Why Is It ...

… that when I look back at all the successes and failures in my life I cannot help but be proud that the potty training stuck

… that I wonder what life would be like if I didn’t overthink everything. I think about that all the time.

… that I am an adult the same way a lawn chair is furniture; I mean, it’s technically true but no one’s impressed and I’m not very stable

… that I lovelovelove when my mere presence pisses someone off

… that since gas has gotten so expensive I’ve decided I’m just gonna drink energy drinks and run everywhere

… that some of you have no idea that you aren’t worth the fuck that made you

… that in high school I could eat a Gordita Supreme and a dozen Krispy Kremes at midnight and lose three pounds but these days I go up an entire pant size every time I swallow my spit

… that when confronted with a problem my go-to mantra is, Whatever. Fuck it. I tried. Not worth it.

… that no one understands that I am happy to apologize for being a bitch as soon as they apologize for bringing the bitch out in me

… that I hate when people accuse me of lollygagging when I am quite clearly dilly dallying

Why Is It ...

… that some people have guardian angels while I have a racoon with a crowbar whispering, “Let’s make it worse.”

… that people don’t understand that the actual size of the fucks I don’t give can be seen from space.

… that no one remembers I was taught to think before I act, so if I smack the shiz out of you, rest assured that I have thought about it and am confident in my decision.

… that my new favorite game is Dodgeball but with random people that don’t know they're playing

… that people who are new at my job always ask me  how is it that I never get stressed working there and I always say, “Honestly, I’ve run out of energy to care anymore.”

… that I never take the high road when I could take the psychopath

… that you don’t realize that you cannot gaslight me because I will just agree with you. You think I’m insane? Same.

… that people need to know that if they feel some kind of way about me … awwwwww.

… that I am very aware of who the fuck I am, so people should stop asking.

… that people should be giving me a standing ovation for staying quiet instead of punching them in the face.

Why Is It ...

… that the other day I stared at the screen for several minutes and then announced, “God this show is boring,” and then heard my boss say, “This is a zoom meeting.” Still, I wasn't exactly wrong.

… that when someone yells stop, I don’t know if it’s “in the name of love,” or if it’s “Hammer time,” or if I need to “smell the roses.”

… that sometimes a yawn is so good you just gotta scream at the end.

… that when people tell me that I shouldn’t let the cats sleep in the bed with me, they don’t understand that I would lets our cats take a loan out in my name.

… that when people say I’m overthinking the situation they don’t realize that I have no other form of thinking.

… that my grocery list is always very simple … #1: Don’t run into anyone I know, and #2 Bread.

… that when someone is trying to offend me they don’t understand that my sense of humor is blacker than my coffee.

… that Taylor Swift could be performing live from my kitchen and I still wouldn’t go.

… that no one ever told me that when I got older the weather app would become part of my daily routine.

Why Is It ...

… that even though I often check myself, I tend to wreck myself?

… that I don’t have a “train” of thought but instead have seven trains on four tracks that narrowly avoid each other when their paths cross and all the conductors are screaming.

… that when I see the sign that says “Please See Cashier” I get right back into my car and find another gas station?

… when someone asks me what essential oils might best calm down my family, my mind instantly goes to chloroform?

… that when I invite people to my house for a party, they get upset that I really meant, ‘Come over and help me fold clothes’?

… that my boss hates when I bring a sort of ‘We should all quit’ vibe into the office?

… that whenever I see a Facebook ‘memories’ post of mine, I’m always wearing the same shirt … the one I have on right now?

… that there are days when coffee isn't enough, and I wish I could be struck by lightning?

Why Is It ...

… that the people who demand you say, ‘Merry Christmas,’ instead of ‘Happy Holidays’ the same people who worship the guy whose Christmas wish was ‘Rot in hell’?

… that a lot of attractive people suddenly become unappealing when you find out how they think?

… that whenever a Southerner tells me that it’s not ‘soda,’ it’s ‘pop,’ I always feel the need to ask them how many times they go to a bar and order ‘vodka and pop’?

… that sometimes when I can’t explain what I’m feeling I can find a song that can?

… that sometimes I’ll say ‘I don’t care’ about a proposition and then talk to myself about it for three days?

… that I wish people would be more grateful that I am not as disrespectful as I can be?

… that pickles are fantastic until you’re in one?

… that when someone tells me I’m cute, I think, ‘I’m feral and chaotic, so don’t touch me’?

… that I still don’t know what I’m wearing to the living room for New Year’s Eve so I might not even go?

Bobservations

Last week Carlos wasn’t feeling well, stuffy and sneezy and such. He thought he might have COVID so we got him a test. That night, as he readied to take the test he told me he didn’t think it was COVID because he still had his sense of smell.

“And I have taste, too.”

“Honey, you’re wearing crocs. You have no taste.”

He took the test; he was negative … for COVID and taste!

The GOP is so out of touch with what the People want; they ran on the border crisis, the fentanyl crisis, inflation, eggs,. Gas stoves and now all you hear is Hunter Biden. Vote Blue forever.

Prosecutors entered a Proud Boys handbook into evidence during one of the trials this week, and it outlines everything from the group’s ideology, communal initiation procedures, group songs and chants, to bizarre rules banning individual behavior including the wearing of fedoras … and masturbation.

“This is our religion. A Proud Boy may not ejaculate alone more often than once every thirty days […] if he needs to ejaculate it must be within one yard of a woman with her consent. The woman may not be a prostitute.”

The rule also denies an exception for cyber-sex with one’s wife and … Wait, forget about the rules on chicken joking, they have songs?? Are these just a bunch of radicalized showtune queens?

Embattled GOP Congressional Liar George Washington Carver Gershwin Santos told House Republicans that he will step down from his committee assignments because he’s a distraction.

Good first step, asshat, now step out of Congress.

I was walking past a farm the other day and a sign on the barn read, “Duck, eggs” and I thought that was an odd place for a comma.

Then it hit me.

I was feeling a little thought-provoking today, so here’s a question for y’all to answer.

The GOP-controlled House Oversight and Accountability Committee has disbanded the Subcommittee on Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, which focused on issues including voting rights, freedom of assembly and criminal justice reform policies.

That right there is the GOP agenda: voter suppression.

This is Stefano Marshall or Stefano Tomadini or Stefano Marshall Tomadini, I’m not sure which. But I know he loves running around nekkid and has purty blue eyes but, Would You Hit It?

Think Before You Speak ... Tweet ... Facebook ...

My parents gave their children many lessons while we were growing up, but two of them stick out the most to me; the first was to be happy, because, in the end, that’s all you really get in life, and the second was to think before you speak … meaning, say what you will, but know what you’re saying.

I’ve tried to follow those two tenets as I navigate through life, and there are times when I am successful, and times when I fuc — make a mistake.

Jane Wood Allen, a schoolteacher, well, at one time a schoolteacher, should have learned that lesson.

See, Wood Allen took to Facebook to parade her blatant racism in a post about First Lady Michelle Obama, saying:

“This poor Gorilla. How is she going to function in the real world, by not having all of her luxurious vacations paid for anymore? She needs to focus on getting a total make-over (especially the hair), instead of planning vacations! She is a disgrace to America!”

Now look, it’s disgusting, it’s disgraceful, it’s racist … it’s Free Speech, but … Jane Wood Allen posted this on her public Facebook page which anyone can see, even her students at Chestatee Elementary School.

Yup, she teaches children. Luckily, though, the school was notified of the posts and confirmed they were related to an employee in the Forsyth County school district:

“We have and will continue to address this issue with the employee on Monday. Racism and discrimination are not tolerated in Forsyth County Schools.” — Forsyth County Schools spokeswoman Jennifer Caracciolo

But this isn’t the first time an employee in that school district has faced disciplinary action for some questionable social media behavior. Earlier this year, Lambert High School principal Gary Davison was placed on leave for sharing some Islamophobic memes on Facebook. But Lambert may have been lucky, and Wood Allen not so much. Yesterday morning Forsyth County Schools announced Monday morning that Allen had been “relieved from duty.”

Good.

Bye Felicia.

Here’s my deal: you can believe whatever you want, and you can say whatever you want, but you need to take ownership of it when it goes out into the interwebz.

I mean, you choose to say ugly things about the First Lady, go ahead and do it … in your home, in private; but when you take it online it’s out for everyone to see … especially your bosses, and even the children at the school where you used to teach.

Think before you speak, Tweet, update, Instagram, whatever … and then maybe choose not to speak, Tweet, update, Instagram, whatever.

Jane Wood Allen

Think Before You Speak

I have been known to say whatever comes to my mind whenever I want to say it. I think of myself as a much younger, male, gay, Sophia from The Golden Girls, who had a stroke and lost that part of the brain that censors speech. Sometimes I say it for a joke, and sometimes I say it for shock value. Sometimes I hurt people's feelings because I speak before I think, and that's a work in progress to fix; I try counting to three, but I get to about one-and-three-quarters and BAM out it comes.

But, and this is a big but, though not as big as a Christina Aguilera butt--see what I mean?--I am not a public figure, so when I say something obtuse, obscene, slightly funny, highly hilarious, or, yes, rude, it rarely makes the papers, and only makes the blogs if I post it myself.

So, it got me to thinking, why don't people in public positions think before they speak?

Exhibit A, at least for these last few months, would have to be Mitt Romney. I mean, he went to London and insulted an entire country. He regularly insults anyone who doesn't qualify as rich, and then says the most illogical things about opening windows on airplanes.

A breath, please, Mittsy, and maybe you wouldn't be the King of Gaffes this election season.

Still, not to be outdone would be one Ann Romney, pretentious "let them eat cake" wife of Mitt. First, she basically told all of us who question her husband to shut up, by telling us that “you people" aren't going to see Mitts taxes. Then she asked us to stop picking on her husband because running for president is hard--like being president is a cake walk--and then, and this astounds me, she told us that, while she believes Mittsy is the best man to fix the economy, she's worried about his "mental well-being" if elected.

Excuse me? Did you just say that your husband is the best man for the job, but that he's also kinda emotionally and stuff? Yeah, Ann, that's the guy I want with one finger on the button.

But that's politics, and they all say things without speaking, or as Obama said, of Mittsy, we "shoot first and aim later."

This brings me to Rupert Everett.

Years ago I rented a movie called Dance With A Stranger and I fell in lust with the dazzling Everett. I scoured the video store shelves--this was the century before NetFlix and OnDemand and computers and stuff--for anything with Rupert. That's where I found Rupert playing gay in Another Country, and that's when I learned that Rupert was gay in real life.

And my lust deepened. I liked that he was open and honest about who he was; it made me realize that coming out is and always will be the best thing a gay man or woman can do for themselves. But then Rupert, off-screen, without a script, began speaking, or shooting first....

He said gay actors should never come out of the closet because they'll never get work, even though, after coming out in 1987, Everett has almost never stopped working. Sure, maybe his career didn't explode--even after playing gay opposite Julia and Madonna--but maybe that's nothing to with his being openly gay. Maybe that's something to do with his talent, his ego, and his choices. He turned down a role in A Room With A View that made Daniel Day-Lewis a household name--at least in my house.

So, being gay doesn’t affect your career; I mean, maybe it would have in 1987, or even in the 90s, but definitely not these days. Case in point: husband-in-my-head, Matt Bomer, who is openly gay--he's got a partner of several years and three children-and yet has a very successful cable show and even played a male stripper, in a woman’s club, in the movies. he doesn’t seem to be suffering in his career because he's gay.

But Rupert doesn't stop. Lately he's been saying things about gay parents and same-sex marriage. He said, before he clarified, retracted and then re-clarified, that he doesn't think a child should have two same-sex parents, that they are better off with Mom and Dad.

And he doesn't like the idea of gays getting married, either, because, it’s a straight thing.

Well, Rupert, the light of my crush has been thoroughly extinguished, thanks to your inability to think before you speak, and your recent need for Botox by the barrel.

Rupert said: 

"For me, being gay was about wanting to do the opposite of the straight world, so I think that's where my problems in this particular area come from. For me, personally, the last thing I would like in the entire world would be to go through cocktailing my sperm with my boyfriend and finding some grim couple in Ohio who are gluten-free and who you pay $75,000 to have your baby. To me it feels absolutely hideous. But that's me, just me. I'm not having a go at gay couples who do. I think if Elton and David want to have babies, that's wonderful. I think we should all do what we want. Isn't there a middle way, where you can just say, 'Not for me, but it doesn't matter'? But no, everything's sort of turned into al-Qaida. I'm sure I'm going to be nail-bombed. David Furnish is probably going to send Patrick Cox with a bomb and blow up the theatre."

No, Rupert, he won't, because you're allowed to think what you want, just exactly like straight people, You're allowed to choose to cocktail your sperm, or not, like straight people. You're allowed to be a parent, or not, want a child, or not. That's what gay people want: equality. And you can, as a gay man, as part of a couple, or as a single man, choose, not to have children. No one’s saying you can’t, they’re simply saying you have the right to choose to be a parent, or not.

Not children--for all of us--and not marriage....Everett on marriage: 

"Why do queens want to go and get married in churches? Obviously this crusty old pathetic, Anglican church – the most joke-ish church of all jokey churches – of course they don't want to have queens getting married. It's kind of understandable that they don't; they're crusty old calcified freaks. But why do we want to get married in churches? I don't understand that, myself, personally. I loathe heterosexual weddings; I would never go to a wedding in my life. I loathe the flowers, I loathe the fucking wedding dress, the little bridal tiara. It's grotesque. It's just hideous. The wedding cake, the party, the champagne, the inevitable divorce two years later. It's just a waste of time in the heterosexual world, and in the homosexual world I find it personally beyond tragic that we want to ape this institution that is so clearly a disaster."

First off, not all marriages end in disaster, and if you want to stop the 50% that do, then let’s talk about divorce.  It’s not tragic to declare your love and commitment to one person; it’s love.

And, while I wouldn’t count myself among them, some gay folks want to get married in a church because they have a faith they want represented in their ceremony; they have a belief that, in God's eyes, the Goddess' eyes, that we are all equal and have the same rights to be married. Or not.

You don't want to get married, Rupert, because you think it's a little too straight, then don’t get married. You have that right. And, married or not, if you choose to have children, or not, again, that's your right. But don’t denigrate the institution of marriage for anyone that wants it, and don't downplay the role of gay men or women as parents.

Being a parent is about loving and nurturing a child, and anyone who wants to do that, who has the capability to do that, should be able to do that.

Being married is about making a long-term commitment to another person, and if you choose not to make that commitment, then don't make it. But don't put down those of us who'd like to be able say, "This is my husband, Carlos."

Precious Sunday

It was one of those Sundays: gloomy, cold, the threat of rain. it was an indoor-by-the-fire-with-a-good-book Sunday, or, better yet, it was a movie Sunday. And since I'd been wanting to see Precious after all the hype--and not the Oprah-hype, that's just noise--Carlos and I planned an escape to Columbia for the show.

We made sure to get there early because, well, once church lets out it's anyone's game, so we hit the 11:30 AM show and were able to get our favorite back row seats. I was prepared to see a fabulous film, extremely well-acted, because I'd seen clips from the movie and seen Mo'Nique, Paula Patton and even newcomer Gabourey Sidibe interviewed around the TV dial and the net. But what I wasn't prepared for was the emotions stirred up by the film. Just simple scenes with quiet dialogue that made you think.

Everybody does something good.

It made me stop and think how easy it is for us to devalue one another, to degrade one another; and I'm not talking just about the LGBT community, I mean. All.Of.Us. How often we toss aside the feelings of another human being because we're just too busy, or we don't really know that person, when it might just take a second to make someone feel good about themselves.

There are all kinds of abuse in the movie, from fists to frying pans, shoves to curse words. And in that theater you could sense the audience tighten up oh so slightly when the violence started. But then Precious, because all she knows is physical abuse, uses her hands to combat those people with whom she's angry; a smackdown of a boy in her class, the shove of a small girl outside her apartment building, and the audience laughed. Laughed. Shoving. Hitting. Slapping. Spitting. Laughter. At first some of it sounded like nervous laughter, but some sounded as though the person actually thought it funny to see this sudden outburst of violence, and it made me wonder.

How many of us live that kind of life and don't tell a soul? Is that why the laughter seemed nervous and tentative, because that person believed they could laugh and make it all go away? Was the laughter due to an inability to cry over that form of violence? See, I cringed at the violence, whether it was aimed at Precious or coming from Precious, because I knew she was completing a cycle of violence that might continue in her own children. It wasn't funny. It was sad.

What's the first thing you think of when you think of home?

For Precious, it was dodging a frying pan, but what is it for you? Is it love? Is it indifference? When you look back on your childhood, is it happy memories that come first, or those other kind? I remember snapshots of memories: my Mom in the kitchen on Thanksgiving Day wearing the most beautiful smile because she was doing what she loved best, taking care of her family. My Dad taking me to an art show in San Francisco because he knew that's what I liked to do.

I love you, Precious.

Easy words. I love you. But we don't often say them to one another. I know I didn't. I remember, eons ago, when talking with my sister on the phone, just as she was saying goodbye, she said, I love you. And I said, Thanks. Thanks, really? It wasn't that I didn't love my sister, I did, and do; it was more about me being closeted and feeling that sense that maybe I didn't deserve love, so I couldn't say it. I was ashamed of myself for not being able to say those words out loud--of course, I'd always signed cards and gifts with Love, Bob but I never said the words; that was a wake up call. Now it's second nature, because I feel it, and know it, and realize that I deserve it.

We are all Precious.

We all have suffered some form of abuse, to some extent, that sticks with us, whether it be violently physically, or just feeling left out and ignored. It's all a form of abuse, and none of us deserves it because we are all precious; we all do something well; we all deserve love, to give it and receive it.

We are all precious.

"That's So Last Century"

You know, it was hard when I was in school.

The gay kid.

If I chose to speak I could hear people muttering 'faggot' from somewhere in the room. I heard 'queer' in the hallways and 'fag' in the lockerroom. It seemed as though there wasn't a safe place to be in those days.

And I'd thought it had changed. i thought as the world grew up we'd hear less and less of 'faggot' and 'homo' and 'queer' and 'dyke' but we don't. Kids today still have a hard time in schools because, many times, it isn't just the words thrown at them, it's fists.

Sticks and stones.

At ThinkB4YouSpeak.com, the folks who brought us the "That's So Gay" commercials, they have a new ad campaign. There aim is to protect lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender teens in school, keeping them safe from homophobic remarks and harassment.

"That's so gay" is the most common phrase heard in schools today. It disrespects the LGBT community because it's another way of saying "That's so....stupid....ugly....dumb."

The Think B4 You Speak campaign aims to raise awareness about the prevalence and consequences of anti-LGBT bias and behavior in schools. Ultimately, the goal is to reduce and prevent the use of homophobic language in an effort to create a more positive environment for LGBT teens. The campaign also aims to reach adults, including school personnel and parents; their support of this message is crucial to the success of efforts to change behavior.

So, think before you speak.