Frog Sex - or lack thereof

He frog.

She frog.

Extinct tree frog.

Apparently women’s hormone replacements which get peed out are polluting the world water and causing frog embryos (tadpoles) to change sex…into mostly sterile females.

Who knows where Al Gore will go with this!

Chip Boy

As I have mentioned before, La Feria is a favorite Friday night destination for some friends and me. The food is certainly not the best, but it has just the right mix of convenience, price, atmosphere, and quality to make it the right place to choose on a Friday night after a full work week.

Another thing it has is cute waiters.

Unlike many places where the service staff all has nametags, the staff at La Feria is adorned only in black pants and white shirts.

Because of this relative anonymity of the staff, we have come up with names for them. Our regular waitress is slowpoke – a name she has not overcome since her first days at the restaurant. She’s our regular waitress because she regularly forgets to charge us for chips and salsa and to upgrade my queso order. There is also leather-daddy because we all know what he has on underneath and what we would be in for if we ever were invited to his apartment (he’s not really attractive, but deep down we all want to be invited to his place).

My favorite, though, is Chip Boy.

Chip Boy knows the flirtatious glance and smile, but he has mastered the perfect swish with his hips to verify his sexuality, to invite the extra glance, and to dismiss himself as unattainable in that one perfected move.

I’ve seen him at the bars: I know his sexuality.

I don’t hide my flirtatious stare.

I’m vain enough to fantasize beyond the attainable.

I would certainly go to La Feria on Friday nights if he was no longer working there, but the flirtatious dance adds to the cheap pleasures that a Friday night happy hour affords. Fantasy adds to the joys in life that we may never achieve and keeps us striving for more.

I like my fantasy life.

Chat Transcript

One of the greatest annoyances I have online are chat-bots - pre-programed "chatters" who reply based on the words you give them in response to their statement. I have fun because I don't use the "right" words.

The ultimate goal is to lead you to a particular website. Don't fall for it - you are likely to get as many infections on your computer as you would get on your person if you met the chat-bot for real.

The following chat transcript is not exactly family friendly, but the "bad" words are mostly misspelled so they don't get blocked by a filter (the chat bot did this, not me).


[19:47] pleasemakemebeg21: hi... annyone there?
[19:47]ME: no
[19:47] pleasemakemebeg21: oh your there ::) hi...
[19:47] ME: I said no
[19:47] pleasemakemebeg21: a/s/l (age ses location)?
[19:48] ME: surely you mean American Sign Language
[19:48] pleasemakemebeg21: im 27/f/USA. was lookin at your profile. thought you might like to chqt.
[19:48] ME: or should I spell it American Sing Language since you can't quite get sex out correctly
[19:48] pleasemakemebeg21: so what hhave you been up to?
[19:49] ME: making fun of chat bots
[19:49] pleasemakemebeg21: ccool. i was just hangin out watching tv. i was getting kinda horny :) (*blushes)
[19:49] ME: I'd blush too if television made me horny.
[19:49] pleasemakemebeg21: feel like a little cber fun with me ? please please...
[19:50] ME: I'm already having cyber fun with you - or rather at you.
[19:50] pleasemakemebeg21: i think ill just take that aas a yes... being as that im starting to get real horny here.. lol ok?
[19:51] ME: Oh baby, so you're into humiliation
[19:51] pleasemakemebeg21: alright :) how bout i get down on my knees in front of you and help you out of your pants?
[19:52] ME: beat you to it babe, I don't wear pants at home.
[19:52] pleasemakemebeg21: tell me what you want me to doo with you while i slip out of my panties
[19:53] ME: hmmm...on your knees, taking off my pants and your panties at the same time. What are you, some kind of Hindu goddess?
[19:53] pleasemakemebeg21: oh yeqh babe.. dont stop. while i slide my hand down between my legs and part my moist lips
[19:53] ME: Actually, I would prefer you call your brother. I'm more interested in him.
[19:53] pleasemakemebeg21: oh it feels so good. Im holding your pulsing cock in my hand, my shiny red fingernails dig gently into your balls, while my full, soft lips engulf the mmass of your meat
[19:53] pleasemakemebeg21: open my website so you can look at me while im sucking you. ise the link in my profile!
19:54] ME: No, I'd really rather look at your brother, besides, your sucking me. Why should I have to look at a website to see you? Are you the Invisible Woman who can only be captured on film?
[19:54] pleasemakemebeg21: what do you think of my pics?
[19:54] ME: Not my type, but if your brother is nearly as hot as you think you are, then I'm all for it.Is your brother as hung as you are stacked?
[19:55] pleasemakemebeg21: shit the phone. dont stop stroking it. hold pn...
[19:55] ME: Please tell me it's your brother?
[19:55] pleasemakemebeg21: maybe you shouldnt ask so manyy questions
[19:55] ME: Yeah, chat bots are not so good at questions.
[19:56] ME: Or punctuation and spelling apparently.
[19:56] pleasemakemebeg21: sorry, I have to take this call, probly take bout five minutess. If you want, come to my page and lets finish this. I have my cam on there cyberfungirls dot com look for me on there
End of Session

I think I'll go have a cigarette now!

Underwear Fetish

Last week I went to dinner with a friend. We have a normal place where we go ninety percent of the time we eat out, but this time I proposed a change because I needed to purchase some new underwear and suggested we go to a place near the mall where I could accomplish my purchase.

He looked at me like I had lost the very central part of my sanity. “What underwear are you going to get at the mall?” He asked, looking down his nose at me like a librarian with half-lens reading glasses.

“Calvin Klein.” I replied.

“You still wear Calvin Klein?” He implored with a pitch that disguised his gender and made me anticipate his next comment would be something about CK underwear being, “so ‘80’s.”

Did CK make underwear in the ‘80’s? I only remember CK jeans in the ‘80’s thanks to the way Mrs. Nornberg stood in the hall each Friday with her butt blocking traffic so we would all read the label on her jeans.

“So where should I go?” I begged. Maybe my choice of underwear is why I rarely get laid. I wanted to know. And I wanted the best.

Without hesitation, he suggested Tapelenders, a local porn vendor.

Without hesitation, I replied, “Not on your life! My boss can see the door from his office!” in a pitch that disguised my gender!

Another librarian look and a disdainful, “They stay open late.”

So I went late.

I never realized that underwear could sell for more than $8 a pair. Most of the underwear was over $20 a pair; however, I did find a well known brand for $10 per pair. I’m cheap so I bought four pair.

I hate to say this, but they feel damn good! I’ll be going back for more very soon. I may even invest in the $20+ per pair kind. After years in the normal tighty-whities, I discovered a few years ago that the Calvin Kleins were worth the extra money and then actually found heaven with some GAP boxer briefs. Now I’m so comfortable, I don’t care if my underwear gets me laid or not.

When do you actually throw old underwear away? Is it when they fail to fulfill their function? Lawrence Ferlinghetti, the noted beat poet, suggested in his poem, “Underwear” that “Women’s underwear holds things up and men’s underwear holds things down.” (Obviously he didn’t wear boxers.) Or do you hold onto underwear until they are merely threads of their former selves?

I, for one, always prayed to never be in an accident.

But now that I have discovered the joy of great underwear, I may never again fear being in an accident. Bring it on. You can scar my face and maim my body, but my genitalia are comfortably held down!

Calling All Lesbians

Now is the time for all good lesbians to come to the aid of their country. The lesbians are the key to ending the war in Iraq in a matter of months.

Recently in a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing, as representatives were grilling Secretary of State Condi Rice about the reasons the State Department was understaffed on translators. One of the representatives, Gary Ackerman of New York, in questioning Rice, asked why she had not hired the numerous military translators fired under “don’t ask don’t tell.” He pointed out:

For some reason, the military seems more afraid of gay people than they are of terrorists. They’re very brave with the terrorists, and if the terrorists ever get hold of this information, they get a platoon of lesbians to chase us out of Baghdad.

Sounds like a pretty good idea to me.

Lesbians, now is the time to join al Qaida.

I propose that we begin with a blitzkrieg of Dykes on Bikes. The military has become accustomed to identifying and defending against snipers and ieds. They are sorely prepared now to handle the thunderous onslaught of short haired women on Harleys.

We can follow the blitzkrieg with a line of lipstick lesbians. Their very presence will confuse all members of the military. They won’t be able to look at a Fatima or Skinnyma in Baghdad without wondering if she is part of the lesbian force.

Next we will send in the Home Depot Aproned Handiwomen. Who in the military can really tell if they have come to demolish or repair?

Finally, we send in the Flannel Force, the most fearsome fighters since Joan of Arc. The intensity of their slash and burn campaign will clearly demonstrate the futility of battling internal strife in a created state.

As our military retreats, under the repulse of the lesbian platoon, the residents will establish their grounds and will be able to district themselves into governable bodies. There will be bloodshed as there is in any birth, and often in death, as the two events are so closely linked. New nations will come forth and the Iraq created under Western influence (thank you France), will die.

The stasis will come, but not at the expense of American lives. As frightened as our military is of homosexuals, the waves of the lesbian platoon will make it through relatively unscathed as long as the Dykes on Bikes avoid the potholes created by the various ieds and car bombs from the last four years.

Guitar Town #3

With very much debate surrounding the changes right now, downtown Austin is undergoing a major urban renewal with almost all construction being mixed use retail/residential high-rise. Though there are many who argue it is changing the culture of the city, I see it giving rise to a real urban culture downtown.

Guitar #3 is outside one of those buildings with some nice cafes and high end shops downstairs and apartments upstairs.


I ate lunch at Jo's Coffee Shop and listened to a nice jazz trio while I ate, then stepped outside to take these pictures. It is not my favorite guitar, but it is ceratainly "artistic."

Too Quiet For Our Own Good

Not everyone believes environmentally friendly design is a good thing. The latest reason to oppose hybrid technology cars was shared in a news article today: hybrid cars are too quiet for blind pedestrians to hear, so they fear being hit by the cars.

I worked hard not to laugh hysterically.

My office is located just a few blocks from the Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired (TSVBI). We have gotten used to seeing people in dark glasses or blindfolds walking in the middle of the street with canes. Judging by the reactions they have to the cars honking at them, they are as hearing impaired as they are visually impaired.

So the idea that certain cars are too quiet for them falls on, at least my, deaf ears.

Guitar Town #2

This guitar is one of my favorites so far. It is posted outside the Austin's Children's Museum (one of the best features in all of Austin and something that greatly contributes to the quality of life in the city).


The blue skies on this guitar were almost as bright at the blue skies outside the day I walked around taking the pictures. Musician and mother, Kelly Willis and her husband, musician, Bruce Robison, autographed this one.

Worst Parents Ever

At some point, we all have the worst parents in the world. My parents earn that reputation from time to time as well. They know just how to say the just the wrong thing at just the right time. Parents have the skill to know just when the child is at the most vulnerable and the statement or action that will inflict the most angst at that time.

I always wondered what it would have been like to be raised by another set of parents. Now that I have moved away from the farm, each visit makes me wonder how I ever grew up there because I am so different today. My parents still live there and it seems like nothing has changed with them. They are doing the same things and believing the same way.

Living in the city has changed my outlook on the day-to-day being of being. The complexities of negotiating the urban landscape provide a different view of the world than the simpler survival mode found on the rural horizon. Additional opportunities present themselves on each block in the city while the country crop often remains the same from mile to mile.

As I reflect back on those days I wonder at the idea that the country produced me.

I think differently.

I act differently.

I believe differently.

Last week one of my cousins died. She was only about twenty-five years old and her life was filled with uncertainty and heartache most of which had been out of her control from conception. Her life was filled with doubts and instability. In the last few years, as an adult, she continued the patterns established in childhood. Her own children bounced between her, their father, and grandparents.

One memory I have from my early teen years is that when my cousin’s mother first announced she was unmarried and pregnant, my mother wished that she and dad could adopt the baby. They just thought it was the right thing to do. They wanted the baby to have a stable life and home.

But they are the worst parents ever. They have a modest house in the country. They have mastered the art of parental guilt. Still, they raised three sons to become responsible, faithful, and trustworthy adults with professional careers. Still, across the last week, one thought keeps coming to mind: maybe her life would have been different and she might still be alive if she had had my parents.

Too Gay for Me

I’m a football fan and have been one for years, so the Super Bowl, right after the National Championship college football game, is the biggest night of the year for me – even bigger than the Oscars. So it was with much excitement that I readied myself and went to the annual Super Bowl party some of my good friends throw each year.

Of course, pre-game programming begins about a week before the game itself and runs pretty much non-stop until the game kicks off. There is media day, look at the field day, dress rehearsal for half-time, and every imaginable team “formation announced” from the least mentioned “insert given position here” team, to the good Samaritan team. Plays from the season before are analyzed with awards given for best tackle by a punter to most teeth knocked out by a linebacker. This year, they even covered each official – what calls did he throw the most and least, etc.

After the tons of useless information which held no impact on the game at all was delivered, the “on the field” pre-game show began. All of us gathered around to see what spectacular would welcome the world to the Super Bowl telecast and what grand entrance would be created for the players from each team.

We all sat mouths agape wondering and occasionally voicing a “What the hell?” Bizarre and abstract shapes wandered the playing field. After a time it became clear that some of the longer shapes were supposed to be waves as people dressed like mutant tropical fish went under and around them. Shortly after that dance began, people with giant cloth butterflies went running around - but like the fish, around the waves. Not over some simulated English garden. And then there were people…They were semi doing a mambo or salsa dance, but none were very good at it. They were probably too ashamed of the costumes they were wearing – most harlequins would not be caught in these outfits.

In the middle of this, one of the party guests exclaimed, “This is kind of gay for football.” I whirled around to see who had said it; a couple other people looked at the speaker and at me. The crowd at the party was generally sensitive to the fact that I am gay.

Normally, a comment like that raises my ire and I address the inappropriateness of the comment. Social consciousness will continue to allow insensitive statements until people make stands when they hear them. Social language has changed over the years to recognize and challenge racially inappropriate vocabulary. Language relating to sexual orientation and body style remains fair game for public commentary. Until the offended and their allies start making a stand against inconsiderate comments about sexuality or weight, the comments will continue.

“This is kind of gay for football.” After pausing for a moment to decide what to say, I could see the others also waiting for my comment. From the corner of my vision, I could see tank-topped men dancing in garish board shorts and all I could say was, “Yes. This is way too gay for football!”

Not All Enchanting

Not all of the “Land of Enchantment” is so enchanting. The conference has been good, but the city is less than fun. I guess that makes the conference that much easier to attend.