The Renaissance of Men

It's pretty widely accepted that gays are always on the cusp of the latest trend. Somehow the gay man is the divining rod for the direction of hair and fashion. In the late nineties into the turn of the millenium what gays had been doing for eons the heteros were starting to notice. We were being watched. Somemehow heterosexual men caught on to the idea that if you have a nice haircut, great clothes, manicured nails, and maybe even wear a tiny bit of makeup you can get the hottest chicks. Basically they discovered that the ladies like the way the gays looked, felt, and smelled so they started to emulate them. Metrosexuality was born.

Soon every woman in America was demanding that her beau become more like a sissy by visiting the salon on a regular basis to get the same kind of maintenance she was accustomed to. Facial hair, body hair, non-designer label jeans, non DKNY euro trash t-shirts, and cross trainer sneakers were banished from the heterosexual closet. All of this was brought to full fruition by America's favorite eunuchs the Fab 5 of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy.

Evidence is now mounting that the gays are in the midsts of another transition. Jim over at Texas Stream of Consciousness read in a recent edition of New York magazine that the somewhat fringe Bear culture seems to be making a foray into the gay mainstream. This has been corroborated by a New York blogger over at Meanwhile. Both the magazine and the blogger cite similar examples of the transition. Meanwhile states in a November 15 entry "Number of formerly screaming gay "twinks" at my gym who, in 2005, have become "bears:" Forty." I personally find it difficult to imagine the trendsetting Chelseaites would trade in their chiseled undernourished overmedicated plastique bodies for softer rounder models. But truth is stranger than fiction and we might see an emergence of reverse liposuction (lipoblowing?) in order to achieve the new look. What I do find more practical is that the hairlessness of the previous age is fading and giving way to the return of facial hair and body hair.

It would be nice if even gap jeans, sneakers, and t-shirts from Target became part of the gay wardrobe in addition to the facial and body hair but I think I'm hoping for too much. The only way that would happen in Dallas is if the great and powerful Oz, a hybrid of Nieman Marcus and D Magazine, told the heard to do so. I actually prefer that my partner and I are some of the few that are accidentally on the uber-progressive end of the spectrum.

Lately it has been near impossible to determine gays from straights or even men from women. I will find it highly amusing that if in the coming months gay men will be identified as having beards and wearing more casual attire. The straight men will precipitate out of the crowds due to thier overly coiffed nature and gays will once again be able to recognize their own in the public arena once again.

Le Match De Basket

Last night I went out with some friends from work to the Mavericks game vs. the Spurs. It was a a terrific game. The score stayed real close the entire time and we almost had the Spurs beat in the last 20 seconds but it wasn't meant to be. I kinda figured they were gonna lose since they beat the Toronto Raptors by the skin of their teeth on Tuesday night. I mean c'mon a team like the Mavs shouldn't be neck and neck with the Toronto Raptors. That plus the fact that they beat the Spurs the last time they played it was meant to be this way.

It was my first time to American Airlines Center since moving to Dallas and I was really impressed at the enormity of the space. Its been a while since I've been in one of the newer arenas that have been built in the nation in the past couple of years. I think Brad and I will be going to more games since we live so close the arena. We had the cheap seats all the way up in the rafters but the view was surprisingly excellent. I don't see why you'd want to pay more unless you really had to be closer. Next week I'll be at the Dallas Stars hockey game on Wednesday night. I haven't been to a hockey game in so long; I'm really looking forward to it.

Administrative Garbage

Just some quick administrative blog garbage. I added my AIM handle to the sidebar under my email link. When I'm on AIM it will light up. Feel free to IM me I really enjoying chatting with people so don't be shy. Also I've added a creative commons license to my blog. Its something that all you other bloggers should look into. We all have really interesting stories to tell and they would all make terrific magazine articles, books, and Lifetime movies. Its a good idea to claim your blog as your own original work just to make sure that when that wild night you had that ended up with you laying in the gutter with your thumb up your friend's ass gets turned into a third tier made-for-TV movie that you get the proper credit for it. You can check out the licenses available at Creative Commons. Oh you can also license your photos for those of you that have flickr accounts as well.

Here are some pictures from the game. Although my eyes are kinda halfway shut stoner style I really like the picture, it amuses me. Now that its cold I live in this hoodie.

Like I said we were up in the rafters.


The junk food was deeeelicious!

World AIDS Day

December 1 is World AIDS Day. The website for the day focuses more on the red ribbon and doesn't make much mention of the facts so I will do it for them.
-25 million people have died from complications related to AIDS since its discovery in 1981.
-It is estimated that 40.3 million people are infected with HIV and 4.9 million people were infected in 2005 this year.
-3.1 million people have died this year from complications due to AIDS.

Some good news to report is that HIV infection rates are falling in sub Saharan African nations according to a UN commissioned survey. More good news is that the HIV vaccine is in Phase II of clinical trials and the results seem promising. More information about the vaccine here.

Remember to get tested frequently and to practice safer sex all the time. It only takes one encounter to contract HIV so be consistent when practicing safer sex. If you know someone that is living with HIV/AIDS take them out for dinner or lunch, call and say hi, or just give them a hug.

AIDS is something that we should be aware of every day and don't forget its not about sporting a red ribbon. It's about people.

Alas, poor Woodward! We knew him America.

Arianna Huffington wrote a fantastic blog post today Bob Woodward, the one time investigative reporter and half of the duo who exposed one of the biggest presidential scandals of all time.

Huffington took the words right out of my mouth with her post. Bob Woodward was once to me a man who was an example of what the media ought to be. He was responsible for exposing a scandal of such magnitude that all scandals thereafter would be compared to. Bob Woodward had a place in my mind as a member in a pantheon of journalistic gods. He was an American hero. If anybody could expose the truth behind the Bush-Cheney cabal it would be Bernstein or Woodward. However, the powers that be are alchemists; able to transmute wrong into right and hero into subservient slave.

Huffington writes that Woodward was granted "unparalleled access" to president Bush in order to write books on the administration. His time with the president and the administration ranges from before Bush was inaugurated right up to the proverbial Guns of August. He sat in on numerous conversations with high ranking senior administration officials and the president. The information that Woodward was privy to, the information that he knew then and he knows now could probably blow the roof off the White House and cause the collapse of the establishment. Huffington goes on to point out that Woodward chose a different path and that he is "so awed by his proximity to power that he buys whatever he is being sold." She points out examples of Woodward's reporting style which can only be summed up as anecdotes that one might hear from a stalker who eroticize the idiosyncrasies of their prey. Banal factoids that neither illuminate or conclude anything about the administration and the president.

Then, in the past weeks, we all learn, that Bob Woodward had heard the name Valerie Plame. He knew that she was a CIA agent and wife of Joseph Wilson, a man who presented a logical and conclusive argument against the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. All this he knew because of his access and did he report it? No. Huffington points out that Woodward had the audacity to say on the Jim Lehrer show in the spring of 2004, at which point the Valerie Plame affair was in full swing, that he witnessed "moral determination, which we've not seen in the White House maybe in 100 years." Can you believe the impertinence of such a comment when he himself had heard and witnessed the outing of a CIA agent by White House officials, an act nothing short of treason?!

It could be possible that if Woodward would have divulged the conversations he sat in on, transcribed, and witnessed he could have affirmed his place in history. He could have done so by exposing a fabricated and ill conceived plan to invade a nation that posed no immediate threat to our nation. Instead he chose to keep quiet and report on innocuous goings on in the administration in the midst of the planning of a preemptive illegal war. No mention of right or wrong, he never once hinted or suggested that the president or the administration was going in one direction or the other. Huffington even ventures to "wonder what All the President's Men would have been like if Woodward had written it alone."

Why? My english teacher junior year in high school, one of the most amazing teachers I have ever had, taught us that when doing critical thinking or analyses you must not explain how or what but why. It seems that Woodward no longer posses his ability to preform such thought. Woodward at one point was a name that was synonymous with exposing injustices and delivering the truth to the people. When I had heard that Woodward knew about the treason committed by this administration and had only just broken his silence I was shocked and gravely disappointed. Huffington suggests that Woodward is just a "dumb blonde of American journalsim." I see something not so trite. It seems to me that the black shadow cast by this president and this administration has has managed to taint one of our nations one-time treasured guardians of justice.

I wonder if that when Woodward goes to bed at night knowing what he knows does he think about the thousands of innocent civilians and the thousands of young American men and women that have perished due to his inaction. When he works in his office and glances over at his two Pulitzer prizes does he think about how he played party to one of the greatest deceptions of this nation and world. I wonder if his conscience is still somewhat in tact to even comprehend the deafening and destructive ripples of his silence. Even if it was intact and he suddenly came to his senses and exposed all that he knew, it would be too little too late.

Exposed

Nathan, over at Nathan Exposed, suggested this idea of exposing yourself by posting a picture from inside your home and explaining it to everyone on your blog. Well here it is.



This is our living room and it's my favorite place in our apartment. It's very cozy and as you can see we have it all decorated for the holidays. We spend most of our time here watching TV, reading, playing cards, or just talking. One of my favorite things to do though is to get take out food and eat it off the coffee table while sitting on the floor while watching a movie. There is something about doing that that just feels so great. It's inexplicable.

You can see on the wall behind our couch a Roy Lichtenstein print. We are both fans of pop art and surrealism and we really enjoy Lichetenstein's "WHAAM!" On the adjacent wall we have an original work by a friend of a friend. Its Edward Hopper's "Nighthawks" but its been invaded by Barbie dolls. Underneath the image it says, "When will it end?" Below the Barbie invasion is a lamp that belonged to my late brother, Douglas. He picked out that lamp for his bedroom when he moved to Arizona with my family and that's one of the reasons why I treasure it. The other is that its actually a Spanish-colonial candelabra with a copper lampshade that has tiny pinholes in it.



My absolute favorite thing in our living room is our coffee table. Its an old table that used to belong to the mother of Brad's ex. The legs were sawed off to make it an appropriate coffee table height. Brad had it when I met him five years ago and I immediately noticed it when I entered his apartment. Under the glass were tons of ticket stubs, photos, fortunes, magazine clippings, business cards from restaurants, you get the idea. I loved it. We've since added our own stuff to the table and still kept some of the original content. It's a nice conversation piece and its a great way to remember all of the places we've been together and the memories we've had.

One more thing. Above our fireplace is a framed promotional poster for David Bowie's "The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and The Spiders From Mars." It wasn't really possible for me to photograph it. We're both David Bowie fans and we really enjoy having him in all of his glam glory over our fireplace.

Intermezzo

Well the thanksgiving holiday is over and we've entered the time of year I like to call Intermezzo; the time in between thanksgiving and christmas. Its mostly a time of stress. Stress caused by buying gifts, sending cards, making plans, breaking plans, and remaking the same plans that you broke earlier in the week.

In order to avoid some of that stress I've decided to do all my shopping via amazon this year. My sister, in her infinite wisdom, has already arranged that her tribe make amazon wishlists. This works out splendidly for me because now I know what they want and I can just have it sent from amazon and I don't have to set foot in a store. I organized all of my sibs and their significant others to buy an iPod nano with an inscription for mom, so she's taken care of. My dad I can get virtually anything and he'll love it, he loves anything that his children give him especially if it is or related to food. Brother's and sisters, along with their legal spouses, were sent foodstuffs from the Collin Street Bakery. Nieces and nephews are a cinch. My brother's partner loves to read anything and I'll just get him a book. My brother on the other hand is notoriously specific. Last year when I asked what he wanted for Christmas he told me he needed this. Yes that is Tiffany sterling silver flatware. More on my brother and his home in another post.

I cannot extoll the virtues of the wishlist concept enough, and I'm not saying all this because I'm an amazon associates member. The list can be made on amazon and then you can purchase the items elsewhere, the point is you have an idea of what each person would like to recieve. Life can be made so much easier around the holidays if you just buy people the stuff that they really want. It saves you the stress of agonizing over the question: should I buy this mowhair tanktop for my sister (hi heather) or a book of smoothie recipes in which each recipe calls for exotic fruits that will cost a fortune to procure. Everyone loses either way. The wishlist concept also ensures that you will not have to force your family member or friend to go to the mall after the holidays are over to return unwanted items. Its a win-win situation; your recipient loves the gift, you feel great for giving them something they actually wanted, you will be at one with the gods of commerce and capitalism. Finally, the thing that I like the most about the wishlist is you get to browse all the stuff on amazon and click "add to wishlist" for the items you like. The sensation is similar to purchasing and its oh so enjoyable.

Which one of these albums would you give this holiday season?

Photo of Rove:AP/Charles Dharapak.

Say It Sunday