Category: errands

Grail Overfloweth

Work-at-home Friday morning, and I have some errands to do in a moment before I do my work-at-home duties. Or maybe I’ll do it later…wait, it’s summer again, so earlier is better but not by much in New Orleans. I was very tired when I got home last night from work–not sure why; I think the heat and humidity sapped my energy on my way into the house from the car (seriously, that’s all it takes) but I did get some of the laundry going. I slept really well last night, which was marvelous, despite waking up before seven yet again. I stayed in bed for a while though, just relaxing and luxuriating in the comfort until I decided that coffee was sounding good and it was time for me to get up. But now I am awake, sipping said coffee, and really looking forward to my three-day weekend. I have to revise a manuscript (as always) but that’s it; and I don’t think this is going to be as hard as the last one. Maybe I’m deluding myself, but whatever works. I’m not dreading it at all, which is a significant change from the past.

We watched The Other Two–this season’s not quite as good as previous–and another episode of The Crowded Room. I think I’ve already figured out what’s going on, two episodes in, but it’s a slow burn show; and it’s not easy to figure out what is going on. It’s extremely well cast, and everything about the show is top notch, but the story itself is being played out a little too slowly? Maybe the pacing will pick up as the show goes, but I worry–as we have noted with other series; the need to fill out eight or ten episodes often leads to a lot of filler and sidetracked episodes that don’t advance the story. That’s a story-telling problem fairly unique to the streaming services–sometimes shorter is better. Not everything needs to be eight or ten episodes long. Tom Holland is really good in this–I think he’s a much better actor than given credit for; but playing a Marvel super-hero stacks the odds against him (although I think he does a good job playing Peter Parker) when it comes to praise for acting and awards. (I thought he was brilliant in Cherry, but no nominations for anything.)

My desk area is a mess and so is this kitchen, so I’m probably going to spend a little time cleaning up around here after finishing this. I am my mother’s son, after all, and now that I have gotten some of the authorial pressure off me, maybe I can spend some more time cleaning up this place and reading and relaxing and so on. I really want to finish the book I’m reading, and I have some absolutely amazing ones on deck to get to–with even more coming out the rest of the summer. I will never get caught up on my reading, will I? Ah, well. I can listen to Carol Goodman on my drive up north in a couple of weeks, and on the way home, too. I’ve not taken an entire week off in a very long time, so that, too, is going to be weird. I am going up to meet Dad in Alabama for their anniversary, and then we’ll convoy back up to Kentucky. I should be able to finish a Carol Goodman on the way up as well as one on the way back.

God, and football season is looming again. What kind of season with the Saints and LSU have? There seems to be a lot of excitement around our new quarterback, Derek Carr (a fellow alum of Fresno State), so there’s no telling. There’s also a lot of expectation for LSU this season, after their remarkable turnaround last year under first year coach Brian Kelly; I’m going to not over-anticipate so as not to be horribly disappointed. Can LSU beat Alabama two years in a row? That’s a feat that only two coaches have accomplished in consecutive seasons–Les Miles at LSU (2010-2011) and Hugh Freeze at Mississippi (2014-2015). Freeze is now the Auburn head coach, and in 2024 Texas and Oklahoma join the SEC (LSU plays host to Oklahoma that year, I think; while Alabama goes to Norman and also gets to host Georgia). College football has changed so dramatically from when I was a kid…I of course remember when the SEC was merely ten teams, before Arkansas and South Carolina were added to make twelve, and Texas A&M and Missouri were added to make fourteen in 2011. It’ll be an entertaining season, to say the least. (In 2024, LSU also goes to play USC in Los Angeles, and UCLA comes to Baton Rouge. LSU doesn’t have an easy schedule that season…)

Okay, time to head into the spice mines. Have a lovely Friday before the holiday weekend, Constant Reader, and I’ll most likely be back again at some point soon.

Wax and Wane

Thursday and last day in the office for the week. I was very tired yesterday, despite not working on Tuesday, and so when I got home I didn’t do a whole lot of anything. No chores, nothing of that sort. I didn’t even read anything! The heat and humidity have returned and it was so miserable when I went out to the car after work yesterday that I felt drained by the time I got into the coolness of the Lost Apartment. I slept decently last night–not great, but restful, waking up a couple of times throughout the evening, but I feel a bit groggy this morning, which is also fine. I think we have a fairly light schedule today at the office and I have some other things I need to get done around seeing my clients. But I’ve almost made it through another week, survived it all, and now we’re at another three-day weekend, which is lovely. I have a lot of work to get done around here this weekend, so the extra day is going to be super great to have.

I need to get caught up on my emails–which won’t take nearly as long as it used to, because I don’t get nearly as much as I once did, which is kind of nice. It’s not that I consider email to be an odious chore or anything, and it’s not like I get problem emails anymore (thank God; I no longer cringe and cower and have to steel myself before pulling up my email), but there’s also not as much urgency with them anymore, either. The decline in the amount as well as the not-quite-as-urgent sensibility of it has resulted in my being pretty lazy about it. (My email provider also recently changed a lot, which is irritating because I don’t like the way it looks now and it wasn’t an improvement to make it easier to use; the Spotify app on my phone recently did the same thing. The lovely thing about technology is the constant need to have to relearn how to fucking use it. That was sarcasm font, by the way.)

So, rather than being my usual lazy self and wasting time finding things on Youtube (primarily to see if they are there), lately as I sit in the easy chair with a purring kitty in my lap I’ve been trying to do some research, that hopefully will stick in my head. Mostly I’ve been looking up videos about the HUAC and Confidential magazine in the 1950s, among other things for that period–also beefcake and peplum–as research for Chlorine. I’m also digging into the 1970’s–mostly music and pop culture, along with historical stuff from the decade–because I want to write a book called The Summer of Lost Boys, which has been simmering in my head since the earliest days of the pandemic. I’m leaning towards setting it in 1975–the summer I turned fourteen and started my sophomore year of high school. It has some potential I think, and while the idea is still amorphous up there in the clouds in my brain, I really like the idea and think it could be a really good book…but I really want to get these two noirs done in first draft this summer. If the heat and humidity doesn’t wear me down too much, I should be able to get both drafts finished by the end of summer.

Unless I get lazy, which is always a possibility. The heat seriously doesn’t help, either. But the thing I always forget is the best thing to do when you get home from work in New Orleans in the summer is take another shower and get cleaned up. I sleep better and I feel better and it generally results in me being a lot more productive. I need to do laundry tonight, put away dishes, and reload the dishwasher, and I am going to start rereading this book that I am about to revise per my editorial letter (I still will be getting one for Mississippi River Mischief, too) and I want to finish reading my book, which I’ve stalled out on now for a couple of weeks…but I need to finish it if I want to move on to my AMAZING TBR pile. I have some errands to run tomorrow morning, too, before starting in on my work-at-home duties, and after that–I am hoping to not leave the house again until Tuesday when I return to work. It would be nice to get some more de-cluttering done this weekend, but I also want to relax, write, and read a lot.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. May you have a lovely Thursday, Constant Reader, and I will see you again tomorrow.

Road, River and Rail

Work at home Friday, and all is well thus far in the Lost Apartment. I did make it through the day somehow–don’t ask me how–but I didn’t feel tired for most of the day and it wasn’t until I headed home that I hit a wall of sorts. I had to pick up the mail–yay for my copy of All The Sinners Bleed!–and then picked up a prescription during a massive thunderstorm, which was kind of fun. I actually love when it rains; I just don’t love that no one in New Orleans seems to know how to drive in rain. One would think that, given how much torrential rain we get here, that–I don’t know–that drivers here would have learned how at some point? (I also got some other buys from eBay in the mail; Alfred Hitchcock Presents Stories to Be Read with the Door Locked, which looks fun, and Mary M. Luke’s A Crown for Elizabeth, which picks up the tale of the Tudor dynasty with the continuation of the story from Catherine the Queen, covering the years 1533 thru 1558. I am excited about both, to be honest.) Paul worked on a grant last night while I watched the last extended gay disco remix episode of the Vanderpump Rules reunion, which was remarkable. I do want to write about reality television, particularly the Bravo flavored kind, but I am also trying to do all these extra Pride entries about not just being a queer crime writer but being a queer American trying to navigate an increasingly hostile world. There’s also been so much coverage of the scandalous last season of this show–along with its mother show, Real Housewives of Beverly Hills–that I don’t really have anything new to add to the discourse, other than to make some observations from a cultural and societal perspective? I think it also might not hurt to unpack why I get so caught up in the (usually) manufactured drama of these shows.

But after I got home and watched, my brain was a bit too fried from the day and the week for the work to be able to make up for the lost time last night and get back on track. It’s getting very close, to the point where I am almost starting to get antsy and have to resist the urge to hurry and finish it as quickly as possible. I am always afraid the endings of my books are rushed because I am so heartily tired of it already and cannot wait to be finished and on to the next thing. I am looking forward to this weekend, primarily for the rest and also for getting things very caught up that have kind of slid this week. I have some chores that have to be done today around the work-at-home duties, and I’d like to finish reading Chris Clarkson’s That Summer Night on Frenchmen Street this weekend, since I now have the latest S. A. Cosby, Megan Abbott, and Christopher Bollen novels to get through. My reading has definitely slid a bid this year, too. I spent some time last night reading the introductions to the Alfred Hitchcock Presents anthology as well as an old MWA one, edited by Robert Fish, that came in Wednesday’s mail, With Malice for All (or something like that). I read the first story in the Fish MWA anthology, and it was very creepy and very short and quite the punch in the face to start off the book.

I really need to get back to the Short Story Project, too.

It was a pleasant week, for the most part. I got a lot of work done this week, which feels great, and I feel pretty confident about moving on and getting this all finished sooner rather than later. I’m looking forward to sleeping in both mornings this weekend, and while I am going to have to leave the house to run errands at some point, at least this morning I can sit here in my chair sipping coffee and thinking I may not have to leave the house all weekend. At one point this week during the office I wandered up to the front desk where some of my co-workers were sitting during the needle exchange (making it Wednesday afternoon, thank you, logic modules in my brain) and they were asking each other icebreaker type questions. When I walked up, the current question was what animal would you want to be so I replied, “My cat, because never leaving the house and sleeping 22 hours a day sounds really appealing.” Scooter has been super-cuddly and affectionate lately, more so than usual, which is saying something because he’s always been super-cuddly and affectionate. I worry about him because we’ve now had him for thirteen years this September, and he was supposedly already two years old when we got him. He’s a sweet boy. I think we’ll probably always have a ginger cat; I suspect when we lose Scooter we may even end up with two of them.

The Strand Critics’ Award nominations came out yesterday, and as always it’s a friend-studded list. Shout out to every finalist. The books nominated that I’ve read are superb, so the choice of a winner isn’t going to be easy–glad the choice didn’t fall into my hands. I am already glad I am not judging any awards this year–I’ve already read so many good books this year that I don’t know that I could chose just the one–and like I said, I’ve not gotten to this year’s releases by some of my favorite authors (and people) and there’s a new Laura Lippman dropping this summer. Woo-hoo! And of course, my TBR pile is already stacked with amazing reads I’d love to make a serious dent in this year.

And on that note, I think I’m going to grab another cup of coffee and put the dishes away and start making a dent in the mess that is the Lost Apartment before I start working for the day. May you have a fabulous Friday, Constant Reader, and I’ll talk to you again later.

Iceblink Luck

Well, we’ve made it to my last day in the office of the week, Constant Reader, and isn’t that simply marvelous?

I knocked out another chapter after work and running a couple of errands (mail, needed something from the grocery store), and am starting to feel a lot more relaxed about how this is turning out. I think I’m catching all the discrepancies and errors. At least one can hope at any rate. I’d like to make this as easy as possible for my (long-suffering) editor. But huzzah, there’s an end in sight. I also paid the bills yesterday and am not completely (or morally) bankrupt…but sheesh, I have a lot of bills. Ah, well. Such is life.

With the end of the book closing in–if I focus and work really hard, I could even finish it this weekend (gasp!), but at the same time I don’t want to kill myself, either. But as long as I can stay focused and not get distracted by any of the annoying hateful minutiae that always derails everything, I should be able to make some really good progress. I am also getting excited because finishing this means I can finally work on something else again for the first time in what feels like years. Don’t get me wrong; writing this Scotty book wasn’t as bad as writing some of them have been. It just feels like it’s taken forever, and there are times when it’s felt like my own personal invasion of Afghanistan. But I’m looking forward to spending the rest of June working on “Never Kiss a Stranger,” so I can focus on Chlorine for July. It would be so great to have a viable, working first draft of that completely by the end of July…and then I will try to find an agent. At last. Surely there’s someone out there interested in repping me, right?

So what if I haven’t found anyone in over twenty years? Optimism! That’s the key.

I slept super great last night and feel much better this morning than I have all week, and I didn’t think I’d not slept well. I don’t know what the deal is, quite frankly, but I am just going to roll with it today and see how everything goes. I may hit a wall and be exhausted by noon, who knows? But I do feel like this morning is showing the potential to be a great day. I will need to probably swing by the mail today–it could wait until tomorrow, in fairness; and I’ve ordered a prescription refill…so perhaps I should wait until I can pick up both on the same trip uptown? (My life is so endlessly fascinating, isn’t it?) I spent last evening (after I finished writing; Paul was working on a grant) watching the third part of the Vanderpump Rules reunion, during which I was constantly having to pick my jaw up off the ground. Now that it’s all over, I’m not really sure I want to do a deep dive into as much as I was thinking I might; I had started doing one after the last season of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, but maybe I could do a compare and contrast of the two together? One is a spin-off of the other, after all–it all comes back to Brandi Glanville, doesn’t it? Which only makes it all the more bizarre, not to mention how current day reality television owes to the OJ trial–without it, we’d have no Kardashians, no Faye Resnick, and that was actually how the Hiltons got involved with the former…and Paris Hilton was one of the original reality stars, let’s not forget that. Maybe once I am finished with this revision…I have so many blog draft entries to finish at some point!

And on that note I am heading into the spice mines. Have a terrific day Constant Reader, and I will check back in with you again tomorrow.

Frou-Frou Foxes in Midsummer Fires

Wednesday Pay-the-Bills day, and I am awake and slurping coffee, which is truly hitting the spot this morning. I slept well last night, and I think I am actually getting used to getting up at this ungodly, abhorrent hour. When I sleep well, I have no problem getting up in the morning (although I always long to stay in bed longer) and I am pretty well conscious, for the most part. (The coffee will do it’s job indubitably before I have to leave the house for the office, which is lovely, as always.) Yesterday wasn’t too bad. I did run uptown to get the mail on the way home (there was exactly one letter; my copy of All the Sinners Bleed, the new S. A. Cosby, won’t arrive until tomorrow), and I wasn’t terribly tired when I got home. I unloaded the dishwasher and cleaned out the sink, revised another chapter, and just chilled out for the rest of the evening. I’ve got a couple of nonfiction reads going at the same time (Hi Honey I’m Homo by Matt Baume and The Way They Were:  How Epic Battles and Bruised Egos Brought a Classic Hollywood Love Story to the Screen by Robert Hofler–I do love books about the making of movies! And of course I am still reading The Johnstown Flood by David McCullough) so I finished the Hofler last night (cannot reiterate how much I love books about the making of classic films. The Way We Were, however flawed it may be, it probably my favorite Barbra Streisand movie–either that or What’s Up Doc.

I have a ZOOM meeting tonight as well, so I’ll probably come straight home from the office today after work. The excitement never stops, does it?

I was also thinking some more about my Pride writings, and whether or not I really want to talk about the homophobia I’ve experienced in my career. I do think these things need to be addressed–absolutely no one should have the false impression this kind of shit doesn’t still go on, isn’t still happening–but at the same time, it’s hard to write about those things without getting angry, or becoming THAT Gay Man (similar in some ways to the Angry Black Woman, I think; a trope that is easily dismissed by the dominant culture rather than examined in the ways it should be; if a Black woman is angry, why not find out why rather than being dismissive?) who people can easily stop listening to. Homophobia sucks, and being on the receiving end of it is no pleasure for anyone. It’s even less pleasant to experience and write about. But these things happen, and not shining a light on these unacceptable behaviors allows them to fester and grow. I like to believe sometimes (when feeling more charitable than usual) that people aren’t aware sometimes that what they are saying or writing is homophobic because that shit is baked so deeply into our society and culture; if you never examine yourself, you never learn and grow.

It amazes me how many people think they already “know enough” and don’t need to continue learning and growing. I always want to keep learning, keep modifying myself into the best version of myself that I can be (thank you, Ted Lasso), and growing into a more compassionate, empathetic person. It would be nice to talk about gay joy, you know?

For me, coming out was like a rebirth of sorts. I was absolutely miserable before I started living out loud as a gay man; I kind of led two different lives in which I had two different sets of friends that knew nothing about the others. But the real life was the closeted one, even though hanging out with other gays and going to gay bars was like a breath of fresh air after being stuck in a smoke-filled room for hours. I was keeping so much from either set of friends that I never really felt super-close to any of them; I loved them all dearly, but felt disconnected from them because they didn’t really know me. I was thirty when I started merging my two lives together, and believe me, coming out didn’t solve much for me, either. I felt freer, but I also had to start learning how to navigate being gay all of the time instead of having a few brief hours of freedom every week. I didn’t make many gay friends, and most of the gay people I knew were my co-workers…and the last thing I ever wanted to do was get physically and emotionally involved with a co-worker. There was still a lifetime of self-loathing and self-flagellation stuffed into my head as I started to reeducate and reevaluate myself and my life. The lovely thing about coming out at thirty meant I wiped the slate clean and had to start really figuring out who I actually was. It also makes sense that my writing never went anywhere while I was closeted; I wasn’t a complete person,. so how could I write and create compelling characters that are fully rounded when I was still under construction?

The weird thing is that thirty-one years later, I still feel like I’m figuring out who I am and what I want from my life…as the sands in the hourglass continue to run out. But while there have certainly been difficult times since I waltzed out of the closet, I’ve also been happier and more content and at peace than I ever was before. It might be age and experience, I don’t know, but I believe that I could have never reached that point while living in the closet. Had I continued to deny my true self, how miserable would my life have turned out? It was already going down a dark path already; the 1980’s and HIV/AIDS still cast a long shadow over my life.

But I’ve also known joy in the second half of my life; joy I never experienced or felt in the first half of it. And I wouldn’t trade that for anything…I’ve never regretted it, not once, not even when all the forces of the religious right and their useful idiots in elected office have arrayed themselves against people like me.

On that note, I think I am going to head into the spice mines. Have a lovely Wednesday, Constant Reader, and I’ll talk to you again soon.

wolf in the breast

Tuesday morning in the Lost Apartment and I feel daunted. I know we have a busy schedule at the office today and I am mentally preparing myself for all those interactions. I love my job (I don’t love getting up at six, never will), and I love that I am helping people (not quite the urgency of the olden days, but still–new HIV infections need treatment and care else it can still prove fatal), but lots of clients have a tendency to wear me out some and thus I am exhausted when I come home at the end of the day. I have to run errands after work today–mail, mostly–and hopefully won’t be so drained by the time I get home that I’ll be able to carve out some revising time. I managed to get through another chapter last night, and I do believe the book is starting to take its final, publishable form, and I should be able to get it in on time.

Last night after writing Paul and I started watching a new bilingual show on Apple Plus called Now and Then. It’s set in Miami, so some of the characters speak Spanish, some speak English, and some speak both. Twenty years ago after a college graduation, six friends partied on a beach; one of them died, and as they were rushing him to the hospital (driving under the influence) there was an accident. The other driver was killed, and to protect themselves they moved the by-now dead friend into the driver’s seat and fled the scene. Twenty years later (there’s a dual time line, which can be a bit confusing at first) the now adult kids are being blackmailed, and of course the same cops are investigating the new murder of one of them…it’s interesting, if a bit confusing, and it took me a while to get used to the characters (as well as figuring out who they all were in each timeline) but it was intriguing and we will most likely continue watching. I am really looking forward to their new Tom Holland show, The Crowded Room, which also looks interesting. Apple is doing interesting things with their television service.

I have some other Pride entries that I’ve started and haven’t quite finished yet. I am hesitant to post them because–well, I don’t really know why. Writing about homophobic treatment within the publishing community, and my experiences with it, shouldn’t make me feel reticent and squirmy. It gets tiring calling this shit out, then having to defend yourself against straight people who question whether or not this stuff happened. It’s a form of gaslighting the mainstream has perfected when it comes to the non-majority; is it homophobia, or is he just an asshole? Why should i feel uncomfortable talking about how I’ve been treated by certain members of the community, when I didn’t do anything wrong? It’s why women who are sexually harassed and/or assaulted at conventions don’t say anything–because for some reason people always want to protect an institution instead of the individual. You become the problem, instead of the person who actually did something wrong in the first place. The casual homophobia at events at Bouchercon etc. always leave you wondering, should I have laughed that off? Should I have said something? There are some straight male writers who’ve made it abundantly clear to me they want nothing to do with me–and can’t even be bothered to be professionally polite. There’s one in particular who’s been especially rude to me at several events. He’s friends with friends of mine, so he will inevitably drift over and join us–pointedly ignoring me. He actually refused to be introduced to me at Sleuthfest one year.

And of course, when I mention this to my straight writer friends, they are very quick to “oh, you must have misunderstood he’s such a great guy” and I always have to bite my tongue to not say, “Great to straight people, sure.” I was a little taken aback when he refused to be introduced to me at Sleuthfest, but I have started being amused by the fact that my existence clearly shakes him to the very core of his being, to the point that now he turns his back to me if we’re in the same area. How can I not be amused by that level of childishness I’ve not experienced since grammar school and the playground? Sure, dude, you’re really punishing me by not meeting me and engaging with me. It keeps me up at night (sarcasm). Sorry about your penis being so small, homophobe.

And of course, there are the lovely ones who think making a joke about diversity concerns along the lines of “I let a guy suck my dick once for drugs, does that count?” Ha ha ha ha, such wit, I can see why you became a writer with that kind of sharp thinking and clever turns of phrase coming so naturally to you that it just rolls off your tongue.

I also wish I had a dollar for every time a straight person has explained to me how someone else saying something horribly homophobic is actually okay because he/she is “nice” and I must have misunderstood. Um, after sixty-one years of dealing with it, I’m pretty fucking sure I know homophobia when I see and hear it, but please, O Wise and Wonderful Straight Person, please explain what is and isn’t homophobic to the gay man from your vast wealth of experience of dealing with it every day, I would never tell a woman something isn’t sexist, nor a person of color what is and isn’t racism.

Sigh. And on that note, back to the spice mines with me.

I Wear Your Ring

Monday and back to the office with me this morning. Woo-hoo! The excitement never stops, does it? I slept pretty well last night–well enough to not want to get up this morning–and so feel a bit groggy this morning. I’m not certain how busy we’ll be at work today, but I am hoping it will be an easy day. Yesterday wasn’t a bad dat; I managed to make progress on the book, got some things done around the house, and we watched the new Arnold Schwarzenegger Netflix show FUBAR, which was entertaining enough. In some ways, the show almost feels like a sequel to True Lies, in which he played a spy whose wife had no idea what he actually did for a living. This show takes that premise to its next logical conclusion, should the wife never find out she’s married to a spy. It had some funny moments, has a really good cast, and high production values. This week the Vanderpump Rules final reunion episode airs, but some of my shows–Ted Lasso, sob–are completed. Not sure what we will be watching next–I imagine I’ll be watching the Randall scandal documentary (more Vanderpump Rules drama) at some point, but not terribly sure that’s something Paul will want to watch.

I didn’t read a lot this weekend; the little writing I was able to do, along with other miniscule irritations over the course of the weekend, managed to tire out my brain to the point where being able to focus on reading wasn’t likely. Progress is progress, after all, and maybe I’m a bit behind my usual schedule, or the one I was trying to keep with it, but it will get completed on time, methinks.

I have my dates and everything all screwed up again; I keep thinking it’s later in June than it actually is. Part of that has to do with the usual “working on a book so not paying attention to dates” thing I inevitably get caught up in, and I imagine the rest has to do with the year being very off-balance for me thus far. I handed over MWA in the middle of January, whilst in the midst of revising two of my own books while editing another, and then Mom died and then it was the festivals and then Malice and now suddenly it’s June, which doesn’t seem real–and I am going back up north the last week of this month. I’d wanted to take a week off this summer just to work on things around the house–purging the attic, for one, and doing a deep, thorough cleaning for another–but looks like that time is going to be burnt being there for my dad. There are, of course, worse things to burn off your vacation time with; and it’s nice feeling closer to my father. I just hate the reason behind it, you know?

At least the Internet is continuing to work for me at home. (Probably just jinxed that.)

It apparently rained overnight; part of the reason I slept so well, probably, and so today is one of those weird mornings where it feels cool because the humidity hasn’t fully recharged yet from the rain.

I’m also trying to decide what my next Pride month entry should be. I’ve got a couple already going–one about being confronted by homophobia within the mystery publishing community–but I find myself hesitant to post it because of not wanting to be “that gay”, which is stupid. If I don’t call out homophobia where and when I see it, I am contributing to the problem. I guess I should be a little less concerned with hurting people’s feelings, or something? I don’t know. But I am heading into the spice mines this morning, and will check in with you later. Maybe there will be a “homophobia in crime fiction” entry posted later, you never know…but one thing for sure, I will be back tomorrow morning.

Fotzepolitic

Sunday morning and things went about as well as could be expected yesterday. Friday evening I had some items delivered from Sam’s Club, but hadn’t noticed that one of the items ordered actually had to be shipped; it arrived this morning here at the Lost Apartment. And while I was waiting for my Cox cable technician to arrive (I rearranged the entire morning to accommodate their 10-12 am window), I got a text message at 11:30 informing me that my appointment was cancelled; then came the email stating we know things happen! Reach out and reschedule! I reached out, only to be told that the technician arrived, called, got voicemail, and departed DESPITE MY HAVING GIVEN THE SAME INSTRUCTIONS I ALWAYS GIVE: OUR BUZZER DOESN’T WORK SO YOU HAVE TO CALL OR TEXT WHEN YOU ARRIVE.

Also, I had my phone with me all morning, so I wouldn’t miss the call. No one called, I have no recents, and I have no voicemails.

This obviously threw me off my game yesterday for writing, but I did get some done. I am a bit behind on the schedule I’d given myself, but I think it’s going to go relatively easily from now on. I ran some errands, came home, got cleaned up, and dove into the writing. I wasn’t really able to shake off the mood, so after struggling for a few hours to get the chapter done, I called it a day and repaired to my easy chair. Needing to cleanse my soul, I did a rewatch binge of the first episodes of Ted Lasso, which are even more charming on rewatch because you get to see all the callbacks you might have forgotten about later in the run of the show, like Keeley acknowledging that she “dated a 23 year old footballer when she was seventeen, only now I’m thirty and I’m still dating 23 year old footballers” while talking to Rebecca. You can almost see the light come on in her eyes–what the hell am I doing–which kind of opens the door for her breaking up with Jamie later. Even though they don’t know each other well, she recognizes that it’s time for her to grow-up and start thinking about her own future, while talking to Rebecca–which is the first building block in their close friendship. Then later, when Paul was finished working for the day we watched Bama Rush, which was kind of disappointing. Originally focusing on four girls about to go through sorority rush at the University of Alabama–which I guess is this viral thing on TikTok–it got a bit derailed with the director started seeing similarities in behavior of the girls planning to go through rush as she went through being a lifelong alopecia sufferer…which could have been made a lot more interesting, but I always thought the point of a documentary was the director didn’t make themselves a part of the story? I think the point she was trying to make was valid, but the way the documentary was a edited together simply didn’t work. The focus shifted, and it derailed after that.

But Jesus God in heaven, those sorority houses in Tuscaloosa! The fraternity houses! They’re enormous. I had kind of figured Greek life at universities would be declining, given how old-fashioned and restrictive they can be, especially sororities–and this newer younger generation doesn’t seem as interested as preserving traditions and institutions as previous ones were, but Bama Rush showed me things I didn’t know…that “Rush Consultant” is actually a career, for one thing…and the documentary only briefly touched on the Machine, a supposedly secret society made up of representatives from every fraternity and sorority that controls everything at the University. (I kind of love that shit; I’ve long been an admirer of Pat Conroy’s The Lords of Discipline, which kind of touched on that kind of thing.)

Today I am going to get shit done. Later this morning I am going to make a very brief and short grocery run to the Rouse’s in the CBD, and then I am coming home to spend the rest of the day writing and reading. I didn’t read yesterday, which was a bit disappointing; I’d hoped to finish reading my current book this weekend so I could move along to Megan Abbott’s new one; but anticipation is always lovely, and perhaps I can get along to that next week. One can always hope, can’t one?

But I feel rested and awake this morning. My back and legs are a bit tight and sore, so I think I’m to use that massage roller thing for my back and maybe do some stretching (which I should do every day) to see how it feels. I am planning on getting a chapter finished, maybe doing some reading, and then making my grocery run so I can come back and do more writing. I need to write most of the day, to make up for the last couple of days of irritation and aggravation that kept me out of the proper mindset.

My mind has been all over the place this week, which is weird, but also kind of normal for me. Whenever I am in the weeds with a book my mind goes off in all kinds of directions and produces all manner of thoughts and ideas. I started writing several other entries yesterday, specifically for Pride Month and specifically about being gay–sometimes about being a gay author and what that’s like; I always forget that people never really quite grasp or understand what it’s like to be a queer writer in an intolerant country, of what it feels like to be othered by every community in which you try to find a place where you belong. I’ve never wanted to be THAT gay; the one constantly having to remind people of what is and isn’t homophobia, and is always having to point it out and teach straight people about what it’s like. It’s exhausting, frankly, and sometimes the well-meaning ignorance is highly offensive, but you know they don’t mean it that way so you push down the offense and ignore it while calmly trying to explain to the person why they can’t say or do that…while also not trying to hurt their feelings (although had they put even the tiniest bit of thought into it, would have never said anything offensive in the first place). It’s exhausting having to see trash equate your sexuality with pedophilia and grooming on a daily basis. It’s exhausting having to constantly have to defend your right to exist, having to constantly prove you’re a human being worthy of being treated the same as everyone else…

The mental health of queer people is always under constant assault.

And on that note, I am going to get some more coffee and start working. Either on the book, or on one of these Pride entries. I can’t decide which. We’ll see. Anyway, enjoy your Sunday, Constant Reader, and I’ll check in with you again tomorrow.

I Will Survive

First I was afraid, I was petrified…

Every gay man of a certain age knows all the lyrics to that song–and can (and will) belt it out while on the dance floor. The minute that piano intro begins coming through the speakers is one of those moments when everyone in the bar pauses and makes the “wooooo” sound as the dance floor fills. One year during Southern Decadence we stopped into the Louisiana Pizza Kitchen for lunch. Every table had a rainbow flag on it, which was cool. One of my friends picked up the flag and started raising it while singing “I Will Survive” because it was, in his words, “the gay national anthem.” I laughed really hard–we all did–but it also stuck in my head. That was in 1995, and almost thirty years later I always hear the opening piano riff and think ah, the gay national anthem! All rise!

I also always smile when I remember it.

Being queer in America means surviving, adapting a protective coloring, as it were, so that you could pass without question during your work life (or people might question it, but not to your face). The one nice thing about being a gay man is the fact that, in theory, we can navigate through the world and “pass”; there are very few of us that someone can look at and think, definitively and definitely, without question oh he’s a homo. I have never thought i presented as particularly masculine; certainly when I was a child other kids sniffed it out about me. I don’t know if that means they had some sort of “bullying gaydar” operating at a high level, or if I was so obviously gay that it was noticeable. (I’ve always wondered.) The way we think other people see us is so vastly different from how they actually do see us; none of my friends were either surprised or shocked when I came out to them at long last. I think that’s part of the reason “I Will Survive” is a gay anthem; for one thing it’s extremely adaptable, for another it’s defiant–oh no, bitch, YOU’RE not bringing me and my life down–(has anyone ever done a study about why gay men are drawn to Black women singers with powerful voices?) and that’s a message all gay men can easily identify with: survival. Back in the day we used to have to develop powerful camouflage (no, I never did) and keep the gay personal life and the non-gay professional life divided by a clear line of demarcation.

That’s why going to gay bars was so important for so many of us; the ability to have a place where you could unabashedly be yourself amongst other people like you was so freeing, so life affirming. After I left the travel industry, I was tired of working for straight businesses and having to play down who I was. I was tired of two separate lives, so after I made the decision to leave that job, start working as a personal trainer and focus my energies on writing, I also made the conscious choice to not ever work in a straight office environment ever again. The gyms I worked at were different, despite being owned and operated by straight people, because I never spent a lot of time there. I came in, trained my clients or did my own workout, and then bailed to come home to write. I have not really had a job in the straight world ever since, managing to work in queer spaces most of my life since.

With the community so hatefully under attack again, it takes me back to those olden days before Lawrence v. Texas was decided; when our sex lives made us criminals. I cannot emphasize this enough–before Lawrence, any time any member of my community indulged in sexual relations, they were breaking the law. Our very existence was outlawed. Legally, it was okay to be gay so long as you never acted on it. Which was very similar to the “don’t ask don’t tell” thing, or the strictures passed along by religious hierarchies to their memberships about being queer–it’s okay, as long as you never act on it. Hate the sin, love the sinner–that whole nonsensical thing that automatically relegates all queer people to a lower level existence in society.

Last night we watched the Amazon Prime documentary series on the Duggar family and their entire religious cult (not based in anything scriptural or Christian, really), Shiny Happy People, and it’s actually very chilling. I never watched their show, but it was during the time that TLC went from The Learning Channel to Touching Little Children; the Duggars anchored the channel’s reality program about abusive religious cults that demeaned women and celebrated over-fertility; it was around this same time TLC began promoting and broadcasting shows about beauty pageants for little girls–essentially, the sexualization of little girls for trophies and checks and tiaras. So, on the one hand they had shows with the Duggars and other families like them–abusive cults where children are often molested and it’s covered up–while also promoting and publicizing the sexualization of little girls in shows like Toddlers and Tiaras. Add in the fact that Josh Duggar–the predator groomed by his parents to be a predator–was going to work for the religious zealots known as the American Family Association (long known for it’s homophobia and misogyny) and pursuing a career in politics as a right-wing zealot and homophobe with direct ties to the Huckabee family, including Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders. (An unholy alliance forged in hell that no one talks about at all anymore. I’d ask that bitch at every press conference if she and her father condoned the Duggars covering up their son’s molestation of children, including his sisters, and why they never spoke out against the Duggars, and just how close were the two families?)

The sheer misogyny of their beliefs and values–women have no value outside of the home and bearing children; if a male molests girls he is to be protected and the girls sacrificed–and women must obey their husband who is also their Lord and Master.

And they call queers perverts?

Take the sty from thy own eye, evangelicals. Seriously. But thank you, Amazon Prime, for releasing this documentary during Pride Month; let’s remind everyone of how foul homophobes are on every level.

The Internet saga continues. It was out when I got home from the office yesterday, and so Cox is coming out again this morning. If this continues to be an issue, we are definitely going to switch providers. There’s a local company our landlady uses that works well, and of course, since they’re local they are a lot easier to deal with–no text or on-line conversations with “support staff” needed. It eventually came back on after a couple of hours, but I am really getting terribly sick of this shit, you know? I have things to do today and messing with Cox isn’t helpful. Ah, well, there are worse things. I want to work on the book today, I need to run some errands, and I want to get some reading done–I want to finish the book I am reading and enjoying so I can move on to the new Megan Abbott, which I cannot wait to read.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Saturday and I’ll check back in with you later.

Heaven or Las Vegas

Thursday and my last day in the office for the week. Huzzah? Huzzah. I do have to go into the office ungodly early for a department meeting, but that’s okay. I may just have to swing by Five Guys on my way home as a weekend treat. WHY NOT? Why not indeed.

Yesterday was similar to the day before; I didn’t feel tired but I also didn’t feel rested. We were busy at work all day, too, which was cool; the day always passes faster if we’re busy. I was very tired when I got home, worked on the book and knocked off another chapter, then we settled in to watch the finale of Ted Lasso, which was simply marvelous; I am going to watch it again (I cried a lot of the way through it, not ashamed to admit it) and was enormously satisfied with the ending. There will be another, more in depth conversation about the show to come at some point, when I’ve had more of a chance to digest it. I see that there are some people who aren’t happy with it–but it hit every note for me perfectly. Did I get everything I wanted in the end? Of course not, but that was never going to happen, and I am very grateful I found the show (thanks again to Alafair Burke, who told me I’d love it in the first place and she was right). I’ll miss AFC Richmond, but…am grateful that I got to know them all. It was simply magic.

We also watched a George Michael documentary–not the one Paul wanted to watch, alas; we’ll watch that one tonight–and then I had to catch up on the Vanderpump Rules reunion, which was hilarious and fun and reality gold. I also loved that almost every commercial break featured a commercial with Ariana Madix, who is having probably the best revenge tour in the history of reality television.

I slept well last night, and this morning I feel rested and awake and ready to go; first time this week, alas, but what can you do? The book is progressing nicely; I may even have time to revise it one more time before it’s due to be turned in. I have a big weekend coming; a weekend of writing and reading (I want to finish Chris Clarkson’s marvelous That Summer Night on Frenchmen Street so I can move on to the new Megan Abbott) and cleaning. I want to get the car washed this weekend and vacuumed out, I need to get moving on the scanning project, and I should get another box down from the attic to go through. I need to drop books off at the library sale on Saturday, too. Sounds like I am going to need a to-do list specific for the weekend, doesn’t it? I’m also going to have some things delivered, I think, on Saturday.

I feel good this morning, about everything, which is lovely. It’s amazing what a difference it makes when I sleep well, isn’t it? And on that note, I am heading back into the spice mines. Have a lovely Friday Eve, everyone!