Wow - What a Weekend

I can't even begin to explain everything that went on:

- Late luggage
- A Toe that was two times it's original size
- A Gusher
- A Cheesecake
- A Packed Airport

I swear it was drama from the start and drama all the way to the end, if it were a paid admission we definitely got our money's worth.

Check out Andi's Pictures HERE

Check out Michael's Pictures HERE

Somethings Coming

This week has been so crazy, well not just this week, the last few months. First I moved back in August, then we had the whole death in the family thing, then The Boyfriend moved, suddenly it's Halloween and it's time for a Housewarming Party!

It's a bittersweet weekend in Chicago, The Amazing Andi is making her regular trip to Chicago, and the boys are all a twitter....the only problem is The Boyfriend is going to New Orleans this weekend to perform for a Circuit Party. He's really sad that he's not gonna be able to party with Andi.

I'm a little concerned though, I think people are starting to talk, Andi and I have seen each other once a month for the last three months.....we've got to stop this because people are starting to question my sexuality, I'll have none of that! The great thing when Andi visits is when we go to all of my "regular" haunts everyone looks at us and thinks "What's he doing with a girl?"

I guess I'm a lot more gay than I thought!

Guess Who's Birthday it is

Michael, Andi & Stella
Originally uploaded by Michael_L.

Guess Who's Birthday is today?

Nope, not mine, you've still got 5 more months of shopping until mine.

Nope, it's not Ms. Mac's, here's was in May and if you missed it, you'd better go over there and give her a Belated Birthday.

Nope, it's that Cutie in the middle, The Ropey Old Bird herself. It's her birthday.

Jump over and tell her to have a great one!

Flushed Away - The Movie

Apparently Dreamworks and Aardman Studios have teamed up...you know Aardman Studios of "Wallace & Grommit" fame and "Chicken Run" It looks like the mice from Chicken Run have their own movie now - Flushed Away

I don't know the whole premise yet because they're just starting to advertise on TV...but a lot of it is in the sewer....and there appears to be singing and dancing poo.....

Anyone know anything about this movie?

I may have to go see dancing poo, what about you?

The Pirate Queen - A Review

We went and saw The Pirate Queen last night.....we walked out before intermission.

The Pirate Queen - A Review

Well, I guess my first post was a little harsh. I mean we really did walk out before intermission, neither one of us have ever done that before. I never even walked out of a movie!

The show wasn't all bad, I mean did you see Les Miz? Did you see Miss Saigon? Did you see Riverdance? Well if you did, then you saw The Pirate Queen.

The opening number, honest to god, was the opening number of Les Miz only the guys were carrying oars, we were quickly flown to Viet Nam for a touching love song and then whisked back to Ireland for a rousing Irish Dance routine.

Stephanie Block (who was Elphaba in the first touring version of Wicked) has an amazing voice. The costumes were pretty amazing (although the English women looked like they were wearing tables) and the dancing and cheography was well executed.

It was just that the show as a whole - made no sense. The backstory that I read online made more sense than anything that happened on the stage. The show couldn't figure out if it wanted to be a love ballady show or a dance show or a belt out the song kinda show. There seemed to be no transitions between the numbers they just ran one into the other, the only thing changing was the set and the lighting.

Honestly, I was bored about 20 minutes into the show and shut my eyes for a few minutes.....we were almost to intermission when The Boyfriend said "I've had enough" I told him there were only two more songs before intermission, could we wait? Well, when that next to last song started, I had had enough too...so we grabbed our coats and walked out.

As we were walking out we recreated the beginning of "Death Becomes" her when the people are walking out of the broadway show....it was funny!

Oh yeah, we should have known something was up when the souveniors were cheap cheap cheap. This year I decided that I was going to get a magnet from every show we saw, typically they're around $5 and pretty nice....the ones at the Pirate Queen were two dollars and looked like someone printed them out on the HP printer in the box office.

Sorry if I seem mean, but I just didn't like this show at all.

Guilty Pleasure

I have a confession to make....I hope that you won't think bad of me when you find out what I have to tell you.

I only watch it do it once a week and it's not like I go searching for it, it just happens. I only go to it when everything else is old and boring. For some reason it intrigues me, I don't understand it.

It's not like me at all to like those things, but for some reason, which I can't undestand, I'm drawn to it, like moths to the flame.

I hope that I can stop with this obsession, if my friends found out they would truly ostrecize, laugh at me and whisper about me at parties.

How can I stop watching this SHOW

Oh I know, it's because I don't watch Sisters and Brothers and when I press the down arrow button on my remote instead of up it's one of the first programs that comes on. I think it's the boobies.

I've seen it all

You know how people always say "Oh I can't leave yet, I haven't seen it all"

Well guess what....I've seen it all!

Go to YouTube and search for keyword: SMOKE

I can't believe that there are actually videos of people smoking....just smoking. Not eating and smoking...no just smoking....not watching tv and smoking....no just smoking.

My most favorite though is this one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPxVRXM0Haw

Smoking....and no audio!

Genius!

***UPDATE - Five minutes later**** Oh my god, I'm so confused. Check out this guy:

http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=Dave019

He's got several videos and they're all of him just smoking. AND the fucker has like 16 ratings on each of them....I'm so confused....I think I need to go to bed!

Wow, you've got to check this out

Is this just not the coolest?

Apparently it's true!

So I guess the old axiom - "It's Better to Ask Forgiveness Than Permission" holds truth. Becuase now Kim Jong Il is "sorry about the nuclear test." HERE

Well, all I can says is Thank Goodness he's sorry...could you imagine what it would be like if he weren't?!?

Oh yeah, so this is gonna be my mea cupla from now on...go ahead try it. Apparently everyone will accept it too!

Goodbye Grey Slacks

Goodbye Grey Slacks, I can't believe you're leaving me.

You've worn me well through the years. You came to me in 2002 from the Burlington Coat Factory. I was looking for a "costume" for my 15 year High School reunion, when I saw you for the first time you jumped out of the clothes rack at me. You made me look so nice that evening, along with a blue houndstooth short sleved shirt and a rust sports jacket, my Mother said I looked so handsome that night, all because of you.

You made me look great that night in front of the 25 people who showed up for the reunion - hey we only had 48 kids in our graduating class so a 50% turnout was wonderful. You did a great job during the whole "coming out" incident which was started by the class Lesbian, and even though I had you scotch guarded in case anyone threw cocktails at us (the highest point of Alcohol Abuse if you ask me) you never needed it!

After the party you did a great job of matching up with many many other pieces from my closet, very rarely, if ever, did you complain about what I tried to match you with. You were the perfect shade, you matched everything from black to brown, stripes to paisleys and patterns to solids.

I remember all those times you came home from the cleaners, you looked so wonderful, so young and crisp and a beautiful crease down your front and perfectly hemmed cuffs - you were the definition of stylish. You were always the first pair of slacks I grabbed - regardless of what the other pants told you.

Alas, your button came off this morning when I went to put you on, I know it wasn't your fault - it was mine. If only I had visited the Buffet one less time perhaps you may have not exploded like you did. But like I learned from my Mother - "When a button comes off, it goes in the trash" And we all know that Mother Knows Best!

So this is goodbye, I'll miss you Grey Slacks!

Breaking Up

Oh no, don't worry, The Boyfriend and I are not breaking up, I just wanted to get your attention.

So are you in a loveless relationship? Are you tired of your current lover? Do you hate confrontation? Well if you answered yes to these questions you need to check out this website:

http://www.ubreakup.com/

The great folks over there have made it easy for you to break up with your lover, all you do is select a breakup message, enter your name and a phone number your message is delivered right to your soon to be ex-lover!

I was going to try this out as a joke on The Boyfriend but then I thought better of it!

The Altar Boyz - A Review

Last evening we saw our last show of the Broadway in Chicago series - The Altar Boyz.

It was actually much better than I had anticipated. Earlier this year The Boyfriend went out and bought the soundtrack, so we could bone up on the songs, etc. I listened to it maybe 2 or 3 times - it was ok, but nothing that fabulous! The songs were just ok, nothing catchy, nothing that I found myself humming, I listened to it so infrequently that I actually took it off of my iPod to make room for new found glories!

Well, let's just say that seeing it live was MUCH BETTER than listening to the CD. MUCH MUCH BETTER! The show isn't that long, only about 90 minutes without an intermission.

The story is about these 5 guys that are a Christian Boy Band - the characters are: The Leader, The Doofus, The Ethnic, The Gay and the Jew. There were some really clever lines in the songs and in their dialog (it was purposely ((at least I hope it was)) very much like an infomercial where they were going over the top in the delivery of their lines).

Of course everyone laughs at the gay boy....he's so flamboyant but no one really sees it except the audience. At once point they go get a girl from the audience and sing a song called Something About You....makes me want to say no (to sex), 4 of the guys are on one side of the stage standing in a line singing this song to the girl with the gay boy behind her and the gay boy swoons because they're singing to him.

My other favorite part was during the song "Rhythm in Me" they're singing about how Jesus put the rhythm in me so I could dance/sing/etc and the gay boy has a few "solos" where all he sings is "Put it in me" it was FUNNY.

I would rank this on the level of Putnam County Spelling Bee but not as good as Avenue Q.

Come Out Come Out Where Ever You Are

It's National Coming Out Day

The Boyz, A Pillow & A Queen

This week is going to be filled with an extraveganza of Theater!

The Boyfriend and I are now 2-year subscribers to the Broadway in Chicago Series (I know I'm such a name dropper aren't I) Surprisingly, tickets aren't as expensive as you would think.

Tonight we're going to see Altar Boyz - I hope it's better than the CD. I've listened to it a few times but it just hasn't "grabbed me" if you know what I mean. I felt the same way about The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee before I saw the actual show - after that I fell in heavy "like" with it.

Saturday we're going to The Steppenwolf to see The Pillowman. The Boyfriend got these tickets last week, I've never even heard of this show. I've been to Steppenwolf several times, and they have wonderful productions so that's something to look forward to. **Update** Since, we're traveling back to PA this weekend, we're going to postpone this - the lovely folks at Steppenwolf were nice enough to give us a voucher to see it on another day.

Finally, next week we're going to see The Pirate Queen from the team that brought you Miss Saigon and Les Miz as well as the team that brought you Riverdance! It's actually the "world premier" of this show, so we've been a little excited about it, but there's not really been any "news" about it. We haven't seen any reviews yet, I haven't heard any of the music, I don't know what the plot/storyline is...so it shall be interesting. I just hope it's not a bunch of people dancing around on a revolving stage while their feet look like they're barely attached at the ankle during the whole time a giant pirate ship is descending from the ceiling - I mean come on that's been done before folks.

United Airlines Really Needs to Train Its People

See, I told you, a day can't go by without using that word.

I called United today to make travel arrangements to go home to PA this weekend. My Uncle that I went to visit a few weeks back passed away yesterday morning, he had been a lifelong smoker and died from lung/brain cancer. I'm glad that I got to see him a few weeks ago, we had a wonderful visit and although he looked totally different, and for the first time ever - an old man, he still had the same sense of humor and joking way about himself.

So I called United today to make travel arrangements for The Boyfriend and I to go home this weekend......

Fucking United Airlines has outsourced their reservations to India. I'm not gonna go on about how wrong that is...that's not the issue...the issue is that the girl who helped me had no idea what she was doing or the type of call that she was handling.

I told her at the onset of the call I was arranging travel for the funeral of a family member. She gets all of my details and comes back with a fare of over $500 for each ticket....whoooo.... So I ask her, if that's the fare for bereavement at which point she says "What kind of fare?" in that same perky voice.

"Bereavement, you know like when a family member dies and they have a funeral." Then she told me to hold...when she came back she told me the fare would be less but only about $125 less, so we proceed through the rest of the call, confirm, credit card number, yada yada yada and while she's waiting for my credit card authorization she has the nerve to say "Sir, would you be interested in applying for our United Visa card which offers an introducto..." that's where I cut her off with a curt "No, thank you" she even had the audacity to continue on with her spiel saying "you could earn 75 thousand..." "I'm really not interested in a credit card right now," I politely told her.

So I got my confirmation number and was ready to hang up the phone when the girl says in the same happy tone "Sir, did I fulfill all of your travel needs today" "Yep you sure did," I told her, "And you sure follow your script don't you?"....she responded with a quizzical "huh?" and I hung up the phone.

I've worked in Customer Service for years now, and almost all of it has been phone based, and I understand the need for a script and to follow it....but come on people, train your CSR's to have a little bit of compassion.....if I wanted to talk to a fucking robot I would have done the transaction online....but I can't because you can only do bereavement fares on the phone and they charge you a $15 fee to do that.... I've talked to all kinds of people in all sorts of situations.....hell this one time I even had a lady tell me that her husband had just handed her a request for divorce and she was still at work placing orders....I felt so bad for her....we sat and talked for aabout ten minutes and didn't even place an order....but not little Miss United Airlines....not that I was expecting a pity party from them, but the least the lady could have done was at least sound a little reverent instead of perky perky perky and try to upsell me on their fucking credit card.

UGH....now I've ranted and if I rant much longer I'll probably keel over myself.

United Airlines Really Needs to Train Its People

See, I told you, a day can't go by without using that word.

I called United today to make travel arrangements to go home to PA this weekend. My Uncle that I went to visit a few weeks back passed away yesterday morning, he had been a lifelong smoker and died from lung/brain cancer. I'm glad that I got to see him a few weeks ago, we had a wonderful visit and although he looked totally different, and for the first time ever - an old man, he still had the same sense of humor and joking way about himself.

So I called United today to make travel arrangements for The Boyfriend and I to go home this weekend......

Fucking United Airlines has outsourced their reservations to India. I'm not gonna go on about how wrong that is...that's not the issue...the issue is that the girl who helped me had no idea what she was doing or the type of call that she was handling.

I told her at the onset of the call I was arranging travel for the funeral of a family member. She gets all of my details and comes back with a fare of over $500 for each ticket....whoooo.... So I ask her, if that's the fare for bereavement at which point she says "What kind of fare?" in that same perky voice.

"Bereavement, you know like when a family member dies and they have a funeral." Then she told me to hold...when she came back she told me the fare would be less but only about $125 less, so we proceed through the rest of the call, confirm, credit card number, yada yada yada and while she's waiting for my credit card authorization she has the nerve to say "Sir, would you be interested in applying for our United Visa card which offers an introducto..." that's where I cut her off with a curt "No, thank you" she even had the audacity to continue on with her spiel saying "you could earn 75 thousand..." "I'm really not interested in a credit card right now," I politely told her.

So I got my confirmation number and was ready to hang up the phone when the girl says in the same happy tone "Sir, did I fulfill all of your travel needs today" "Yep you sure did," I told her, "And you sure follow your script don't you?"....she responded with a quizzical "huh?" and I hung up the phone.

I've worked in Customer Service for years now, and almost all of it has been phone based, and I understand the need for a script and to follow it....but come on people, train your CSR's to have a little bit of compassion.....if I wanted to talk to a fucking robot I would have done the transaction online....but I can't because you can only do bereavement fares on the phone and they charge you a $15 fee to do that.... I've talked to all kinds of people in all sorts of situations.....hell this one time I even had a lady tell me that her husband had just handed her a request for divorce and she was still at work placing orders....I felt so bad for her....we sat and talked for aabout ten minutes and didn't even place an order....but not little Miss United Airlines....not that I was expecting a pity party from them, but the least the lady could have done was at least sound a little reverent instead of perky perky perky and try to upsell me on their fucking credit card.

UGH....now I've ranted and if I rant much longer I'll probably keel over myself.

Do you hate the "C" Word

You know the word I'm talking about....there are only so many words in this world that can be described as "The X Word" (replace X with a letter i.e. The F Word).

Now granted, I LOVE the F word, for some reason it has invaded my normal everyday language, I don't feel well unless I get to use the F word at least once a day, even better days are when I get to use the F word in a sentence like "F you, you F'in F'ers" but alas I digress.

So do you hate the "C" word? You know the word I'm talking about, it really is one of the foulest words out there....well if you sometimes feel as though someone really deserves the C word you could instead call them a Squaw.

According to the Coeur d'Alene Tribe in Idahoe, Squaw refers to female genitals...wow, did you know that? I had no idea!

So now when you get really pissed off at that lady in front of you, instead of spewing out the worst of the worst words you can instead call her a squaw and feel just as satisfied.

Here's the story

Oh My God, I'm on the Internet

***UPDATE*** I hate the f'in Internet....of course the ONE day that something exciting happens to me is the ONE day they don't post a blog entry....I swear I talked to Norm....We talked about Fall and Halloween....oh well....

I was perusing through my list of blogs today and on one of my regular reads I found a link to Ring My Bell.

Basically you call number between the hours of 11:00 am PST and 12:00 pm PST and have a chance to talk one on one with the days "host", well just as I was reading the post the clock flipped over to 1:00 CST - which meant that it was 11:00 am PST, could my luck really be with me?

So I called the number.....I pressed 1 to agree that I was over 18...and I got connected to Norm Korpi! AND I was the first caller, can you believe that shit!

Don't ask me who Norm is, I don't know - it says he was on MTV's Real World which means I'm 37 and he's probably 22...but we chatted about Halloween Costumes and a few things going on in Chicago...he seemed really nice!

I guess it'll be there for a while so go check me out....I'll post the permanent link later when they post it.

Thanks to KB for the link - btw, KB & his BF live in Chicago - KB knows The Boyfriend and KB's BF lives in my neighborhood....yet we've never met - how twisted is that?

Don't worry I'm still gay

Wow, everything has been kicking my ass lately!

All is well though, it's just been so overwhelming the last month or so, actually it's been a whirlwind since the beginning of August when Andi and I went to Madison.

I just wanted to let you know that even though I've been super busy I'm still gay!

The Boyfriend and I are going to NYC in November (I'm so excited-more about that later though), and today we bought tickets to a show! Actually it's the second set of tickets that we bought, we bought tickets months ago for A Chorus Line and today we got tickets for Company. I know both revivals, go figure! See, I'm still gay.

I'm really looking forward to the trip, the last time I was there was 1989 almost 1/2 a lifetime ago, wow that's pretty sobering! Damn, I'm old! But even more exciting than the trip is that I'm going to get to meet up with a long lost relative - how much fun will that be?

So anyone have any tips for NYC? Where to go? What to do? Anyone want to give us a tour while we're there? Honest we're not hillbillies, just ask Andi& Stella

I bet she was smoking Pall Mall's & drinking a Tab

CLICK HERE

Idiot

'nuff said.

A few videos to share

This reminds me of Shirley Q. Liquor...have a gander:



Here's another one


Now I just need to find me a black drag queen and we can start making videos too....anyone know anyone?