| Another year...another page |
[Mar. 22nd, 2010|04:22 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| |  cheerful | ] |
I turned 56 today (actually to the minute...about thirty minutes ago). It's been a crazy year, what with losing my job last July, and the subsequent hassle of making ends meet until I get another one.
Still, I remain grateful to be alive, surrounded by good friends who as supportive as they can be. I look at this time in my life as a challenge to always see the glass half full in everything around me...and so far, I think I'm managing to do just that.
The future might see me living in another city (maybe even back in Columbus Ohio, where I moved from to Florida 16 years ago)...all in the process of finding employment. I have considered a change in career and even broadening my graphic design experience into the field of website design and management with an emphasis on networking technologies. One never knows what the future will bring.
To all my LJ friends who share my birthday, I shout out a hearty "Happy Birthday' to you...with the hope that you did something special to celebrate it today. I was intending to go to the beach today to fly kites but the weather is not cooperating...
Hugs to all! |
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| Anger breaks the silence |
[Nov. 6th, 2008|03:58 pm] |
On November 4, 2008,
The passage of
The Marriage Amendment
to the Constitution of the State of Florida
accomplished nothing.
....except to tell me that
4,717,753 Floridians
do not approve of my lifestyle...of my life.
Never has
HATRED
been given such a firm mandate. |
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| December 24 1986 |
[Oct. 12th, 2007|07:56 am] |
| [ | music |
| | Eine Kleine Nachtmusik | ] |
At my oldest brother's house, Christmas Eve...both so drunk, that we couldn't adjust his new telescope to even look at the moon.
ME: "you know that thing Linda (his first wife) kept saying about me in the 70's?"
HIM: "Oh yeah, I remember."
ME: "I don't think it was true then...but...it's true now."
HIM: "well, that still OK by me and Elva (his second wife). I think we always knew....just do me a favor and don't catch anything, OK?"
Interestingly...I had no intention on telling my oldest brother the news. But after four glasses of egg nog and Bacardi 151, anything is possible.
I had told my younger brother, that afternoon, as he and I were closer...And surprisingly, he DIDN'T take it well. He was (finally) getting married...and I think he was afraid of what Shirley (his fiance) would think. Later on, Shirley told me that when she found out (and how relieved he was to hear that having a queer brother-in-law was far from bring a problem for her), she told him that she had had plenty of practice.
Apparentally even as Shirley was inheriting a gay in-law when she and William got married, my little brother was about to inherit SIX! |
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| Back to Columbus... |
[Jun. 19th, 2007|10:32 pm] |
| [ | music |
| | That Happy Feeling -Bert Kempfaert | ] |
I'm flying back to Columbus tomorrow afternoon...to meet up with old friends and to join into the Pride festivities on Saturday. It's been...lessee....five years since my last visit....and quite frankly, I expect that the town I used to call "home" will continue to show me how much it has changed in the 13+ years since I left the cold and ice of winter for sunny Florida.
Even in 2002 (I came back for Pride that time too) I was given too many reasons to dismiss the cold hard truth behind the statement, "You can't go home again." We grow older, even though our memories do not.
I came out in 1985, my second year there in the city. In fact, my whole reason behind moving to Columbus in the first place was to address the growing problem concerning my sexuality in what I deemed a "nuetral" environment. Still I waited a whole year before I said to myself, "Fuck it!" and just came out with a vengence. And fortunately, Columbus, Ohio was the perfect place to be if you are going to do something like that. In the months that followed that eventful "Summer of "85", I experienced little in the way of a backlash from friends or co-workers. In fact the first time someone even shouted the "other F-word" at me was after I moved down to Jacksonville in 1994.
Pride in Columbus has, remarkably, drawn in tens of thousands of participants for the weekend...and that always meant super-packed bars and a festive, turned up atmosphere that me and my friends there looked forward to year after year. But in 2002, I know that things had changed. I was no longer one of the boys on the dance floor, lathered in sweat from dancing for a hour at a time, to music that was always just too good to step away from. I was now one of the older guys who watched from the rails, smiling at all the excitement and the fun—but still wishing the beats per minutes in the music were fewer...like they were back in the days of Dead or Alive, or Madonna (in her Material Girl days).
I'm going back to Columbus this year to spend time with a couple of good friends (one of whom was my first lover)...AND to meet a new friend I just met online (I will talk about that some other time). Yes, I will march in the Parade Saturday afternoon (I will never stop doing that) in my black denim shorts and my construction boots —but maybe this time I will take it a little easier on the cock-tailing at 2 in the afternoon and I probably will not ask the DJ to play the 12-inch version of Gloris Gaynor's cover of I am What I Am (ha!...he probably doesn't have it anyway). (grin)
Go carefully, all...and Happy Pride! |
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| IGNORE my last post please |
[May. 21st, 2007|09:30 am] |
I haven't posted since February and here I am posting for the second time in 24 hours.
Please 86 my recent post about cell phone numbers being released to telemarketers in 12 days. Apparentally it was a prank or something like that. I will strangle Tom, my ex (when I see him at the end of June) who passed on this "helpful" information last night.
I called the number as I said, and it seemed legit...but who knows what I REALLY did. Just do not call the number yourself.
I went online and through Wikipedia, found this:
http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2007/02/dnccellphones.shtm
Now you must pardon me; I have to get off this computer and look for my brain, which I must have misplaced last night...
Have a great day. |
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| In case you didn't know...... |
[May. 20th, 2007|10:45 pm] |
REMINDER....12 days from today, all cell phone numbers are being released to telemarketing companies and you will start to receive sale calls.
If you haven't figured it out, the downside of having some solicitor call your cell phone is that YOU WILL BE CHARGED FOR EACH AND EVERY ONE OF THESE CALLS (a big difference from when they call your land line)
To prevent this, call the following number from your cell phone:
1-888-382-1222.
It is the National DO NOT CALL list. It will only take a minute of your time. It blocks your number for five (5) years. You must call from the cell phone number you want to have blocked; you cannot call from a different phone number.
Help others keep their minutes for better things by passing this info on to anyone you know who uses a cell phone. The whole process took about 20 seconds for me to do for both my cell phone and my land line. |
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| I'm not making this up you know |
[Feb. 15th, 2007|11:10 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| | doing okay | ] |
| [ | music |
| | none | ] |
This posting is actually a response to something that ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=92.1) mrdreamjeans recently posted, but after thinking about it, I thought it funny enough (...and sad enough) to share it with the rest of you who stumble upon my journal entries from time to time.
A comedy club (housed in an old movie theater) out here at the Beaches recently declared the upcoming performance of Eve Ensler's "The Vagina Monologues" on their marquee. The marquee, in typical movie theater-in-a-strip mall fashion, is right next to Atlantic Boulevard, a street that is one of the main thoroughfares connecting the beach to downtown Jacksonville.
Unfortunately, the declaration of said production was short-lived...sort of.
Apparentally, someone was so offended by the term vagina on a sign so close to a busy street —that the proprietor, fearing that he would lose revenue (that he most likely wasn't going to get anyway) changed the title of the performance on the marquee to:
The Hoo-Hah Monologues
Yes, this is a true story. Sometimes I just don't know why I live here!
Happy Heart Day, everyone! |
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| Hot flashes...or global warming? |
[Jan. 8th, 2007|12:04 am] |
| [ | music |
| | Tim Story "untitled story" | ] |
I was sitting at my computer this morning when I realized I was perspiring ever so lightly...kinda like I do when I've been eating one too many jalepenos or...if I am coming down with something. "Oh gawd," I thought to myself, "I really do not want to be getting sick right now...too much to do this week and next" But I guess I should be thankful as I haven't been sick with ANYTHING since the early summer...
The thought of summer though brought to mind some recent news out of the northeast of unseasonably warm weather for January. So...I checked my handy-dandy weather-up-to-date for Neptune Beach, compliments of Yahoo...and...
JEEZ! 82° and it's not even lunchtime yet!
Well, at least it wasn't the flu. Stay cool, my friends! |
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| This Christmas... |
[Dec. 26th, 2006|10:19 pm] |
| [ | music |
| | Roxy Music -Avalon | ] |
Good King Wenceslas looked out on the feast of Stephen,
When the snow lay round about, deep and crisp and even
This was my favorite Christmas song, even from childhood. Easy to see why...what other Christmas carol do you know has my name in it?...
Happy St. Stephen’s Day...which is today, the 26th of December. Today is also the birthday of Wil, an ex of mine who now resides in Seattle (I need to give him a call).
Christmas hasn’t meant much to me nowadays...not like it did around the time I was last partnered. But...instead of just humbugging the whole thing, I did my best to stay in the fray this year and attend every party or get-together I was invited to. And invited I was —a lot! This was surprising to me in itself because I have habitually turned down every invitation to Christmas thingees for years, and I had just assumed that everyone would have just given up on me by now. Not so, I guess.
OK, now that Christmas has come and gone, I have to wonder: how do you “party animals” out there do it? I mean, I am worn out…and five pound heavier!! ...and there is still New Years Eve to contend with!
Armstead Maupin's Michael Tolliver said in “Tales of the City” that “Christmas is a conspiracy to make single people feel lonely.” I suppose I have finally learned that as true as that may seem to be at times, one does not have to be alone at Christmastime...if one tries.
Happy Lá Fhéile Stiofán to you all |
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