Uncategorized – Page 3 – Queer and Loathing in America

All I Do Is Win

The 2023 football season is very different from every season that has come before it.

College football has gone through a reboot of sorts, in which the old pretenses of amateur athletics in exchange for an education have finally been stripped away to turn the game into a semi-pro NFL feeder system with payers getting paid ridiculous amounts of money, by the college and by booster collectives and being able to cash in on their name-likeness-image (NIL) by doing advertising for businesses.

College football is very different from the era I grew up watching, and so I’ve seen the changes first hand. Back in the early 1900’s, when college football truly began, college was for rich kids or poor kids who were super-smart and worked hard and put themselves through with scholarships, financial aid, and jobs. College was only for the elites; working class people and most middle class kids couldn’t afford it and it was out of the question: you needed family money or a lot of intelligence or athletic ability. The rags-to-riches story of kids from farms or very poor families who got to go to college and change their lives became a cliché in film and books and sports columns; Americans always love an underdog in their entertainment (while never examining in their own lives and behaviors how they treat underdogs–which is usually with the same condescending contempt that the elites show to underdogs in college sports movies and novels). In some cases it was true, especially during the Depression. (Watching the ESPN documentary Saturdays Down South, about the rise and history of the Southeastern Conference, you hear that same story over and over again with the older guys, or the phantoms from the past.)

When I was a kid, there was no national championship in college football’s highest level. Originally, the Rose Bowl was kind of seen as a “national championship” game as the only postseason game, but eventually other bowls began popping up for those excellent teams passed over by the Rose Bowl, which led to the creation of the Cotton, Sugar, and Orange bowls, which were the original big four bowl games. The national championship was decided by polls that didn’t always agree, so almost every year there was no consensus champion, and often more than one. Most lists of college football national champions only counts one or two polls, usually the AP (sports writers) and UPI (coaches poll). Needless to say, this didn’t solve anything and led to a lot of controversy and bad feeling. The writers and the coaches were frequently biased, which led to a situation where a “brand” name school–your Oklahomas, Ohio States, Notre Dames, Alabamas, and USC’s, among others–were always taken more seriously than non-brand name schools; it wasn’t easy for any team who wasn’t one of those (or Michigan, or Texas) to be picked over a name brand school; and it was always obvious that an undefeated Notre Dame would always win the polls over any other undefeated team. The bowls gradually tied themselves to conferences, which made the national championship race even more tangles. The Southwest champion always went to the Cotton Bowl, SEC has the Sugar, the Big Eight had the Orange, and the Rose was the Big Ten champion against the Pac-9 champion. The money also wasn’t there; ABC had an exclusive contract to televise NCAA games, and so every weekend there was usually a game of national import to watch as well as something local. We were from the South but lived in the Midwest when I was a kid, which meant we rarely got to see any SEC games unless Alabama was doing really well.

The break-up of that monopoly held by NCAA over television rights for college football fell in the early 1980s, ESPN launched, and suddenly the landscape of college football had changed forever. The need for a consensus champion led to several attempts to solve the problem, but the question of the top two teams to play for it every year became controversial as inevitably, someone was left out. The debacle of the 2003 season, which saw LSU win on the field and USC win in a poll, led to some more tweaking of the system. But…when they expanded the field to four I said “there will be controversy when you have six teams with the same record so two are left out (which happened last year, with Georgia and Florida State) and now this year…there’s a twelve team playoff so the season doesn’t matter quite as much; there will be teams left out again, the players are getting paid, and the conference realignments all went into effect this year, changing everything. I’m not used to seeing Texas and Oklahoma being SEC teams, or USC and Washington being in the Big Ten.

It’s fucking weird.

It always surprises people that I love college football. Gay men aren’t, apparently, supposed to care about sports and especially not “sportsball”¹; but for many of my straight guy friends, football is something we can talk about outside of writing or reading or anything publishing related; it also helps me feel more comfortable talking to straight men as many of them are football fans. There’s no better icebreaker than talking about football. I also am not one of those fans who mock and taunt fans of a team I don’t care for. And I know a lot about college football from decades of watching it; I have relatives who’ve played at the Division I level, and whenever my family gathers for any kind of event in the fall on a Saturday, we usually gather around the television to watch whatever games are airing.

I generally try not to read a lot of books about college football. My reading time is too consumed with reading fiction and history that I generally can’t spare a lot of time for reading about something I just enjoy, and it can never count in my fevered brain as research, as I most likely will not ever write anything about college football, although I suppose I could write about being a fan, and what that is like, and how fun it is to follow LSU (and the Saints) as a fan here in Louisiana. But with the pandemic and all the insane daily news of the last four (or ten) years, I didn’t follow the behind-the-scenes machinations of how everything was coming together for the realignments and the play-offs–and what all went on in the boardrooms; why some conferences grew and became super conferences, how some others rebuilt, and others died on the vine. The Southwest Conference died in the early 1990’s, so it’s not like conferences haven’t died before, but seeing the events of the last few years was kind of crazy.

So I bought a copy of The Price: What It Takes to Win in College Football’s Era of Chaos, and left it on the coffee table next to my easy chair. The lovely thing about the book is each chapter is written like a stand-alone in-depth piece of journalism, and provides a lot of background on all the politics and backstabbing and money involved in rebooting all of college football for a new era, and how much the big money involved drove almost everything. It’s also a terrific in-depth look at the 2023 season, from the pre-season media days all the way to the championship game with Michigan once again ascending the throne of college football.

As for me, it’s an adjustment to the new world of college football, but at the same time, the only thing constant in anything is change. Is it better or worse than it was before? I am not going to stand on my lawn shouting at clouds about it, and am willing to give it a wait-and-see attitude; you can get used to almost anything, and I imagine at some point we’ll get so used to the new system we’ll look back at the old worlds (as we have already done) and wonder, “why did we do it like that when it doesn’t make much sense?”

Que sera, sera.

And if you do enjoy college football, this is a terrific read.

For the record, gay men who call it that aren’t clever or amusing, but incredibly offensive. I actually cringe a little bit for them. Not being a part of something that’s enjoyed by the vast majority of people doesn’t make you any edgier or cooler. It’s actually infantile and makes me think less of you. “oooh, is today the sportsball?” You can also not say any-fucking-thing. And remember that the next time someone mocks you for, I don’t know, liking show tunes and red carpets. ↩︎

He Thinks I Still Care

Yesterday didn’t turn out the way I’d hoped, but low energy is sometimes completely unpredictable. I ran my errands yesterday–mail, prescriptions, groceries–and by the time I got home I was very tired, to the point I didn’t even finish putting the dry goods away from Costco on Friday (yes, there is a Costco-sized package of paper towels sitting on the living room floor, where it’s been since I tossed it over there on Friday). Instead, I collapsed into my easy chair and started watching games. First I watched Florida beat Mississippi State (how bad are the Bulldogs this season?), then the LSU-UCLA, the end of Vanderbilt-Missouri (probably the best game of the day) and at the end of it all got to watch Tennessee dominate Oklahoma for most of the 25-15 game before turning it off to go to bed as the sleepiness took over. LSU struggled with UCLA in the first half to a 17-17 half-time score, but went on to win it 34-17. The defense still looks iffy, the offense is starting to really gel, and they always seem to never really be into the game in the first half. There was a lot of sloppy play in the game, and I also do think LSU was the better team…but they just never seem game ready when the game actually starts. Both offense and defense looked better in the second half to me, but that is alarmingly reminiscent of the last two seasons….and historically, LSU always plays not as well in the first half. We’ll see how that goes in a few weeks when Mississippi comes to Baton Rouge. The Saints play at noon today, too–which is probably when I am going to make groceries today; it’s always best to do it in the ghost town New Orleans becomes during Saints games. I’ll have it on and probably won’t watch, as I still get too vested in Saints games.

My mind was too fatigued yesterday for me to process trying to read anything (although I did finally read that Advocate piece on jockstraps and their history, so I can possibly write that essay at some point; it also occurs to me this morning that maybe I should try outlining my essays, figuring out what I actually want to say rather than ad-libbing these essays that I post. I am very behind on them now–especially when it comes to writing up books I’ve read–and maybe, just maybe, outlining the points I want to make and the information that led to the coming up with those points and defending them might not be a bad idea. I do enjoy freeform writing–that’s what this blog actually is, isn’t it?–but it’s probably not the best for long form personal essays. I’m always learning, aren’t it?

My copy of Julia Dahl’s I Dream of Falling arrived yesterday, emphasizing further the need for me to get back to reading. I have way too many great books to read on deck, and not reading every day is a mistake. I should come home from work every day, put my stuff down, feed Sparky, change into more comfortable clothes, and read for an hour. There are good games on next weekend, but nothing to take me away from doing things (LSU plays South Alabama, and it will most likely not be televised), so next weekend should be a good time for me to get reading. The following weekend is a bye, so…the next two weekends should be more productive than the usual weekend in fall.

I did, however, do some thinking about the next chapter of the Scotty book, and I think I need to reread the previous, already written chapters. I also want to mark up Scotty books–I was incorrect, Garden District Gothic was never marked up–so that I can start transcribing and getting everything organized. So, I need to get this done with the last three and transcribe the mark-ups from Jackson Square Jazz, too, which I can do during the Saints game if I so choose. I want to do some cooking today, too–things for the week for lunch, healthy snacks (making a salad to eat from over the week; roasting Brussels sprouts, and making chicken salad)–and I need to get some filing done, at least out of my inbox, which has been a royal mess for quite some time. I also need to look at deadlines and so forth, and plan some short story writing time as well, and take some time today to at least start that next chapter. I also found some great inspirational pictures for a short story I am writing; one can never go wrong with bayou and swamp pictures, seriously. Maybe the LSU bye weekend I can drive out to the Manchac Swamp and LaPlace and take a look around so I have a better idea of how to write that story. It’s very lengthy already–focuses on desire for a gay college student for his straight best friend (does this still happen?)–but the ending has to not be rushed as it is now, and just as layered and complex as the opening of the story; right now the story feels like it’s front-loaded with a lot of set-up than BANG! It’s almost over instantly. So much work to get done…

And on that note, I am going to head into the spice mines. The dishes aren’t going to do themselves and that food isn’t going to prepare itself and the filing won’t put itself away, either. I hope you have a lovely Sunday, Constant Reader, and if I get some of those entries done, I’ll be back later. Otherwise, till tomorrow morning, adieu.

Judgement of the Moon and Stars

I love short stories.

I actually always have, once we actually started reading short stories written in the twentieth century; making me read shit like “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” and “The Minister’s Black Veil” as hardly conducive to getting teenaged Greg to sit still long enough to read one. I did read short stories in the Alfred Hitchcock Presents books my grandmother always had around, but that also kind of gave me a stilted view of short stories and what they were supposed to be; I thought stories always had to end with a jolting twist or surprise in order to, well, properly work as a short story. I still have a tendency to try to write stories inside that box, with the final paragraph or sentence essentially changing everything that came before it¹; Daphne du Maurier also wrote her short stories this way, too. But when we finally moved on to more modern stories in high school–William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily,” Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery”, Katherine Mansfield’s “Miss Brill”–I was enthralled–but also, these stories also come with a big twist at the end. It’s something I still struggle with, and those kinds of stories are also harder to write, I think (yes, making it harder on myself like always). But I do love short stories, even though I often find them to be more difficult to write than novels (they actually are different kinds of writing). It does seem weird to me that I am close to finishing my fourth collection of short stories, yet here we are.

I was asked to be to be the judge for the Saints & Sinners short story contest this year, which was a bit of a shock at first, because usually it isn’t someone who is primarily known as a crime writer. I also don’t consider myself to be a terrific short story writer, either (maybe my insecurity about my short stories will go away now that I am getting closer to feeling normal–for me–than I have in at least five or six years), but on further reflection, I have edited a ridiculous amount of anthologies, I read a lot of short stories, and I’ve always been a fan of short stories and a huge admirer of those who write them well (looking at you, Art Taylor, Barb Goffman, John Floyd, and your incredible peers), so it does kind of make sense in that regard. I’ve also been an editor now for almost twenty four years, so there’s that, too.

I don’t remember the last time I read stories just to score them and not worry about how to put them together as an anthology, which is an entirely different way of reading and evaluating stories–and it’s actually much easier; I can just say what my scores are and be done with it. I’ll also have to write the introduction to the anthology for next year’s Festival.

But the deadline looms!

You can click for more information here. The deadline is October 1!

I did this in my stories “Keeper of the Flame” and “Housecleaning,” and probably a lot more times than that–those are the two that come to mind. ↩︎

I Can Help

Friday after the storm and I am heading into the office in a bit to see what is the situation with our testing supplies, which have to be in controlled temperatures. The exciting day job responsibilities of a Gregalicious. These interrupted weeks are always a bit difficult to re-acclimate back from, especially these sudden and unexpected ones; the ones you plan for are disruptive enough. But I have to go in on a Friday after being home for two days, to then be home again for another two days, and then go back to normal, whatever that may be now. My mind and body clock are sufficiently scrambled now, and it may not be easy getting back into the old routine again–which may not be a bad thing, if I can perhaps establish a new one out of this chaos?

Always a plus!

We finished watching The Perfect Couple, which really didn’t stick the landing, but otherwise was a lot of fun to watch. I imagine the book was probably better. Yesterday was an odd day; it’s weird to have a hurricane day (let alone two in a row) and not have to worry about working at home and so forth; it was like having a weekend in the middle of the week and now I have a day to go into the office when I usually don’t before the weekend, which is very odd. I also started reading Jordan Harper’s Everybody Knows, which is phenomenal, and I also collected all the marked information from Who Dat Whodunnit for the Scotty Bible. The next book up is Bourbon Street Blues, and what’s interesting is catching the continuity errors I’ve made over the years, which points out the need for the Scotty Bible, which I should have done after the first three when I went back to write the fourth.

The Internet is out this morning–it survived the storm, but a day later goes down? Excellent service, Cox. Fortunately I have an iPhone hotspot so I can check my emails and everything before I head into the office. The email communiqué yesterday afternoon about the office being open this morning mentioned that we’d be using generator power if Entergy was still down; which means limited access to the Internet and so forth. It could make for an interesting day, but I kind of think Entergy might have the power back on across the city by now? There are, per the outage map, still some parts of the city that are without power, but most people have it. It does look like the office is still down, but there was so little red on the outage map I doubt it will be out for much longer.

The aftermath of a hurricane–no matter the size, whether’s it’s a tropical depression or a Category –always feels like awakening from a disorienting dream. The release of tension–because no matter how calm you feel, you’re super tense waiting for the unknown–and once the storm is past, you just kind of let all the internal pressure out and feel exhausted. I didn’t work on cleaning up the house much; I have a sink full of dishes to do and bed linens to launder today, and I should probably stop on the way home to get something to make for dinner, as there is very little of anything in the house. I got a pizza for us last night (I was starving), and have to do some writing tonight when I get home. I think I am going to take some of the Bible information and put it into the first four chapters, and I may even go ahead and do second drafts while I am in there. There’s a lot of “riding the storm out” bits and pieces I can add in–the tension, the worry, the hurry-up-and-wait of it all; how the day before is simply stunningly beautiful, the howling of the wind and the steady downpour of rain. Figuring this book out isn’t going to be easy, but the time frame I was originally looking at does work–so the entire book will take place over about thirty-six hours, from start to finish, with some flashbacks to the past. I am still excited about this book, and compiling the Bible, to be honest. I don’t know why it took so long; the post-it notes have been in volumes of the backlist since before Royal Street Reveillon was published–the last two books don’t have post-its in them.

The weekend is going to be fun, methinks. A plethora of college football games to watch; LSU plays at eleven, so that will free up the day later. I am going to try to do some writing tonight when I get home from work, and I definitely am going to read more of Everybody Knows. I have errands to run and some things to get done this weekend, and I definitely need to clean the damned house. Sigh. Stop being lazy, Greg!

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely day, Constant Reader, and I may be back later; one can never be entirely certain!

A Very Special Love Song

Sunday morning and the Gregalicious slept late. I also went to bed early last night, so my body must have needed the rest. I did feel tired yesterday and even fell asleep a few times while I was watching football games yesterday. LSU played terribly but did win in the end, and Tulane played fantastic but had the game stolen from them by shitty officiating from SURPRISE! officials from their opponent’s conference and an insane, completely stupid offensive pass interference penalty that wasn’t even interference or holding to steal the tying touchdown from them in the final moments. There were some other interesting results yesterday, too, but I didn’t feel particularly into any of the games, in all honesty. I was kind of unemotional during the LSU game–the only time I actually felt any actual emotion was when that bad call was made during the Tulane-Kansas State game. Which is odd–there was one upset loss that made me laugh laugh laugh yesterday–but we’ll see how it goes next weekend, when the Tigers play at South Carolina.

I did break through the reading glass ceiling yesterday morning and tore through the ARC of Alison Gaylin’s January release, We Are Watching, and my god, that thing moves at the speed of a bullet train! I also realized that my problem with finding time to read is because my mind is still in the headspace of having to limit time doing anything because there’s so much else to do! I did my daily German lesson, too, while I was watching the Tulane game, so my Duolingo streak continues. But I’m so used to having to limit my reading time because I am a binge reader–once I get into the book I’m going to probably want to read it all the way through, and doing so usually costs me some writing time or cleaning time or something, with a million things hanging over my head. I realized yesterday morning that I can read for as long as I want whenever I want because I don’t have all those responsibilities any more. So, probably when I finis this, I can make some time to read after doing some things. I don’t know what time the Saints game is on today, and should probably check. It’s also not raining and sunny outside, for the first time in nearly a week. I do have to run an errand at some point today–I need charcoal, which I forgot to pick up the other night at the store–but I can probably get that at Walgreens and not have to get in the car.

I am probably going to work on the book today around some chores in the kitchen and finishing the dishes. I am starting to get into the swing of the weekends with very little to do and am starting to acclimate to it. It’s nice seeing how everyone else does these things, and I am also starting to realize that a lot of my tendency to being reclusive and not wanting to leave the house for anything other than work has everything to do with exhaustion, and now that I am not exhausted from everything and knowing that there was no end in sight for tasks and things, I’m thinking this may not be so bad. I just haven’t had the opportunity to really sit down and recognize that my life is different now than it was before Mom died, and the year I’d planned to spend transitioning into a normal life again was spent grieving and having surgeries of my own. It’s very weird, and I know it’s not my first time bringing it up, but I’m not used to having free time this way, and realizing if I hadn’t split up my energies the way I mostly have for the last decade or so, I could have gotten a lot more done. I don’t regret anything I’ve ever done, for any number of good reasons, but it’s still kind of odd and I do find myself wondering how did you manage to do all that, write a shit ton of books and short stories, and edit two to three manuscripts per month?

It’s a mystery to me.

But we’re supposed to have some cooler weather now that the storms from that tropical system have passed, but there’s another depression out in the Gulf just off the Yucatan with a good (70%) chance of forming into something stronger, and there are two out in the Atlantic currently. Hurricane season theoretically peaks in mid-to-late September, so we’re almost out of the woods–unless there’s a surprise in store for November. That’ll be nice and will bring the power bill down a bit (it’s been brutal this summer), which is always a plus.

And on that note, I think I am going to get cleaned up, run my little errand, and plop my ass back into my chair to get some writing work done. Have a great Sunday, Constant Reader, and I’ll see you perhaps later on.

Mr. Tambourine Man

I was actually cruised yesterday!

I was more startled than anything else, to be completely honest. I had an appointment at 11:30 at the CVS on the corner of Magazine and Louisiana (where the Blockbuster was when we used to rent movies and TV shows on video or DVD) to get my new COVID booster. I made another stop on the way there, to pick up a prescription, and then headed over to Louisiana Avenue for my shot. I had actually never been inside that particular CVS (the one on Prytania is only a few blocks from the mail service and thus more convenient for me to go to), and it’s actually a nice place. So, I checked in for my appointment, and when I was directed to the privacy screen for my shot, this incredibly lovely young man in his early twenties got in the Pharmacy line. Our eyes met, and tilted his head to one side as he smiled, and I thought, as I sat down and the pharmacist closed the screen, I thought, was he cruising me? As I sat there, I thought nah, way too young and besides, I look like shit. I got the shot, which I didn’t feel (shoulder was sore later on in the evening, though; still is a bit this morning), and as I rose to go, the guy was still in line and gave me the same look, only along with the eyes up and down first, and he was indeed cruising me. I kind of laughed to myself as I walked out to my car–I would have definitely pursued this when I was younger–and remembered again how oblivious I am to that sort of thing outside of gay bars. I always was. It never occurred to me that people might cruise me in public spaces that weren’t exclusively queer; friends had to tell me all the time, “That guy was cruising you!” It certainly isn’t anything I’ve even thought about for years, so it was definitely a compliment and I couldn’t help but laugh at myself as I shook my head and started the car, “you know, some younger men like older men, dumbass.”

So, if anyone is ageist, it’s me!

Yesterday, outside of the shot and some other errands I ran, was a lazy day for me. I didn’t do a whole lot of anything; I scribbled in my journal some but the book is beginning to take shape, which is lovely. I pretty much spent the entire day cuddling or playing with Sparky while watching college football games. It was delightful seeing Georgia humiliate Clemson and Miami annihilate Florida, and Texas A&M gave Notre Dame a scare last night. Tonight LSU plays USC in Las Vegas (GEAUX TIGERS!) and we’ll get a better sense of how good this year’s edition of the Tigers are. And Tulane won big, too! We haven’t won a season opener since Joe Burrow graduated (2019 season), so hopefully that will change this year. I think I am going to do a lot of nothing today, too–I’m going to clean the house and write for a while since the game isn’t until tonight–which feels good. I slept super late again this morning and have to think my body needed the rest. I feel good this morning, the coffee is hitting and I don’t feel tired or sore physically (other than the aching shoulder from the booster yesterday), and that way if I can get everything cleaned up, organized and filed today gives me tomorrow to run to the grocery store and write.

I did bite the bullet and renewed the digital version of the Times-Picayune, despite the paper’s descent into a MAGA propaganda machine. I need to be able to read the state and local news, and much as I love local independent reporting, they don’t have the capability to cover Louisiana/New Orleans like Louisiana Sedition can. And I am leaning, more and more, into the concept of writing environmental crime stories so outsides can see what is going on here in Project 2025 Land. I am absolutely fascinated now by the Devil’s Swamp Lake superfund site just north of Baton Rouge, and I’m also researching a short story called “The Haunted Bridge”¹, which is over Bayou Tortue (sometimes referred to as “Bayou Torture” on some websites I’ve seen; which is also a good title), and has a ghost story about a young woman whose prom date raped and murdered her on the bridge and threw the body into the bayou; that could be fun to write. God, it’s so nice to be excited about writing again and being creatively engaged.

Oh, and congratulations to everyone who won awards for their crime writing this weekend at Bouchercon–Barrys, Anthonys, and Macavitys all! We didn’t win for School of Hard Knox, but the nomination in and of itself was a lovely thing. It was my eighth (!!!!) Anthony nomination, which is pretty amazing, I think. I’m definitely the most nominated queer at the Anthonys! And we did have a queer winner last night; Kristopher Zgorski shared the Best Short Story Anthony with co-writer Dru Ann Love, which is awesome. Yay for Dru and Kris! They do so much for crime writers, and it’s fun to see them getting started as crime writers themselves, and getting recognition of their own.

It does look like it’s going to rain today–we didn’t get hardly any yesterday, or maybe I’m confusing yesterday and Friday; it’s entirely possible. And this kitchen is an absolute disaster area this morning, so I’d best get going on getting things cleaned up around here so I can do some writing. Have a great Sunday, Constant Reader, and I may be back later.

Yes, that’s a Nancy Drew title, and it fits two stories I want to write about–the one mentioned here and the Murder Bridge outside Emporia, Kansas. ↩︎

Don’t Stop Believin’

Thursday morning and last day in the office this week. I think I have a prescription to pick up; I neede to call and see if it’s ready or not during the day today. I was tired yesterday–I’ve been mentally weary all week for some reason–and was very happy to come straight home from work. I resisted Sparky and finished the dishes, which need to be put away tonight. It was very nice to come down to a clean kitchen with nothing on the counters and the sink empty. This kind of also puts me ahead on the weekend, too. Huzzah! I still have some filing and straightening and organizing to do around the house. The Olympics end this weekend, which means technically I can start writing again this weekend–I mean, ending a few days early on the embargo isn’t going to be the end of the world or anything, and I am kind of itching to get back to writing again. That, by the way, feels good.

I feel decent this morning, too. I’ll probably get tired at some point during the morning, and I am sure my butt will be dragging come this afternoon. I also need to get the mail today–maybe tomorrow; it depends on timing–and I do have some errands to run tomorrow. Maybe the mail can wait? Who knows? I do have a meeting tomorrow in the morning, and I made an appointment to get my labs drawn next Friday (fasting labs, and no way am I fasting all morning and not having coffee; there was nothing available for tomorrow until the time of my meeting). I feel very good about getting back on top of my health stuff, and my insurance issues are all ironed out. I have one more leftover issue from the surgery, and I hope to get that taken care of this weekend. Thank God.

In other big news, I deleted my Twitter account yesterday. I just bit the bullet, went in, and deactivated my account. I don’t care if someone else uses it because I don’t think I will ever go back there. I know, I know, I should have done it a long time ago. Being there only helps as another user to count towards advertising revenue, and I don’t want any part of that on my soul and conscience anymore. I went back and forth over the morality of being there still (friends who are only there, etc. v. being complicit with that vile company) and pondered the hypocrisy of that, while keeping my newsletter on Substack¹ and actively working to build an audience there. It wound up not being that difficult of a decision, really; I realized that the only times this week I’ve been tense or irritated has been because of Twitter and morally bankrupt people there, so it’s clearly not good for my mental health. I deleted it for my own well-being in the end, but making it about ‘taking an ethical stand’ is verifiably false. I don’t like getting credit for something I don’t deserve, and there was nothing noble about deleting my account other than self-preservation. I don’t even know why I went there in the first place, to be honest. I’ve never really gotten much joy out of being there, and what joy I managed to find there didn’t make up for the absolute horror of being there. I was never targeted or swarmed, it was never anything like that…but what is allowed there under the guise of “free speech” (and they decide what is protected and what is not, with a heavy thumb down on the scale on the side of being fascist or enabling it) is horrific and shameful and disgusting.

I did enjoy removing the app from my phone, though. It was almost as satisfying as slamming down the phone receiver used to be.

We’re also still in a boil water advisory, and today’s “feels like” is going to be 110. Woo-hoo! But it’s August, what can I expect or what more can I want? This weekend is also the Red Dress Run (which is how Garden District Gothic opens, or was it a different Scotty? Sigh), and there are some other things going on around town as always–Dirty Linen in the Quarter (it’s the Quarter’s version of White Linen Night, and I really should write about both) and there’s a Drew Brees pickleball tournament (I’m not really sure what pickleball is, to be honest, and not sure that I want to, either), too. Sounds like a good weekend to stay home to me, doesn’t it? It’s going to also be horrifically and horribly hot, too.

And on that note, I am heading down into the spice mines. Have a lovely Thursday, Constant Reader, and I’ll most likely be back at some point later.

*Greg Louganis, seen here in his Olympic debut in Montreal as a teenager, winning the silver medal. I was enchanted by his incredible physical beauty.*

Two people I really respect in this business are still at Substack, and since they have better ethics than me and are, in general, much better humans than I am, I will defer to their judgment in this case. ↩︎

Take a Giant Step

Seriously, what the actual fuck, George Clooney? I was never really a fan, but you’re a fucking asshole. For one thing, you’re a rich straight white man who lives in Italy with a wife who’s half your age. Trump wins and you’re going to be just fine, so miss me with your “macro” concern for the country. Gays, women, and minorities NEED for the Democrats to win this election; Project 2025 quite literally spells out what they are going to do to us. And once they start mass deportations and have all those internment camps just sitting there waiting for people…well, deportation is hard and messy and complicated, why not add some Nazi showers and ovens and be done with the whole problem right there? And if you think queer people aren’t on the list, what color is the sky in your fucking world? It really upsets me when narcissistic trash like George Clooney suddenly decide that their opinion is so smart and so important and matters so much that he has to spew bullshit in the New York fucking Treason Times.

You’re dead to me, George. Take an acting class sometime. It couldn’t hurt. And maybe learn some fucking humility, you arrogant piece of smug shit. So you’re worried and millions of votes should not matter anymore because George is uncomfortable and “concerned”. We threw out King George III 250 years ago; and you sir, are NO George III. Fuck you, shut up, and keep your skanky ass in Italy. I guarantee you any project you appear in I will review bomb with one-stars. You deserve to lose everything, you arrogant piece of shit. Will you wrinkle your brow and feel shame?

Or are you just that fucking fond of your tax cuts, Richie Rich?

It has not been missed by me that the only people calling for Biden to step aside are all rich, white and straight. Coincidence? I think not. Which is why you can never trust rich liberals–right, Susan Sarandon? Their narcissism and smug sense of superiority will always pick their money over vulnerable populations.

Nothing makes me sicker to my stomach than a limousine liberal. I’ll never forget that witch Susan Sarandon manhandling Dolores Huerta, who has shit out more progressive acts than Sarandon has ever done in her entire cosplay liberal acting life, for not supporting Bernie in 2016 and then claiming DOLORES FUCKING HUERTA is a part of the “establishment.” Does she even realize she’s mouthing the language of 60s anti-war protestors that no one else has used in over fifty years?

Then again, she’s old and should probably step aside for someone younger who can do the job better.

What’s amazing to me is how straight white people always get so defensive when their allyship is questioned. Is there anything worse that a mediocre straight white man who is so convinced of his own importance that he just has to express his opinion, which is so much more important than anyone else’s because he had relatives in the business and some desperately sad women thought he was hot? Where’s that Jim Jordan exposé documentary you promised us years ago? Yeah, that’s what I thought: sell out. Straight white people cannot ever be trusted to not throw everyone else under the bus, and the richer they are the more likely it is.

As a gay man, I’ve watched the Democratic Party throw us under the bus “because it wasn’t time” so many times that I understand the impatience of other minority groups when progress doesn’t move fast enough. I’m so inured and immune to it that it’s really hard for me to not expect disappointment from my fellow progressives. But this? This isn’t the party heirarchy. It’s not the rank and file voters. It’s CNN, MSNBC, New York Times, and The Washington Post, and it’s definitely coastal elites driving all of this. Go fuck yourselves. You jettisoned Hillary’s candidacy in 2016, which put us into the situation we are in now. We should be ending the last year of her second term, and we’d still have Roe, regulations, and a President who is not above the law.

But you just wouldn’t listen, would you?

And even now, as they undermine the President and his reelection campaign, when he doesn’t step down and if he does en up losing, they won’t take any responsibility for the fascism they’ve loosed on all of us, and will smugly assert “well, that’s what they deserve for not dropping the President,” you know, the Susan Sarandon playbook.

And for the record, a thousand curses on all of you. History will not be kind to you for abetting the fall of the United States. But you’ll be long dead by then–along with the mound of graves for anyone who isn’t a straight white cisgender Christian.

Born This Way

I was a voracious reader from the moment I learned how to read–all things considered, my favorite waking activity was reading. I loved nothing more than those enormous doorstops of books that used to get published (apparently when the cost of ink and paper was considerably less), and during the Bicentennial madness, James A Michener released a book called Centennial, the history of a small town on the Platte River in Colorado that was renamed Centennial in honor of Colorado becoming a state in 1876–the nation’s centennial year. (I’ve always thought it odd that we trace our nation’s birth back to the Declaration of Independence, rather than the ratification of the Constitution, which created the United States government.) I really loved the book, even the several hundred pages about dinosaurs and how the ancient swamps gave way to the Rocky Mountains and the plateaus. Another thing that was big in the 1970’s was the “mini-series”–although at first they were all adaptations of novels and sometimes were called “books for television.” NBC, I believe, filmed Centennial, and I watched and enjoyed it thoroughly.

But the standout for me was Gregory Harrison, a young new-to-me actor who played the pivotal character of Levi Zendt, who actually founded the town (it was called Zendt’s Farm before the renaming in 1876) and I could not get over how good looking he was. There was also a shirtless scene, and I became a big fan. He was, looking back, absolutely one hundred percent my type; how many characters have I written about a hot lean muscular man with blue eyes and curly dark hair? Okay, his eyes were gray but that’s close enough for atom bombs and hand grenades, is it not? He then was on Trapper John, MD, which I didn’t watch (outside of General Hospital, I’ve never really watched many medical shows, and not sure why that is), and then he made a made for TV movie in which he played an actor who becomes a successful Chippendales-type dancer, For Ladies Only. It wasn’t a great movie, but he danced in thongs and bikinis and quite lustily, I might add, and that was really all I was watching for–but Marc Singer, player an older, mentor type, kind of stole the movie out from under him (more on Marc Singer another time)

For Ladies Only was an attempt to cash in on the Chippendales craze, and they were everywhere in the early to mid 1980’s–Donahue, Oprah, every talk show during daytime you could imagine–the entire concept of women appreciating men as sex objects, the way they’ve always been seen by men historically–and even The Young and the Restless had a regular cast member who was a male stripper (who mentored Nikki when she became a stripper; yes, Nikki had a rather sordid past on that show). It was the time period when what I call “the gay gayze” really kicked into gear.

The movie For Ladies Only wasn’t the greatest movie ever made, but Harrison was one of the few actors at the time who could pull off playing a male stripper and actually not need a body stand-in or anything (neither did Marc Singer–and if you need to know anything else about Singer, google image search “Marc Singer the Beastmaster”; he was also a big crush of mine after I saw this film). It was one of those sad morality plays that always wins big in the end. Harrison’s character was a struggling actor who gets recruited to join a Chippendales type show, his popularity begins to grow but now when he goes on auditions, no one will cast him because he was a stripper (how did that work out for Channing Tatum, you ask? Three smash hit films about Magic Mike, that’s how). I recorded For Ladies Only, and kept that videocassette for many years, finally discarding it in a purge before leaving California.

Thank you again, Mr. Harrison, for helping to define my taste in men–especially fictional one; how many characters have I written with curly dark hair and blue eyes?–as well as realizing for sure just how not straight I was at heart.

The Jellicle Ball

Macavity Award Nominees 2024

For works published in 2023

Best Mystery

Dark Ride by Lou Berney (William Morrow)

Hide by Tracy Clark (Thomas & Mercer)

All the Sinners Bleed by S.A. Cosby (Flatiron)

Happiness Falls by Angie Kim (Hogarth)

Murder Book by Thomas Perry (Mysterious)

Crook Manifesto by Colson Whitehead (Doubleday)

Best First Mystery

The Peacock and the Sparrow by I.S. Berry (Atria)

The Golden Gate by Amy Chua (Minotaur)

Scorched Grace by Margot Douaihy (Zando/Gillian Flynn Books)

Murder by Degrees by Ritu Mukerji (Simon & Schuster)

Dutch Threat by Josh Pachter (Genius Book Publishing)

Mother-Daughter Murder Night by Nina Simon (William. Morrow)

Best Mystery Short Story

“Real Courage” by Barb Goffman (Black Cat Mystery Magazine #14, Oct. 2023)

“Green and California Bound” by Curtis Ippolito (Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, Sept/Oct 2023)

“Ticket to Ride” by Dru Ann Love and Kristopher Zgorski, (Happiness is a Warm Gun: Crime Fiction Inspired by the Songs of The Beatles, ed. Josh Pachter, Down & Out Books)

“Pigeon Tony’s Last Stand” by Lisa Scottoline (Amazon Original Stories)

“One Night in 1965” by Stacy Woodson (More Groovy Gumshoes: Private Eyes in the Psychedelic Sixties, ed. Michael Bracken, Down & Out Books)

Sue Feder Memorial Award for Best Historical Mystery

Time’s Undoing by Cheryl Head (Dutton)

Evergreen by Naomi Hirahara (Soho Crime)

The River We Remember by William Kent Krueger (Atria)

Our Lying Kin by Claudia Hagadus Long (Kasva Press)

The Mistress of Bhatia House by Sujata Massey (Soho Crime)

The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store by James McBride (Riverhead Books)

Best Mystery-Related Nonfiction

Finders: Justice, Faith, and Identity in Irish Crime Fiction by Anjili Babbar (Syracuse University Press)

Spillane: King of Pulp Fiction by Max Allan Collins & James L. Traylor (Mysterious Press/Penzler Publishers)