I am book happy.

Coraline just rocked my world.

Acid Row by Minette Walters is currently providing me with my British mystery fix for a bit...

And, most importantly, Redemption Ark by Alastair Reynolds is winging it's way across the Atlantic Ocean to me as we speak... a total score here, because I ordered the hardcover version from Amazon UK only hours before its availability status went to "Special Order, Available in 4-6 weeks". Which means I barely managed to score a true first edition. Whoo hoo. I rock.

In email from Dominican Dave today:

Walking back to the hostel, I passed a little grocery store and they had a stereo blasting out front, like they all do here, but as I got closer I realized that the song I was hearing was "Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now" by the Smiths. That was so fucking weird that I just stopped and stood on the sidewalk until it was over. And the next song was the usual bachatarengue crap. I think it was some kind of sign from God. Although I feel reasonably happy...

sometimes life is really like a movie, huh?

Does anyone out there possibly have a copy of the movie A THIEF IN THE NIGHT? I would kill for a copy of it, but I don't wanna pay cash to a bunch of evil Xians to get one.

This movie left an indelible mark on my psyche. If you grew up in a Baptist or fundamentalist family of any sort in the 70s, you know exactly what I mean. For years as a child, anytime I found myself completely alone for a minute, I was convinced that I'd been 'left behind'. That the Rapture had come and poor little me had been left to fend for myself against the evil minions of the AntiChrist. That at any moment someone was gonna come around and try to put a barcode on my hand or forehead. That eventually I was gonna meet the guillotine.

So, um... I'd really like to watch it again...

So... um... I don't really meet many people that I really click with as far as dating goes. I'm a bit of a unique individual for a gay guy, I guess. I don't think I'm better than anyone else or more special or anything... I just don't meet many guys that I could see myself getting into anything longterm with.

There really hasn't been even one person since Dave and I broke up, almost five years ago, that I've really felt like I could just totally click with.

So, now... I think I've met someone that could really do it for me... and they live on the other side of the country...

I'm sort of wigging over this a bit... and have been for a couple weeks...

Oh yeah... i forgot that I also bought some action figures today. I found the brand spanking new Masters of the Universe action figures at an independent toy store this morning and I just had to get the new He-Man figure. Check him out... is he hot or what?



And I also bought some of the Where the Wild Things Are action figures. I found Max, the little boy in his animal pajamas, at clearance prices, so I snagged him.

I had my first day off of work in almost a week and it was lovely. I spent most of it watching movies. I saw Minority Report and Sum of All Fears in the theater. And I was a bit shocked that I liked Sum way more than MR. The latter movie had plotholes that you could drive a semi through. And those missing pieces just destroy the whole movie. I won't go into them cuz I don't wanna spoil it for anyone, but I think that this movie is getting way more praise than it deserves. Meanwhile, I thought Sum was a pretty tight and thrilling movie. *shrug*

Then I came home and read Coraline, Neil Gaiman's new children's book. It was pretty darn phenomenal. If you like dark twisted children's lit, check it out.

And then I ended the night by watching Showgirls. heh. talk about UNDERrated movies....

I need to stop reading the press on the whole issue of the Pledge of Allegiance or I'm going to have an aneurysm. Right now, I realize that separation of church and state means absolutely nothing to the fucking idiots we've elected to run our country, especially that raging fuckhead (former cokehead), that some of you idiots elected as our president.

Right now, i'm just completely done with the Republicans, the Democrats and pretty much everything in between.

There is NO FUCKING GOD, you FUCKING idiots.

How the hell did humanity become such a mass of stupidity? Is there no hope for rationality, science or reason ever winning the day?

This is what the major issue of the day is... whether or not our government should exalt the Christian God? It's pretty clearcut, IMO, that it shouldn't. But a cornerstone of our Constitution means nothing balanced against superstitious bullshit. And do you really think all of those politicians believe in God? I sure as hell don't.

Meanwhile, the fucking FBI can go to the library and find out every book I've ever checked out, because privacy also isn't guaranteed anymore...

Police state, anyone? To fight governments like the Taliban ours must become more like them?

Got it... i have no right to privacy and I have to worship YOUR god... is having sex with another guy gonna be illegal next? Oh that's right... it already is in Louisiana...

I'm not sure I haved a lucid point here besides the fact that I'm pissed off...

Okay... you can tell that I've been feeling crappy all week when all I blog about in a week's time is my dislike for god...

heh...

You know... I've never really thought much about the issues in this court ruling. But, I think the ruling is correct.

It is somewhat personally offensive to me that the Pledge of Allegiance requires me to recognize a god that I do not believe exists. That the currency of our country also takes note of him. As does our national anthem. What's up with that?

Of course, I don't think for a second that this ruling won't be overturned. Because, a bunch of hypocritical judges are gonna kowtow to popular opinion or to their own personal beliefs instead of doing the right thing...

I don't believe in god. I don't need god. And I thought the constitution of my country was supposed to protect me from his believers...

okay... having grown up thinking this movie was gonna come true in my lifetime, I find this article kind of scary...

heh...

ok... the pic problem should be fixed... and hopefully adding the pic off to the side didn't trash everything...

if so or if the pics are still huge, someone let me know... it all looks fine to me...

I need feedback... are the pics I'm putting on my page showing up as gigantically huge and bigger than the browser? Dominican Dave says they are for him... I see them as smaller size.

Please let me know...

Okay, you...

(inspired by Jonno's response...)

I love...

New Orleans
dogs and their unconditional love
tattoos and hot boys with tattoos
sushi
Krypto the Superdog
Dave, my ex... my bestest friend for forever
Apple Computers
books, for filling my head with so much information and so many dreams
music, for providing a soundtrack for those dreams and my life
romance
sex
dark movie theaters
my friends, each and every one of them

and on the really really good days...

i just love life

ok... i do think i need a haircut though...

I've had a terrible self image the past couple days because all of the pics I've taken of myself have been horrible... but someone suggested that i take some in natural light at an hour earlier than 11 pm...

and I think he was right... i feel much better about this...

my octopus...

craptacular, no?

So, today at work we had our big Summer Reading Kickoff party in the kids' department. And I took pics...

They're here, here and here.

Some pretty cute pics. And I'm WAY impressed with iPhoto. It made it extremely easy and unbelievably easy to download, edit and post the pictures to the Web. Seriously... WAY WAY WAY impressed.

So, Jhames isn't the only one with a doggie...

I introduce you to Keisha...

I am DAS UBER geekboy...

I am geekboy... here me roar...

I'm feeling like spending some cash this week...

do I...

1) get a new tattoo?

2) buy a digital camera?

3) buy clothes?

someone wrote a poem with me as it's subject...

Just because I haven't mentioned it lately... i am still in FUCKING LOVE with my new computer...

Apple, you rock my world...

What
kind of clothes should I be wearing? by Evelyn

Heck yeah...

If you're flash equipped, I suggest a trip to here to see what I think is gonna be a classic children's book...

I think I fixed it... i need emails confirming this if so...

Jhames, Robbie... one of you fellows who knows HTML wanna help me out? The code that the Tagboard page is giving me to put on my page is just wrong... i can tell by looking at it... Someone wanna let me email it to them so they can fix it for me? :)

Ok.... it seems the problem was the Tagboard... anyone have any advice? I liked it, damn it.

Grrrr.... where oh where is my blog? Can anyone besides me read this? Hopefully, adding this post is fixing the problem...

While reading a few NOLA blogs just now, I came across this post.

I'm not gonna repeat any of the info. You can go there and read it. If you're pro-choice and have the time, emotional stability and energy, help out somehow if you can.

I was a volunteer worker for NARAL (the National Abortion Rights Action League) as well as a clinic escort back in Baton Rouge several years ago. Back in the day when Operation Rescue went from city to city having BIG events where they blockaded clinics, Baton Rouge was their target in the summer of 1992.

It's sort of hard to believe it's been ten years. I have a lot of extremely vivid memories of that period.

In 1992, Operation Rescue was trying to repeat the success of their "Summer of Mercy" the previous year in Wichita. I think they thought they'd find a bunch of idiotic southerners who would pretty much turn a blind eye to them and let them have their way. They were very wrong. The pro-choice community mobilized and the city leaders did an exemplary job of preparing the city. The police department sent people to Wichita to learn all they could about the previous summer. When Operation Rescue arrived in town, they found that the city had blocked off a several block area around the main women's clinic in town and built a chainlink fence around it. The police department controlled the access and trained escorts were inside the fence to provide protection.

As one of those escorts, I began the week spending the middle part of the day at the clinic. By the end of the week, I was basically living at the clinic around the clock. It was July and we had very little shade during the day. And all day every day, we were hit with verbal abuse from the "Christians" on the other side of the fence. The clinic stayed open the entire week though.

Being a NARAL volunteer before the siege started, I had a bit more responsibility thrust onto me than a lot of the volunteers. I spent a lot of time just standing in the corners of the clinic lot with a walkie talkie watching the crowds.

Moments I remember that week...

-watching over the fence while several hundred people rush through the back field towards the clinic after breaking one fence while being chased by the police (they never made it to the inner fence);

-wading out into the crowd of "pro-lifers" once to bring in a woman who I suspected had come to the clinic without her prearranged escorts, trying to confirm her identity against a list I had in my pocket while not drawing the attention of the crowd and then getting her through the police cordon once the crowd realized what was going on. the look on that one woman's face made the whole week worth it...

-sleeping on concrete curled up next to Dave, who came to escort as much as he could, giving up school or work time...

-gatorade... i remember drinking lots and lots of gatorade...

-the cops being surprisingly sympathetic to us, but I guess the fact that they were being screamed at as much as we were helped in that area...

In the end, their Summer of Mercy failed miserably. It sort of broke the momentum that Operation Rescue had built up and they never really managed to have anything on a really large scale again.

I kept working as an escort at the clinic for a while. Finding myself as part of a non-violent human barricade holding crazy people away from the door of the clinic more than once. After a short while though, it took an emotional toll on me and I realized I had to stop for my own sanity. And I did.

And, honestly, i dunno if i can go back and do it again. I have to think about it a bit before I decide to volunteer this time. I want to, but...

I wouldn't, however, change one moment of the volunteer work I did before. So, again, if you feel you can help, please do so...

The past several days have been brilliant. I started 6 days off work on Thursday.

So, Thursday started with several hours laying of sun at The Country Club. Then I headed to the Quarter to meet the weekend's special guest, a fellow blogger spending a long weekend in New Orleans. I've been talking to Clee online for a while now and reading his blog just as long, but I'd never met the boy in person, so I was a bit nervous bout the whole shebang. On the way to Good Friends, we arranged to meet, I saw a cute guy on Bourbon Street. After a bit of a doubletake, I realized that the cute guy was Clee at about the same moment that he realized who I was. So, we head to Good Friends for a drink and so I can use the ATM. Then it was on to the Shim Sham for 80s nite.

For some reason, I've never really gotten that into 80s nite. Well, this week was an exception. I was shaking it on the dancefloor all nite. The big discovery for us that nite was that Sweet Child of Mine is very much a dance song. Why didn't I ever realize this in the 80s? It's got a total dance beat. Anyways, Jonathan met up with us at the Shim Sham as well and a good time was had by all.

Post Shim Sham, I wandered the streets a bit with Clee (that's pronounced like a posturpedic would be, by the way... Sealy) before grabbing a cab home. Beyond that all I'm gonna say is that someone is a very good kisser.

Friday, I met Clee back in the Quarter for lunch. I took him to my favorite complete tourist restaurant.... Cafe Maspero's on St Peter Street. Maspero's has huge sandwiches for small prices but it's always way packed with tourists. But, it was all good. Clee then go to experience the tropical nature of New Orleans, because by the time we finished eating, a ferocious rainstorm swept into the Quarter. The streets and sidewalks were flooded like crazy and trying to take cover under balconies did no good, they all leak and drip on you. Clee had to hop a cab to make an appointment in the Marigny for an upcoming artshow he's doing, so I ran into Virgin and browsed before hopping a bus home.

Friday nite, Jonathan and I went for a late dinner at La Peniche in the Marigny. I had a scrumptious shrimp platter. Afterwards, we went to the Quarter to meet up with Clee and Bud, a San Fransisco expatriate that he had dinner with. We all were pretty bushed so we called an early nite of it.

Saturday, back to the Quarter to meet Clee for coffee. We decided to ride around a bit in my car, mainly so we could hit More Fun Comics. Now, here's a guy after my heart... he's happy to go comic book shopping while on vacation. I picked up my weekly comics, including the first issue of The Filth, the latest offering from the brilliant mad brain of Grant Morrison. After comics, I introduced Clee to the yumminess of Juan's Flying Burrito. Then we just spent the afternoon hanging out and talking. A bit after 7, Clee and I met up with Jonathan, Robert and Steve at Lola's. Lola's is an amazing little restaurant on Esplanade Avenue. It's sort of Spanish, i guess... paella, ceviche, gazpacho, lots and lots of garlic. We waited about an hour for a table, standing outside and sipping wine in the humid evening. But, it was all good, good conversation, anticipation of an amazing meal. I was a bit surprised when two of my employees came walking up and said the were driving by and saw me and stopped just to say hi. That made me feel kinda nice, I have to say.

Anyways, dinner really was brilliant. I had calamari, gazpacho and seafood paella. We consumed quite a bit of wine. Conversation flowed as easily as the wine. A pretty great evening. Then we headed back to Robert's for a bit of conversation before calling it another relatively early evening.

Sunday, was another hang out in the Quarter day. I met up with Clee and we just walked around. Then my friend Brian called and met up with us. Then Jonathan called and met up with us. We wound up at Good Friends again, having frozen drinks called separators, just missing a bakesale where a cake was reportedly sold for $300.

After Good Friends, we wandered down to Tea at the Bourbon Pub. I ran into scads of people that I knew. I felt ever so popular. Twas a bit weird actually... Unfortunately, Clee had to leave pretty early to get sleep since he had an early flight out. Jonathan and I tried as hard as possible to get him liquored up so he'd stay longer but we failed... darn it...

So, we then proceeded to stay out until about midnite, getting quite soused, before grabbing a late nite snack at Angeli.

And today has been total 'sit on the couch and watch movies while eating junkfood day.' And I succeeded wildly at this....

A great fucking weekend... now I just have to figure out how to deal with a crush on someone on the other side of the country...

Ok... I added a tagboard... i dunno if it's gonna stay on here or not... what I really don't want is for it to become a little blog clique thingie of cute comments by the same five people having a conversation that no one else gets... but, if you have a comment or something to say... go for it!

wake up number 37...

wowzers... i just got through watching The Mothman Prophecies and i'm creeped out of my skin.

great great great horror movie... why the hell didn't i see this one in the theaters?

Three songs to wake up to with long languid stretches and messy hair:

All I Need - Air
Get Up - Amel Larrieux
Destiny - Zero 7

take the cher test.


and go to mewing.net. because laura isn't cher.


And thank god for that... link via my friend, Jonathan, who is 110% Cher... a fact which at this moment is causing me to reevaluate our friendship...

A stupid fact about me...

I've always wanted a Magic Eight Ball. You know, the toy that answers questions. So, all of my life whenever I've seen one in a store, I always pick it up and ask it, "should I buy you?"

Not once in 20something years has one ever given me a positive answer. So, I don't own a Magic Eight Ball.

So, no work for six days...

I slept late (8 am... sad, huh?) this morning. And quickly dove into some long overdue housecleaning and laundry. Geez, it feels good when you pick up all your crap and clean your house. Maybe there's something to all that feng shui shit... or maybe it just feels good to know I'm not gonna accidentally rip any covers off comic books by stepping on them...

Then the poor doggie got a bath followed by banishment to the backyard to dry off. I think I brushed about a cubic meter of hair off of her.

As I clean... i look around my apartment and realize that I live in the home of a retarded twelve year old... I have action figures and comic book art everywhere, combined with the best furniture that Ikea and Target have to offer , much of it as brightly colored as this webpage and quite a bit of it on big wheels.

I actually wonder if some people would be surprised to see my apartment. Out in the world, I wear dark colors mostly and tend to be a bit on the quiet and serious side... unless I'm Mr Happy Drunk Boy. So, seeing this fantasia that I live in might be a bit shocking for a few people. I dunno...

Regardless... i'm gonna spend the afternoon baking by the pool at the Country Club. And then I'm gonna spend the nite boogying to 80s tunes at the Shim Sham. With special guest in tow...

I really dunno why I'm so picture happy on my blog this week...

I am SO FUCKING jealous...

Go now and behold the most charming little romance unfold before your eyes...

What I'm listening to a LOT lately:

Sleep sure can make life look better...

My life has pretty much sucked for the last week or so. Work has been horrendous. I've been a total bitch to my coworkers. My work schedule has been grueling. I've had hardly any free time. I have bags under my eyes. I'm borderline depressed. The guy I was supposed to have a date with never called me back and when I finally did talk to him said he'd been sick and was gonna call me soon... uh huh...

But one more day and then I have six days off of work... it can't come soon enuff...

ok... so Jhames quit... i can understand why...

So, Blogwhore the Game has begun.

dunno bout you... but I'm rooting for Jhames...

a decent enuff day..

got up a little before 10 and went to brunch with a few friends at Feelings in the Marigny. Oysters, crabcakes and a whole bunch of mimosas.

Which led to a long nap with my doggie.

And then a romp in the dogpark, where I got to meet Iain, the spanking new son of my friends, Brian and Tracy. A total cutie.

And capped the nite off with my friend Steve watching Undercover Brother. Funny movie if you've seen lots of blacksploitation films of the 70s...

The date I was supposed to have this weekend never happened tho... typical... i'm terminally single...

I don't think I can stand the fact that this book isn't out until October... someone buy me an advance copy off of eBay...

Ok... what the heck happened at the Eiffel Tower involving the Osbournes? Over the past 24 hours, I've gotten 3 Google hits from "eiffel + tower + Osbournes"...

Obey the Monkey

Sometimes people just amaze me...

I went out a bit ago to walk my dog and drop a burned CD of Bran Van 3000 Discosis off to the guy who cuts my hair. It's a beautiful day out, warm and moist without being overly humid.

On the way back, I noticed a guy with a boxer puppy on the sidewalk, so I went into the street so my dog wouldn't snack on his. He looks over and smiles and says thanks. He's adorable.

My dog stops at the corner. His puppy runs closer. I compliment him on how goddamned cute it is. We talk about dogs for a second or two. We both start to walk away. And he calls out, "have a good day... and you take care of yourself." Which was so damned sweet.

I'm still smiling.

I was pondering the people in my life the other day...

My closest friends consist of...

a 20ish former barista and soon to be college student
a professor of neurobiology
a corporate attorney
his boyfriend, a nightclub manager
a voodoo priest

and me, a bookstore manager...

eclectic, no?

On the Batman action figure front...

I was shopping at Walmart for various sundries (heh, I just like saying that... "various sundries") and I came across the unexpected... three new Batman animated action figure two-packs.

Whoo hoo.

They were:
Batman & Two-Face
Batman & The Riddler
and
Batman & Robin

The last one is the important one... because it's the Tim Drake Robin (that's the younger one), but he's painted in the colors of the Dick Grayson Robin (that's the older one). Now see.. only a complete geek like me would even understand WHY that's cool...

Just trust me... it's cool...

So, last nite, I was safely wrapped in my covers in bed, when I happened to glance at the author photograph in the back of my copy of The Standing Dead and noticed an itty bitty web addy. So, leapt out of bed did I, speeding to trusty iMac.

That's right all you google drive-by people... Ricardo Pinto has a website.

I've added a link to it and two of my other favorite authors off to the side of the page.

I've also taken this opportunity to get rid of the Guestbook. Nobody ever used it. So, it's dead. Bye, Guestbook!