Spring

Perhaps you heard?  Sunday, April 20 was both Easter (as I like to point out, a Jewish fairy tale about zombies celebrated with symbolically ritualized cannibalism.  Fabulous) and also the highly unofficial holiday of 420, which for reasons no one knows celebrates marijuana.

I don't really care one way or the other about either of them, in fact, I had forgotten this was Easter until Friday when I was trying to make reservations for brunch.  My biggest complaint on Sunday was that the confluence of both meant that every idiot in town whose driving was impaired either by religious fervor or dope, or both, was in my way.  There is an intersection where three streets cross and some buffoon attempting a left turn had some crisis of confidence and just gave up, sitting in the middle, blocking the rest of us.  Maybe it was an art piece, there's lots of those around here.

On the brighter side, the brunch was just charming and included an ice cream cone for dessert and I found a great couch for the New Orleans house.

Also blooming right now is my beautiful, beautiful cereus, so yay for spring and all that.

On the Prowl

Secret Agent Fred and I walking down Market Street in the Castro, talking the talk: "Nice people call it anal rape...."  What do people overhearing us think?  One wonders.

Fred and I have re-entered the world of The Rock n Roll Lifestyle, which is pretty fabulous, but difficult to accomplish anything in.  I stayed more or less in bed for 20 hours a day for several days over the last weekend, fending off all sorts of attempts to lure me out.  When I finally turned to on Tuesday, I had an astonishing stack of emails and stuff to deal with.  I had seen something from my tax guy that was something about filing an extension.  When I got around to opening the attachment, it turned out I needed to cough up $3,000 to the state by April 15, which was that day.  Luckily I was able to stop squealing long enough to notice I could do it online, and I did.

Fred and I did manage a very productive day last week.  We went out decorating shopping, looking at tile for the bathrooms in New Orleans and then couches.  Tiles were a big success, couches less so.  When did Room and Board turn into an expensive version of Ikea?  The only couch they had that I liked was the one we already have here, and I'm very conscious of the fact I seem to be replicating my house here at the one in New Orleans already, so no.

We also hit a sort of antique mall and found a lovely little orange lamp and then a weird gallery where I found a lithograph we're both wild about.

When I got them home, I realized they're perfect in the living room here, goddamit.  This happens a lot, I try to pay attention to the New Orleans house and suddenly I'm redecorating San Francisco.  So very not productive, but now I have lovely addition to my living room.

House Party

Oh, hello, there, how nice to see you again.  I had to dash off to New Orleans last week to meet up with the architect handling the plans of the renovation of my house there.  I was sort of dreading this, in part because my previous experiences with architects have been very much of the "I am an Ayn Rand sized diva and you had best watch out" type of soul withering punishment, and also because I assumed all the ideas I had for revamping the shabby little joint would be kicked to the architectural curb.

Instead, Katherine, Queen of Architects, was supportive and interested, complimentary about my ideas and made all of them work and improved even the most crack pot ones.

So now, demolition is proceeding with speed and my friend Stephen, who is running the project, and whom I think we can refer to as Sister Mary Legs in the Air from now on, is a genius.  He's very practical and so energetic about getting this crap done, I have to go lie down after watching him dervish around, ripping and tearing and nailing and all kinds of other butch things.

He and my friend Magda whipped up a pair of temporary gates from some scrap fencing in an afternoon.  This was after some riff raft had busted into the house the night I got in town, so some more secure access seemed like a good idea.

I also had dinner with Jason from Night is Half Gone who was down with pneumonia just a couple of weeks ago.  Everyone should go tell him they wish him well, although I have to say the whole story sounded suspect to me.  He just happens to have pneumonia the night my house is burgled and then is up to (not particularly outstanding) dinner and drinks on the town?  Hmmmm.

Anyway, photographic proof:

Before

After.  Or actually, during.  We'll see about after in a few months.

Also, Saki has sort of tentatively decided the cat tree is not an instrument of torture from the devil.  Sort of.  Yay.

Because We All Do, but Not All of Us Have a Posh Accent

Leading the list of products I'm pretty sure I will never, ever purchase, but the commercials for which I sort of adore:

Breeding Despair

So is being funny and smart the consolation prize for not being humpy?  Or is it the other way around?

Before you answer, think about this: who was more likely to have contributed to the gene pool:

Once again, harsh, evolution, harsh.

And where does that leave the denizens of Duck Dynasty?  You would think if fate had been cruel enough to abandon you in whatever trailer park they arose from, you would abstain from breeding, out of depression if nothing else.  But no, no.  Always, those we'd least like to see spawn feel free to fling their DNA around with merry insouciance.

Also, just a few short years ago, gay mens with babies were a big part of the landscape, but I just realized I don't see them as much.  Do you think they returned them?  Did they eat them?

I'm just being philosophical, I do that sometimes.  I might also be a teeny bit loaded.  I do that sometimes.

Photographic Proof

I am so bad about not taking pictures that when I got back from New Orleans, I simply assumed I had none.  Imagine my surprise when I discovered some aliens had apparently been snapping away on my behalf.  Herewith, Mardi Gras 2014:

Asian Magnolias exploded into bloom right after we got there, a botanical "Hey gurl, welcome back"

Two views of the patio of our charming, charming French quarter hotel

Magda and the author planning something or the other.

Magda sucking down a delicacy known as a Frozen Irish Coffee which turned out to be deadly poison and laid the poor  thing to waste for days

The coldest fucking parades I have ever stuck it out through, bolstered as I was  by my sistahs in crime,  from left, Secret Agent Fred, Sister Mary Feet in the Air, Magda, and the author, dressed as Roz Russell in The Women.  Please note the staggering amount of beads all caught in mid air.  We scorned any that had landed on the filthy sloppy ground.  Friends referred to us as "Bead Whore," but they were just jealous.  Sad, really.

The Haul back in our room.  We had planned to hurl our largesse to the clamoring crowds below on Mardi Gras day from our balcony, but the fucking freezing cold rain eliminate that plan, so we just abandoned our riches when we left. I felt like some Russian white countess kissing off the family jewels as she scampered out of town ahead of the Bolshies.

My new house, plain, echoing, smelly (goddam hobo tenants,) and LOOOONG.  Forgetting something in one of the front rooms when you're in the back makes you seriously consider roller-skates.

Burp

Back in San Francisco, the first order of business was brunch, of course, cause I'm all gay and stuff.  We hooked up with our young friends, collectively known as The Children, at the ever fabulous Foreign Cinema.  Drinks and coffee flowed, bacon and omelets were downed, a good time was had by all.

Of course there was a price to pay, isn't there always?  My stomach is reporting in with heartburn of a volcanic level and claims the bacon had uranium in it.  Please tell me it is not actually possible to die of indigestion.  I feel like if I breathed towards an open flame, we could all go up in a terrible blaze.  Dammit.

To take my mind off grease-based misery, some houseboy booty.

Obviously a young man who sensibly avoids brunch overload.  Dammit.