Jazz Thursdays: Did You Evah

Two punk icons take Cole Porter's high society shimmer and drag it through a few punk cliches. Not jazz, not punk, all fun. Special mention goes to Rodan, as the party crasher, and Debbie's "la la la la" cresendo: a single moment without irony.

Secret, Secret

Although I love PostSecret.org, I never thought I'd ever want to send a secret in. Why? Because I have a big mouth and had not secrets to share. Or so I thought. I spent some time this weekend thinking about it, and came up with at least a dozen secrets--some barely a secret at all, some I wouldn't share with anyone.

So I sent my first card in on Monday. I have another waiting for next week. Several more are lurking in the wings. (I'm saving the juicier stuff for later).

If any of my cards are posted, I'll mention it here. I won't tell you which card is mine. You'll have to guess that on your own. But it will probably have a shirtless man on it.

Just saying.

Down the Rabbit Hole

Some see online interaction as a way to engage each other, spread influence, change minds.

Perhaps.

And if that's what you think, I encourage you to hop on over to Salon and check out this discussion of atheism. There were 234 comments the last time I looked. Only two of which have been highlighted by the editors as noteworthy.

Let that be your first warning.

Best Comic Book Convention...Ever

Tony and I spent Saturday morning trolling the booths at the SPX, the small press expo, somewhere in the hinterlands of Maryland. I've never thought of myself as a "comic book guy." Shameless fanboy, perhaps. But comic books--while I understood how cool they could be--never really created any passion in me. This show changed my mind.

The floor was small but crowded. Almost every booth had a pile of objects to look through. Many were handmade or one-of-a-kind. Styles ranged from exquisite hand painted abstracts, to postmodern pen-and-ink cartoons. The artists were super friendly and everyone had a great story. (And by "great" I mean funny, weird, inspirational, and/or insane.)

I bought an autobiographical book called Shirtlifter from a supremely hot bear artist named Steve MacIsaac. He said it was more "artistic-y than pornographic-y." Having cruised through it last night, I guess he's correct. But it still plenty pornographic-y for me. I'm not sure I get the point of the whole thing, but I think that's commonplace among the small press people: Hold a magnifying glass up to the most arcane, commonplace, or otherwise invisible speck of reality (or surreality) and let it speak for itself.

On the way out, I bought a silkscreen of 16 little line drawings of the same dumpy little man in various states of dress.

I'll let that speak for itself, too.

PostSecret

PostSecret.org has been one of my favorite website/art installations for years. We had a chance to see Frank Warren, the artist behind the project, speak at a local bookstore. He's a very earnest, thoughtful, and apparently kind man, but I have to say his description of the project dimishes it a bit--just as one would expect any great work of art to eclipse its creator. There wasn't a lot of insight to be had, but we did get to see and hold a few actual secrets in our hands. That alone was worth the trip. There's surprising power in those little cards.

He Might Be an Evil Genius and All...

Went with the usual suspects to see Merrily We Roll Along at Signature last night. A few things:

• When I turned the corner, I thought for one second I was in a retirement home. I haven't seen that much grey hair since the DC Eagle circa 1990.


• I still hate musicals. Maybe not hate. Maybe...don't get. But I still hate wasting my time.


• My friends and family are funny people. And by funny, I mean random and vulgar.


• Lamb vindaloo is so hot, my saliva becomes poison.


• Stephen Sondheim may be an evil genius and all, but cliche is cliche. There, I said it.

Jazz Thursdays: The Jazz Messengers - A Night in Tunisia

Serious jamming from all-stars from the 1960s: drummer Art Blakey, Lee Morgan, and I think that's a young Wayne Shorter.

Home Sweet Homo.

I've returned from the Twin Cities. The week-long work conference was exceptionally busy. Work, what a drag. Sheesh.

Although most of my time was spent in the conference center, I did get to see a bit of both St. Paul and Minneapolis.

One of my co-workers used to live in the Minneapolis, so he took us on a night tour. Very cool city. Small enough to live in, big enough not to be bored. And it's on the Mississippi--who knew!

I also found a quaint little gay bar near my hotel. That came in handy when the boys from work stood me up one night. That's OK. I know how gay men of a certain age are. I had a Plan B already in mind. (No. Not that Plan B. Gross.)

All in all, it's nice to be back.

Roxy Music: Jealous Guy

Less elemental (and more truly full of regret) than John Lennon's orginal, you definitely get the feeling Bryan Ferry is singing directly to Lennon after his murder. It's not a love song. It's a eulogy, from one giant to another.

On the Road: Which Is the Evil Twin?

I'm here in Minneapolis-St. Paul for a week-long work conference. I can't say that this trip has has an auspicious beginning. One of the first things I saw from the window of my cab was an old man vomiting violenting on the side of the street. Then giggling and tiptoeing away. I also found out that a man came into my hotel last week, grabbed one of the domesticated ducks that swim in the interior decorative pond, and bit its head off.

Ahem.

Still, the cities themselves have a groovy, post-industrial feel. The buildings are pleasingly square. And the streets are walkable.

I have six more days for some drunk to gnaw my head off.

Jazz Thursdays: Chet Baker's Let's Get Lost

Not a video, but a slideshow of Chet's publicity stills, under one of the most romantic songs (and performances) of all time. Let's get lost, indeed.

Insult of the Day

This feature has been gone from EE for too long. Perhaps, it's been waiting for this:

Realistically the competition is now between Hung and Casey. Both Brian, who makes no sense, and Dale, who makes no sauce, are both plainly outclassed and they know it. You kind of feel bad for Brian, whose years on Ritalin have left him a glassy-eyed surfer strewn on the beach of life with no board.

I love Top Chef. There, I said it. But Gawker's gentle assassinations run a close second.

Same Same, but Different

In August, I was away for a couple of weeks traveling through Cambodia with the husband and one of my friends from highschool. There is too much to say about this excursion right here, right now. The short version: Great food, terrible weather, awesome people, durian stinks, silk is cheap, ruins are big. I'll get around to more detail eventually.

Until then, enjoy the image above: Me, doing my best to make sure Angkor Wat stays a ruin.

Friday Fun: The Polyphonic Spree's Running Away

Cynicism and optimism are not mutually exclusive.

It's like running away/ With the wind in our face/ It's like flying/ And you and I are open wide.

DC Observed

I started the DC Observed photography project on May 18 this year. The original goal was to post a photo that was taken in DC every day for one year. I've come pretty damned close to achieving that goal. Vacations, work, and illness have kept me away now and then. But I'm not giving up. If I can do it at least 90% for the whole year, then I'll consider it a success and try for something bigger and better next year.

Fingers are crossed.

Jazz Thursdays: Bill Evan's Quartet

The Bill Evans Quartet sessions at the Village Vanguard are unbelievably cool and exciting performances. This video is a little low-tech, but the brilliance still shines through.

It's Time for You to Lose Your Excitement

This Larry Craig folderol has me asking the question: Are straight people ever going to get their shit together when it comes to sex? I''m being serious here. Straights may be the dominant culture, but it's obvious that--when it comes to the Big Nasty--they are as clueless as children.

It was nothing short of embarrassing watching the smirking, giggling newsreaders on cable try to get their arms around the reality that a man could marry a woman and still have sex with men. I mean, they seriously didn't know this happened? Has happened for all of history? Is happening? Sheesh.

I've personally known many married men who also fuck around with guys, and each of their situations was different. Some were cheating from deep inside the closet. Some claimed to be straight. Some were gay, but married because they wanted a "normal" public life. Some had arrangements with their wives. And while I certainly have opinions about their choices, I never made fun of them or even judge them harshly. Why? Because their lives, like my own, were messy and real.

And how about the serious--or at least professed--puzzlement about a fetishes such as anonymous sex or tearoom trade? I find it hard to believe that people in show buisness are more square and more naive than I. Seriously, the only thing that outpaced the ignorance was the squeamishness.

Embarrassing. Unbelievable.

To be clear, I have nothing but disdain for Larry Craig the politician and the immoral, hateful, and unrealistic policies that he and his party supports. But Larry Craig the man gets my sympathy. The snickering jackdaws that have made his life a living hell over the last few weeks have done nothing to illuminate the situation.

And no one has asked the most obvious question: Why are we behaving like immature assholes? Answer that, and you may know why a 60-somethinig Midwestern politician had to go into a men's room to get a blow job.

All my life, people have asked me if I'd ever wanted to be straight. My answer has always and emphatically been "no." There are many reasons. The last two weeks has highlighted one: Gay men understand sex. We know how it fits into life. We get that it's simultaneously important and frivolous. We embrace--however reluctantly--its messiness, its complications, its contradictions.

We are adults about it.

Finally, before you call me a bigot, I realize I'm making some generalizations. I mean, some of my best friends are straight.

How Soon Is Now?

I just finished a presentation on the state of Web 2.0 to a group of historians/educators in Atlanta. They were awesome, but I'm whipped. Up at 4:30 AM and won't get home until whenever.

Zzzzzzzz.

The Beginning of the End

I've been collecting compact disks from the beginning and now have thousands of them. I began to rip them to MP3 a couple of years ago, but just as I was reaching the end of the stack, my external hard drive died. Tens of thousands of songs and hours of my precious time just vanished. So sad.

I bought a new hard disk--with a backup--and began the process all over again in January 2007. And once again, I'm nearing the end of the stack. I may even finish up this weekend.

Then I will weep with joy.

Update 09.05.2007: I'm done! Now all I have to do it get the new external HDs ready, clean up the files list, configure the backup software, and we're off.

Tucker Carlson: Blowhard or Gay Basher?

Let me rephrase that as "and Gay Basher," since Tucker's been blowing hard for decades. If you've missed this ongoing story, here goes.

In an MSNBC Live interview, Tucker, in a lame-assed attempt to demonstrate his manliness, claimed to have "bashed" a gay man in a men's room for coming on to him. Transcript below.

ABRAMS: Tucker, what did you do, by the way? What did you do when he did
that? We got to know.
CARLSON: I went back with someone I knew and grabbed the guy by the -- you
know, and grabbed him, and -- and --
ABRAMS: And did what?
CARLSON: Hit him against the stall with his head, actually!
[laughter]
CARLSON: And then the cops came and arrested him. But let me say that I'm
the least anti-gay right-winger you'll ever meet --

Note the laughter--not just from Tucker, but from Dan Abrams and Joe Scarborough, as well.

Verdict: Tucker's either 1) laying it on thick to increase his frat boy credentials; or 2) a criminal. Just to be safe, I'd go with 3) an asshat without a shred of credibility.

And if you want to see another conservative go down in flames, here's the video: