"major pumping action required"

.... this just seems so wrong...

Metro Weekly's new policy?

Courtesy of Married to the Sea

Happy Easter From Team Lady

and don't forget our friend Peter Pan

UPDATE - BEST EASTER VIDEO EVER

I'm So Excited - I'm So Scared!

The passing of June Pointer got me thinking back to my favorite episode of the late 80s early 90s classic tv show - Saved By The Bell.

In this particular episode Jessie, Kelly and Lisa created a girl group called "the Hot Sundaes" for a local talent competition. Zach served as their manager and helped them produce this sexy music video:




"Put your mind to it, go for it, get down and break a sweat
Rock and roll, you ain't seen nothing yet"

Ever the over-achiever, Jessie was under incredible pressure to maintain good grades, get accepted to a good university and keep the band going. With not enough hours in the day she found herself with an addiction to no-doze pills...



All came to a head in a particularly emotional scene where Zach confronted Jessie with her addiction. She attempted to prove how okay she was by singing the Pointer Sisters "I'm so excited" until she broke down into tears with the phrase "I'm so excited.....I'm soooooo......scared".....



This poignant episode taught an important lesson on the dangers of over the counter caffeine to millions of children across this great country. Several million more across the world upon syndication and subsequent translation in various languages.

Thank you NBC for producing such ground breaking television. You truly saved me from walking down a very dangerous path...



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The smoky sky is falling...

Friday night I started my shift as I always do: sitting on my cooler, reading the blade, waiting for customers to arrive. I stumbled upon this article about the closing of Lizard Lounge.

Now I've never been a huge fan of Lizard to begin with so I'm not gonna shed any tears, but something just doesn't add up with Mark Lee's story. Even if he's absolutely certain that the smoking ban will hurt his business beyond the point of making a profit, why close eight months before the damn thing even takes effect? Is he really that fired up about the cause that he's willing to give up 8 months of profit to make a point? I doubt it.... The only reason I can think of is that even without a smoking ban in effect he's not making any $$ - if you're going out of business anyway it's much easier to have someone to blame than to admit your own business was a failure.

But whatever, I for one applaud the smoking ban and can't wait til it takes effect. It's been long overdue. It'll be nice to finish a shift without burning contact lenses and blackened lungs. It'll be nice to wake up the morning after a shift and not cough up phelm from all the crap I breathed in the night before. Is it going to hurt business???? It's possible, but I'm not all that worried. If anything, I think it'll hurt the straight bars far more than the gay ones. From a gay bar perspective the only other option is Freddies in Virginia and it takes a lot to get a gay city boy to cross that river. People are still going to go out because, bottom line, our people love to get drunk and love to get laid.

If anything, it'll actually be interesting to see how the ban effects Halo. I know a couple people (myself included) that really only go there because it's smoke free. Now that my favorite bartender there is gone and all the bars will be smoke free - what reason will I have to go there anymore???

Who knows what'll happen....maybe Mark Lee is right and business will decrease, tips will be lost, the bar will close and i'll resort to turning tricks on the corner. But for now I'm thinking I've read this story before...

Random Observation

The likelihood of a guy to be involved in the circuit scene is directly proportional to the number of shirtless friends in his Friendster profile.

Adventures in Bartending:

1) This past Friday found a rather gregarious group of men and women in my bar. They were celebrating a birthday, but that fact alone couldn't account for the level of their mirth. Some regulars began to comment "wow they must be really drunk", but I know drunk and that wasn't it....oh no, it was something much worse - they were ACTORS!! Yes indeed, a theater troop had descended upon our bar.

I sort of have a love/hate relationship with theatre queens. One the plus side it's great to have a bar full of jovial, confident, friendly & chatty people. On the downside, the karaoke turns into all showtunes (*cringe*) and even the pop songs are sung with a musical theaterized flair. Can be great fun, but if you're not in the mood it can be torture. One highlight of the evening was a gentleman who decided to sing "What a Feeling" from Flashdance....I think he might have gotten into the song a tad bit more than he should have when he did a tribute to Jennifer Beals and poured his Vodka & 7 all over himself.... nice...



2) If you attempt to order a cocktail after last call and get denied please do not use the "you never called last call" excuse. Just because you were too drunk to hear it doesn't mean we didn't call it - the karaoke host announced it just before i starting cheering. No amount of pleading or begging will make me change my mind...you're not worth me getting fired...

3) I have been known to wear political shirts a time or two when I am out at a bar, so I won't say not to. If you do though, please be aware you may be alienating a good share of the boys in the bar - especially if you are affiliated with a party that discriminates against the gays and/or women. (for the record i save my ultra-lefty political shirts for when i'm not tending bar). A shirt that says "guns don't kill people, abortion clinics kill people" may reflect your beliefs but is certainly not the best way to get on my good side. And for the record the shirt should read "guns don't kill people, fanatical right wing christians who blow up abortion clinics kill people"

4) thanks to Jimbo for finding this great list . You are not a strong black woman. :)

Karma

It's interesting how Karma works sometimes. I used to think of it as if you're good, good things come your reward, if you're bad, bad things come as punishment. The past couple weeks have shown Karma to be less about retribution and more about learning.

As mentioned earlier, a couple weeks ago I met a charming guy that became quite the mancrush. After feeling emotionally closed off and distant for awhile it was a breath of fresh air to actually be interested in someone again. It had been quite some time since I had that excitement and it felt good. For the first 3 dates it was smooth sailing, it all felt so easy and natural. Then something changed....I don't know what really. But the next date was strained and the ease of conversation faded into awkward silences. I was bothered by it but tried to write it off as a fluke. The next date however had a similar tension. Something was amiss...

Doubt settled into my mind and I began to brace for rejection. Despite my interest, there was growing distance from him. I had no idea what was going on or what I did wrong. As I was pondering and overthinking I asked myself "why doesn't he just tell me if he's not interested?" It was then and there that I had my karma moment. That was the lesson I needed to learn.

I have been known to be slow to reject a guy if I felt things weren't working. If they were assholes it was quick and easy - but the nice guys were so hard. I hated knowing that I would be hurting their feelings and so I delayed and put some distance and tried to let them down gently. What karma needed to show me was that hey it kinda sucks to know something is wrong and not know what. Spending a week or two wondering what is going on and overthinking things can be rough.....The letting down gently is anything but gentle....it can be quite the mindfuck...

So I accepted my lesson, even felt bad about how I treated one guy in particular. He was a great guy but due to some differences in our lives I didn't think it was going to work. I didn't want to hurt him and didn't want to be the asshole so I held off and was more and more distant...In retrospect my not wanting to be the asshole made me the bigger one. So I wrote him a random out of the blue apology email. Doesn't change anything really, but felt I owed it to him...

And today suspicions were confirmed, mancrush is no longer crushing on me. I'm not sure what went wrong along the way and honestly I'm not sure I want to. Maybe I'm better off saving a character flaw review for another day when my ego is more up for the task.

While I'm a bit disappointed things didn't work out I really have no room to complain, it's been a learning experience. I certainly can't fault mancrush for anything because he handled things exactly the same way as I have done in the past....right down to the 'it's a rough time in my life' email. I get where he's coming from....but it's also good that I now have perspective from the other side (not to imply I haven't been rejected many times before cause I certainly have!)

And as I said in a previous post the best thing for me personally is that knowledge that I'm not as closed off as I felt I was. It's been a long ass time since I've been excited about someone and it's good to know this heart is still beating even if it means it gets hurt every once in awhile....