shifts included working the crowd, coming onto un-suspecting guys and offering "massages" or simply "lap dances" or... if they weren't getting any luck there, simply asking for "tips". man... the life of a miami dancer. sometimes it makes you wonder if being good looking is that worth it. guess it just depends on what your opportunities are. anyways, carl and i both got "hit on" in the course of the evening ... while eric seemed to be actively hitting on the dancers haha! no, actually eric did get hit on repeated ... like many many times .... by this guy we called "uranus" because apparently when asked where he was from ... answered as such. you're just asking for it then you know! so uranus guy wouldn't leave eric alone so there was the first of many amongst friends, dude... pretend to be my boyfriend ... haha! i did happen to get hit on funnily enough actually twice but as my luck is with these things ... its usually en route OUT of a bar or club that this happens. what's a boy to do?
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so feeling we had just inhaled in a few STDs at twist, we decided that that was enough for our first night, we didn't want to go all the way just now of course. an amazingly delicious late night pizza snack and a shower later, our first day in paradise finally came to an end.
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our second day in miami started at the decent hour of like uh... noon. we hit the beautiful BEAUTIFUL beach which was literally a 5 minute walk away, first getting a rejuvenating breakfast, looking at boys boys boys, and then finally finding a nice spot on the beach to try to get a tan. we each had varying levels of success with this endeavor i have to say. eventually i think i came away from the whole vacation with a nice glow that lasted a few days .... but then again, i'm the darkest of the three to begin with ... i'm just glad i didn't burn is all! haha. carl got a nice bronzing but being as white as he is, i think he rocked the tan ... for a day. eric is snow white as far as i am concerned, and he remained wonder bread throughout the trip ... to his chagrin. on the beach though, we definitely found some people that would have put us to shame ... but hey, they are probably natives and sit in the sun everyday! it was a beautiful beach though, and the water was so perfect!
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starting to feel the "tingle" of impending skin cancer, we decided to call it quits. we each had some respective errands to run so we took our leave of each other. i had to go find a bank, which i never did, and to get flip flops, remember the hot tranny mess the day before? carl eventually joined me for that and we kind of hung around together and then met up with eric. this evening, we again got pretty ... carl let me do his hair ... and i have to tell you... he was hot with a psuedo faux hawk... yummilicious! then we mozied ourselves to a even more fabulous resturant called Tantra. it was fantatsic... kind of indian fusion hip place that carpets its foyer in REAL grass... haha... sort of smelled like a barn though. haha. anyways, it was a great GREAT meal and kind of blew the bank... but whatever, its vacation! and again, it was nice ocnversation ... slightly a little more tame bacuse we were placed in the table literally in the center of the room, either the dork table or the hot boys table, i choose to believe the latter.
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we left the restaurant and started walking towards the two bars that uranus guy's friend had mentioned to us, a place called palace and then a place called score. palace we never found, but we soon found score ... and to our chagrin, it had been seized by lesbians.... eeewwww! this became a laughable, sort of "theme" of our trip ... crazy lesbians who were intent on ruining our vacation and all gay mens' vacations for that matter! i mean ... they took over a gay bar! sulking, we plopped ourselves down at halo again, which was actually a little better than the night before and the talent majorly improved. there were so many nicknames flying around that night! the high point of my night in some way was being able to talk to one of the HOTTEST guys in the bar, whom eric and i were totally scoping, and the guy totally knew we were, and loved it. i went out for a cigarette and while smoking, someone asked me for a bum, i was like whatever, and then handing the cigarette to him, i realized it was HOT guy! haha, i chatted him up for a few and luckily enough found out where the shit was happening that night.
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oh, at halo, we also met four other characters added to this hot tranny mess. a threesome we termed the DC Trio whom will eventually come in and out of our vacation drama because strangely enough they had almost the same itenrary, that is going (and leaving) Key West at the same time. they even had the same return flight as eric. anyways, carl was a gab whore and all he could do was talk to our new friends, especially one we ended up calling the scottsman (earlier in the night) and then viper chipmunk (later in the night). the dc trio composed of an entertaining, yet loud italian twink (actually they were all twinks) named enzo, who despite rubbing me the wrong way at first, turned out to be the most endearing of the three. the other two we called birdboy because well he looked like a bird... and apparently a silent bird at that, and the last we called paul newman (at first... because he looks liek paul newman). so after i found out where to go from the hot guy outside, us seven mozied over to the place ... called "buck fifteen", whatever that is suppose to imply.
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it was PACKED! it felt almost like a frat party funny enough... a gay frat party that is! and like your frat brothers back in college, within five minutes of getting to the place, they leave you with strangers and go off to do the nasty. carl took his little boy toy viper chipmunk into the corner to make out ... or something. and eric became a sleezy ho and stalked the crowd, focused on a dude we met in line we termed "the rock"... because well... he looked like "the rock". so i was stuck entertaining the dc trio, which was ok at the time, because i sort of was into paul newman and was chatting him up a bit. i could tell it wasn't really going anywhere though, but whatever, the music was really good and i had a good time dancing. eventually carl came over and told me that "they" were leaving... aka him and viper chipmunk. honestly a little taken aback at first, i figured its vacation and if carl wants to go home with a viper chipmunk, that's his fun. so me and eric were left since the DC trio had decided to call it quits as well. as anyone who's gone to a gay club will know, the later it gets, the way more sketchier it gets... drugs, sex, etc. eric was being adamant about making "the rock" acknowledge his existence (albeit "the rock" already saying that he had a boyfriend... with him right there!) ... so i decided not to cock block eric and left. the walk home was a little depressing to be honest ( i mean i've had just been psuedo ditched by mud peeps) but my spirits were picked up immediately relishing on that same pizza we had the night before. i thought that i would just be hitting the sheets without much fan fare, but as i was just getting ready to go to bed, eric walks in having given up the chase as well without any game (the club became even too sketchy for him when people were passing around bumps of coke) and soon enough carl walked in, but with an interesting story that entailed potentially missing bits and pieces of himself ( the usual pieces you know ... like self respect ... haha! just kidding, i mean who goes out on the town with it anyways?? ).
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open that bitch up : the next morning, we left miami without much ado except for a funny incident. after we had gotten the rental car and soon found out that the exit to the highway to key west was blocked (literally blocked) by some party ... we figured of course it must be a lesbian party since we were convinced they were out to get us! the road trip itself was relatively uneventful except for a moment where we all thought we would die from starvation : if there is one thing i know, it is when to eat to avoid hunger ... the boyz should have listened to me! we eventually relished the last snack bar that eric kept in his bag... that and gum satiated us for a bit longer, until we came upon a restaurant. anyways, the rest of the drive to key west was beautiful indeed ... it was so nice to see actually blue water again ... the gulf of mexico near houston is more brown and green. we got into key west easily enough, found our rental cottage (so cute!), and simply just hung out and rested for a while.
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carl got it in his head to go for a run, and so i accompanied him. it was a great run, and it got a chance for us to show the key westians our hot sweaty bodies... haha, yeah. after the run, we met up again with eric and we got ready to go to dinner ... a cutesy mexican place where we talked about... well, guess what ... sex and boys .. big surprise. after dinner we then went on our entertaining bar crawl of sorts for the evening. the thing about key west we realized, is that the selection in bars... and in hot men... was quite quite quite limited. i mean, we kept thinking and asking ... where are the hotties, but conversely in was kind of nice ... to be.... the hotties. haha.
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it was almost comical, that with every bar we went to in search of something more entertaining than the first one we went to (Bourbon Street Pub), things got sketchier and sketchier .... it actually sort of felt like new orleans southern decadence in a way... very seedy. we actually were in this one bar for maybe two minutes and i went to look for the restroom, i came upon a curtained doorway in the back where i assumed led to the bathroom... upon entering i see one of the patrons getting blown by i guess one of the "dancers" ... great! oh excuse me. haha. we summarily left. haha.
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but that wasn't the end of the festivities that evening for sure. we weventually ended up staying at bourbon street pub for the rest of the evening / morning, because despite its lameness, it was the least sketchy bar while we were sober... as the night progressed and i got more and more drunk, well, everything was fun and its a surprise i didn't end up in that curtained off area in teh other bar. again we met so many characters! right after dinner, we met the "latin princess" who we eventually found out was part of the group that was doing "naked boys singing" in key west. hey we met famous people... woooo. he was loud, but fun ... think enzo on steroids. people in general were friendly i have to say, very friendly. my cold shoulder treatment aka new york attitude, came off a bit harsh to some people apparently ... whatever, there really wasn't that many people i cared to talk to anyways. anyways, the one thing i can think of that typified that friday night in key west for me was "disappointment in men" .... go figure right? what else is there to know about gay men?
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so it all started when we were going to meet up with the dc trio ... again. i personally was looking forward at giving another shot to mr. paul newman... who was so cute, so americana corn fed yumminess! anyways, i guess i set myself up for that one putting him on such a pedastal which he immediately tumbled down from once we met at the bar, and within 2 minutes of saying hello he goes off and hooks up with some seriously nasty dudes. ok, from that moment on, "paul newman" got renamed into "double dicking slutty whore boy".... haha... since he was hooking up with two (nasty!) guys. whatever, what did i see in him to begin with? but he wasn't the ONLY disappointment.... no, i also eyed a yummy "leather daddy" ... who although hot and maybe checking me out too ... decided to dance and of course danced like a girl. he was hotter just standing still. and sexy yummy "chemistry teacher" dancer turned out to be not so hot even though he liked showing his dick because he was balding .... that pretty much does it in for me, no friar tuck "halo" for me please. if any of this doesn't make sense to you, don't worry it doesn't for me as i typed this... haha. it was such a fun night.
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if there was eveer a moment in my life that i drank to forget my troubles, i think it was that night. taken aback by having my perfect boy paul newman disintegrate in front of my very eyes, i honestly felt kind of shitty ... and so i drank. now i don't usually drink when i felt shitty, but it was the only thing i could think of to do that night ... so from being lightly buzzed, i was on the sharp slope of falling into drunken oblivion. my lot in life though has made me have almost impeccable memory even when completely drunk. so i remember the details of carl staying with me most of the time, while i pumped first loads and loads of self-deprecating chatter out about myself, and then, when the shit really hit the fan, just loads and loads of vomit. interspersed somewhere was stumbling to cvs for more cigarettes and then flopping like a fish out of water on the bathroom floor.
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i don't think i have EVER vomited that much in one go!
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despite not being the best way to end an evening of revelry, i will tell you one thing. throwing all that vile stuff up, was the only reason why the next morning ... when i luckily woke up, i felt really like a new man. i felt so good i went for a fucking run, and then cooked breakfast for the boys. i had not an ounce of cynicism about men and whory boys left in me ... it had all been thrown up out. thank god for good friends who put up with that drunk shit.
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the second day in key west resembled our second day in miami ... that is... BEACH time! it was great.... we went to this beach called smather's beach where funny enough we saw the greatest concentration of hot boys we had yet to see in key west, unfortuantely they were all straight. but oh well, we were willing to settle for just eye candy nowadays. anyways, smather's was lovely, the sand was beautiful, there was palms trees for light shade, the sky was clear and it was sunny and warm, and there was refreshing ocean breeze! fucking nirvana dude. the water itself was interesting as there was a broad shelf that was covered in seaweed that if you trudged gingerly through (it was like walking in slimy quicksand) you came upon the small outcropping where you could sit in the water and it was just enough to cover your mid torso. the water was clear there and it was just so beautiful. a little moment with god so to speak.
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we boys worked on our varying degrees of tan-ness for about an hour or two and when things were starting to get kind of toasty we planned the rest of our day ... go shopping for groceries for a fabulous dinner (made by me of course!) and then have dinner, chill out, and then of course hit the bars ... again! right there and then i had decided to have a drinking respite that night since i was such a alcohol whore the night before .... and to my chagrin, the boys really took that to heart and got trashed themselves since of course now that i was designated nurse / drunk person shepherd. anyways, cooking dinner was a lengthy affair ... the kitchen in the cottage was certainly not Top Chef so it took me a while to get things done with my limited resources. but it was lovely dinner i will say myself. Peanut Satay chicken with sauteed peppars on jasmine rice. Sweet potato mash. sausage and cream cheese stuffed mushrooms. butter sauteed asparagus. butternut squash soup. pretty simple, a lot of the stuff semi-packaged ... but still oh so yummy. and its nice to impress the boys too and to thank them, especially carl for putting up with my silliness the night before (but knowing they'd be making such fools of themselves later that evening, i probably didn't have to cook them dinner to thank them).
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doctor, we have complications : so... after dinner, we rested for a bit and repeated the previous evening all over again. but this time, it was my turn to be sober. (not that it was really anybody's "turn" but since i was such a lush, somebody had to take responsibility). anyways ... a little quick update... in reality, it's like 2 weeks later ... so i need to wrap this bitch up.
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anyways, short story of the second night in key west basically involved us going to just the one bar that was not too sketchy. we actually didn't meet the corn-cobbers that night but that was ok because their were plenty of other characters. there were so many weirdo i think its best actually to just gloss all over them except for one particular character we will simply call ... "eric, you know he's a stripper" guy. so basicly eric was enraptured by a stripper at the bar who granted was cute... but come on ... he was a stripper. anyways, to be honest i was pretty patient the first night with these shennaigans and the second night i was pretty patient as well ... hell, i even gave both carl and eric dollar bills tos tick in the nasty dancers' underwear. the thing is though, eric didn't care he was a stripper, he has this "saviour complex" ... he wants to be fucking christ and change the "bad boy" good. you know... he will admit this too ... he takes the plot of the movie "trick" and imagines it to be actually ... like... real... life.
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so the boys drink and drink and drink some more. by 2 am, the sketch factor increased exponentially... and by that time, i actually had lost the taste for alcohol and actually for once stopped drinking. however, since i was the only sober one in a mile radius of the place, i got to see the national geographic show unfolding in front of me... especially the show of eric continuously trying to get the attention of the stripper... and it worked, but eric wasn't satisfied with the various nod of attention and such ... he wanted to go home with him ... and make the stripper an angel. haha. ok... so the thing is carl is getting kind of annoyed because he's drunk. we FINALLY leave the place maybe 2:30 ish i think and i swear it just went downhill from there!
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both of these boys are drunk, walking in different directions at different paces, and mutually annoyed at the other. somehow i coral them into denny's... someone suggested it and i figure some food would be good. now the funny drama is that after ordering eric says he needs to go home to get his "lactase" pills... and i'm like fuck ... there is only one of me you know. luckily enough some boys we met at the aforementioned bar stopped by and i pleaded with the guy... dude, do me a favor and just watch after my friend here while i walk with my other tenacious friend back home to get his fucking milk piils. AIYAH! and while we walking home, eric constantly is telling me he is fine and to go back and look after carl... yeah... right. he also trie dto walk ferociously fast (which really wasn't) figuring he could "lose me"... you know, drunk logic. we finally get home, get the pills, walk back to denny's and lo and behold carl is surrounded not only by the boys we met in the bar but also by a couple that eric was trying to get into a threeway with ... i guess the stripper didn't pan out ... depsite eric drunk dialing him telling him he wants to fucking meet... great! haha... the rest of the meal was pretty uneventful and interesting at the same time. it's like when your no gas light comes on while you are driving on the highway... everything in general is OK except you never know when the shit is really gonna hit the fan.
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post meal, we all make it back home, carl goes to the fridge and starts drinking a beer... great. and eric is trying to find various positions to get to bed ... first on the couch, then in a failed attempt to brush his teeth on the bathroom floor, and then in a failed attempt to charge his phone, on the floor next to his luggage... great! at least he wasn't moving anymore. carl had some shit to dish which actually went pretty smoothly and he took a shower and went to bed by himself easily enough ... i think in general he was more exhausted than drunk.
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so yes... i returned the favor from the previous night.
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clean up and close up : the last day and night in key west. time seemed to stand still strangely in key west. before i went, a co-worker mentioned a concept called "island time" ... basically that everything went so much slower. the thing is... i'm not exactly sure if it went slower ... but for some reason, after just three days in key west, i had the feeling that i had lived a lifetime almost there. it was very odd. anyways, the boys woke up without much incident the next morning, we had coffee and breakfast and the rest of the day was spent doing some actual tourist type things. we went to go see various "famous" houses in key west that overall was entertaining. we wrapped up the daytime with hanging out and watching the sunset ... which was cute. then we had a FABULOUS dinner at the place along the coast... it was very romantic, except you were with two other strictly platonic friends. the funny thing about this place was that eventhough the food was phenomenol... the service was a little weird... and again, we blamed the lesbians who apparently didn't believe people could have potato allergies and apparently were unwilling to subsitute rice for it ... and hostess whom feigned difficulty at finding your reservation when you could see it on the book yourself ... saying with some disdain ... i'll see what we can do for you. ha... great.
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so dinner was full and actually i think i would have been happy to just call it a night .... but well, eric really wanted to screw the stripper so third time in a row, we went back to bourbon street pub, where this evening we encountered the corn cobbers ... i summarily (and pretty obviously) dismissed paul newman aka double dicked slutty whore. i have a gift i've realized, of overtly dismissing people ... its the queen in me... haha. anyways, this was my last night in key west and in comparison to the two before regarding eric's fascination with the stripper whore, i was pretty catty tonight. actually both me and carl became snooty charlottes (from sex and the city)... tsk tsking at eric's behavior. the highlight of my experience in that bar was that carl and i actually chatted up the bartender who shared our tsk tsking and was actually quite a doll to chat with.
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it was actually sort of amusing how when i drink, i become very honest about my NEGATIVE opinions about other people... and very self-righteous as well. anyways, carl and i basically came to the conclusion that if eric wanted to go play screw the whore, that was his life, so we left the lovely bartender and us two called it a night ... at least at the bar. we continued our drinking trying to finish both beers and cigarettes back on our little vacation cottage deck being interuppted once by eric stumbling home... making me feel as if he was gonna give up... but later i found out he came home just to drop off his wallet to ensure that he wasn't going to end up paying for sex .... hmmm... great. as long as no money's exchanged, the dancer isn't a whore... just a slut. at the time all i knew was him saying it was hot and i assumed he was going inside for air conditioning ... when he left and didn't come back ... well, put two and two together.
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i had a great time with carl .. i love these little gaycations and this one was a little unique in the sense that i got chance to really learn a bit more about what's going through carl's mind and life and also of course to share my own trials and tribulations. it was good. eric, i love him as much as i can for having met him only three times or so in my life... but he's a character, and he's gonna have to walk down a certain path in life, that i wish (personally)he wouldn't ... but ... its his life. and by the way, eric didn't come home until eight the next morning and depsite having bits and pieces of the evening to piece together... i actually kind of don't want to do it.
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it was a little sad leaving key west. we cleaned up the house, ate a little breakfast, had coffee, and got our car ... relatively unceremoniously left the place and hopefully did not bring anything back except good memories with good friends... and some characters. the drive back was fairly ordinary except for realizing that miami's roads are completely incomprehensible and illogical. we finally found the car return place and made it to the airport. we said our goodbyes and i hoped to not have to wait another year to see them both again. my flight back to texas was uneventful thank god and that evening i tidied up my home a bit and actually took it easy as i had given myself two more days off after returning.
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gaycation v4.0 ... complete hot tranny mess ... but with good friends ... everything is good.
Back in the Game
OK, blog readers, buckle up buttercup, because this is gonna be a juicy entry! i’m going to kick it off right and just go to the skinny and admit to you a little secret of mine. well, its really not much of a secret, at least to friends around Houston, but i guess since the blog is read mostly by friends a bit further away … it might comes as a bit of a shock. the secret is … that basically until relatively recently, i haven’t gotten laid in “like forever”. now, i bet you’re wondering … god?! was that a secret?!! haha… well, the simple fact is that i hadn’t hooked up or even gone out on a date even since last year around Halloween or so. chalk it up to simply being busy (holidays and parties galore last “season”) or traveling (china, hong kong, and japan) or simply just not being in the mood … the past half year has been a bit of the doldrums in the bedroom.
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the funny thing is, the past few weeks, more or less since my birthday funny enough .. it has been far from the doldrums … more like a nice April shower … that brings May flowers!! haha… yeah whatever. i have always described my sex life like rains in india or some weird place like africa … it’s either “drought” or “monsoon/flood”. another way of seeing it is that in the past say 6 weeks (more like 3 weeks really), i’ve gotten laid more than i have in the past 6 months, or really in the past year actually. so yeah … i’ve been busy. mind you i am not just opening up my legs for every Tom, Dick, and Harry (haha!... all depends on your definitions i guess) but i am also trying to go on “serious” dates to get to know one another more .. at least a little before prying open legs.
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of course, with every sea change of lifestyle so to speak, i like to ruminate on number one, why the previous condition occurred, and two, why the current condition occurred or is occurring. to answer question one, i go back to the notion that it was a mix of basically being busy with “life” in general and also being not particularly interested in guys. but come on alex, not even getting some ass .. you are still a man right? yes, i am, and its not like i didn’t get horny from time to time. but i dunno, for a while, there was a notion in my head that i didn’t want to entertain hooking up just for the sole pleasure of doing so … that everything that could be physical could only be so after a mental / psychological connection … or basically, i didn’t want to sleep with anyone unless i really thought they were worthwhile dating material seriously. however, a lot of people will admit that this is often an impasse in the gay search for love of course.
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oh well, but slowly (or maybe not so slowly), i’ve sort of molted that shell and have had a much more relaxed so to speak view of sex and love of late. taking a pulse at the moment, i’d still have to admit that finding a “boyfriend”… or god, just someone that is fun to date, is the goal right now … but my attitude towards just “meeting” people for “fun” .. is like i said, much more relaxed. an interesting hybrid i have been trying out of late is basically the cross of the fast and dirty, “come over and lets fuck” hookup and the full blown “lets go on a date” hookup. this version is the “let’s meet for drinks, get some liquid courage, and then go back to my or your place” .. so technically its not a “random” hookup, but its far from the expectations of a real date where we pretend to not want to give it up so easily.
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how do i feel about that though? well, maybe that’s the best way to show my attitude towards the “game” at the moment … in short, i don’t have really any feeling about it. its sort of sense of acceptance of the “game of play” that pervades my quest for sex or love at the moment. the core thing is that there’s great fluidity … if i get the sense that a potential partner wants to play the “dating” game, rules are drawn up for that, and i go on first dates that end in nothing racier than a long hug. and if a boy is hitting me up online at 3AM wanting to come over and blow me … well, then its pretty obvious that the word “dating” is not the first thing on his mind (but of course i have also realized that real relationships (be they successful or not eventually) can evolve from plain and simply “booty calls”). the thing is … EVERYTHING is game now and i have little expectation for things.
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in some ways it sounds pessimistic … as if i was so jaded by the “game” that i’ve acquiesced to the “game” and am letting it take me for a ride because i can’t help myself. in contrary, right now, i feel in decent control of my situation, and i believe i am actually enjoying the potential polyvalent nature of the game of love and sex, sex and love, sex with love, love with sex, etc, etc. instead of pessimism, i see it as a variation of optimism and open-ness… a belief that you can “love” in many different guises and that love itself shifts masks all the time. at the core of things, there is a kernel of hope that someone out there can be mine, and only mine … there is “hope”. in contrast, the past few months probably have been more typified by a reluctance to “get out there” because i didn’t want to risk being hurt… because I didn’t feel like entertaining the notion of “possibly” being happy with another was worth the potential downside. in some ways, now i have rewrote the pathways of exchange, or the currencies of love, in the sense, that i’m trying to negate all sense of potential debt, and saying that its trade itself … an economy of love, where the denominations can indeed include kissing, touching, sucking, and fucking … that generates its own value.
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how that really works, i have no idea. i was always bad in economics, but like china dipping its proverbial toes in the waters of the free market, there’s the sense of openness and the value of simply having it … despite what may happen.
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so on the radar of late, there have been “blips” that involve a devastatingly cute 21 year old (am i kidding myself?! see how “open” i am?) that flakes out on actually meeting (of course) but seems quite happy and content to simply flirt, a handsome 25 year old Apple nerd tech junkie who is articulate and kisses well (amongst other things) and who shares a palpable love of travel and cultures like i do, and a hopefully promising 32 year old with beautiful blue eyes who i’m crossing my fingers returns my emails soon. that of course are the “dating” blips; they themselves have been floating in a sea of much less definable and loosely associated “other” blips. i’ll leave that to your imagination.
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chalk it up to the summer heat!
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All About Face
hey blog reader. it's been a relatively quite week. one more and a half to go before Gaycation 4.0. woohoo... can't wait! nothing of real importance has come about this week or last i think except for finally getting snared into the phenomena of "Facebook". actually, back at Harvard i was already on Facebook, but being more of a Friendster user, i decided to just let the profile sit idol and really didn't accept any "requests" for "friends". well, that all changed in a heartbeat, and there's sort of a funny reason why actually. one really late night i was just surfing around and out of nowhere i started thinking about this guy i sort of psuedo dated back at harvard and we ended up hooking up (only once ... sigh!) anyways, a little bit after coming to houston we sort of on and off chatted online still but then for the longest time i haven't heard from him (since for the longest time i kind of took a break from being online and all). so... i was thinking ... i wonder what he's up to now. so i admit it ... i googled stalked him. didn't find much but did find an electronic business card so to speak so i know where he works... woohoo. anyways, what i really wanted though was to see something of a picture, so i immediately thought... online communities.... Facebook?
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now i didn't go to Friendster because i knew from before that he had removed his profile from that service. now... you might ask... why did i need his picture so bad. people who know me well (well, now everyone who reads this) knows that i keep basically a "list" of all the guys i've hooked up with. its sort of a "book of shame" or more pragmatically, a "paper trail/contact list" if i had ever really fucked up and got "something" from fucking around. i'm all about notification in that situation ... keeping a list is useful ... and despite not really entering that many entries in a while, there was a time that it was a "constant" ritual.
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so i went on to Facebook and typed his name and voila ... he's on there. now the thing is since i had to log on it somehow occured to me... well, why don't i just make a "real" profile. i mean, my friendster profile although still up is pretty much defunct so i decided, what the hell. i spent teh next hour or so (late into the night where i should be sleeping!) and made up a fun little profile, added pictures, etc ... and of course .... requested his friend link. i didn't really know if he would accept it or not but a few days later, he accepted it and asked how i was doing.
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it was fun looking into at his profile after he accepted my request, to my chagrin, in the time since i last talked to him, he had landed himself a boyfriend, complete with yucky cutesy picture of him and his boyfriend on his page. oh well ... i mean, i had landed a boyfriend too in that time but of course, we know how yucky and cutesy that relationship was. i was kind of peeved i have to say , as to be honest, i had a semi crush (scroll to "In the Mood For Love") on this boy, ok... a full blown i wanna have your babies crush haha. and now he's with someone else when he could have totally been with me haha... if i had stayed in boston after graduating HAHA! oh well, there was something short and sweet about our little love affair. it was one of those weird relationships totally based on flirtation .. a protracted 6 month of woo-ing (and ahh, ahh, ahhing) that even after we had consummated it, the electricity was still thee (and the actual sex not too shabby either! ahh ahhh ahh) .
anyways, long story made short ... i got a few pictures for my book of shame... nice ... number XYZ guy taken care of (what you actually thought i was going to tell you a number?!)
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oh yeah, also reconnected with people i use to know ... like Webb School people... whoa! also finally have a forum to post up pictures of shit. blogger deespite its wonderfulness, sucks at the whole picture upload thing ... Facebook is so much more stable, faster, and easy to access.
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