Bummer In The Summer

Well, summer's here and you know what that means: The 2009 West Hollywood LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender) Pride Festival fell on the weekend of June 13 and 14, 2009. This was the third time I attended the festival and most likely the last. There were some pretty radical changes from the last two times we attended, and all for the worst. The three passageways were narrowed down to only one, which created an unbearable congestion of people taking forever just to get to the festival area. Where there were two exits before was now reduced to just one so you had to leave exactly the way you came in, stuck in gay gridlock.

The gay guards at the gate made everyone open up their purse or handbag, and when the big Latino guard saw the leather vested teddy bear in Rebecca’s purse, he squealed, “Have a good time, you leetle queenie bear!”

Once we hit the main campground we realized we were no longer in Kansas, Dorothy: our favorite vendors weren’t around this year, the public service booths like Cedars-Sinai weren’t giving tons of free swag like they do every year, and the Erotic City attraction with the bondage booths had a long line winding around the grounds, so getting in wasn’t the queer cakewalk it was last year.

Saddened, we trudged over to the bandstand where we saw some great shows in the past, but the funny drag queen who usually hosts the show wasn’t on stage. Instead some boring meat puppet from E! Channel was gabbing like a broken record at 78 rpm. He brought Andrew Christian on stage, who whined about getting kicked off some terrible TV contest show before he introduced a boring boy fashion show on stage. The lawn in front of the bandstand was gone, paved over by concrete so everyone was forced to stand and not lie down anymore. Yuck! The only thing that held our attention was an insane plant man creature on stilts who stalked (ouch!) around the grounds. He was awesome!

After a few more dead minutes of watching the world decompose before our eyes, we strolled down Melrose Avenue quietly, and then Rebecca said, “I’m surprised we went this year. You told me last year that you were done with Gay Pride.”
“I did?”
“Yeah, you said that it wasn’t going to get any better than it did last year.”
“Oh, wow, I totally forgot…Oh well, maybe next year we’ll go to Long Beach Gay Pride and we haven’t been to Palm Springs Gay Pride, either.”

The horror continues!

Mid-Year Wrap Up

Since the first half of the year is done I figured it's time to do a halftime wrap-up of all the things that happened to me in 2008. So let's get the fuck started now:

January: Went to the NAMM show (North American Music Manufacturers) at the Anaheim Convention Center. It was crowded and exhausting. This month marked my father's 90th birthday. Posted my 200th review on Yelp. Joined GoodReads and was appointed a librarian.

February: Went to Beverly Hills and picked up a mink coat Rebecca's friend left her. Celebrated our 15th wedding Anniversary. Gave Rebecca blue topaz earrings. Went to the boat show at the LA Convention center thanks to stephen l at Yelp. My mp3 player died and I had to get a new one, sob.

March: Made a killer eggplant parmigiana at home. The next day I had a poisoned burrito at Chipotle. Fuck Chipotle, the worst food chain of all time. Some girl on the internet thought I was a chick and wanted to have lesbian sex with me.

April: Went to the Noir Fest at the American Cinematheque and saw some wild, sleazy crime films starring Steve Cochran, June Havoc and Beverly Michaels. Painted my toenails blue and started shaving my armpits. Maybe I am a girl and I don't even know it.

May: Met Raquel Welch in my parking lot. She's so cool. Rebecca gave me her old Canon so now I'm taking pictures of myself all the time (see above). Went to a Yelp event at the Blue Goose Lounge. Some people I "friended" saw me there and didn't say hi. Fuckheads. Thanks for friending me. Bought another camera, a Nikon Coolpix, like in the lame Ashton Kutcher commercial.

June: Went back to Palm Springs, where it was 110 degrees and all the tourists ran around with their dicks in their mouths. Played a skeeball contest with Adam B from Yelp at Santa Monica Pier and beat him fair and square, yay. Went to Gay Pride in West Hollywood and everywhere I went there were promos for Washington Mutual getting tossed in my face. I'm glad I canceled my account with them years ago. Bought myself six pair of shoes and boots this month. Maybe I am a girl after all.

The 2008 LGBT Pride Festival

Well, it's the first weekend in June and that usually means it's time for Gay Pride in West Hollywood. It was a real assault to the senses...sight, sound, and with a petting zoo, olfactory as well.
I saw more lesbians there than gays, maybe a first since the last few times I've been there. Rebecca thought most of the lesbians at the fest looked like they should be stirring a boiling cauldron somewhere. Some of them did look like witches, but there were old queens who looked just as ghastly.
As usual, I was there for the swag and the cool merch that was for sale. I bought two belts, one metal with little gears on them and one leather with an old 45 RPM adapter belt buckle. Rebecca got the best belt, though: a belt buckle with a removable booze flask clipped on it!

The festival was not without it's carnival vibe, though: we walked into an S&M tent where a man wore a creepy rubber pig's mask and he was sticking another rubber lad into a leather-lined box. In 95 degree weather! There was another dude clad from head to toe in rubber and wore a rubber top molded into a wall urinal. It was sick! I was so hypnotized I forgot to take pictures. Damn it.
A perplexed old queen walked up to me and grumbled, "I've been committed to mental institutions five times. The last thing I want to do is get locked up again!"
"Well, these guys seem to like it", I said.
"They can keep it!" he spat, busting through people on his way out of the tent.

We went to the bandstand and watched a bad Pussycat Dolls-ripoff troupe dancing and acting the way only a nine-year old girl would find sexy.
Then some kid with a skunk striped mohawk talked for ten minutes about how all his songs were originals, and went right into David Bowie's "Changes". Then he performed Michael Jackson's "Don't Stop Til You Get Enough". His backup singers both looked like they weighed 350 lbs. each. Woof!
Kimberly Caldwell from "American Idol" followed, wearing a hideous t-shirt belted into a dress with the ugliest orangey indoor tan I've ever seen. She performed an all-lesbian set, Melissa Etheridge, then Bonnie Raitt, what a fake, she's doing some guy from her TV show, what's with the dyke beau gestes?

Last year's music program was Eighties rock and I missed that. I think everyone did, too, because the turnout for the musical acts was a lot weaker than last year. Here's hoping next year's program will be a lot better.

Los Angeles Gay Pride Parade 2007

Openly Gator: “Queer Duck, only you would treat a funeral like a disco”.
Queer Duck: “But everything is a disco”.
-Jm J. Bulllock, Queer Duck (Showtime)

The parade? Well, how disappointing was that? I didn’t see any motorcycle dykes this year and the vivid memory of gay gray leather daddies rockin’ out on a flatbed truck all giving me chickenhawk appraisal is permanently burned in my innocent memory banks. No gray gay leather daddies this year, just a lot of crummy marching bands, wholesome gay kids in white t-shirts marching down the road, dullard Asian PFLAG, etc. I like my gay filthy and nobody was serving it up. There was a bear truck with eyes and fangs but the gays on it were safer than soap.
Debbie, oops, Deborah Gibson rode on a convertible and waved to the crowd sporting the worst weave ever seen. It wouldn’t fool a 5 year-old. Worst Gay Pride Parade, ever.
After all is said and done, I had a great time both days and it was great to celebrate life and laughs with my gay friends. We are fambly.