Today marks the one-year anniversary of the start of my most expensive Fourth of July weekend getaway ever. I’m feeling less than nostalgic…

I hate that I can’t watch first season episodes of The Simpsons on TV anymore without wanting to switch to the DVD commentary track and hearing tales of how bad the animation was. All the same, I’m glad my local rerun carrier has cycled back to older episodes. Maybe I’ll see my favorite again soon…

Things I meant to write about yesterday but didn’t, since I was making a dent in The Big Pile of Email™:

• Two consecutive nights of dreams I actually remembered the next day. Neither of them was terribly exciting, but in one of them I was a 1970s cop show detective investigating a murder inside a really cool 1960s motor lodge. I’m not sure, but I think it may have been in Atlanta. Or Reno.

• San Francisco’s new law banning public urination and defecation. But that was too easy a target. Biggest wonders: (1) why there wasn’t already one and (2) why there was any significant debate on the issue.
• The loss of a semi-daily Jonno. We’ve both been doing variations on this theme for so damned long that I feel like we’re old friends, even though I don’t think we’ve ever even been in the same state at the same time, much less the same room.

When I think about what I really like as far as the web, technology, etc. go, I realize that I’m more excited by information and data (and sometimes by neat little automation tricks) than by actual design. I like organizing things, categorizing them, finding new ways to search, sort, and reassemble them…

That’s not to say that I don’t like presenting them in a pleasing way; that excites me too, and I think I have at least a slight grasp of good deign principles. But as a rule, I get more of a techno-boner about Filemaker and even Excel (imagine, a Microsloth program which actually works well…) than about, say, Illustrator (whose Bezier curves I have neither the will nor the stamina to decipher…). It’s really cool, though, to find a way to make dry data look good AND be functional…

I’ve been known to sit in front of my computer all night working on a new Filemaker database (you should see the “supermarkets” directory on my G4) to which I’ll eventually refer, at most, about once or twice a month. I’ll spend hours on some pointless little CGI script which may give me a day’s worth of amusement once it goes live. I’ll sometimes spend a day or two trying to make Dreamweaver’s back end do something it doesn’t think it can do (with inconsistent success, alas). This is what gives me a sense of accomplishment…

But it’s as much about the actual data involved as it is about the nuts and bolts. I couldn’t get so excited if the subject were, say, the flora and fauna of Central Iowa. Technology for technology’s sake (and data for data’s sake) does not excite me; technology which has some useful purpose in my life does. I don’t want to understand every aspect of how a database program works, but I do want to understand enough that I can make it do exactly what I want and have the result look exactly as I want it to…

I’m not sure if this makes me right-brained, left-brained, or some strange centrist hybrid. Would that my life and my apartment were as neat and organized and attractively arranged as my miscellaneous sources of information…

Now to try, once again, to solve the dilemma of turning those thousands of dirty pictures into some sort of super database so that I can immediately find that shot of some dark-haired guy getting fucked on a barstool while wearing nothing but his Adidas and a baseball cap…

It’ll keep my hands busy until tomorrow, when I have someone to occupy them…

It happened. My monitor died tonight. I’m using a spare 15″ right now. Suffice to say, this will be an EXTREMELY temporary situation…

The monitor situation has been rectified (and all the discards have been safely shipped to Fresno for dumping), I spent a quite wonderful long weekend with Mark, and Blue Apron Blues disappeared over the weekend. Two positives, one negative…

Or two negatives and one positive if I figure in the two hundred bucks I didn’t really need to be spending right now…

More later…

I woke up this morning feeling like death warmed over in a defective microwave, and it’s been going downhill ever since. It’s nothing specific; I don’t think I “have” anything. I just feel draggy and headachy and stuffy. Probably something allergic. But at least my thyroid hormone level is normal. That’s a plus, I guess…

Random thoughts for a Monday afternoon:

• It’s a wonderful thing to have a betrothed who likes to cook AND clean. And who can even cook things other than the “heart attack on a plate” specialties I’m famous for. And who leaves me the leftovers.
• It’s hot. It’s getting hotter. This doesn’t fill me with much confidence that I’ll be feeling significantly better tomorrow.
• Being stuck on a hot, sticky, and very overcrowded 1-California bus going about 3 miles per hour when you’re late for a doctor’s appointment is one of the most unpleasant things in the world.
• Realizing that the entirety of your doctor’s appointment lasted about half as long as the aforementioned bus trip provides a good 76% of the U.S. recommended daily requirement of bitterness.

Lastly, there’s a new rant over on Planet SOMA if anyone cares…

Found a link to this article somewhere today, and as I finished reading it, I couldn’t help but think, “What are they whining about? Isn’t this a good thing?”

I don’t mean to sound insensitive to small business owners or anything. But, taking the somewhat altruistic claims of “gay bookstore” owners and the like at face value, you’d think they’d be tickled pink to find that society has evolved to the point where mainstream retailers take homosexuals seriously and no longer wish to avoid their custom. Hasn’t general acceptance, after all, been one of the main goals of most gay rights movements?

Or does that only extend to non-profit groups?

It’s no secret that I have some significant issues with the idea of “gay marketing”. Most of these revolve around the idea that it’s a fairly stupid strategy, given that there’s no homogenous group to market to. Homosexuality is not synonymous with homogebneity; as a group, we are no more likely to share one set of common values and priorities than are heterosexuals.

Thus, marketing tends (in the case of bookstores) to be aimed more at a specific subset of homosexuals who like to read mostly books about other homosexuals. It’s a valid niche category and all, albeit a rather boring one. And certain urban bookstores have made a small profit serving it for years. To a one, they all pushed the idea that “we have books you can’t find anywhere else”.

Well, now you can find them somewhere else. Now, people in Des Moines don’t have to dive into big city ghettos nor pay for shipping to get the information they want or need. One bookstore manager says, “But now gays take this all for granted, a byproduct of assimilation.” So he finds ghettoization and isolation preferable? Once again, I thought the idea was to create a world where one can take these things for granted.

Notice that I’m not talking about the sad decline of neighborhood independent bookstores here. The stores mentioned in this article are complaining about the loss of patronage from tourists and other oustide residents. I might be inclined to be more symapthetic if their arguments were framed in terms of neighbohood politics rather than merely a reaction to the fact that they don’t know how to evolve and compete in today’s marketplace. Then again, I also might not.

It seems the bookstore owners are more concerned about losing business than about promoting that “big gay ideal”. They’d apparently prefer that people were forced to work just a little bit harder in order to be sufficiently (and deservingly) homosexual. In other words, they want their customers to confine themselves to nice, paternalistic little overpriced ghettoes and shop only in their stores.

Methinks these “community-oriented” bookstore owners are a touch more capitalistic than they care to admit. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but to pretend that there’s some greater issue involved by attempting an annoying form of guilt-based marketing is a very bad thing. Niche retailers who are willing to do the work have found new life with online sales and by catering to new markets. Those who aren;t have whined themselves to death.

Gay bookstores are not non-profit organizations. They are businesses. Successful businesses are not successful because they maintain their customer base through pleas for charity. They’re successful because they know their market and innovate in response. I do not owe a business owner a living because he was “first”. I’ll glady contribute to it, however, if he does his job well and provides a service I want in a superior or convenient manner.

Great. I’m home all day feeling crappy and it’s going to be the hottest day of the year so far. My timing is, as ever, impeccable. But I’m using the day to scour job listings (both in San Francisco and not) and to catch up on my reading. Maybe the lack of movement will help…

We made it all the way to 92 this afternoon. Color me thrilled, really. But I’m feeling much better, strangely enough. It’s amazing what two Tylenol gelcaps and swearing off cigarettes and the computer for most of the afternoon will do for the constitution. If history is any indicator, alas, the peak of discomfort in my apartment won’t come until 7:00 or so. I think the evening will involve my deck and a good book…

Note to Mark: it’s actually quite comfortable in Eureka this afternoon. But that may be the only decent weather in the entire country today…

When motels were motels:

And sometimes were restaurants too:

As I was composing an email response today to someone who was amused that I always place the phrase “gay community” within quotation marks, it dawned on me why I have so much trouble stomaching the idea of the concept (and the ideas of “gay pride” and most aspects of the “gay movement” in general): the maddening attention toward the idea of “community-building”, usually at the expense of anything resembling individual achievement.

The whole cliché of “community” is is rather pervasive not just among politicized homosexuals, but among many pointy-headed academics, and especially among the professional victims of the world. We no longer have homeless individuals, but the “homeless community”. There are no homosexuals who like sports; there is merely the “LGBT sports community”. People with personal websites now owe dues to the “weblogging community”.

Any given group of individuals who shares one common interest or problem, no matter how insignificant to its members’ actual daily lives, must suddenly be a “community”. It’s as if nothing any individual does has any intrinsic value unless it’s done with the sanction of –and of course the appropriate designation by — some unspecified number of other people. Without a “community” to be served, any individual achievement is meaningless. Everything is set in terms of “we think” rather than “I think”.

And heaven help anyone who dares think differently. Immediately they’re derided for “not speaking on behalf of the community” (read “not really being one of us”). These “open and affirming” communities are often very quick to exile members who have a penchant for independent thought, especially when it sometimes contrasts with what the “community” has deemed to be the proper way for its members to think.

The theme of this year’s San Francisco gay pride event was “Be yourself. Change the world.” It’s a nice sentiment, but the very nature of the event (and the actual phrase, if you read it a certain way) suggests that “being yourself” has no particular value unless you’re doing it as part of some greater community goal. Some people don’t want to change the world, and want to do their own thing even it involves quietly blending into their surroundings. And other people don’t much care that the “pride community” has given them “permission” to wear a feather boa rather than a tank top.

It’s great to meet people who have common interests. This is a natural human desire and it makes life much more fun. I was very excited to find that there are a lot of people who are interested in old supermarkets. It’s nice to be able to rely on other people for information. But I’d still be interested (and research them just as obsessively) if I were the only person on earth who gave a damn.

Maybe I’m just not a “joiner”, but I don’t need a “community” to validate my interests, my lifestyle, nor my troubles. I can justify them to myself just fine, thanks, and that’s really all that matters.

So Amazon just sent me a reminder that my birthday’s coming up in August. They’re so considerate to assume that I’m a complete idiot and was likely to have forgotten…

It’s off to Fresno tomorrow to see my favorite boy, not to mention The Shroud. All the weather stories have me a little nervous; when people who have lived their entire lives in Fresno start using italics and even underlined italics to emphasize the fact, it must be pretty fucking steamy…

To the corner store now. Elmo needs a Fresca…

Among the things you can do in California which you can’t do many other places: drive 185 miles on a Sunday afternoon and experience a 45 degree temperature drop…

Good weekend, but I’m too tired to talk about it (or about much of anything else) right now. G’night…

I’ve been working on the edge of Nob Hill this week and have generally been walking home rather than fight the 19-Polk or (God forbid) any of the Van Ness buses. Today I varied my route and took Larkin rather than Polk. I wanted a change of scenery and I also figured I’d stop by the used pornography store. There was, as usual, nothing of any particular interest to me there. You’d think that in a city like San Francisco, there’d be a huge market for — and a decent selection of — used porn. You’d apparently be wrong…

Unrelated to porn: twenty years ago tonight I did my first radio show at the tender age of 17. Among the featured tracks were “From the Air” by Laurie Anderson, “Mesopotamia” by the B-52s, and “Overpowered by Funk” by the Clash. Despite all the 1980s finery, I started the whole thing with “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” by the Beatles, and I think “Love Street” by the Doors was in there somewhere too. I was apparently in a musical transition phase which continues to this day…

Unrelated to music: seems I’ll be getting my conjugal visit this weekend after all. I love it when my voice mail messages are not from creditors nor from travel agents with a (pre-recorded) “really great deal”…

Unrelated to Mark or to voice mail: I always like it when this time of year rolls around…

Speaking of twenty years ago, it was that same week that I first met my friend Duncan, an island of common sense and humor in a sea overflowing with people who have neither. Happy birthday and many happy returns of the day, my good friend…

I love my apartment. I’ve lived in it for nigh onto ten years, so this is a good thing. I’m about to be sharing it. I love that too. That said, there are a few things about it which I will not miss when I leave.

Requirements for my next abode:

• A washer, dryer, and dishwasher. Pretty close to non-negotiable.
• A shower surfaced in actual tile and not some Formica-like substance which doesn’t really lend itself to being in a damp room.
• No, repeat no, industrial grey wall-to-wall carpet.
• Sufficient electrical service so that I won’t cringe if I dare to use the microwave and the toaster oven at the same time.
• A guaranteed and maybe even designated parking space.
• About 50% more of a bedroom than I now have.
• About 100% more of a guest room than I now have.
• No warehouse (with constant deliveries by very large trucks) across the street even if it means I can’t look out my front window at all the cute juvenile delinquent boys who work there.

People in the south are just nice. In today’s mail, I received a box of supermarket collectibles and rare photos from a complete stranger in North Carolina. He’s letting me borrow them to scan for this site and then I’m to return them to him. They’re not terribly valuable, although they are somewhat irreplaceable and would probably fetch a couple of hundred dollars on eBay. But this very nice man thought nothing of sending them right to me, even though he doesn’t know me from Adam, and he even told me I could keep some items of which he had duplicates…

Sort of restores my faith in humanity. And you can rest assured his stuff will be returned quickly and in the same condition in which it was recieved. I want to get it all back to him before I have a chance to spill something on it…

Absolutely asinine: career homosexual Jeff Sheehy’s latest rambling in the Examiner about the “explicit homophobia” among tenant activists who dare to disagree with his position on a pending home ownership ballot initiative in San Francisco. Apparently, since he is homosexual and since the issue might impact him in some fashion, anyone who opposes it is a raging “homophobe”…

Note please that I don’t currently have an opinion one way or another on the initiative itself; I don’t know enough about it. I might even find myself in favor of it, just like the author, if for different reasons…

But I most definitely have an opinion on this particular op-ed piece. It aggravates me so much I can hardly express it. Mr. Sheehy has apparently lived so much of his life framing everything in terms of sexual orientation that his only means of arguing ANY issue now seems to be to cry “homophobia” whether or not any actually exists. Limited vocabulary, I guess…

For all his babbling about “refugee communities” (who evidently have more of a God-given right to own property than anyone else, especially with government assistance) and “life as a fully realized person participating in a community free from discrimination”, he doesn’t seem to grasp the fact that homsexuality is completely unrelated to this particular issue. There is no connection. Period…

Of course, to admit this to himself would be to render invalid his assertion that tenant activists are nothing but evil “homophobes” (despite the fact that many of them are every bit as homosexual as Mr. Sheehy himself). While these activists undoubtedly have some skewed priorities, I find it hard to stomach the none-too-hidden assertion that they wake up every morning wondering how they can “screw over the fags” today…

I can see a great future for Mr. Sheehy as a speech writer for Willie Brown, another San Franciscan with a penchant for finding bigotry anytime a dissenting question is asked…

OK, so i’m having the same, ummm, adverse reaction to my Subway lunch that I had to the Quizno’s stuff a while back. Maybe I should just give up subs and stick with double cheeseburgers…

Caught the premiere of Georgy Girl on TCM tonight and it got me in the mood to seek a bit of information on one of my other favorite British (and Lynn Redgrave) films of the era, Smashing Time. Which I managed, a few minutes later, to buy on DVD for only eight bucks plus shipping. I do love the web sometimes…

Mark gets here in less than 24 hours now. He’s had a crappy week. I’ve had a lethargic week. Much garlic should do us both a world of good, although it probably won’t help me update more frequently nor be better about answering email than I’ve been lately…

Time to walk up to the corner now and pick up enough fags to last me through tomorrow…

I fear I may have developed a dreaded summer cold. Granted, summer in San Francisco is a relative thing, but that makes me no less phlegmy and my throat no less scratchy. Other than that, though, I don’t feel particularly sick. Maybe it’s just allergies, but I don’t think so. Either way, if this screws up my weekend, I’m gonna be pissed and I even know exactly which co-worker to be pissed AT…

So yes, the dreaded summer cold DID arrive in my life on Friday, but fortuntely it was accompanied by my first birthday present of the year (from Duncan) on Friday afternoon and by the arrival of Mark on Friday night. All in all, it was bearable, although I’m sure I wasn’t terribly exciting company this weekend…

So about that Gilroy Garlic Festival: we tried to attend. We really did. Mark drove patiently through the hell which is everything south of San Jose, and I killed off a box of Kleenex in the process. We were motivated, dammit…

About 45 minutes after we’d originally planned to, we arrived in downtown Gilroy and started following the signs (and the hoardes of cars) to the park where said festival was to be held. I’d mention the name of the park, but I have no idea what it was; after moving slowly in a line of cars to the point where (a) we were on the verge of running out of gas, and (b) we still had no idea if we were within ten miles of the damned place, we gave up and headed back north…

The lack of planning was stunning. The festival is apparently held in some godforsaken park in the middle of nowhere, with only one road in or out. Any other roads which may (or may not) have led to it were blocked off. There is no indication of how far away you are and the traffic is astounding. Just plain idiotic; if they want people to get so frustrated that they just give up, they’ve found the perfect MO…

The day was saved somewhat by dinner at the El Rancho Steakhouse in San Jose and by catching Superfluid Helium 3 in the Mission (which turned out to be far more car-friendly than suburban Gilroy). Jamie met us for the show, Mark drank, and I ate carrot cake. We were happy, even if one of us was a bit sniffly…

The cold seems to be going away now, or at least moving deeper into my chest, which is good. I think. Mark’s gone away too, which is not so good. But it leaves me the rest of Sunday afternoon to watch movies and drink Diet 7-Up and avoid leaving the house and having to see the lukewarm leatherettes who have overtaken my neighborhood as part of the annual dress rehearsal for the much bigger naugahyde festival in September…

This kept me up way too late tonight. As I think I’ve mentioned before, California is now doing what every other state in the union did thirty years ago and adding exit numbers on all its freeways. And here’s the full list detailing plans for the Golden State’s bold leap forward into the 1970s…