Friday, September 28, 2007

Hair Ye!



www.HAIRTIX.com

This afternoon, I got in my car which was parked near the hardscrabble intersection of Overland and the entrance ramp to the 10 Freeway. If you live in Los Angeles, you might recall this section of town as a place with many ramps, bridges, medians and weeds. In one of the medians was a man with a sign that read, “Vietnam Vet. Disabled. Just Hungry. Can you Help?” He limped. He was old. He continuously moved his jaw up and down as if he were chewing or something—the kind of action you see in an old Hitchcock movie when it wants to be made clear that “this old guy is sort of nuts and falling apart.”

I didn’t give him any money. I honestly only had twenties. However, I did have quarters. But I need those for parking. I felt bad for the guy, truly, but I did nothing to help him. Next, I had my privileged day and went to the theatre. Which woke me up.

We saw HAIR, the 40th anniversary production at the MET Theatre. HAIR is presented by the original Broadway producer, Michael Butler, a very affable guy whom we met in the very convenient $5 parking lot.

Guys, go see it. It’s fabulous. I have never seen the play before. Sure, I saw that Twyla Tharp movie of it (a few times) which was so 1979 does 1968. And I actually liked the movie. For the music. But the play is a much more enjoyable experience. The extremely loose nature of the narrative, the be-in philosophy, the fun sketchy bits, the lovely celebration of life, light, color and flesh really do work on your senses and your soul that by the end, when they drag the audience up onstage to clap to LET THE SUNSHINE IN, you are not only happy to go, you are pretty much in love with everyone in the room.

Of course, Galt MacDermot’s music is still the big star here. My favorite songs, both in composition and execution, were Ain’t Got No, Frank Mills, Black Boys/White Boys, Walking in Space & What a Piece of Work is Man. These, of course, are not the greatest hits, but that’s usual for my taste. Singing talent varies some, but it’s really not much of a problem. There are some standout singers. When you go, you can hear them for yourself.

The cast is gorgeous, talented, honest, generous, extremely present and filled with some kind of special love. To be in their presence, even if they were to be doing nothing more than humming the phone book, is worth the price of admission.

I do not want to give short shrift to Ragni’s and Rado’s script. It is infused with the full awareness of some positive life force, a wonderment that is especially coursing in the blood during the coming-of-age season in life. The writers juxtapose this natural, positive energy against a society that is willing to take these beautiful young adults and have them killed. It is really quite shocking, an enormous tragedy and obviously relates to today’s situation in Iraq. By the time the sardonic What a Piece of Work is Man is sung, overlooking the mock carcasses of a recognizable sampling of different groups of people who have killed each other during the last few centuries, you realize, intellectually, this is where the whole story has led and it's like being hit with a plank. Then, emotionally, you feel completely saddened by the fragile, confused psyche of the human species and its ability to twist into the insane direction of fear, greed and thoughtless carnage. This play makes you want to make sure that not only do you remain conscious every second of your life, but that your life, in fact, needs to also be about awaking consciousness in others.

Do I have to mention again how great the music is?

Really, go see the play.


Get your Wig Here


www.HAIRTIX.com



Personal Hair History:

I was too young to see the play when it came out. I remember, in Peekskill, my Uncle Gene had the album and it was totally taboo and we were not allowed to listen to it.
Years later, I was Berger in a production of HAIR at Harvard (Tufts and Harvard shared hams) which I had to quit because, basically, it was a terrible production, completely rewritten in the worst way. Then, in the late eighties in New York City, I was offered the role of Berger in a German touring production---but just to take over for a few weeks so the real Berger could have a Christmas break. I didn’t take the gig because my ego was bruised, being offered nothing more than a mere replacement jaunt. I did meet Ragni and Rado, the creators, during the endless days of auditions. Old, fun, nutty Hippies. Hard to tell exactly who was gay between them. The audition process was much like the play—sort of wild and without boundaries and I was put off by it. I didn’t get it exactly. I was never meant to be in HAIR, I guess. But often, I sit at the piano and pound out Easy to Be Hard or Walking in Space.

www.HAIRTIX.com

Thursday, September 27, 2007

I Fear Depression

I sit and wonder about the economy. How can we bleed all this money into an un-winnable war and not completely destroy our fiscal lives?

It’s one thing to pummel a country and then plunder their resources, like Georgie wanted to do in Iraq. But to just spend and spend and get nothing at all? It’s suicide.

Simple bookkeeping teaches us that we are headed for ruin.

And the nutjob in the White House continues whistling his tune like a deranged bird at 4PM sitting in a mossy tree.

Dead young men and women. So many dollars gone that could have been used for healthcare and engine innovation. Because a super rich kid with not one original idea in his head was handed the presidency.

As the Catholics say:

“Let Us Pray.”

Tuesday, September 25, 2007

STANDING OVATION

A year ago, my play THE FAT OF THE LAND ran for six weeks in Hollywood.
Which was a big, full experience.
Here in Los Angeles, we have these things called Ovation Awards--which are really our local theatre awards, mini-Tony's if you will.
Dan Alemshah, who played Claudia Vestibule, the big hearted, multi-racial Tranny, received an Ovation award nomination. It is really very exciting and well, we're all so happy for this.
Congratulations Dan.

"I tried to sneak out the window, but I'm too big."

The Fat of the Land

More Judy

Thanks to a new friend (hello DB) I have been turned on to this website.

The Judy Garland Experience

I did not dare join, enter or even consider. That fabulous rabbit hole is not for me as I have deadlines and headlines to make. But go ahead and enter, if you dare. Apparently, there are some hilarious Joan Crawford postings on there where she steals some of Judy’s stage thunder.

One of my close straight friends (hello JK) cannot understand the gay male obsession with Judy Garland. He tries his theories out on us. He thinks maybe we want to be her or maybe it’s just that we want to be her. When we explain that she embodies the timeless hurt of gay people and that we really relate to her, it doesn’t compute. Maybe he cannot see the pain underneath The Acheson, Topeka and the Santa Fe?

Perhaps we, as a gay people, understand putting on a show to cover up pain. It’s what we do. And no one put on a better show than Judy. Vulnerable, strong, talented and just a really great singer with always a huge gay following, Judy inspired the Stonewall Riots on the night of her death. And for that, too, we love her.

Sunday, September 23, 2007

The Gayest Concert Ever

In a disappointing tone I must say the Rufus Wainwright doing the Judy Garland Carnegie Hall Album at The Hollywood Bowl concert---was rueful.

The LA Philharmonic was sublime. It’s like the codgers in the orchestra were just waiting their whole lives for this night. They were as smooth and alive and clean as a tight ensemble, yet they were a whole orchestra. Amazing musicians.

But poor Rufus. He was not up to the task. He did keep apologizing. Frankly, it was as if he said at a bar one night, all drunk, “I can make a movie. Watch me.” And then he went ahead and it turned out to be the worst thing ever made.

Rufus couldn’t hit the notes. He cracked all night long. He could not act the songs. He behaved as if it was torture just getting the songs through his chords. By the end of the concert, even a visitation by Lorna Luft couldn’t really do much. Not that one thinks Lorna could. The evening devolved into a family living room fest with his sister singing and his mother at the piano and Rufus croaking out some more old standards.

It was sad. Someone should have stopped him.

There is a lot of stuff that happens because someone has a certain stature. His or her senators should keep a very watchful eye.

Friday, September 21, 2007

Happy Peace Day



Thank you Martha.

This clip is smart and very moving.

Thursday, September 20, 2007

What's New With You?

One expert said about a confirmed meteorite crash this past weekend in Peru, “When a meteorite falls, it produces horrid sounds when it makes contact with the atmosphere. It is as if a giant rock is being sanded.”

It is a wonder to me that more people throughout history have not been crushed to death by meteorites.

I used to have a saying when I was in my twenties, living in New York:
“Your mother smells. Like Meteorites.”

I loved the insult because of its ambiguity. Who the hell knows anything, really, about meteorites?

The idea that a meteorite sounds like a giant rock being sanded would be quite a horrid sound. It is horrid sounds, sounds that are completely unfamiliar to us, that surely cause the most fear. If I heard a giant rock being sanded, heading my way, I’d practically vomit. Apparently, over two-hundred people near the crash site fell ill. I bet it was from the new experience.

Wednesday, September 19, 2007

Radical Children

During liberal upheaval, art is often so damn good. It has energy. It is young, muscular and demands color and attention. Even if a piece (any kind of piece) is not about the political movement, for it to survive during a strong time of changing energy, it must include this vector of jagged lightning.

During conservative periods, there is a lot of remake and pastiche. It becomes very academic. People feel safe. The rules are in place. Progress is glacial. MFA adjudicators make choices that reflect their personal tastes while declaring the importance of this or that piece with respect to “What is happening today,” or “Its place in the historical dialogue.” This is tired but it is valid since during conservative periods, people are more apt to slow down and think a little bit. Reflection isn’t a bad thing, but minds in reflection lack a beat. And you can feel it. It can leave you in your head and unsatisfied.

Ideally, one would live and create in a moderate society, with quick cycling fluctuations between liberal explosion and measured conservatism, at least in art. It would be thrilling to burst, rest, burst, rest. But societies have other ideas. In order to reach across continents, oceans and resistant minds, the sine waves of cultural environmental change often require a wavelength between fifteen and fifty years.

Fascinating are the people who start the upheaval at the end of a conservative era. I think we are in that period. It is time to take the youth seriously.

Tuesday, September 18, 2007

Western Movie

There’s been a spate of Westerns on television and at the movies. Bully.
But what intrigues me most about the West in the United States, and I do live about as far West as you can go without moving to Hawaii, is the pioneering spirit.

People complain less in California than they do in other parts of the country. And I don’t believe it’s due to the better weather or grander space. Something happens to people when they take that wagon train/plane/1992 Geo Prizm across the country. It’s like, if you’re going to trek all the way across a continent, well, you better be in a can-do mood when you get to the other side. And for the most part, people are and they do.

Joan Didion famously wrote:

California is a place in which a boom mentality and a sense of Chekhovian loss meet in uneasy suspension; in which the mind is troubled by some buried but ineradicable suspicion that things had better work here, because here, beneath that immense bleached sky, is where we run out of continent.

Monday, September 17, 2007

Premium LA

One Moment.

One Ride.

Saturday night, I was part of a sketch/show/happening/live venue thing in Hollywood with Bill Maher. I had a little singing thing to do in a mock evangelical choir. Bill Maher had a funny bit as a mock minister. A big fan, I am, of Bill M. But it’s not cool to bray in Hollywood. At one point during the evening, Bill stood across from me and we caught each other’s eye. I just acknowledged that he was present on earth. He returned the same look and seemed almost appreciative that I had the good sense to just be myself. It was very in the moment and I’m glad to have had it. Of course, I could be reading into it, but I don’t think so.

Sunday, a good friend of mine was in town from New York and she wanted to go to the beach to run and I was on my way to Santa Monica to see a play. I went with her in her car, pointed her toward the beach, saw the play and took the Rapid Transit 720 bus home along Wilshire Boulevard. The 720 bus is truly express and travels along the East-West spine, the busiest Boulevard in Los Angeles. I made it home in an hour. (A car would have taken about forty minutes at the most.) It was a very pleasant experience. I might be deluded, but I don’t think so.

Friday, September 14, 2007

Wednesday, September 12, 2007

Tell Me You Love Me

We watched the new HBO show tonight, Tell Me You Love Me. It was taped.

Mostly, it’s a soap opera with very pretty white people in upscale homes. (Note to set designer: every home looks too much alike.) What was so unique about this television show is that it had actual sex in it. You don’t see actual penetration, but you do see lots of flashes of every body part. Breasts, for sure. Ball sacks, a plenty. Beave, a bit. Rod, absolutely—and at one point there was a full handjob complete with shooting sperm, I’m not kidding.

It was very strange to witness this kind of thing on television that was not running a DVD. I’m not at all prudish, so I was not bothered. But I had to ask in the name of entertainment, “Whatever for?”

This type of thing does not sexually arouse since all the sex is completely surrounded by upper class angst and life dissatisfaction, adhering to the evening soap opera format. So, to what affect is all this bosom heaving and knob gobbling?

When the show was over, I turned to Adam, my Recognized-by-the-State-of-California-Domestic-Partner, and I said to him, “I have a great show I want to pitch to HBO. I’m going to call it TOILET. It’ll be a nighttime soap opera except we will add in aspects of people’s toilet life. Pissing. Shitting. Showing people on the bowl. Inspecting logs. Talking about how good it feels to take a monster dump.”

Maybe people are bored with the human condition so the envelope is pushed in the silliest ways. Or maybe there IS something new under the sun, without having to get into people’s private parts (or, hypothetically, toilets), and people are just blind to it right now.

I also wonder what these actors must think about their jobs.

Two Days in September

September 11, 1974

Today was really a bad day. I mean really. It was so boring. At the corner, it was beat. It was beat all over. I think I should gain about 10 pounds. Its really ridiculous how much I weigh. Well I'm going to sleep Well Goodnight.

September 12, 1974

You wouldn't believe how exciting today was. Keith and Chris were slitting on the fense at the corner and this fat guy who owns it told them to get off. Mr. Davansoe got into it and Keith was cursing at him and they ended up fighting the cops came and everything All the queer people were coming out and everything. They were all bitches. But the time the cops left we were all


September 11, 1974
We used to spend time loitering on a certain street corner in the neighborhood. We would sit on a split rail fence or across the street on cement stairs that were walled in by rock walls on both sides. I truly was emaciated.

September 12, 1974
Chris was my best friend. He now installs fences. Keith was retarded. We kept him around to buy alcohol. The fat guy owned the property with the fence. Mr. Davanzo owned the house with the stone wall and the cement stairs. We did run away before the cops arrived.

Tuesday, September 11, 2007

The Bobber

When I was six years old, my father bought my brother and I matching fishing sets:
A drop line, two hooks, two sinkers, two bobbers each.
We were a simple people.
The drop line was a square of four red dowels of wood with strong green fishing line wrapped around the square. I remember it being a light string/cord.
The sinkers were silver and looked just like today’s sinkers, as well as the hooks.
The bobbers, red and white, were also standard issue. We had small ones. Not super small, but approximately one inch in diameter.

It was very exciting. We lived near a lake with three bridges over it. One bridge was over the small man-made damn that emptied into a stream. I am sure the damn was made for what must have been a farm. The bridge certainly looked like an old white wooden farm bridge. It was definitely older than the housing development where we lived. The lake also had a decent sized island in it, not that far from the land. A very old stone bridge connected the land to the bridge. The path across the bridge was made from dirt and rock and grass with what looked like old wagon wheel tracks. This was where we fished from. The third bridge was at the stream-feeding-in end. It was paved and modern and led to other parts of the neighborhood.

The first day we went fishing was extremely joyful. My father took my brother and I to the stone bridge with our tackle, freshly dug-up worms and a bucket for the fish we were certainly going to catch. The bridge had two arches over the water. This area of the lake was very calm, almost a little swampy, with dragon flies, lily pads, algae and fish! Not long into it, my line got caught on something and I pulled and pulled. I was able to salvage the hook and the sinker. But I lost the bobber. I watched it floating away. We threw rocks past it, hoping the ripple effect would scoot the bobber toward the shore, but it did nothing. The bobber kept floating further out into the lake. I was very upset. I kept throwing stones. My father told me not to worry about the bobber. But from family history, I knew I wasn’t going to get a replacement. My symmetrical set of two of everything was now all out of wack.

I do not remember if we caught any fish. We went home. I lay in bed that night crying (to myself) in a way that bordered on hysterical. I could not stop. It was maniacal. And I knew it was maniacal. I also knew it was only because my fishing set was no longer perfect. I became aware that there was something wrong with me for being so insanely upset about one lost bobber, that somehow it made me weak to allow this kind of reaction and over emotionalism. I eventually calmed down and thought to my six year old self, “Maybe it’s time to grow up. Things are not always going to be perfect. You can live with just one bobber.”

I’m not kidding.

Monday, September 10, 2007

If This Stall's a Rocking'...

As vile as Larry Craig is for his hypocritical standing on family values/gay rights/etc.—I really do believe this gray haired natural homophobe from another generation needs to get off. From his charge that is.

First of all, placing cops in bathrooms to catch gay people doing anything at all just reeks of bad fish, Puritanism and Totalitarianism.

Secondly, why can’t you pick up someone in a bathroom? Total strangers eye each other across bars, Little League Games, the office, airplanes and then, very quickly, may end up in a romp. Can you arrest someone for trying? “Love those breasts. Wanna do me?”

Sure, if people are actually going at it in a bathroom stall, I guess a cop should have the right to break it up. But at what point is human contact illegal? If I hold hands with Adam, my RBTSOCDP* of fourteen years, in a men’s room and even say something to him like, “I can’t wait to go home tonight, watch TV, eat pork chops and then perhaps we can, you know...” can I be arrested? What if I gave Adam a peck on the cheek in that bathroom? What if a complete stranger finds Adam to be very adorable and they strike up a conversation in a bathroom and that stranger ruffles Adam’s hair and pats his hind as a joke and says, “Have a nice day, cutie.” Is that punishable? I should hope not.

There is something crazy going on here. Sure, I understand. You don’t want sex going on in public places. In our culture, for some reason, public sex has been collectively defined as a problem. I disagree with that notion. But I also understand that I’m in the serious minority opinion here. So, okay, I accept that people, all people, should not engage in public sex for the sake of order and let’s face it, aesthetics. However, when is something public sex? And when is something just a cry for public sex? Who draws that line? It’s so scary to know that the government has decided what that line is.

Additionally, if two men are in a bathroom stall going at it, wouldn’t it be much more polite to just let them finish up? Instead of taking them in for mug shots?

And finally, if men are free and easy enough to have sex all over the place, including bathrooms, bushes, rest stops and exit ramps, then shouldn’t we all just agree that men can kind of be just like that? Especially when it comes to two men together? Perhaps there should be pay stalls around, just for this purpose? Like those groovy Paris toilets of yore? (Which they did end up taking down because people were having sex in them. Even France has its limits.)

My suggestion to cops: People are sexual. Leave them alone. If you don’t want people having sex in bathrooms, do what the French do: Put an old lady in there with her mop and tip dish to watch over things. Nothing keeps the blood more even and a penis more flaccid than an old French lady.


*Recognized by the State of California Domestic Partner

Friday, September 07, 2007

What if You Felt Great?

I was just reading online about the new movie about the Apollo 11 mission to the moon: Buzz Aldrin, Neil Armstrong, Mike Collins, the first astronauts to make it there and back, safely.

Obviously, it was such a big deal. I remember the day they landed on the moon. I was standing in front of Steven Rinkoff’s house on Union Road in Spring Valley, New York and I looked up at a 4:00 moon and I thought, “There are people walking around up there.” But I also remember thinking that the idea of making myself think about something that was not obviously visible to me was very similar to making myself think about anything else that was not obviously visible to me. Ultimately, the abstraction of knowing that something was going on that I could not see did not make me actually feel any closer to it. In fact, I blankly felt, “Well, that’s going on up there. But I’m here and we can’t communicate. So, it’s really like any other day.”

Years later, I went to college and living on my dorm floor was the daughter of one of those astronauts. I won’t spell out her name here so she will not be able to Google it. It was not unusual to face the children of ambassadors, writers, inventors, and work-a-day physicians at my college. But there was something quite fascinating about living on the same floor as a woman whose father had been to the moon. She seemed like she was touched with some sort of special moon dust. She, at least, seemed kind of like something out of science fiction. She was also flat chested and depressed. Dean, who was a senior, lived in a single next door to her and he had a crush on her. I had a crush on Dean. I tried to steer his attention away from her, the daughter of a moon visitor. She knew what I was up to, but she didn’t mind because she was not that interested in Dean. Because of our Dean connection, we became friendly, though most of the other kids on the floor wouldn’t talk to her much because she really was quite morose with depression and possessed a personality that could most generously be described as “Southern Tragic”. At that time in my life, I was not the happiest soul, either, so I was a bit drawn to her. However, I was much more optimistic than she seemed ever capable of, so I was cautious. Besides, she did not seem to have the hookup for intimate friendship.

As often happens with the disaffected and the miserable, I saw an ad for a Communist Party meeting at Harvard and I decided that I just had to go. I started asking around, seeing who wanted to join me. Understand, this was at the height of the Reagan era and students were celebrating their inner CEO, looking askance at my bong, and planning for lives of professional sameness. The astronaut’s daughter was the only one who showed any excitement to go to a Communist Party meeting. She said she would go with me. Friday night.

I thought, “How cool. Here she is the daughter of this man who has actually been on the moon. And she is more depressed than I am. And she is going to go with me to a Communist Party meeting. In Harvard Square. Maybe.”

When the evening came for the meeting, I knocked on her door and she opened it, in her yellow, flannel, lightly floral nightgown. She said she was sick and couldn’t go. I could tell she was either faking illness because she got cold feet or she was, maybe, just really depressed. I could also tell that she knew full well that this was the night and she had not forgotten about it. Her refusal to go proved to me what I had always suspected about her--that she was not a real rebel, nor was she brave. She was just like everyone else at my pre-professional college. Watching her ass. Making sure she didn’t do anything wrong. I stood at her door and I pushed her for the truth. I really wanted to know why she didn’t want to go. Then, by the darting of her eyes and the clenching of her hand against the edge of the open door, it became clear to me that there were millions of reasons why she did not want to go. Without divulging the words (but by observing her behavior) I could tell she did not want to go because she thought better of it after agreeing; that when she agreed, it was only on a lark and not something she took seriously; that I was a weirdo for wanting to go at all; that it was a pain for someone who is depressed to get dressed on a Friday and schlep down to Harvard Square; and lastly, because of who her father is, a hero.

Of all these things that I saw flash through her eyes, she only said one thing to me, the ultimate trump card that would end my inquiry as to why she was in flannel and not all pumped up for the big event, “I can’t go because of my father.”

I nodded my head in total understanding. But I gave her a look that meant, “You have to get out from under this famous father shadow or you are doomed.”

It was the only time she ever mentioned her father to me. She did know, though, that everyone talked about her only in terms of who she was: the daughter of a moonraker.

I walked away from her door. She went back to bed in her flannel nightgown. I decided not to go to the meeting either because I had no one to go with. Plus, there was a good movie playing at the pub and I didn’t really feel like going down to Harvard Square either. And furthermore, I was relieved that she bailed on me because I didn’t have to go, either. I was also afraid, having a mini-red-scare, post McCarthyism metabolism spike going on in my lizard stem. That passed.

Then, I felt very insignificant because her father had been to the moon and my father had mostly been to Paramus. But then I felt relieved about my father. I would never have an excuse to not do something because of who my father was. Nothing hangs over me. I am wonderfully free. Even if I ever become very depressed, I cannot use my father as a copout.

I do not think she ever finished college. In fact, she had a nervous breakdown and had to leave school. I remember the day the ambulance came to haul her off. She was the second one that year. The first one was an older, goofy looking guy, back in the fall. I felt kind of sad about it. But I also felt that if she had gone to the Communist Party meeting, not to become a Communist, but to just stand up and say, “Fuck it. I can go to a Communist Party meeting whenever I feel like it,” she might not have had that nervous breakdown. In my world view, I felt like I was her savior but she chose not to be saved.

It was also rumored that she had one shriveled ovary which caused her to have this low register voice and a bit of a tomboy demeanor. The guys on the hall nicknamed her “Estro” , short for estrogen, more specifically meaning a deficiency of estrogen. They never said it to her face, but I am sure she heard about it from someone.

Thursday, September 06, 2007

Galvanize Your Life

Is courage just the awareness that gestures, journeys, lives have intrinsic shape, and must, one way or another, be completed? That there is a path to be followed, literally to the death? Awareness is harsh but better than being unaware, never sensing a path. Better than a life of stunts, false starts, dead ends. Better than the irredeemable ugliness of the halfhearted. Better than feeling there is no shape to anything. The world knows itself.

--Peter Behrens, Author, The Law Of Dreams

Wednesday, September 05, 2007

Hollywood Purity Ball

One of the enjoyable things about living in Hollywood is that there really are lots of talented people doing all sorts of wacky crap.

Thank goodness.

Friends of ours pulled together a mock Hell House a couple of years ago. A Hell House is one of those Christian sideshow places where they set up rooms that depict, live, how you will suffer in hell if you do things like get an abortion, have premarital sex, do drugs, have gay sex etc. It was quite something, with fake flying guts, people roasting in hell, all kinds of sinners being tortured by Satan. You name it. (Isn’t it great that you actually have to capitalize the S in Satan for it to be spelled correctly?) Hollywood Hell House We were involved with this for a bit but then we kind of fell through the cracks and missed being in it because of time constraints, scheduling.

However, this time around, the commitment is much smaller and the concept much easier to produce. So Adam, my Recognized-by-the-State-of-California-Domestic-Partner, and I are going to be in the funny, nerdy, no-soul all-white choir doing a pop medley about the importance of keeping your virginity as part of the evenings scripted shenanigans. The gist: if you are a girl, you really must pledge your intact hymen to your Daddy until the day you get married.

If you want to check out this event, buy some tickets at the link below. We’ll be performing just one night, September 15. A guest star like Bill Maher will most likely be there, performing live. If not him, someone like him.

It’s all tongue in cheek. (Better than tongue in vagina?)

Purity. Ball.

Hollywood Purity Ball

Tuesday, September 04, 2007

Pier To Peak

A half marathon was in play this weekend. I did it with some friends. It was thirteen miles---which was not such a big deal. (And I didn't do it for time, but only for completion)...What was ridiculous about it was it had a four-thousand feet elevation gain. Pier to Peak means it began at sea level at the pier in Santa Barbara and then ratcheted up four-thousand feet above sea level through a couple of micro-climates...ending in pine forest thirteen miles and four hours later. Crazy stuff.

I cruised hard up until mile seven. At that point, I said to my party, "Save yourselves. I can't go that fast."

So, I finished the last six miles alone and kind of delirious. It really is extreme--to decide to haul your ass, nonstop, up a four-thousand foot mountain over thirteen miles. You start seeing the Infant of Prague, the Virgin Mother, maybe some aliens.

I held up pretty well. I was not affected by the extreme heat. I was annoyed by the small black flies that were coming at my face for moisture? Salt?

Plenty of water and designer energy bars kept me afloat.

It was the hardest physical thing I've ever done. I recommend such a thing. It's transcendental...at a biochemistry level, of course. It chases away all thought. It simply becomes about "move, move, move, move, move, move, move, move, move, move, move, move"-- which sounds dull but really isn't.

And the sense of accomplishment. Followed by huge cheeseburgers. It's so peaceful.