Ryan-Field

Boy Toy Stalking David Geffen; Straight Guy Favorite DILFs; Last Season of Glee

Boy Toy Stalking David Geffen

This information I’m linking to now is from Queerty.com, but there it’s linked to TMZ. The music industry’s billionaire, David Geffen, is allegedly being stalked by a 20 year old former boyfriend. Get this, the boyfriend’s last name is Kuntz. No comment.

20-year-old Jamie Kuntz has been accused of stalking the 71-year-old for the past several months. His behavior has included following, harassing and making a “credible threat” against Geffen sometime between September and November.

In October, Kuntz was arrested for violating the terms of a restraining order. He now faces felony and misdemeanor charges and is expected to appear in court later this week.

Kuntz and Geffen first hooked up when Kuntz was 18. In 2012, the teenager was kicked off his college football team after being spotted making out with the then 69-year-old billionaire in a press box. He told teammates Geffen was his grandfather. (The school maintains that he wasn’t removed from the team for being gay, but because he lied about the kiss.)

Very little surprises me anymore. And I actually do think some of the best relationships, gay or straight, occur when there’s an age difference. It could be a ten year age difference, or even a twenty five year age difference. They usually last. But I can tell you one thing for certain about life. When you see an 18 year old making out with a 69 year old there is almost always a sizable amount of money lurking around in the background. Goodness and love have nothing to do with it.

Straight Guy Favorite DILFs

For those who don’t know I’d better get this out in the beginning. DILF means “Dads I’d like to fuck.” It’s not always meant to be literal, at least not in this context. It’s more sarcastic in nature.

Gay men and women aren’t the only ones who have a special place in their hearts for DILFs, according to the latest Buzzfeed video examining the same-sex attractions of male hettys.

Consider the pursuit of human knowledge one step furthered.

Aside from the fact that they use dumb words like “hetty” in this article, it’s not completely horrible. Of course Grandpa Geffen’s name is not on the list, but most of the guys who are listed with photos are not bad at all.

The thing that always amazes me is that straight guys would be interested in other men at all. But one thing doesn’t amaze me. Gay men can’t stop reading about it.

You can check them out here.

Last Season of Glee

If you haven’t had enough of Glee yet, you’re in for a treat. There’s still one more season of schmaltz and happy crying left. And now there’s a gay singing quarterback…because it’s not enough pressure to be a gay quarterback in high school.

When casting for the role, the character was described this way: ‘He’s post-Glee gay — no one messes with him about his sexuality because he will kick their asses if they do.’

Williams was a finalist on Canadian Idol in 2008 and has many onscreen acting credits including How to Build a Better Boy, Pete’s Christmas, Saving Hope and Headcase.

Now, to be perfectly honest I actually think this might work out well. I know it’s pure cheese and I’m not even sure I’ll watch, but I do think it’s interesting to give younger people the image of a gay guy who will kick ass if anyone screws around with him. Just the other day on Twitter I politely let a straight guy know that not all gay men dress and act flamboyantly. Some gay men would be more than happy to kick his ass when he least expects it. And that’s the dead honest truth of the matter. You just don’t hear from us often enough.

My only concern is that PC bleeding heart liberal Ryan Murphy will ruin this somehow. I hope he really makes this kid a badass hero who does kick ass and fuck all the PC convention. Gay kids need some of that, too.

Chase of a Dream PG-Rated Version

Brokeback Mountain Author Pissed Off; Bubble Butts; Don Lemon Worst Journalist List 2014

Brokeback Mountain Author Pissed Off

The author of Brokeback Mountain, Annie Proulx, is making a few strong statements about how her short story was received and how it’s been interpreted in various ways over the years. The story, which became a huge bestseller and a ground-breaking feature film that many claim spawned the m/m romance genre, has never been without controversy. And that controversy has not always come in the form of traditional homophobia. I remember back when it was released and I was interviewing and reviewing gay male bloggers for bestgayblogs.com many gay men weren’t thrilled with the story or the film.They found fundamental flaws in the storyline, but I’m not getting into that right now. I thought it was a nice story, in a general sense.

In any event, this is what Proulx said, in part:

So many people have completely misunderstood the story. I think it’s important to leave spaces in a story for readers to fill in from their own experience, but unfortunately the audience that Brokeback reached most strongly have powerful fantasy lives. And one of the reasons we keep the gates locked here is that a lot of men have decided that the story should have had a happy ending. They can’t bear the way it ends — they just can’t stand it. So they rewrite the story, including all kinds of boyfriends and new lovers and so forth after Jack is killed. And it just drives me wild.

I really don’t know what she’s talking about when she says “men” are doing this. But I may have missed that. My only comment is that after writing and getting published for many years in the concentrated genre of gay fiction I’ve found more than a few things interesting in the past ten years, since BM became so popular. One of them is that I still can’t get over how many people coming from a place of privilege can’t wait to tell gay writers how to do “it.” Another thing is how little they really know about gay men.

But I really don’t want to get off track here. I’ve done parodies of mainstream classic stories with gay characters, like An Officer and His Gentleman and Pretty Man. But frankly, the one story I always thought was off limits as a parody in this case was Brokeback Mountain. I wouldn’t parody a gay story…unless I were to do it with straight characters. And I think I know exactly what Proulx is talking about this time. I just wish she’d been more specific in her rant.

You can read the rest here.

I highly suggest reading the rest of this in full. I really don’t have any strong comments on this one. I actually find it interesting when readers take my books and stories and reinterpret them in various ways. I don’t mind it in the least.

Bubble Butts

This is all about the sexy photo column at Queerty.com. I’ve been following it all year and I love some of the things they’ve done…especially about breaking body image stereotypes. I follow a pop star on social media and he posts some of the hottest photos online. But most are photo shopped. When he posts a real photo of himself, even though I think it’s hotter than the photo shopped pics, you’d be amazed at how many will criticize him. He’s absolutely adorable, yet they can’t wait to point out his flaws.

This year, Queerty launched a new photos column, Homo Erotica, that highlighted various sexual styles and looks while celebrating sexy men of all sorts. Over the past 12 months, we’ve covered foot fetishes to armpit fetishes, hairy older hunks to twinks, with a few bubble butts and beer bellies thrown in for good measure. It’s been an interesting year, and we’re looking forward to bringing you even more homo horseplay in 2015.

You can check out the pics here. I think the cute guy with the belly is adorable.

Don Lemon Worst Journalist List 2014

I think most readers know I usually support everything LGBT. But I don’t think it’s wise to blindly support anyone just because he or she is LGBT, especially when an openly gay journalist like Don Lemon makes ridiculous comments about women and rape. Sexual orientation doesn’t give anyone a free pass to be arrogant or obnoxious. Dumb I can overlook. But I find it hard to believe anyone can reach the point of CNN anchor and be stupid.

The worst journalist list was created by Columbia Journalism Review and those on the list are considered to have made the most “cringe-worthy” remarks during the year.

David Uberti, the Review’s fellow wrote in a post why Lemon deserves to be ranked along with other missteps in journalism this year.

‘As one of the most recognizable anchors on CNN, Don Lemon has helped lead the cable network’s coverage of the biggest stories of the year. Live television is exceedingly difficult to produce, of course, but Lemon’s gaffes this year offer a case study in how to choose words wisely — or not.’

Uberti highlighted several controversial comments made by Lemon including telling an alleged rape victim of Bill Cosby, ‘You know, there are ways not to perform oral sex if you don’t want to do it… Meaning the use of teeth, right?’

The anchor also pondered whether Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 was swallowed by a black hole.

You can read the rest here. It gives us all hope for the future journalists coming our way. At least they nailed this one. It’s also one reason why I refuse to even watch CNN anymore.

Chase of a Dream PG-Rated Version

Gay Boyfriend "Twins"; "Fag" Cousin; Anal Cancer

Gay Boyfriend “Twins”

This one made me smile. Through the years Tony and I have known several gay couples who fall into this category: gay boyfriend twins. It’s not about incest. These guys aren’t related to each other. They are boyfriends who try hard to look like each other. The first year we were together Tony made a point of telling me he didn’t want us to ever look like “one of the Bobsie Twins.” At the time we knew a gay couple who wore the same outfits (always tight black shirts), the same shoes (black boots), and even wore their hair the same (too short, dyed black, and spiked)…like identical twins…and even though it’s not something that would have occurred to me I completely agreed with Tony on that matter.

This article explains it in more detail with photos:

We’ve all seen it happen. Two people start dating, and over the course of the relationship, they start to morph into mirror images of each other. It can be funny, sad, hot — it all depends, really.

But did you know there’s a blog that chronicles this phenomenon? The aptly named BoyfriendTwin Tumbler is just chock full of wonders.

You can read more here. The comments get a little snarky, too. This one seems to have hit a nerve.

Side note: most of the gay couples we’ve known over the years do NOT do this. They don’t dress like twins, and make a point of it. The ones who do dress like twins are usually the ones you run from at parties.

“Fag” Cousin

This guy’s cousin came out to him on social media…my nephew did the same with me on Facebook. This guy claims he wasn’t shocked…I was stunned. I really didn’t have a clue. But then I didn’t know my one brother was gay until I ran into him in a disco in New York.

In any event, it’s an interesting story about how their relationship as gay cousins devolved over time. From the way it sounds the younger cousin who came out on social media felt as if the older cousin was trying to mold him into being the gay man everyone expects…the typical South Beach gay man. It didn’t work because the younger cousin wasn’t into any of that, and the two cousins wound up drifting apart for obvious reasons.

When I moved to New York my relationship with Juan took a turn for the worst. My other cousin, Raul, came to visit. I hadn’t spoken to Juan in a few months and asked how he was doing.

“Dude,” Raul told me. “You know he doesn’t like you. He was talking mad shit about you the other day and I swear to God I wanted to punch him.”

I was floored. “What do you mean? What did he say?”

“He said: ‘There are two types of gay men in this world. Ones like me and fags like Paul.’”

It’s interesting to me because my one gay brother has always been a circuit queen. I’d rather eat dirt than follow a bunch of dizzy queens in skinny jeans to Spain looking for the disco ball. I’d rather go skiing in Vermont than clubbing in South Beach. We are complete opposites in many respects, and I think too much alike in others. It’s taken years for our relationship to reach a point of ease…the best word I can think of because we never argue…so just because two family members are gay doesn’t mean it makes anything easier. My relationship with my straight brother is much easier, and we tend to agree more on everything (the other gay brother is awkward with him, too). It’s interesting.

The rest is here.

Anal Cancer

There’s a campaign moving forward about the growing awareness of anal cancer among gay men. It’s called “Behind Closed Drawers.”

“A growing number of physicians and health activists recommend that all men who have sex with men, especially those who are HIV-positive, be tested every one-to-three years depending on their immunological well-being and CD4 count,” organizers said in a statement. “They suggest that HIV negative individuals be tested every three years. This work is important, because most people know little about anal cancer, have never been tested for it, and don’t know that screening tests exist.”

You can read the rest here. They’re asking for help and there’s information there on how to do it. I don’t know much about this type of cancer so I can’t comment.

I think this comment from the thread about HPV is interesting.

The key thing that is not made clear from this article and much of the coverage you see around is that the vast majority of Anal cancer is caused by HPV infection (Human Papilloma Virus) – so it is a sexually transmitted disease. It is the exact same virus which causes the majority of Cervical Cancers in women. Anal Cancer is just as nasty and aggressive as Cervical Cancer, and if you have a screening programme available to you, you should take it up because getting to it early makes a huge difference.

And there is a myth that if you don’t have genital warts, you don’t have HPV – you can be infected with HPV and never know it.

You can also be vaccinated against HPV. In the USA, all gay and bisexual men up to the age of 26 can be offered HPV vaccination (and all other men up to the age of 21). In the UK there is currently no vaccination of men but you can request it. The message is clear: if you’re gay or bisexual, take part in screening and get vaccinated if possible.

I like to make a point of letting readers know this book was released in two versions, one with strong sex scenes, one without. This is the PG rated version and runs about 52,000 words. It’s .99.

Chase of a Dream PG-Rated Version

Amazon Reader Review:

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A very very good read & very romantic, September 21, 2012

gdbtraveler – See all my reviews

Verified Purchase(What’s this?)

This review is from: Chase of a Dream ( Book II – Chase Series) (Kindle Edition)

This book was a great read and I like the austhor’s writing style. I couldn’t put the kindle down once I began the read.Most reads coming available are so like each other once you read one other authors seem to copy situations and language from each other. Ryan Field should use this novel as his best, hope he continues to produce such good reading.

Gay Boyfriend "Twins"; "Fag" Cousin; Anal Cancer

Gay Boyfriend “Twins”

This article explains it in more detail with photos:

But did you know there’s a blog that chronicles this phenomenon? The aptly named BoyfriendTwin Tumbler is just chock full of wonders.

You can read more here. The comments get a little snarky, too. This one seems to have hit a nerve.

“Fag” Cousin

When I moved to New York my relationship with Juan took a turn for the worst. My other cousin, Raul, came to visit. I hadn’t spoken to Juan in a few months and asked how he was doing.

“Dude,” Raul told me. “You know he doesn’t like you. He was talking mad shit about you the other day and I swear to God I wanted to punch him.”

I was floored. “What do you mean? What did he say?”

“He said: ‘There are two types of gay men in this world. Ones like me and fags like Paul.’”

The rest is here.

Anal Cancer

There’s a campaign moving forward about the growing awareness of anal cancer among gay men. It’s called “Behind Closed Drawers.”

You can read the rest here. They’re asking for help and there’s information there on how to do it. I don’t know much about this type of cancer so I can’t comment.

I think this comment from the thread about HPV is interesting.

And there is a myth that if you don’t have genital warts, you don’t have HPV – you can be infected with HPV and never know it.

Chase of a Dream PG-Rated Version

Amazon Reader Review:

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A very very good read & very romantic, September 21, 2012

gdbtraveler – See all my reviews

Verified Purchase(What’s this?)

This review is from: Chase of a Dream ( Book II – Chase Series) (Kindle Edition)

Gay Panic Defense; "Faggots" Written on Door; Having Sex With Straight Guys

Gay Panic Defense

Openly gay New Jersey assemblyman, Tim Eustace, introduced an interesting bill that will prevent criminals from using what’s being referred to as “gay panic defense.” I never knew this even existed.

‘I want to make sure that we’re paying attention to things before they happen,’ Eustace said, as reported by New Jersey.com.

According to state law, a charge of murder can be reduced to manslaughter if the crime ‘is committed in the heat of passion resulting from a reasonable provocation.’

Eustace’s bill states provocation is not reasonable if based on the ‘discovery of, knowledge about, or potential disclosure of the homicide victim’s actual or perceived gender identity or expression.’

I guess this means, as the law stands now, if you claim you were shocked into committing a crime because you found out someone was gay or transsexual you have a better chance of getting reduced charges.

Lambda Legal, a national LGBT organization, notes while the term ‘gay panic’ is not an official defense, it does ‘allow a defendant to enlist the judge and the jury’s support (or, at least, empathy) for the defendant’s anti-gay or anti-trans bias, by asking the justice system to excuse the killing as an “understandable” response to finding out that the victim was LGBT.’

Check it out here.

“Faggots” Written on Door

This next link reminded me of something that happened to my family when I was growing up. My younger straight brother once asked a girl of African American descent to the prom. He’d been dating her for a while. The morning after the prom my family woke to find the “N” word written all over the garage doors. It was really the first time I’d ever experienced that brand of racial discrimination. This happened in New Jersey, too. I never forgot how it felt…and I still don’t even know the full extent of that kind of discrimination.

Prior to that, I did know gay discrimination and I wasn’t even out of the closet yet. This is the kind of thing I’m talking about. A gay couple found the word “Faggots” written on their front door beneath their Christmas wreath this year. This is how they handled it:

‘To the individual who scrawled the word ‘’faggots’’ into our door: We regret to inform you that you completely failed to use glitter paint and/or sequins, your work looked rushed, and your handwriting was positively atrocious.

‘It is for these reasons that we had to remove your work from our door with sandpaper.

‘Fabulously yours, the Gays in Apt. 611.’

I have to admit it’s so much classier than what I would have done at this point in my life…found the bastards and kicked the living shit out of them. But then all gay people are different and I don’t recommend my way at all.

Here’s the rest. It’s a long one.

Having Sex With Straight Guys

I have to admit that I have had sex with straight guys and never thought it would be newsworthy. One hot Marine I once knew was definitely fiction-worthy, but I really never thought much about it…and, it’s not that much different than sex with gay guys. At least not in my experience.

But this is interesting, a commentary piece by someone named Topher Gen, whoever he is:

I’ll be honest here; I’ve been a guys ‘test dummy’ more than a couple of times in the past. The reason I refer to it so crudely and cheaply is because after these affairs were conducted, that’s how I was made to feel. That’s how the straight party felt about it: It was cheap, maybe even dirty.

That response is, while not universal, fairly common. So this topic will likely conjure up some uncomfortable feelings with some people. But we should address it all the same. Why does society give a ‘curious’ guy such a beating should they experiment with another man?

I’ve seen it happen: Rumors fly and the heterosexual, who perhaps is teetering on the edge bisexuality, is branded a ‘poof’ and ridiculed which makes them ashamed of their feelings.

I’ll be honest here, too. I never felt as though I was anyone’s “test dummy.” I knew what I was doing each step I did it. And the straight guys I was with didn’t treat me any differently after sex than they did prior to it. If anything I used to feel guilty because they would thank me and I thought I should have been thanking them. If you know what you’re doing, straight men are even more thankful than gay men. And they want to see you again…even if that’s not part of your plan. Straight men can be very pushy sometimes, but also far less complicated to deal with. There’s no over-analyzing with straight men.

In any event, maybe good old Topher Gen might be over-analyzing this a little too much. Sometimes a shtup is just shtup. But it is interesting anyway and the comment thread produced some excellent discussion. I can only speak from my own experiences.

However, just don’t let their girlfriends catch you with them. That can get ugly…makes you run naked fast.

Chase of a Christmas Dream

Gay Panic Defense; "Faggots" Written on Door; Having Sex With Straight Guys

Gay Panic Defense

‘I want to make sure that we’re paying attention to things before they happen,’ Eustace said, as reported by New Jersey.com.

According to state law, a charge of murder can be reduced to manslaughter if the crime ‘is committed in the heat of passion resulting from a reasonable provocation.’

Check it out here.

“Faggots” Written on Door

‘It is for these reasons that we had to remove your work from our door with sandpaper.

‘Fabulously yours, the Gays in Apt. 611.’

Here’s the rest. It’s a long one.

Having Sex With Straight Guys

But this is interesting, a commentary piece by someone named Topher Gen, whoever he is:

I’ve seen it happen: Rumors fly and the heterosexual, who perhaps is teetering on the edge bisexuality, is branded a ‘poof’ and ridiculed which makes them ashamed of their feelings.

However, just don’t let their girlfriends catch you with them. That can get ugly…makes you run naked fast.

Chase of a Christmas Dream

Robbie Rogers Gay Masculinity; Twinks, Daddies, Jocks; Transgender Fairy Dolls

Robbie Rogers Gay Maculinity

It was hard to title this part of the post. I thought about using “Gay Stereotypes” and a variety of other interesting words often used with respect to gay men. I’ve often talked about how we usually see only one type of gay man portrayed in the mainstream, when the truth is that there are all kinds of gay men and if people really knew this there might not be any stereotypes at all.

But as it stands this is still a discreet topic and many gay men haven’t even come out at all. Many don’t come out because of stereotypes. It’s not a simple topic. The other day I posted on FB about Michael Sam mentioning there are other gay pro football players and one gay guy commented that Sam shouldn’t have said that. The guy who commented thought it might start a “witch hunt.” That floored me a little because even gay people don’t always see the importance of coming out…as difficult as it is to do for all of us.

In any event, Robbie Rogers is a gay athlete and they’re doing a sitcom about his life. ABC is doing this, which doesn’t give us much hope that it will be either accurate or funny…because it’s network TV. But the main point right now is that Robbie Rogers has asked to have a masculine actor play him in the sitcom, and if this is done right it sounds as though it could be something different for a change…something with which other gay men can identify.

We want to teach people through laughter and play with stereotypes.

“It’s gotta be someone funny, someone who doesn’t care and someone very masculine; someone you wanna grab a beer with. In a perfect world – he obviously wouldn’t do this and I don’t think I’m anything like him – but someone like Chris Pratt. You know, someone hilarious, good looking but not super fit, you know what I mean? So it looks like he doesn’t go to the gym kind of thing…”

Now you would think that was an innocent comment from Rogers. However, if you move down to the comment thread and see some of the vicious comments left by disgruntled people you would think Rogers killed a kitten. It’s also two-sided and it sparked an interesting discussion.

Twinks, Daddies, Jocks

Here’s a link to an article about the various definitions often used to portray small groups of gay men. It’s interesting because it shows how the gay community can often be so diversified…and it’s hard to argue with any of them, except that they only define small groups. I don’t fit into any of the categories and no one I know does.

Here are two I didn’t even know existed:

Pocket Gay
Petite and small in stature, a pocket gay is a travel-sized homosexual who stands under 5’7, even in shoes, and is often highly sought after the moment he steps into a gay bar.

Short guy
Petite and small in stature, a short guy stands under 5’7, even in shoes, and is overlooked or assumed to be gay when he steps into a straight bar.

I probably could have lived a full and happy life never knowing these labels exist, however, I’m just passing the information on with this one. It’s just one of those topics where you’re not sure whether to laugh or kick something.

I’d like to know one thing: what about the gay men who own homes, pay taxes, vote, are active members of their communities, and have families? Guess what, they even go to church. You know, the majority of gay men out there in the world today. Your cousin, your neighbor, and even your facebook friend. Never see a name for them anywhere in these trashy clickbait articles.

Transgender Fairy Dolls

I’m not talking about a category or a stereotype this time. There’s a new toy doll out on the market that’s “shocking” parents because it’s a transgender fairy doll. But even that information is sketchy because it could have been a mistake. And I don’t really know enough about transgender people to comment honestly about this, but I would think this might be insulting on a certain level. I could be wrong about that. I really don’t know.

News about the doll broke after a mother claimed her three-year-old daughter discovered the penis under the doll’s skirt. She posted a picture of it on her Facebook account. The story quickly went viral, causing a stir across the country, before eventually turning into a worldwide pandemic among concerned parents.

The toy was made in China. It is unknown whether the penis was intentional on the part of the manufacturers or if was a factory defect, though we’re going to take a wild guess and say it wasn’t intentional.

I will say this. The transgender people I know don’t identify with fairy dolls. They identify with a specific gender, period. Unfortunately, as it stands the comments aren’t too helpful with this one. I was hoping to learn more, but didn’t.

You can read the rest here, with a photo of the doll.

Chase of a Christmas Dream

Christmas Past by Ryan Field

Christmas Past by Ryan Field

Below is a post I wrote for Queertown Abbey’s 12 Days of Christmas event this December. When they asked me to write it and I noticed they wanted specific traditions and recipes, I wasn’t sure what to do. I guess in a general sense Tony and I spend Christmas in certain ways, but we’ve never had any set traditions that went from year to year. I love restaurants and great food, but I’d rather skip a meal than cook one, so traditional recipes were out of the question. Why make pizza at home when the pros do it so much better?

I tried to focus in a more general sense, which covered many years in only a few paragraphs.

In any event, wishing everyone a great Christmas and safe travels if you’re on the road!! I’ll resume normal gay news blogging on Friday.

The night we met the entire east coast in the US was dealing with record cold temperatures and snow that had frozen over to ice in many places. We actually met in a gay bar in New Jersey that’s not around anymore, on a Saturday night. And there’s a reason for this. If it had not been for the cold and ice we probably never would have met at all. We only went there was because we didn’t want to drive into the city on Saturday night in that weather.

After we met that night, we started “seeing” each other on a regular weekly basis all through that Christmas season. I would drive to meet Tony on Friday nights, and he would meet me on Saturday nights. We did this for two reasons, and I’m mentioning this to show what the times were like. One, we were both fresh out of college and still living at home, and the distance between us was about an hour. Second, in 1992 it wasn’t common for two gay men to “date.” Although neither one of us ever denied we were gay to family, we didn’t talk about it either. And getting picked up for a date by a guy just wasn’t done in our worlds.

During that time, Tony was in the process of purchasing his first home and he was going to settlement the week before Christmas. This bothered me a little because I wasn’t part of that and I felt as if I were intruding in a way. In fact, at the time I thought things might not work out because of this. I’d always pictured meeting someone and buying a home together. But life, as we all learn eventually, is never as we plan it and I wound up loving the town house he bought and I eventually moved in later that year. There wasn’t a move-in day. It happened slowly over the course of that year. Since that time we have purchased other homes together.

But as I look back now, I think those years, in that town house, were some of the best we’ve ever had. We were too young to even know what we were doing and we learned as we went along. The first Christmas in the town house we purchased the biggest tree on the lot and spent hours decorating it and I still didn’t think we had enough ornaments. So each year after that, even to this day, I wind up buying at least a dozen or more new ornaments. Although I’ve never actually counted them, it’s reached a point where there are so many ornaments to put on the tree it takes a full afternoon to put it up. (And hours to take it down.)

It’s hard to pinpoint a specific tradition or “thing” we do for Christmas…other than this massive overly decorated Christmas Tree. Each year since 1992 it’s always been a little different. Up until we moved to our present home we had huge Christmas parties every year, with forty or more people. One year we hired a male stripper to help serve and he turned out to be the best help we ever had. He really did work. When we moved to our current home, which is in a more rural part of town, we stopped having large Christmas parties because our driveway only holds about twenty cars. There’s no parking on the street because it’s so rural. So we figured that in order to avoid insulting people we couldn’t invite for lack of parking space we just wouldn’t have huge parties anymore. And that’s been fine.

The point is that it’s always different in that sense. I wish I could say we have a specific tradition but we really don’t. Last Christmas we spent a good deal of the time in the hospital with my mom and that came along without warning. The year before, we both had the flu and didn’t do much of anything. If there is any specific tradition I suppose it’s Christmas Eve. We started having a small dinner for just us and two very good friends we’ve known for years. They were an older couple I met when I owned my art gallery and we all hit it off immediately. At the time we met, they were already together about forty years. We spent many Christmas Eves with them, until one of them passed away about five years ago. So now we spend it with the survivor…just the three of us. It’s something I think we all look forward to each year and it’s something I also know I’ll miss one day.

As for favorite recipes. Each year that’s different, too. And I think that’s part of what I’ve always enjoyed the most about the Christmas season. It’s never exactly the same, but it’s always spent at home and it’s never been uneventful. The one huge change is that we’re both “out” with our families and we do spend time with them at Christmas. And, of course, now that we’re legally married it does make a difference. Neither of us thought it would. But it does. It makes us equals with every other straight family member and that’s important. Far more important than most people actually realize.

Check out the rest of the Queertown Abbey event here.

Gay Gang Rape; Gay Sword Attack; Family-Friendly Pink Flamingos John Waters

Gay Gang Rape

Some stories are harder to post about than others, and this is one of them. A young guy from Quetzaltenango, Guatemala was disowned by his family for being gay. They threw him out with nothing. He left home and got a job working in a clothing store. What happened after that leaves me cold.

Earlier this year, local gang members began extorting him for money. The men repeatedly called him a “faggot piece of shit” and a “whore.” One day in March, they ganged up and forced him to perform oral sex on them.

The incident, which marked the third time he had been sexually assaulted, left Amezquita-Guzman traumatized. He decided to flee Guatemala shortly afterwards, traveling up through Mexico and finally crossing the Rio Grande into Texas.

He fled to the US seeking asylum and it only gets worse.

Agents with Immigration and Customs Enforcement detained Amezquita-Guzman in May. He was sent to a privately-run detention facility operated by Corrections Corporation of America in the state of Georgia where he filed a claim seeking asylum.

“He could have been released on bond, and he wasn’t,” Amezquita-Guzman’s lawyer, Patrick Valdez, tells the Blade. “My client’s not a danger. He doesn’t have a record in his country or in this country. His record is impeccable. And he had a legitimate asylum application and he had to litigate his case in custody the whole time. That was unfortunate.”

After fighting for one year, he was finally granted asylum. The rest is here.

Gay Sword Attack

This allegedly happened between two middle aged straight men. The grown straight men were watching “a game” and one said the other had “homosexual tendencies,” which started a shitstorm that led the one accused to get a sword and start flinging it around at the accuser.

Voices were raised. Punches were thrown. The two men wrestled their way into the kitchen, before a third man finally broke up the fight and told them to “take it outside.”

The fired up 44-year-old went outside and waited. When Cowboy finally emerged from the building, he was wielding a two-foot sword, which he began wildly swinging in the air. He struck the man once in the head and twice in the left arm before the injured man said he was calling the cops, upon which Cowboy dropped the sword and ran away.

All that, because one didn’t want to be accused of being gay. That’s the shame we all have to worry about the most. There’s nothing wrong with being gay…even if you’re not gay. You don’t need to defend yourselves with swords. The rest is here.

Family-Friendly Pink Flamingos John Waters

I like some of John Waters’ work, but not crazy about it all. I recently tried watching a documentary about Divine and I got so bored I couldn’t stand it a minute longer. Even the documentary couldn’t make Divine look good, which I doubt Divine would have minded in the least. However, from a writer’s POV I do find this interesting and I do think Waters is a genius of sorts for what he does. I can appreciate certain forms of art, but I wouldn’t hang it all in my home.

In any event, Waters is going to recreate a kid, family-friendly version of his 70’s cult film, Pink Flamingos. I don’t think this is a hoax.

“I’ve always said that if you took out the sex and the violence, that it is a children’s story because it’s the battle of the gross-out, and that’s what most kids’ books are now,” John Waters recently told the NYT about his upcoming plans to turn his 1972 cult classic Pink Flamingos into a family-friendly story.

“Kiddie Flamingos” will feature an all-kid cast, who will “wear candy-colored wigs, cat-eye glasses and at least one pencil-thin mustache (drawn on, of course)” while they are filmed doing a table read of the new script.

The reason I find it so interesting is because I did the same thing with Chase of a Dream when I released it in two different versions, one with sex and one without any sex scenes at all. In the future I’ll be experimenting more with that, plus rewriting a great deal of back listed books, in order to do almost the same thing. Just not for kids. Maybe Walters is trying to break into a more mainstream market?

You can read more about Waters here. I’ll be looking out for this one. I’ve seen a lot of mixed commentary about it, but I think it’s a fascinating idea. And good for him for competing with the all the cultural appropriation happening these days. He must be watching all that closely, too. CA is when people coming from a place of privilege try to dominate a minority by taking on their characteristics and creativity.

Chase of a Christmas Dream