In Which We Give Minimal Thanks

 

Oh ladies and lady boys, this year for Thanksgiving I decided I would not cook for once.  Secret Agent Fred and I thought we would be the only ones of our friends who would be in town, so we started shaking down restaurants to find where we might go.  Sort of just arbitrarily, we wound up at the Four Seasons Hotel.  Because we are fancy boys, that's why.  Then about a month ago, our good friends, Drumstick and Hot Foot, announced they were not going to be leaving town.  They did so with the air of a dog who wants to go out for a walk, so I invited them along.

The Four Seasons really is a pretty swanky joint. It used to be decorated in extreme good taste, lots of silk and velvet and mohair all in a taupe/gold/turquoise palette.  The last time I was there was before R Man died and that was 12 years ago and even then all the finishes and upholstery were sort of tatty.  They obviously got theirselves together because it's all been redone, but in a very disappointing mushroom gray blandness. Yuck 

The dining room where we were eating is on the 5th floor and has big windows along Market Street in the very heart of downtown, so it was a very big city kind of experience.  Aside from the views though, dinner was sort of meh.  

We started off with an amuse bouche which sounded interesting on the menu (octopus, chorizo aioli, and potatoes) but which did not really amuse my bouche.  It was followed up by very nice frisee salad with grapefruit and crab in it.  And then a lobster tagliatelle course. I assume they boiled the lobster and then saved the water as a kind of court bullion to cook the pasta in.  I thought the lobster was very tasty, but I didn't like the pasta carrying a kind of fishy flavor.

The main course, of course, was all the All-Stars of Thanksgiving gone by: turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes, and green beans.  The turkey was bland, and so was the dressing which also had an odd gummy texture.  The mashed potatoes, which should be the star of the evening were served as an artistic smear across the plate.  I say if your mashed potatoes are thin enough that you can paint with them, you have done something wrong, very wrong.  The green beans were green beans.

The whole dessert course was made up of tiny little sweet things, sort of like what you get at tea and was entirely forgettable.

Then the check came, has it almost always does, and it turned out to be $300 a person. Three. Hundred. Fucking. Dollars.  I am happy as anyone to fling money about, but I really prefer a bigger bang.

I felt like I was being punished for not cooking.

And now, some boys to give thanks for:

What I really would have preferred for the day.

Even I know it's not baseball season, silly, but who could refuse a butt like that?

Konstatin Resch.  When I first saw this, I thought he had a giant padlock on the head of his dick.  I thought his boyfriend was being very sensible, but then I realized I just needed to clean my glasses.

That is some mighty fine amuse bouche.

Athan Seville.  You know he is both cute and trouble.

More tasty than the mashed potatoes tonight.

This guy originally worked in the porn trenches under the name "Flex," but now he's expanded it into Flex  Xtremmo, which just proves you actually can make any situation worse.

One of our new favorites, Massimo Arad.

Doesn't everyone love Austin Wolf?  I know I do.

A classic.

Sports.  They're everywhere.

In Which We Withdraw

 

mrpeenee suffers from This Asshole.

So.  Degenerative joint disease, did you know pretty much everybody will wind up with it eventually, unless you die first, which seems like a sort of extreme kind of plan.  Trend setters and pace makers such as I just got a head start on the rest of you by coming down with it sooner.  I first noticed this burning ache between my shoulder blades when I was a teenager, brought on by my scoliosis.  The scoliosis caused the joint between my shoulder blade and backbone to not work right and instead of the two plates of bone sliding over each other, they scraped away instead.  Yeah, it is just exactly as pleasant as it sounds.

Anyway late in 2010, I finally harangued my doctor into doing something about it; his plan turned out to be turning me over to a pain specialist who prescribed daily pain medicine for me.  It helped immensely and I am grateful for it.  He was also the doctor who first gave me this look I came to recognize as "no idiot, of course not" when I asked if they couldn't just cut out the rib and the joint that were causing so much trouble.

Thirteen years of various pain meds have come and gone, we've had some laughs, some ups and downs, but then Thursday morning it all came tumbling down.  There's a small pharmacy on the ground floor of my building that I've been using because I think it's important to support small businesses.  What a schmuck I am.  I showed up there Thursday morning to pick up my regular prescription, only to find out they had changed their hours and were now closed on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  That was not part of my plan since I had used up the last of the medicine the night before.

I sort of white knuckled it through until Friday when I went down there and lo, the pharmacist had gone home early.  They are closed on weekends.  That meant no pain meds for you, mrpeenee.

Today is Monday, a day I was not sure I was going to see.  Withdrawal symptoms include, but are not limited to, fevers and chills, gastro distress, body aches, and the hilariously so-called heebiejeebies which refer to seriously uncomfortable sensations in your joints and extremities.  I've been busily working my way through the whole delightful list with the addition lately of an increased sense of smell.  I have fucking bionic scent; a small problem is that everything smells bad.

The only thing I have missed out on is an increase in pain.  Why is that?  Because the medicine I've been taking appears to have made absolutely no difference in my pain level.  The ache up inside my back feels no different today than it has for years.  I have to assume the dopamine receptors in my brain that opioids work on have been so fried out after all this time that the medicine has been doing nothing except keeping me from going into withdrawal.  Hilarious.

So since it's not working and since I have now pretty much suffered through the worst of the withdrawal, I'm just going to stay off of any more pain meds.  Maybe.  I hate making pronouncements like that since much like saying you're going on a diet is so embarrassing when you fall off a week later, I'm not sure what the future will hold.  But it seems like it would just make my life simpler if my back is going to hurt either way to not have to support big Pharma.

In short, don't do drugs kids, but if you do do drugs, don't stop.

I was going to present a sample of mens with really fine backs, but I am not up to that level of research. You'll just have to make do with these guys:

Jamie Dominic, complete with saddle.

The very fine rear view of Todd Morgan.

Diego Sans has always been sexy, now he's just being excessive.

Everything counts in large amounts.

David Nazar, yummy.

Tall and skinny: it's a look

I have also been very emotional; I was soaking in the tub, listening to the Trainspotting soundtrack (it seemed appropriate) when the Lou Reed song Perfect Day came on.  I've always thought it is one of the great melancholy songs and I was suddenly on the verge of tears.  Fortunately, the part of my brain I think of as The Victorian Governess took control and briskly told the rst of us to stop that RIGHT AWAY.  It helped.

And JUST NOW, Pandora offered me Smalltown Boy by Bronski Beat, I told her, I said to her, I said, "Honey, I just can't" and skipped to the next song which turned out to be Enola Gay by OMD.  So that was OK, nuclear disaster seemed like something I was much more up to.

In Which We Revisit Ancient History

 

I was looking back at some of my old posts because I was trying to remember this particular post.  I thought it had happened around this time 16 years ago (16 YEARS AGO! My god.)  Turns out I was a week late for the actual anniversary, but considering how vague my memory is, I think this is pretty good. Anyway, here is my own little way back machine moment:

Nov. 9, 2007

I've had my share of odd days, but today may be one of the strangest. For one thing, today is the anniversary of mrpeenee and R Man. Twenty-six years ago tonight we hooked-up, as the youngsters say, in the backroom of a bar in New Orleans and started the complex navigation to the lovely happy life we have now. Coincidentally, I was 26 years old, so tomorrow morning, I will will have had him in my life longer than I lived without him. In all those years, I have never had any hesitation in saying he is the center of my universe, the joy of my life, the cream in my coffee.

After a late lunch this afternoon (at Chow, of course. I recommend the pear cobbler) we went to shop for tile for our bathroom renovation and then on to R Man's appointment with the cardiologist for an examination. I'd have to say that was the point where the day tipped over into the bizarre because that was the point where the good doctor announced R Man had to go immediately into the hospital for angiogram. An angiogram is where they stick a tube up through the artery in your groin into your heart in order to shoot radioactive dye into you to see if your arteries are blocked. I was well and truly flipped out when they wouldn't let us just walk across the street to the hospital, but made us wait for a wheelchair to transport R Man over there.

It turns out that a regular part of these angiograms includes an angioplasty where they do actual repair work. Once they have a look-see at how badly the pipes are plugged up they can sort of Roter Rooter out the cholesterol crud that's blocking the way and then you go home the next day and subscribe to AARP. Except for R Man who has such severe blockage of two arteries and a major branch that he has to have coronary bypass surgery tomorrow. Maybe Sunday, they're not sure.

My approach to bad news is to just ignore it, to stick my fingers in me ears and sing "Lalalalala, don't hear no lesbian subplot" until it's over. Having disaster strike like a brick falling on one's head is better suited to that system than a growing problem one should be planning for. Still, even for me, this is all pretty breathtaking while I think R Man is sort of numbed. Three hours after standing around admiring expensive Italian glass mosaic tiles, they're prepping R Man for surgery and and hour later the cardiologist starts off his little talk to me with the phrase "The good news is...." There is no sentence in the world that starts off with those four words that is ever going to go in a direction you want it to.

Everyone at the hospital seems somber, but not worried (except me and R Man) so maybe coronary bypass surgery is not such a big deal, but that seems sort of unlikely.

Anyway, so, once upon a time, R Man and I had our first night of wild weasel sex under his roommate's fur bedspread (I believe the fur was shaved rat, but it was very romantic, nevertheless) and 26 years later, tonight, I was cutting up shrimp with artichoke hearts from his hospital tray to feed him his dinner. That was sort of romantic, too, and R man said it was very tasty, but you know, it's just not the same.

And now, back to Nov 17, 2023.  It all turned out OK, fucking terrifying, but OK.  R Man lasted another  4 years, and I was plenty glad to have them.  And now I live around the corner form where Chow, the restaurant I mentioned in the first paragraph, used to be.  

Anyway, here's some naked guys:

Somebody is enjoying himself.

I know I promised naked men, but isn't this guy cute?  He reminds me of R Man when I first met him.

Dillon Roman and his great big pocket rocket.

Dwain LeLand, titstitstits

I ran across this and the next few shots over at Sicko Ricko's blog listed as "Random Dick."  OK. 

I started this evening off listening to Bette Midler's album from 2014 It's the Girls, which is mostly sort of MoTown hits genius, and then Pandora wandered off eventually landing on Sonique's Sky (which I love) through the ancient disco offerings of Jackie Moore and This Time Baby and now we have somehow landed in the inevitable 80s and Don't Go by Yaz.   I expect Cher to drop by any minute.  All that's OK with me.   So is this Random Dick.

I am not usually sentimental, but the combo of remembering scary days gone by with an all-too-appropriate soundtrack has won out.  Old disco does that.

In Which We Can Host

 

Secret agent Fred's apartment building is doing some work on his place so he and his terribly sweet cat, Toby, have decamped over here. It's always a pleasure being able to hang out with Fred and it's very amusing to have a kitty back in the place.

This week's special guest star, Toby.

Fred has had a very rough year, his cancer keeps hanging around like an unwelcome guest, chemo and radiation were both an important part of his schedule, he wound up with anemia and was so beaten down by it all that he was one of the few people I know who spend more time in bed than I do.

At the end of the summer though, he suddenly bounced back, energetic and in good mood and interested in hanging out with us.  It was an enormous relief; this time last year, I was very worried that we would be looking at a fredless future quite soon.

So I have been really enjoying having my old friend back and when he wanted to spend some time up, I was all for it.  We had a very amusing couple of days and went out to dinner, things are going great.  Until they weren't.  On the way home from the restaurant, Fred sort of collapsed and wound up puking all over the sidewalk and staggering back to the apartment.  I thought I would have to carry him and wondered if instead I should just call for an ambulance.  The whole gastrointestinal storm blew up in just a moment, but had real lasting power.

The poor old thing spent all day in bed yesterday and most of today.  My nursing prowess tends towards asking "how are you feeling?" over and over as if I could harang the patient into feeling better.  I try to imply that they are letting me down by not recuperating fast enough.  Knowing that that is, oddly enough, not helpful, I restrain myself instead and just ask what they need and occasionally offer aspirin or tea or ginger ale or plain rice.  Late this afternoon, Fred got up and accepted my rice idea and is now ensconced on the living room couch.

Having gone through these peaks and valleys several times with R Man, I know there's really not much for those of us on the sidelines to do other than just hold on and hope for the best.  When you're sick there's just not a lot anyone can do for you.  Anyway, at the moment Fred is doing better so I'm just going to enjoy a dinner of rice with him.

Guys:

I love big ol' hardons that just pop out.

The most popular guy on the work site.

Daniel Osgood.  Cause sometimes you just want to be pretty.

A new favorite of ours here at mrpeenee, inc., Juan Hortoneda.

 A peek o' cheek.

Paride Spaziano, the beautiful.

My Halloween post included a bunch of cop love pictures, this is just a leftover.

I forget this guy's name.  Sorry.