Another One Bites The Dust

We’ve been trying to avoid thinking about this for a long time, but eventually the inevitable comes for everyone.

Just as ships must all eventually depart from the shore, and Paula Abdul must finally detach from all reality, so too, must we all leave our early twenties.

Yes, it’s true. We turn 25 on Sunday. Don’t cry for us, we’re already dead.

Gone are the days of fearless weeknight binge drinking. Long past are the mornings where it was okay to wake up and not know where we were, or who with. No longer are we able to use the excuse “but we’re just kids!” Time to cut up our parents’ emergency credit card, which they thought we chopped three years ago. Never again will we be able to use our age as a come on. From here on out, dating a college boy will no longer seem natural: it will be a triumph.

So long, Steak Frites - hello Seared Ahi Tuna with Mesclun Greens.

Farewell Pabst Blue Ribbon – Amstel Light, enter if you must.

Now is the time of Abyssine Eye Cream, Viking Ranges, and the consideration of small pets. These are the days of wedding toasts, condo shopping, and the catching up with your family. Of waking up at eight because you “just can’t sleep any later.” Of falling asleep at one because your eyes just close, no matter where you are in the house.

But it is not with regret that we doff the title of “twink.” No, it is with great eagerness that we leap into the void of “Mid-Twentydom.” Because we’ve only been on our own for three years now, and we’re just getting good at it. Our bodies have now been programmed to automatically steer us home safely, even if we are blackout drunk. We have restaurants that we know we like, in every neighborhood in the city. We know what to do when the L stops running. We cut off all those terrible friends we hated in college but hung out with anyway. And we’ve figured out how to sneak booze at work.

So here’s to the next five years. Because no matter how grim, soul-crushing, and emotionally stunting they may be, for every day of the next five years we will be able to raise a triumphant fist to the rampantly age-ist gay world and shout:

“Hey. At least we’re not in our motherfucking 30s.”

Like Sands Through The Hourglass, These Are The Gays Of Our Lives

So a wonderful and cute new/old friend of ours, Sam, has started a blog that's become quite popular in a short period of time. It's named in honor of the only soap opera we've ever become addicted to, Days Of Our Lives. Fittingly, it follows the very real tumultuous lives of a group of adulterers, murderers, and ghosts.

OK, not really. It's called Gayz Of Our Lives, and it's about all of Sam's hot gay friends, and the rest of New York Fabulosity. You should go check it out. There are even some pictures of us on there. We're the ones in the gogo swing wearing the adult diaper with the tear-stained mascara.


(PS - our coworker right now is on the phone with Gloria Estefan. She stepped away for the minute, and we discovered that yes, she is her own hold music).

I Try To Discover, A Little Something To Make Me Sweeter...

We are feeling sick today, so no posts. Except to say:

This is pretty much the story of our life.

"She Said, 'I'm From A Place Where We Don't End Our Sentences With Prepositions.' So I Said, 'Okay, Where Are Ya'll From, Bitch?'"

There is a very good article on the Nerve right now that ties together gay cowboys, the Abbey, and the nature of father-to-gay-son relationships. A great part is when the author’s father unwittingly takes his gay son to the gayest bar in gaytown (West Hollywood) and slowly realizes what he’s done:

“Finally, I blurted, "Do you realize what kind of place you're in? Do you know this is the biggest gay bar in town?" He nodded. Deep wrinkles, from years of narrowing his eyes — hard expressions I'd always seen as angry or suspicious — now looked softer, like traces of wincing and fear. He spoke carefully, as if the sentence were a thing he didn't want to drop: "I had begun. To figure that out."”

This reminds us of a time when we took our dad to a straight bar in our college town called Rudy’s. It was divey and a little bit punky, and the patrons were a well-pierced bunch. “Is this a gay bar?” our dad asked, after a few PBRs. “Oh Dad,” we said. “We go to gay bars to get husbands, not prison-grade tattoos.”

While the nerve.com article is well-written and touching, the best part is undoubtedly when the author finds himself at a gay cowboy bar, chanting along with many other macho hombres the lines of the best “Designing Women” monologue ever. We remember watching this, at the butt-clenchingly awkward age of thirteen - when Dixie Carter is uncharacteristically defending her sister, Delta Burke:

"…Suzanne was not just any Miss Georgia, she was the Miss Georgia. She didn't twirl just a baton, that baton was on fire! And when she threw that baton into the air, it flew higher, further, faster than any baton has ever flown before, hitting a transformer and showering the darkened arena with sparks! And when it finally did come down . . . my sister caught that baton, and twelve thousand people jumped to their feet for sixteen-and-one-half minutes of uninterrupted thunderous ovation, as flames illuminated her tear-stained face! And that . . . just so you will know — and your children will someday know — is the night the lights went out in Georgia!"

If you didn’t just get goosebumps reading that, you may want to try doing some shots of flaming sambuca until you do. Otherwise, you may call yourself gay, but you’re clearly not doing it right.

Asking And Telling = Bad. Gossip, Wishful Thinking And Conjecture = Maybe Okay.

The American military has stopped defending the logic behind their “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy and merely says that it follows the rule because it’s the law. Likewise, the number of gays bounced from the military on such cases has dropped significantly from 2004 to 2005. In some instances, soldiers have not denied being gay – they just say that they’re indispensable to the team, and are allowed to remain onboard.

We’re not saying this is great. As Jack Twist would say, “This is a god damn bitch of an unsatisfactory situation.” But it’s better than it was. We never expected change to happen on a given day. We hoped that, over time, discriminatory policies would be proven to be faulty.

And every day we get to keep one of our boys in that open-air shower room with dozens of other marines is, let’s face it, a victory for our team. As Joey Tribbiani would say about sharing soap: “Next time you're in the shower, think of the first place you're washing, and the last place I washed.”

Oh we will. And meanwhile, where’s that conditioner…

This Was, At Least, Not The Worst Thing We've Walked In On In Our Living Room.

The other night we came home to our apartment, which was curiously quiet, except all the lights were on. "Hello?" we said from the entryway? "Hello!" shouted our lady roommate, very quickly. "Is everything ok?" "Of course!" she shouted, with a clearly false chipper tone. We walked into the living room and saw her, surrounded by food, sitting in front of the television, which only showed the blank TV screen. She looked guilty.

"Were you watching our gay porn, again?" we asked.

"No," she said.

"What's going on here?" we pressed, very suspicious. She pressed play on the remote, sheepishly. After a moment, Jake Gyllenhaal appeared on the screen, holding his fist in his mouth, blinking back tears as he steered his blue pickup truck back toward Texas.

"You were watching 'Brokeback Mountain' again!?" we cried.

You see, in our house, we have a problem. A friend bought a Thai version of "Brokeback" and we have been wrecked ever since - particularly our female roommate. She watches the movie from beginning to end, fast forwarding through the parts with women in them (except for the "Jack NASTY" bit). And anecdotally, I understand we are not the only ones who watch and re-watch. Which makes us feel good about the film - it bodes well for the DVD release, and suggests that it wasn't just a controversial flash in the pan, among straight people.

This, of course, is a lot more heartwarming than the original reason we obtained the videotape, which was of course to lure naive boys back to our apartment. Make 'em cry, then make 'em strip, that's our motto. Then make 'em cry again.

Gay Is The New Guatamalan-ness.

We had a conversation with a friend yesterday about the fact that we often use the words "fag" or "queer" or "homo" in our regular parlance.

"Unlike you, I don't use those words," said our friend.

"It's reclamatory language," we shot back.

But our clever friend raises an interesting question. We may be taking the sting out of words like fag, queer, sissy, homo, buttpirate, cockgobbler, juice-in-the-loose-caboose, etc - but what can we do about the word "gay"? That's the larger problem. We are careful not to use words like "ghetto," or "retarded" for that specific reason, because we know how it feels when someone says "that's so gay" after someone does something lame. Is it a fad, as this article suggests? Or is that terminology here to stay?

We're not sure. All we can say is, we hope one day, the word "gay" will be used for its positive connotations. Like, you will see a well-designed apartment, or a pair of perfectly distressed, ass-flattering jeans, and say "Wow, that's totally gaytastic." Kind of like "that's hot," or "that is SO fetch."

We'll start right now. You read the FAGAT Guide? That is SO GAY.

Happy Saint Patrick's Day. We're All McQueens Now.

We are wearing green in honor of the day. Last night, we went to Patrick McMullan's annual gong show and watched midget leprechauns do a dance to U2's "It's A Beautiful Day." We couldn't have been more Irish (and by "Irish," of course, we mean "tanked").

We were thinking about how, on St. Patrick's Day, everyone in New York is Irish. Funny how the same does not apply for the Puerto Rican Pride parade. It's a subtle distinction.

As for the Gay Pride March (we don't say PARADE, mind you, because it's a very serious event), we've always thought that it could use a little bit more of the "everybody's invited" vibe. Wouldn't it be nice if people saw the parade and thought "Wow, those people are having so much fun, in a non-threatening way that appeals to me. I wish I was gay!" instead of "Oh my God, I hope my children and pets don't see those freaks."

Obviously, we recognize the flip side of that argument ("We should be proud of why we're different"). We're just throwin' it out there. Maybe we could have two celebrations - one nice picnic in the park with Pinot Grigio and toasted biscotti, and one tranny-fisting orgy circuit party at Roxy.

We can see it now: Mayor Bloomberg pumping his rainbow flags in Central Park, and Hillary Clinton at Roxy pumping... oh dear.

Losers Will Be Forced To Live As Second Class Citizens, Subjected To Close-Minded Stereotypes And Funny Looks On The Street. Winners To Get Same.

In The Netherlands/Holland/Ganjcentral, "officials" have decided to host a soccer game between gays and Muslims, because of the history of violence between the two groups across the pond. Knowing that soccer in Europe is always violence free, we think this is a good idea. They first came up with the idea for this kind of healthy frivolity at Dachau, didn't they?

We especially like this part:

"Gay Muslims can take their choice of teams," Suzanne Ijsselmuiden said. "People can have many identities."

Just they always wanted - the choice to be ghettoized as lightfooted pansies, or lightfooted pansies who are hated by their own God.

Even We Know That's Not How You Play Football

We went bowling last night, at Leisure Time, the secret bowling alley hidden in the Port Authority. They give you "Towers of Beer" at your table, and there is a DJ who asks Oscar trivia questions as you bowl. It might be the very strangest place in America.

We are very bad at bowling. We don't know why, but we imagine it is for gay reasons. Limp wrists do not lend themselves to proper form, it seems. For some reason we just can't manage to bowl "straight." The balls we are used to handling are usually a bit smaller. The last time we rammed a candlestick, we were shoving it up the ass of a huge black man named Yummy, etc, etc.

But it made us think about sports. In high school and college, we excelled at crew, track, and cross country. The connection between all of those things? No balls. We, like many gay people, cannot interact properly with baseballs, basketballs, soccer balls, or footballs.

So this brings us to FAGAT Guide Rule #2:

Do not throw things to gay people.

If you're in the office and need to pass the tape to the fag across the cubicle, for God's sake, get up and walk over there. Lending a pen? Slide it across the floor. Scissors? Just get him his own pair, he's just going to use them to trim his happy trail, anyway.

Because gay people, as a race, cannot catch. Go ahead and test this out. Find a queer and say "Hey, CATCH!" Will he toss up his hands in basket formation? No. He will shriek, cover his face, and crouch in terror.

Obviously, there is one situation where this catching theory does not apply. But even that involves a fair share of crouching, and shrieking...

We Would Have Gone To The Met, But We Used That Up The Last Time A Friend Got Engaged.

On Saturday afternoon we went with a group of friends to the “BODIES” exhibit at South Street Seaport.

It was very compelling/educational/revolting, and we enjoyed it until we got to the “Fetus” section, at which point we felt our eyes wandering. At first we thought it was the Freak-Show style aborted babies in jars that caused our distraction, but we quickly realized it was something quite different: the museum gallery was filled with strikingly hot gay men. Who were cruising like it was going out of style!

We were unable to concentrate for the rest of the exhibition because of all of the eyeball pingpong. What on earth could have brought all that man candy to such an informative and scientific show? To better understand how to tone their muscles? To giggle at the fun-sized Asian penises on display? To help them figure out where exactly is the prostate” (we swear we overheard the younger half of a gay couple exclaim “I TOLD you!” as they both examined the appropriate slice of Chinese.)

Then we remembered why WE were there. Because, lacking children, a spouse, a pet, or wedding plans, we wanted to have something to talk about at cocktail parties other than our job. We can see it now:

MARRIED COUPLE: Did we tell you we’re pregnant?!!?

FAGAT: Your baby right now is the size of a Raisinette, and looks like a Beaker, the scientist Muppet.

MARRIED COUPLE: We wonder where the bar is.

On The Flip Side, It Might Be Kind Of Nice To Be Able To Date Brad, Angelina, AND Maddox.

And we’re back.

So we had the chance to ask the "Omnisexual” about what the hell that title means, recently. And he dutifully explained that it does indeed mean that he would date “anything, boys, girls, animals, vegetables…” He went on to explain that for a lot of judgmental gays, that causes problems. Boys, apparently, see this attitude as a half-ass way of trying to explain an underlying confusion about simple homosexuality. “Queers can be very homonormative,” we said sagely, sympathizing with the plight of our date/friend. We are polite and always try to make people feel comfortable.

But then, on the way home, we realized something. WE belong in the category of “judgmental gays.” For us, the idea that you “just love someone for who they are, regardless of gender,” DOES sound like a half ass way of trying to deal with a sexual identity that a person is unwilling to accept.

Say what you will, do what you want, put whatever objects in your various orifices as you see fit – more power to you. But don’t expect people who are comfortable with their (singular) sexual identity to want to date you. We were supposed to stop having sixteen-year-old “crises of self” when we turned seventeen.

We just want to be an old, fat queen with Slavic-adopted twins, living in Brooklyn Heights, with a lawyer husband and a hot English nanny who summers with us on the Vineyard while on break from Smith. Our babies will wear matching short lederhosen, and so will the pool boy.

Call us old fashioned, but whatever happened to traditional family morals?


(Did you notice we switched back to the royal "we" in this post? Coincidence? Irony? Faggotry? You decide.)

Must…Resist…Obvious…

Last night at Marc Jacobs’ party honoring Debbie Harry’s induction in the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of fame, Jacobs dragged his boyfriend Jason Preston onto the red carpet so that the paparazzi could snap Preston’s funky new tattoo. Preston had emblazoned “MARC JACOBS” permanently on his forearm, in the exact Georgica font that Jacobs uses on his merchandise.

Immediately, of course, all of the gays in the press line short-circuited with glee and hilarity. We won’t attempt to transcribe all the jokes here, but we can tell you that they all ended with two words:

Label.

Whore.

Thumbnail courtesy of Patrick McMullan

Maybe Oprah IS Our Best Hope For Representation In The Senate

Sometimes, the UK seems like a more fun country than the US.

Take Michael Cashman, the English European Parliament Minister who is about to get gay married tomorrow. Cashman became famous as an actor on that country's absolutely ridiculous soap "EastEnders," became a human rights activist, and then an elected official. Imagine if James Denton from "Desperate Housewives" came out, joined HRC, and then became a Senator. Would it spell the end of civilization as we know it? Probably. Would C-Span skyrocket in the coveted 18-25 demographic? Definitely!

If you get a minute, check out Cashman's official website bio . Highlights include:

"Michael was born in the East End of London in 1950. His birth was premature by three weeks, primarliy due to his mother attempting to defend her husband in a street fight outside Stepney East station."

"During his career he worked with luminaries like Lionel Bart, J. B Priestley, Sir Alan Ayckbourn (who directed two plays which were written by Michael), Sir Ian McKellen, Elizabeth Taylor, June Brown, Sir Elton John and David Hockney."

Can you imagine a US Senator's bio including zingers like the above? How about this one:

"Michael lives with his partner, Paul, and they have been together for over 20 years."

Ha! The British. What'll they come up with next?

Gay Sperm - The Best Investment You'll Ever Put In Your Vagina.

New Zealand has finally wised up and started allowing gays to donate sperm.

It raises the question, though: will fag jizz be labeled appropriately? One would hope so.

The Murphy Browns of New Zealand are wise enough to know that gay cum is worth its weight in gold - like Prada shoes, graduate degrees, and so many of the other things things we work so tirelessly to earn, exploit, and then heedlessly discard.

And in the end, would you rather have a son who gets married and forgets about you because he has a wife and children? Or would you rather have a son who has plenty of time and extra income to concentrate on keeping you away from Talbots and chunky Zales jewelry?

And you'll finally have an excuse to watch every episode of "Designing Women" all over again!

Christine Quinn Squats Down, Pisses On St. Patrick’s Day Parade

New York’s first gay City Council Speaker faces an interesting dilemma this coming St. Patrick’s Day – whether to march with the drunks, or whether to continue to protest (as she has in years past) that the parade does not include gay groups.

It’s an interesting problem, for many obvious reasons. The City Council Speaker usually marches in all such parades (Puerto Rican, Gay, etc). But most of the other parades are all-inclusive.

Quite frankly, it’s not necessarily a bad thing we gays aren’t allowed in the St. Patrick’s Day Parade. It just heightens the distinction that, while the Gay Pride Parade is offensive and oppressive to most city dwellers, when the Micks take over 5th Avenue, it’s way worse.

Sweeping up body glitter is ten times easier than mopping up green beer vomit, it seems. Say what you will about us – we are fastidious.

And we would never drink beer.

Seriously, All They Wanted To Do Was Get Y'all To Stop Wearing Black Jeans

The Rev. Jerry Falwell has turned away a group of gay college students interested in meeting with their counterparts at his Liberty University, in an effort to spread understanding. The student group, Soulforce, has met with some acceptance at other schools, and was even greeted with cookies at Liberty last year. But this year, no way, flambé.

“For Falwell, once was enough. "The parents of our students have entrusted their sons and daughters to our care," he said in a statement. "Liberty has an obligation to these parents not to expose their children to a 'media circus' that might present immorality in a positive light."

That’s right, Jerry. We know how you hate a media circus.

“Will & Grace” Inspires Comical, Painful Real Life Spin-offs.

I’ve been trying to figure out how to parse this article in the New York Times, about women who are married to gay men. The problem is that there isn’t enough outrage. There are women who accept their husbands lying to them, there are men who stay with their wives, even though they want to be with other men – and there are therapists that say nobody is to blame.

According to the article, “2 to 4 percent of ever-married American women had knowingly or unknowingly been in what are now called mixed-orientation marriages.” That’s an awfully nice euphemism for “one in roughly thirty three American women is married to a fag.”

Everyone in the article is very understanding of one another, which is good, since they’ve all been married and are trying to make the best of a really tough situation. So where’s the anger? Why no quotes saying “Why the fuck did I grow up in a place that made me feel I had to live a lie, which has caused me to devastate my best friend and partner?” The Times didn’t happen to record any of the women saying: “Thanks, America, for helping me build the perfect life. My especially favorite part was when, after ten years, I found out it had been phony the whole time!” The article almost makes this really tragic problem seem like another mundane aspect of family life in the USA, like arguing over who takes out the garbage, and trying to figure out who actually like ‘Everybody Loves Raymond.”

If I’d written this article, I think the headline would have been “I Married A Queer, And I’m Really Fucking Pissed About It.” The sub hed could then be a hubby response, like “Hey, You Think I Fucking Enjoyed All Those Times I Had to Stick My Face Down There?”

FAGATS Continues To Turn Into Towleroad, Gains Decades, Loses Vertical Feet

To further my post-Oscars Brokeback bemoaning, I refer you to this article by critic Roger Ebert, which responds to the Ken Turan article that I appreciated yesterday. Ebert goes on and on about how there is a pro-“Brokeback” conspiracy to denigrate “Crash” as a film. As if people who think that “Crash” is a bad movie must be part of some evil gay agenda:

“It is not a "safe harbor," but a film that takes the discussion of racism in America in a direction it has not gone before in the movies, directing attention at those who congratulate themselves on not being racist, including liberals and/or minority group members. It is a movie of raw confrontation about the complexity of our motives, about how racism works not only top down but sideways, and how in different situations, we are all capable of behaving shamefully.”

This makes me upset about Roger Ebert. Is he kidding? “A direction it has not gone before?” It was the most contrived piece of crap I saw all year. You’d think Roger Ebert would have know how to recognize stock characters, hackneyed 1970s racial themes, and clichéd plot twists by now.

But as a wise and handsome friend pointed out, this was not the most upsetting segment of the article. Rather, this was:

"'Capote' was a brilliant character study of a writer who was gay, and who used his sexuality, as we all use our sexuality, as a part of his personal armory in daily battle.”

The image of Roger “Mr. Magoo” Ebert using his sexuality as a weapon every day makes me want to sandpaper my genitals.

Gay Firefighters: The Last Taboo.

The Washington Post predicts the success of “Brokeback Mountain” will ease the development of more mainstream gay movies.

THIS IS THE PAPER THAT BROKE WATERGATE, PEOPLE. Listen up.

Included on the list are adaptations of gay classics like Patricia Neal Warren’s “The Front Runner,” and “The Mayor of Castro Street,” about the late, great Harvey Milk.

Which made me wonder – what great gay stories would I like to see made into movies?

How about…

“The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay,” starring Jamie Bell and Benjamin Mackenzie
“Brideshead Revisited,” starring Jude Law and Paul Bettany (oh, wait…)
“The Clay Aiken Story,” starring Topher Grace and Vin Diesel
“Ulysses,” starring Harry Connick Jr, Jake Gyllenhaal, and Cillian Murphy as Molly Bloom.
“The Vin Diesel Story,” starring The Rock and Cole Hauser
“The Boy With Clawz,” starring Heath Ledger, and introducing Chris Pine, as the nubile assistant.
“Missy Elliot,” starring Queen Latifah.
“Massage Oil And Me: Inspired by a True Story,” starring John Travolta.
“Vatican,” starring Ian McKellan.

My number one favorite new gay movie that will clearly become a blockbuster, though, definitely has to be “Silence of the Clams: The Jodie Foster story,” starring Dakota Fanning. It’s the role she was spawned to play!

He's Just Not That Into Jew

In the interest of service journalism, I am going to start issuing some rules. (Also, I'm doing away with the royal "we," until I can find someone to write this site with me. Don't question my reasons! It only will bring us closer.)

So you can periodically expect some issues from the FAGAT on high.

Today's Rule: NEVER GO TO A GAY PLACE ON YOUR FIRST DATE

I had a lovely date two weeks ago with a perfectly tall, handsome-enough, non-freak guy. We ate at a Chelsea restaurant, where he had slept with and/or dated a handful of the waiters. Once came up to stare at me so many times, that when asked if there was a problem, he said: "Oh, no, I was just thinking you'd make a really beautiful drag queen."

Then, we went to a popular gay night at a big bar, where we both knew a lot of people. From a relatively intimate evening, it turned into a smorgasboard of cruising, air kissing, and drink tickets. My date ran into more ex-boyfriends. In the bathroom, I was accosted by a friend who spotted us together and tried to stage a dramatic, coke-fueled intervention. "He is bad NEWS!" our friend cried. We shook him off, unnerved, and continued peeing.

Then, the death knell sounded: I ran into someone cuter, younger, and more charming, who asked me out.

This situation was not of my creating - I suggested neither the dinner location nor the visit to the gay party. My date had unwittingly crafted his own downfall. Had we been on our third date, and someone tried to pick me up, I probably would have ignored it.

So today's lesson is: Don't go to gay bars on a date, because sluts like me will ditch you in a hot second if something better comes along.

Also, if you can, it's best to be younger, cuter and more charming than everyone else.

But you already knew that.

Jake, Oscar Boast Asses That Are High, Tight

The Los Angeles Times' Kenneth Turan, writing on their "Envelope" website, vocalizes eloquently exactly the way we feel about last night's "Crash" win. We were expecting it, and even resignedly picked it on our ballot for the Oscar pool at our party.

"Sometimes you win by losing, and nothing has proved what a powerful, taboo-breaking, necessary film "Brokeback Mountain" was more than its loss Sunday night to "Crash" in the Oscar best picture category.Despite all the magazine covers it graced, despite all the red-state theaters it made good money in, despite (or maybe because of) all the jokes late-night talk show hosts made about it, you could not take the pulse of the industry without realizing that this film made a number of people distinctly uncomfortable...

"So for people who were discomfited by "Brokeback Mountain" but wanted to be able to look themselves in the mirror and feel like they were good, productive liberals, "Crash" provided the perfect safe harbor."

The whole article is dead-on and a really good read. But we think it misses another point: People really DID like "Crash." People like Oprah, Joel Seigel, and Katie Couric. And it wasn't because it was good - it wasn't. It was obvious, cliched, boring, and formulaic. Frankly, it was patronizing. It shouldn't have even been nominated (the actors, perhaps, but not the film). The problem is that a film doesn't need to be GOOD (like "Brokeback"), it just needs to be about something important.

What we basically mean is that we've finally realized the Academy voters are just dumb.

Which has left us feeling, right now, the way we felt when we found out that bears indeed DO shit in the woods.

We Know There Is A Lot To Say About Last Night's Oscars

But this headline that appears on MSNBC.com right now is a little bit much, don't you think?

SPOTLIGHT ON THE OSCARS• ‘Crash’ tops ‘Brokeback’

That's just poorly-crafted and unsubtle, guys.

Just like "Crash," actually.

This Is Worse Than That Time That They Cut Off The End Of "24" Because Of Football

We're so sorry we haven't been posting. It's been quite an eventful week for us. Today we came down from a four day nerve/adrenaline rush and fell asleep on our keyboard.

We think you all should be aware of a potential disaster that has occured for the gay community. No, we're not talking about the fact that people now identify us with Clay Aiken. It's worse:

The Dylan has broken his cell phone.

Take a deep breath. Sit down. Have some Poland Spring mineral water and an Emergen-C.

If you have to ask who "Dylan" is, or what is "last name" might be, you're clearly the kind of person who is allowed to donate blood in the US. And you shouldn't be reading this blog. Dylan's phone had a whopping 1800 numbers in it. We didn't even know that was possible. 1700 of them belong to cute boys. It was a nexus of gay - sort of like the Barney's Warehouse sale, but digital.

GET A HOLD OF YOURSELF PEOPLE! NO NEED TO PANIC! We all just need to calm the FUCK down around here.

Now, there is a chance the numbers from his phone can be retrieved. There is a chance that the party will go on. There's a chance, that through the work of a grumpy Arab phone technician who is working frantically this very minute, that this center of the gay universe can be brought back to life.

All we can do is hold our breath, and pray to Allah. It should be easy - you're all on your knees at least five times a day anway.

We’re Afraid We’re Going To Have To Ride This One Out, Boys.

Someone told us that we hadn’t posted enough about “Brokeback Mountain” today.

We’ve been trying to avoid this, so as to not contribute to the clusterfuck that has been gay coverage of the movie. But under pressure, here is what we think:

“Brokeback Mountain” is a necessary evil. For years, perhaps decades, we will have to deal with “BM” jokes – much like blacks had to hear about “The Jeffersons” and “What’s Happening!!” for much longer than they would have liked. What’s so noteworthy about the movie is that it’s just a regular, good movie – with gay protagonists. Like the “Jeffersons” was a regular, family sitcom, that happened to star a black family. It was long overdue, but it finally got mass coverage, and brought us a leap forward in understanding, even if it was not the way we’d prefer to progress.

We loved the movie. It was important, seminal, and painful. It wasn’t perfect, and it wasn’t uplifting, but we realize it was important step to take. It made us cry, and feel sick to our stomach for days.

In other words, we feel about "Brokeback Mountain" the same way that we felt about the first time we got fucked up the ass.



We shall not speak of this again.

There Is Really Nothing To Write About Today. Where Is Fred Phelps When You Need Him?

Students in Britain are finally doing something about an issue that’s made us mad for quite some time. They’re finally fed up with hearing about blood donor shortages, while gay men remain blocked from giving blood.

It used to be that we would lie on the form and donate anyway, if we had been recently tested for stds. But then we got on some phone call list where a woman harassed us daily about donating blood (at the Port Authority, of all places!). Finally, after getting tired of making up excused why we couldn’t schlep up to the grundle of Manhattan during the work day for 45 minutes, we snapped:

“I’m gay! Now will you leave me the fuck alone?”

Then we hung up the phone.

It really felt like that time when the enthusiastic theater girl in high school never got the hint.

Thank God for those girls, really. Back then, they did such a good job of urging us out of the closet.

Now, they do such a good job of making our Pumpkin Spice Lattes.

It's Too Bad He Isn't Gay, Because We Bet He Has A Really Smooth Asshole

“Desperate Housewives” cutie Jesse Metcalfe has been covered so aggressively by Perez Hilton that we feel we must comment on this. Metcalfe seems obsessed with getting the word out that he is. not. gay.

A Perez spy who saw Metcalfe at LAX nightclub reported: “He was chatting with people here and there but seemed to be standing alone looking awkward, throughout the night so we started to chat with him. Out of the blue, he told me and several friends of mine "could you please tell your people I'm not one of them, I'm not gay". We all looked at each other like, where the hell did that come from?"

OK, Jesse. Let’s go over what this tactic achieves:

1) It makes people wonder if you are gay, when before they were just wondering who does your eyebrows.
2) It ensures that people will think you ARE gay and trying to overcompensate.
3) It makes gay people, who make up a big part of your fan base, think you are a jerk.
4) It alerts women that you are insecure, and which makes you less sexy. And gay.

See, Jesse faces the classic g-list conundrum – is it better that people talk about you being a homophobe? Or that they don’t talk about you at all?

But seriously. Who does do his eyebrows? Because for phony craftsmanship as obvious as that, she should have her Korean citizenship revoked.

We're Sorry We Were Gone For The Weekend, But Thanks For All The Dirty Text Messages

We know, being gay, that cruel humor at other people's expense is a little bit unoriginal. Cliched, if you will. A cop out - like getting your trick to jerk himself off so you can finally get some fucking sleep. Easy - like you, after we feed you two vodka sodas and tell you that your eyes are pretty.

But we just had to say something about this. Boy George, the only 80's pop star currently living in drag and in exile (oh, wait), is opining on the subject of gay marriage:

"Gay unions, what is that all about? I haven't been invited to any ceremonies and I wouldn't go anyway. The idea that gay people have to mimic what obviously doesn't work for straight people anymore, I think is a bit tragic.

"I'm looking forward to gay divorces."

You know what, George? We're done, thanks. If anyone ever overextended their welcome, it's you. In exchange for ONE listenable ironic novelty song, we have had to put up with your unending presence at our Thursday night parties, your appalling Broadway show, your nauseating fashion lines, and the constant reminder that gay stars don't burn out, they just turn fat and deplorable.

We're no experts, but when your greatest achievement in life is to be the only aging gay British singer MORE detestable than Elton John and George Michael, it might be time to just cut your losses and give up.

Perhaps by hoovering up, all at once, the ten kilos of cocaine you have hidden under your bed.

With your massive, vacuum-like asshole.

And Yet They Won’t Let You On An Airplane With A Pair Of Tweezers.

So we had a long talk with porn star/director Michael Lucas yesterday about his new star, Clay Aiken-outer John Paulus. We also talked to Paulus. The whole story has begun to make us sad, so we won’t dwell on it.

But within an hour of when we talked, a messenger arrived at our office with a basket full of five of Lucas’s porn DVDs, three giant bottles of lube, some naked trading cards and some bath salts. After being ridiculed by my co-workers, bosses, and boss’s bosses, we stuffed the porn, lube, and salts in our bag.

As we headed out of the office, we were handed a few pairs of women’s panties, because we were going to a Tom Jones concert, and when in Rome, one throws panties at Tom Jones.

So after chugging a bottle of Bacardi Razz in the cab with a co-worker, we skipped to the gate of the concert where, yes, you guessed it, our bag was searched by an enormous stern black man. Out came porn, lube, and women’s panties. We were horrified.

Brother didn’t even bat an eye.

This is why we love New York.

Johnny Weir, Are You Queer?

For those of you who were desperately seeking a retropop/spoken word mashup deliberating on the sexuality of an androgynously fashion forward ice dancer, your prayers have been answered.



It’s amazing what a community can achieve when they don’t have to waste their energy on child-rearing, or paying attention to women.

Pollin' Altar Boys In The End-o, Sippin' On Gin And Juice

This makes us uncomfortable. New Hampshire’s gay Episcopal Bishop, Gene Robinson, has checked himself into rehab for alcohol dependency.

Now, we’re the first ones to say that being gay and being a drunk go hand in hand. Check out Wonkette lately, for example. But for a person like Robinson, there’s just so much more pressure on him to be a good example. After all, his appointment caused a rift in the international factions of one of the world’s largest religious organizations. Even party boy George W. Bush kicked the habit when he realized that he was going to be a prominent public figure. Every time Robinson comes out with a sentence like this:

“In his letter, Robinson, 58, said he has been dealing with alcoholism for years and had considered it ‘as a failure of will or discipline on my part, rather than a disease over which my particular body simply has no control, except to stop drinking altogether.’”

…it makes us involuntarily shudder. It’s not going to be very difficult for critics of Robinson to pick up on his “failure of will or discipline” and lump homosexuality as just another one of his weaknesses, to be fixed.

Then again, for how many gay people was alcohol the raison d’etre for their first foray into gayland? How many of us would have really made that first leap without a few cocktails to guide our nervous pubescent hands steadily into an Jack Twist-style reach around? In a way, in fact, we owe alcohol a lot. Robinson was just paying the piper.

We think this is the spin that the Episcopalian publicists should aim for. Or this: “Hey – at least Robinson was getting drunk and sleeping with someone his own age…”

People Say We Have A Problem With Alcohol, But We Can't Remember The Last Time We Drank!

We have nothing to say in honor of Valentine's Day. We are going out to get drunk with one of our best gals. But this joke, which we learned from George Clooney, pretty much sums up the way we feel about the holiday, and love in general. Minus the wife part:

(As told to Quint from Ain't It Cool News):

GEORGE CLOONEY: "A guy is in a bar. He's so drunk he throws up all over himself. He tells the bartender, "What am I doing? When I go home my wife's going to kill me..." The bartender puts twenty dollars in his shirt pocket and says, "Go home..." Have you heard this one?
QUINT: No, I haven't heard it.
GEORGE CLOONEY: He says, "Go home and tell your wife you were in a bar and a guy came up... he was drunk, threw up all over you, but put $20 in your shirt pocket." He goes home, walks in and his wife says, "Hap, look at you. You threw up all over yourself!"
He goes, "Honey, a guy got drunk and threw up on me and he put $20 in my shirt pocket." She reaches in and pulls out $40 and says, "What's the other $20 for?" He says, "He shat in my pants, too!"

Onward to Easter!

If You Wishful Think Hard Enough, It Just Might Come True.

Our friend Perez today illuminated some courtside subtext between Jake Gyllenhaal and his "Day After Tomorrow" co-star, Austin Nichols. We didn't realize they were friends, but we do remember meeting Nichols at the premiere of his most recent flick, "Glory Road." We stopped to talk to him because he was so tall and handsome, and for no other reason. He admitted to us that he was the only person in the movie who wasn't good at basketball.

"I lied and told them I was a basketball player," he giggled, as we swooned. "I am a terrible basketball player."

We then told him that if they ever made a movie about Tom Brady, he should play him in the lead role. This comment thereby exhausted all of our sports knowledge.

We eavesdropped as he chatted with someone else nearby, who asked him what his favorite recent movie was.

"Brokeback Mountain," he grinned. We gripped a nearby publicist for support. "I can’t think of any other love story that got me so..." and then he trailed off.

We'll end here because we don't want to jump to any conclusions. And also, because we don't want to have to clean out the inside of our jeans twice today.

Does Valentine's Day Make Bloggers Less Funny?

We are a little bit jaded about love, if you haven't noticed. Like most people, we've been bent, broken, and (very recently) physically scarred by it.

So it takes a lot to make us choke up. But today's FHC post did the trick. Congrats on your anniversary Tristan and LL.



Aw, who are we kidding? We cry at De Beers commercials. This weekend we watched "The Princess Diaries 2: A Royal Engagement" and were unable to move for hours...

R.I.P. Boy's Room. Go Go, We Hardly Knew Ye.

So we’ve been following the coverage of the whole John Paulus/Clay Aiken scandal that has been played out slowly in the press, and on Howard Stern. Basically, the gist of it is that Clay Aiken found John on bigmuscle.com, they emailed for a while, and then they had an unsafe sex session, in which Paulus, a former marine, bottomed for the pop twink. Paulus has a semen-stained towel to prove it.

As always, we wanted to wriggle ourselves right to the prostate of this matter, so we’ve actually had email conversations with Paulus. It turns out, contrary to what’s been reported, that he received no money for telling his tale to the National Enquirer. In fact, he was fired from his job, but he ended up getting a deal with porn director Michael Lucas, so hopefully he has enough money to buy condoms these days.

But it brings forth the question: if you slept with a closeted pop star, would you rat him out?

On the one hand, you wouldn’t tell a closeted guy’s parents that he was gay. But do people in the public eye have a greater responsibility to set an example? Is their personal comfort less important than getting mainstream America comfortable with gay figures?

Luckily, we’ve already had four shots of tequila at our desk in the last half hour, and couldn’t give a twat.

Viva la weekend!

(a moment of silence (and another shot) for the death of Boy's Room. Oh, how we loved/hated that place...)

Isn't This Confusing Enough As It Is?

We’re sorry that the FAGAT Guide has taken such a personal bent lately – we’ve just been very busy and interesting things keep happening to us. But we promise, this will be the last personal one for a while.

You see, we recently met a very cute boy at a men’s show last week at the start of Fashion Week. We pursued him through a mutual friend, asking him what his deal was (as in, is he single or in a relationship – because boy clearly wasn’t straight). Her response? “He is Omni.”

We were flummoxed.

We’ve heard of gay, we’ve heard of lesbian, we’ve heard of bisexual. Hell, we’ve heard of transgendered and transsexual. But Omni? As far as we understood it, bisexual meant that a person liked both boys and girls. Do we really need MORE than that? At what point do children and animals get involved?? So we asked a bisexual friend of ours to explain the difference. “Well, when you’re omni,” he said, rolling his eyes as if we were born yesterday, “you can pick and choose what you want from wherever.”

Not being enlightened at ALL by that statement, we went back to the source. She clarified: “He'll date a man, woman, vegetable, as long as its right!”

Now, we appreciate that sentiment, but really, did we have to bring in the VEGETABLES? Still confused, we consulted the final word on everything everything: Wikipedia. They helpfully explain:

“Pansexual, omnisexual, and pomosexual (postmodern sexuality) are substitute terms that rather than referring to both or "bi" gender attraction, refer to all or "omni" gender attraction, and are used mainly by those who wish to express acceptance of all gender possibilities including transgender and intersex people, not just two.”

So, wait. We’re used to getting the sloppy seconds of some random female hos. Most gays at least stop at second base on their way over to our team. But our rear end could be in the proximity of the same cock that, say, tickled Amanda Lepore’s fauxgina?

We’ll pass, thanks.

If I Can Make It There, I'm Gonna Make It Anywhere

We went to the Heatherette show last night, and once again it was amazing. It began with thumping music and darkness, and a monologue about New York voiced by Richie Rich. Then the lights went up on three tap dancers dressed as zombies. After that more (sexy/scary) dancers came out, and then the show began.

Of course the clothing was mostly unwearable (the guy dressed as the Indian was mega hot, but we don’t know HOW that shit stayed on his lower body) and the crowd was irreverent. But it felt like a rock concert, and with Naomi Campbell closing the show, we thought it was a complete success.

Afterward, in the backstage lounge as we watched Alan Cumming hit on one of the shirtless models, we wondered why it was we took up writing, and not sit-ups, full time. Then we overheard a pair of models groan:

“I’ve had a piece of glitter stuck in my eye for two days,” said the first.

“It’s like déjà vu all over again,” the other replied.

And we felt better.

We Think The Public Would Prefer A Vanity Fair Cover With These Two Naked With Tom Ford.

We’re sitting at our desk at work and there is a copy of “O” The Oprah Magazine on the floor near us. It’s an “O At Home” special edition, and its cover features Nate Berkus squatting with a white rose in his mouth. Berkus is staring up at us with a maniacal grin (and perfect white teeth). It’s an altogether ridiculous pose that would make anyone look like a fool, but Berkus is just so. damn. adorable. that it’s actually cute.

We totally hate him.

On a related note, we hear from a VERY good source that the rumors about Berkus dating a certain Latin singing sensation ARE, in fact, dead on. The two have been doing the deed for months. The source is so good, in fact, that in the gossip world we would call it “practically under the bed.”

As opposed to “practically at orgasm,” which is where we are, just imagining the visual.

The Queen Is Dead. Long Live The Queen.

Like all of you, we are in love with Daniel V from Project Runway.

So last Thursday when we ran into a publicist friend of ours who works on the show, naturally we inquired whether he was single, and if we could be set up with him. He is single, as it turns out, and looking for love. Our friend was with last year’s winner Jay McCarroll, who caught wind of our interest.

“You know,” snapped McCarroll, swinging his giant Spin Doctors be-hatted head in our direction, “He is less cute in person than he is on TV!” We assured Jay that it was fine – we are also cuter on television. “I was supposed to get all the ass when I won last year, and I got nothing! Now little Daniel comes along with his floppy hair in his big schnozz and he’s getting all the boys. What the hell?” McCarroll continued. “Why can’t you fall in love with someone real? Get a hobby!”

We laughed it off because, frankly, we’re cute and fun and Jay McCarroll is ugly and appalling. But then, when we were outside of the party (It was a MAC Cosmetics party and Pam Anderson’s boobs were there) he approached us again and continued to berate us. “Think with your mind, not your crotch!” he commanded, as if someone who thought with their mind would somehow want to date Jay instead.

The implication there, we suppose, is that someone with a “mind” has no “eyeballs,” or “sense of touch.”

"Does My Hair Look Too Shiny?"

So our friend Sitting Bull, much like Denise Richards, had an HIV test this week. Denise Richards got hers because she found out her husband was rampantly cheating on her with prostitutes. Sitting Bull got his because he is a bath house troll (when he’s not fucking, he can be found living under a bridge with Cynthia Nixon’s girlfriend).

We tease. Sitting Bull is a demure and well-behaved lady with a lovely and devoted husband. He was just doing his gay duty and getting tested regularly. It’s nice for him that he has a boyfriend who can handle the testicular exams for him. We have to do it ourselves – in the shower.

Anyway, Sitting Bull reminded us today of a universal phenomenon: there comes a time when as gays, we all become Bill Frist.

In the moments before receiving the results of an HIV test we go from being confident, healthy, fun-loving queers to nervous nellies who honestly wonder whether we caught it while wiping off the elliptical at Crunch, or even sitting next to that hysterically crying queer during “Brokeback Mountain” at Chelsea Clearview. All those incredibly awkward moments we spent in the bedroom asking “I don’t have a condom, don’t YOU have a condom?” suddenly seem fruitless. The blundering silences as we waited, grundle humiliatingly exposed, as the top fumbled with the wrapper? Wasted. The annoyingly long period when we insisted upon safe sex with our boyfriend until we could check his dental records to prove he wasn’t crystal whore? Might as well have barebacked on the first date.

Why does this test, which should be an affirmation of health, play upon our deepest guilt? Do we really think, deep down, that we’re all sluts?

Since this post has turned into a column from “Sex and the City,” We will end it fittingly. By going and fucking Jason Lewis.

With a condom.

Be safe!

We Really Wanted To Wipe Off His Little Poop Mustache

The other day when we complained that no one mentioned the word “gay” during the Golden Globes in reference to “Transamerica,” “Capote” or “Brokeback Mountain,” we realize we were being a little bit “glass is half empty” about the whole thing. Last night we ran into John Waters at a Paper Magazine party for his new Next show, “Movies That Will Corrupt You,” and he laughed at our concerns.

“What do you mean?” Waters scoffed. “Everybody refers to them as gay. Every article in the world calls it a ‘gay cowboy movie’. It’s going to be the gay Oscars. They should re-name it the GLAAD awards.”

We will choose to look at this whole situation as well in a glass-is-half-full manner. We made John Waters laugh. That puts us on par with a drag queen eating shit, internal organs on burning pokers, and a woman who can pick up a bottle of soda with her vag.

Score.

Then Again, You Could Just Buy The Porn. It Would Save You A Lot Of Laps.

We’re going to be honest about something: We’ve never understood why there is such a thing as the Gay Games. We see why the Paralympics exist, and we even get the rationale behind the Special Olympics. Hell, we even sort of understand “Champions on Ice.” But we don’t like the implication behind needing a Gay Games. The reason the Special Olympics and Paralympics exist is that the contestants are mentally or physically handicapped (sometimes both) and therefore, from birth, are disadvantaged to the point where they could never compete in the real Olympics. But there is nothing physically or mentally wrong with gay people – shouldn’t we just use the real deal? That’s what other minority groups (black, Mormon, libertarian, etc) do. By insisting upon our own competition, are we admitting that we are inherently less good at sports?

That is not to say we don’t support gay athletics. Gay amateur sports leagues are a fun way to meet people and a good way to stay healthy. But the insistence upon our own, watered-down Olympics has always struck us as a little bit, well, embarrassing.

Of course, for every well-reasoned argument, there is clearly a flip side. In this case, it’s obvious. Whoever came up with the idea to get every gay guy with a rockin’ swimmers body into a locker room at the same time is clearly a genius. If we met him, we would immediately buy him a drink, and a cameraphone…


We will never advance as a society.

If We're All Fairies, Queens And Crones, Someone's Gotta Be A Wizard, Right?

We think it's time we directed you to the online presence of one of or favorite performers, and oldest acquaintances. Soce the Elemental Wizard is something that so many people in New York strive to be, and very few achieve: he is one of a kind. As a gay Jewish rapper (he also plays the violin excellently), Soce is occupying a gap that we never knew needed to be filled.

He performs in Manhattan and Brooklyn at open mic nights, and has his own gigs occasionally where he headlines with other, like-minded MCs. While there are many exciting and hilarious parts of his website to explore, our favorite has always been the video for his song "Sad and Lonely." Be warned, however: This song is catchy, and you might find yourself singing it to yourself softly as you ride up the elevator with strangers. This we do not recommend.

We just thought of this: As strange as the idea of a gay Jewish rapper may be, why does the idea of a gay Christian rapper seem even more far-fetched?

We Guess That's Why They Don't Call It Wonkbutch.

You may have read on other gay blogs about the controversy surrounding David Lat, the former “Underneath Their Robes” blogger who is about to begin helming Wonkette . Conservative Lat has a great resume: Harvard undergrad and Yale Law. And he’s a funny little bitch. But what’s causing a ruckus among the queers is a series of columns he wrote for the Harvard Crimson years ago, which some say were homophobic. Is someone with an anti-gay bias going to change the heart and soul of a popular blog? Some say, yes. Won’t it be funny when everyone learns that the person is gay himself? We say, sure!

First off, here’s a sample of his college writing: "National Coming Out Day is just another event in the recent rash of identity-based pride rallies. These alleged celebrations of diversity have devolved into mutual masturbation festivals. They reassure people who are still deeply troubled by their lifestyle choices and are desperately seeking a stamp of approval. We have a duty to deny them this approval."

Ouch. That was way harsh, Tai.

Still, what’s interesting to us is not that he once wrote a series of columns that sounded homophobic. We’ve all written/said/snorted some things in our lives we wish would go away. But in his new position as Wonkette editor, Lat is likely to have to write about hypocritical arch-conservatives who lead secret gay lives. A few popular DC blogs (America Blog and Blog Active) focus on this topic. If Lat, an arch-conservative, had an under-the-radar gay life of his own, it seems to be a conflict of interest that should at least be recognized. And outrageously mocked – Wonkette is the ass-fucking blog, after all.

And yet, here we are. It is our understanding that in fact, yes, Mr. Lat is one of us – and relatively open among his friends about that fact. Otherwise, we’d be reluctant to say anything. While at Yale, he had a relationship with an undergraduate male known to us. Which makes sections of the recent Times article about him that refer to his “double life” and his difficulty explaining it to his parents especially humorous. Not to mention this passage:

"David was on this one side a hard-core Federalist Society type, who clerked for an extremely hard-right judge, and was way to the right of most of his associates. And he had this whole other side of flamboyant, theater-watching, Oscar-watching, shoe-loving, litigatrix. How do these two sides get reconciled?"

We emailed Mr. Lat to get comment and see if he had anything to say. After all, there is a possibility that we are mistaken. But he declined to respond to our questions, and hedged with a grace matched only by Anderson Cooper:

“I'm flattered by all the interest in my personal life, but I'm really undeserving of all this attention. While the publicity whore in me is obviously gratified by the media coverage, I realize it's ridiculous that this much ink has been spilled over me. I am a mere blogger -- and not just any blogger, with all the insignificance that the term denotes, but a blogger who got his start writing about judges (a topic most Americans find soporific).”

And then he asked us to call him if we were ever in DC, so we could go out. Ass fucking, here we come!

“You Can’t Handle The [Naked] Truth!”

We have lately been intrigued by a series of ads on other gay blogs for “David Rich Fitness Naked.”

While we knew a fitness video where the instructors (sexy Lewis Payton models) exercised naked was too much to hope for, we were pleasantly surprised to find out what they mean by that suggestive title. The guys, David Rich and Sean Harley, designed a workout program specifically targeted at making your body look good naked. Not to be strong, not to be huge, not to be better at sports - merely to look good without clothes. Which, to be perfectly honest, is why we work out. And we suspect we are not the only ones.

So when we came across this marketing plan, we were impressed. To hell with you, fitness celebrity John Basedow. These guys are speaking our language.

But then we noticed a highlighted quote, among pictures of men with ridiculous abdominals in impossibly small bathing suits:

“Fact: You want to look great Naked. Who doesn’t? People will treat you better, you’ll get more attention and more friends, a more fulfilling love life, you will feel great and get to live the life you’ve always wanted to live.” [Emphasis theirs]

Hm.

This is a little bit like in “A Few Good Men” when Jack Nicholson says: “You don't want the truth because deep down in places you don't talk about at parties, you want me on that wall!” It’s a little too honest. We like to secretly think everything will get better when we look good naked, but we don’t want anyone to admit it. If we go on stripping bare the neuroses of gays, what’s next? Someone admitting that hilarious bitchiness is just a cover for massive insecurity?

Come on, let’s keep some of our cards to ourselves…

We Promise To Remain Bitter Until Someone Sticks A Dick In Us.

We were blissfully ignoring the onset of February 14 until this morning when we were opening our mail at work, and we received our first Valentine’s Day gift!

Pleased and flattered, we opened it up right away. It turned out to be a DVD of “Saw II” and two severed fingers, made of chocolate.

Thanks Lions Gate Films! So romantic. We will be sure to nibble on the fingers as we cry ourselves to sleep on the 14th, fat, alone, and watching the last 25 minutes of “Love Actually,” “Bridget Jones,” and “Sean Cody's Greatest Hits” over and over…

But it did make us think. Valentines Day is something that, unlike gay marriage, adoption rights, and inheritance rights, we don’t have to fight to make our own. It’s is a bastion of heterosexuality that they can’t stop us from invading. And yet… do we really want it?

Sure, we’ve had bad Valentine’s Days (our first girlfriend, Mary, dumped us on Feb. 14 in the sixth grade) and good ones (our boyfriend Brian went to see us in “La Boheme” (we played a non-singing waiter) and brought us flowers). But for the most part, we associate the holiday with disappointed girlfriends and poorly lit Italian restaurants – and you KNOW we don’t do pasta.

So…. We propose that Halloween become the new gay Valentine’s Day. It’s really more what we are about – exhibitionism, camp, boys in skimpy costumes, better candy, big parties and “funny” shirtless pictures of ourselves specifically taken for the purpose of posting on Friendster.

And really, if you’ve ever stumbled home in a skimpy Tarzan costume at 7 in the morning, still drunk, smeared all over with blue paint from some hot guy who was dressed as Smurfette, shivering in the freezing cold Nov. 1 weather, you know… That’s a holiday done RIGHT.

Who’s with us?

Jack And Ennis Were Just Cuddling For Warmth. What?

We came across an interesting interview with Jeremy Irons in the UK Evening Standard yesterday. Now, Irons is clearly not a homophobe - but some of the things he said made us do a double take. Take, for example, his interpretation of the relationship between Charles and Sebastian in Evelyn Waugh's exhausting love chronicle "Brideshead Revisited." He calls their closeness a "male platonic friendship, spanning many years."

Riiiiight. And Oscar Wilde was just Bosie Douglas' "mentor."

But we especially like this part of the interview, when the author asks if Irons has ever fallen in love with another man:

"I think I am too competitive with men, that is what gets in the way. I can understand love between two men, I have no trouble getting my head around that. But I have never fallen in love with another man."

Let us digress for a moment, into personal territory...

We have been single for approximately one month in New York City. In that month, we have started going to the gym at least four times a week, spent approximately $1,000 on denim, shoes, and furniture to spice up our apartment, tried two new facial products and three new haircuts.

On Tuesdays we go to Beige. On Wednesday we go to Phoenix. On Thursdays we go to Duvet. On Friday we go to Opaline. On Saturdays we go to Starlight. On Sundays, we go to Hiro. (On Monday, the Gay Sabbath, we rest.) On each of those nights, we stand by the bar, with every other 23-38 year-old on the city, sizing up whether the boys around us have the right body, haircuts, denim, shoes and facial products. If we find a boy we like, we then have to size up all of the rest of the crowd around him to see if their body, haircuts, denim, shoes and facial products are better than ours. We are 6'3" with brown hair and blue eyes. But that guy over there who is eyeing the same cutie is 6'1" with BLOND hair and blue eyes. Who wins out?

If the temperature is right, we strike up a conversation. If we want to impress the person, we mention our fabulous job. If his is more fabulous, we might be forced to bring up our Ivy League education. If he name drops his law school, we name drop our prep school - all the while eyeing the boys around us who might have gone to prep school AND law school, and checking to see if our eyebrows are better than theirs. "You read New York Magazine?" we ask. "We prefer the New Yorker."

"Oh, you played squash at Brown?" we murmur politely. "We rowed at Yale."

So, Jeremy Irons, you think you're "too competitive with men" to be gay, eh?

Bring it on, bitch. You wouldn't last a day in Chelsea with that haircut.

Hmmm... New Philippe Starck Dining Room Set? Or A Baby. Decisions, Decisions...

When we were young, we used to get a meager allowance. We were forced to give part of it every week to the collection at our Catholic Church (No joke. And thank God, really, because we've gotten QUITE a return on that investment).

But the rest of it we spent mostly on comic books, basketball cards and shiny rocks. Our loving parents always tried to get us to think about saving up for something we might really want, like a college education for our children or a bike with one of those pink banana seats and streamers. We never listened.

And now we realize we're not the only ones. A recent UK study shows that gay men and women make more money on average than their straight counterparts - and also that we spend it mostly on "leisure activities."

"Lesbians and gay men are currently spending the bulk of their wealth on CDs (£800m a year), DVDs (£843m) and holidays – more than £3 billion was spent by lesbians and gay men on tourism last year, according to the study."

We love it when we live up to stereotypes. The leather sling market must be a little harder to follow nationally, otherwise we're sure that would be in there, too.

It kind of makes you wonder what would have happened if everyone just SHARED their copies of "Confessions on a Dancefloor" and gave all the money we saved to Jack Abramoff...

We Guess This Implies A Definition For “Jelly Sticks,” Too.

After telling you about our favorite new term, the “Marcia,” a good friend let us in on another idiom we didn’t know about.

What do you call it when two bottoms date one another?

“Doughnuts.”

Why?

Because they are all holes and no poles!

Yuck, yuck.

We Cheer And We Lead, We Act Like We're On Speed, You Hate Us 'Cause We're Beautiful, Well We Don't Like You Either

Over at Vividblurry.com they’ve started the inevitable Hot Boy Posse debate. We’ve mentioned the HBP in previous posts but we’ve never really explained who they are because we’re hesitant to give them any more attention. But what’s going on at Vividblurry is worthy of comment.

HBP is a group of boys started by this character named GoGo Mike. There have been previous iterations of this group, for generations apparently, but now GoGo is pretty much in charge. It’s a loosely affiliated collection of handsome-ish aging white guys with good bodies who have bound together to form an exclusive club.

In our high school, there was a self-anointed group like this that called themselves the “Sweet Posse.” We kid you not. They came up with this name because thought they were “sweet,” logically enough. They wanted people to resent them but nobody had the energy. What strikes us as most unfortunate about HBP (other than the ridiculous and embarrassing website and promotional material) is that it crystallizes a lot of what is high school-like in the gay communities in even the biggest of cities. Even though there are thousands of gay men in a place like New York, there are only a few places for us all to go out, and even fewer spots that are cool – so it’s possible to know people everywhere you go.

There is a hierarchy based on looks and charisma. And most people don’t know one another, but there are certain people whom everybody knows. In a community where acceptance is extremely important to new members, it’s just a bummer that this kind of setup, this stratification, comes up. If you read the entries in the comments section over at Vividblurry, you’ll see what we’re talking about. People have a hard time distinguishing between their disdain, resentment and jealousy for HBP – potentially because they’re all the same thing. We know the HBP kids just want to have fun, but then again, that’s how Slap Bracelets got started, isn’t it? And look where that got us.

We’re sorry this was such an earnest post. To make up for it, we will tell the only joke that we know:

Q: What’s better than winning a gold medal at the Special Olympics?

A: Not being retarded.

Not That We Expected Michael Lucas To Be Literate, But It’s ‘Sex AND The City,’ Thank You.

A really stupendous thing has happened.

We have somehow (through no effort of our own, we swear) made it onto the reviewers mailing list for Lucas Entertainment. We got our first batch of porn to review today.

The DVD is part of a series called “Encounters.” The tag line is priceless: “In New York, with a population of 10 million, SEX happens.”

(Technically, there are only 8 million of us. Does this mean only ORAL happens?)

We have yet to screen this new gem, but from the press release, we can tell it’s going to be a winner. It’s described as a totally new idea, “an homage to New York life – fully embracing the Chelsea lifestyle.” Hmmm… 'Roided out muscle queens having marathons of anonymous sex? This new idea has really knocked our socks off.

(Which, we suppose, is good. We needed something to clean up with.)

But seriously, when can we expect to see porn that is NOT embracing the Chelsea lifestyle? How about an East Village or Lower East Side porno? You know, with thin pretty boys who are overeducated and underpaid and like slumming it in the formerly dangerous neighborhoods where RENT took place?

We would totally cast Topher Grace as ourselves.

Catherine Zeta-Jones Finds Shark, Jumps.

We ran into Alan Cumming at a Chanel dinner at Lever House last week and of course we asked him about the project in which he is involved, the Catherine Zeta-Jones Gay Rugby Musical project.

Cumming explained that he was "attached to it," but didn't really quite know what was going on. "I was in the swimming pool at Palm Springs at Christmas," Cumming (sporting a new shaved 'do) told us. "And this bloke goes 'Hey Alan, I was just called into meet with the director of this movie you’re in.' I said 'Which one?' And he said that one, and I said, 'Oh, well, news to me!'"

We decided to make the pictures on this blog less risque, so that you guys could view it at work (ok, let's be honest, law school), so we'll refrain from posting a shirtless pic of hottie Gavin Henson, who is also "attached" to the film. If you would like to ogle pictures of this English rugby star, we suggest you check out The Blog About Gavin's Tits.

Meanwhile, we're going to go spend some quality time imagining what happened between Joaquin Phoenix and Jonathan Rhys Meyers just after the cameras cut away from them at the Golden Globes...


(ps - Did anyone else notice that no one mentioned the word "gay" once when they were talking about "Brokeback Mountain," "Capote," or "Transamerica" last night? We think the only time it was used was when the "Will & Grace" cast made a joke. WTF?)

“The Marcia.” Learn It. Love It. Live It.

Last month we, together with our roommate Aishwarya, came up with a new and necessary term: “The Marcia.”

Marcia (mahr – shá) : n. A gay man who seems butch until he opens his mouth and turns out to be a giant fag. From the Greek term “hamartia,” meaning “fatal flaw”. Example - "OMG, I finally drunk dialed my internet crush and he turned out to be a total Marcia! You think it's too late to pretend to be deaf so he doesn't talk while we're fucking at the beach house in Rehomo?"

How many times has this happened to you? Someone looks super cute on friendster, and then you see him out at Beige, and he turns out to be a prancing queen. The funniest part is usually that said girly men have no idea the way that they come off – and will often commit the faux pas of teasing other effeminate men. Which is just awkward, for everyone.

Once again, we find ourselves to be ahead of the curved penis. In this month’s “Out,” writer Erik Piepenberg examines this very phenomenon. In addition to discussing the tragicomic genius of faggy muscle daddies, the article makes an interesting point:

“Perhaps what I noticed in the speech of that butch-looking but queeny-sounding guy was a marker of culture, not physiology. Gay men may use ‘gay speech’ in much the same way some racial and ethnic minorities use their own in-group speech patterns, like blacks’ use of what sociolinguists call African-American vernacular English, or, colloquially, Ebonics.”

Holy Hollister! We can get our own SPEECH pattern!? Can we call it “Homosexual vernacular English”, or, colloquially, “what happens to your voice after dozens of cocks slam into your vocal chords”?

To Kal El, Thanks For Everything, Bryan Singer

Calendarlive.com has new "Superman" pictures. And at this point, things have gotten pretty extreme.



Parker Posey as Lex Luthor's evil girlfriend? Could this movie BE any gayer?

We can't wait for the surprise underwater ending scene in that was filmed on HD Steadicam from the inside of the director's hot tub...

What Do You Get When You Cross Russell Simmons With Richard Simmons?

We just got the chance to chat with Roy Simmons, one of the three former NFL players who are currently out of the closet. The other two, David Kopay and Esera Tuaolo, have made more of a name for themselves, but with Simmon's book "Out of Bounds" coming out this month, we think you'll begin hearing his name, too.

Simmons, who played for the Giants and the Redskins from 1979-1984, wrote a crazy book. There's sex with a teammate, bath houses, prostitution, peep shows, booze - it's like a Sean Cody catalog, but in this one, the characters couldn't just go back to their cater waiter jobs at the end of the action.

When we talked to him, we asked him about what he thought the chances are that one day pro football players will be comfortable coming out.

"Minimal," he told us. "That’s how it is. Inless you’re a star, a super, super star. But if you’re just trying to make it, a general player with talent, they’re not coming forward with that, no. It’s not pressing in their life that they would need to come forward and free themselves. Free themselves for the owner to say the next morning, excuse me you’re fired."

So you're saying we've got a chance!

After, if a ball player was gay, he would definitely be a super, super star.

We Always Think We're Missing The Point With These Things.

Does the above advertisement make you want to:

A) Go to the gym immediately and remain there for the rest of your life?
B) Wax your chest and grow stubble?
C) Touch yourself?
D) Look online for the outtakes from this photo shoot, a la Dieux du Stade?
E) Kill yourself?
F) Burn all of your clothes and anything in your apartment that has ever touched a carb?
G) Watch Nip/Tuck?
H) Drink until you forget how much less attractive you are than an Italian model?
I) Go spray tanning?
J) Drink until the guy at the bar looks like an Italian model?
K) Rediscover your collarbone?

Or L) Buy expensive clothing?

Ring, Ring, Ring Goes The Telephone - The Lights Are On But There's No-one Home

It's probably better that our computer won't let us view this at work. Otherwise, we wouldn't be able to do anything else all day...

We're Not Even Going To Mention COSMOgirl!

Our roommate mentioned to us yesterday that he wondered how new magazines could ever start, what with all of the daily refreshed content on blogs. We agreed – even if magazine writing is better edited and more focused, it’s hard to respond to pop culture ahead of the curve of the blogs. Or to report on a niche (cars, sports, gambling, what have you) if there are people who put out copy about it every day for free online.

So it occurred to us that we might be stuck for a while with just the magazines that we already have. Which, to be honest, is pretty grim. So we’ve rounded up a little advice for our current gay publications. We can only hope they read this and take our advice. After all, we did name ourselves The FAGAT Guide…

Instinct: Get writers with a real sense of humor. If Maxim, Stuff, FHM and Giant can find hundreds of funny straight writers, surely you can find one or two gay ones. Eight-pack abs alone do not a monthly make.

Passport: Finally understand that not all of us travel with Jansport backpacks with lots of buttons and rainbow flags on them.

Genre: Get a production budget.

Details: Get it over with and stop clicking [FIND: “man” REPLACE: “woman”] in each article. It’s just confusing for everybody.

Out: Take out all the stuff about old people. Even THEY would rather be reading about young, hot things.

The Advocate: We actually think this magazine is pretty decent, and necessary. But if we had to say something, it would clearly be: lose the lezbos.

Out Traveler: Stop doing stories about places like Morocco, Dubai and Cairo. Why would you ever write about locales where gay people are persecuted and in danger? Does Sports Illustrated write about Provincetown? We don’t think so.

DNA and Blue: Figure out a way to be better distributed in the US. Honestly.

Men’s Health: Just stop pretending.

Jesus Tittyfucking Christ.

The Colin Farrell sex tape has hit the internet.

…And suddenly, handicapped bathrooms in offices everywhere were occupied…

He's Not Gay. He's Just Witty. And Likes To Wear Boots.

We've been chuckling for days about the recent kerfluffle in the UK over Kevin Spacey's name being included on educational materials about gay people in public schools. It reminds us of a time the "Usual Suspects" star chatted up a very handsome friend of ours at a Los Angeles party in the late 90's.

Spacey followed our friend out of the party, but was soon confronted with the fact that our straight-acting pal wanted to head home alone. K-Pax then came out with our favorite never-say-die entreaty ever:


"Hey," he grinned sheepishly. "You don't have to be a waterskier to waterski."


Brilliant.

We Can’t Wait For When Kimberly Stewart Tries To Date One Of These Guys.

Gay TV channel LOGO is now casting for a pilot of a “Laguna Beach” type reality show, located in Provincetown. The camera will follow 8 to 10 P-town boys as the live, love and, presumably, tweak on the tip of Cape Cod for a summer. Here are the questions that prospective stars are supposed to answer as part of the interview process:

* Did you just break-up and need to get away for the summer?
* Have you heard that P-Town is a gay-friendly mecca and you'd like to get your feet wet?
* Do you work at a restaurant in P-Town and wonder what it'd be like to be on a TV show?
* Do you own a business on Commercial Street?

Which, we feel, is completely the wrong way to go about casting this show. If we were going to do a reality show about Provincetown on a gay network, our questionnaire would be something more like this:

* Did you just break-up, and will stop at NOTHING to get revenge?
* Have you heard that P-Town is a gay-friendly mecca and you want to get plunged more time than Wood’s Hole?
* Do you work at a restaurant in P-town and sell crystal on the side?
* Do you own a business on Commercial Street, and wonder what it would be like to murder people?

We would, of course, wait until the interview to find out the rest of the important information, like what was their favorite Melrose Place moment involving Kimberly, or roughly how many penises they fit inside their assholes at once...

We think this list would provide much higher quality television, in the end.

I'm Sorry. I'm Not Familiar With That Term.

The highest Cherokee Indian court in America has decided not to strike down the first gay marriage in Indian country.

"Cherokee tribal members Kathy Reynolds, 29, and Dawn McKinley, 34, married in May 2004 in Oklahoma, just weeks after the city of San Francisco ignited a national debate on gay marriage by briefly allowing same-sex couples to wed ... Because tribal law at the time allowed same-sex marriages, a tribal clerk gave them a wedding certificate. But members in the Tribal Council sued, saying the marriage would damage the reputation of the Cherokees, and the law was later changed. In a December 22 decision announced on Wednesday, the Judicial Appeals Tribunal of the Cherokee Nation, the tribe's highest court in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, rejected the request for an injunction against the marriage."

While the decision to changing back the law to make gay marriage illegal again is a disappointment, it’s nice that the Cherokee court decided not to take away something that had already been given to this couple. They wouldn’t want to be known as… uh… never mind.

Anyway, this is the kind of wisdom and consideration we’ve come to expect from the American Indian Community. After all, these people did figure out how to use the whole buffalo.

Well, You Need To Have SOMEONE Around To Help You Pick Out Shoes.

We were taping commentary for a special on VH-1 today about “Kept Men,” and something occurred to us.

In addition to being official purse holders, what do Star Jones’ husband Al Reynolds, LeAnn Rimes husband Dean Sheremet, and Charlize Theron’s fiancé Stuart Townsend all have in common?







They’re all over 6 feet tall, of course!

Honest, Officer. I Was Just Helping That Sheep Over The Fence!

A senior pastor at South Tulsa Baptist Church on Oklahoma (who regularly preaches against homosexuality) was arrested on Tuesday for soliciting a male undercover cop for oral sex in a parking lot where gay prostitutes are known to hang out.

The pastor, Lonnie Latham, “has also spoken out against same-sex marriage and in support of a Southern Baptist Convention directive urging its 42,000 churches to befriend gays and lesbians and try to convince them that they can become heterosexual "if they accept Jesus Christ as their savior and reject their 'sinful, destructive lifestyle," writes the AP.

His excuse?

"I was set up. I was in the area pastoring to police."

Which, to be fair, could definitely be true. He was trying to help!

It’s just like that time we got arrested at The Cock examining people for testicular cancer.

(Thanks Andy for this)

Perhaps They Should Have Named It "Slightly-Perforated-Rectum Mountain."

The fags over at Not Only But Also have raised a very important question: In Brokeback Mountain, How Did Jake And Ennis Have Sex With No Lube?

“No wonder. Ennis, we know this is your first time and all but it takes a lot of magic lotion to get the rabbit into the hat. That Jack goes back for seconds and thirds without some serious consideration of fixing the friction is laughable. Didn't Ang consult any queers?”

We will admit that we, too, shifted uncomfortably in our seats at this moment – and not just to re-adjust the front of our jeans. Bitch, that had to HURT.

But we’d like to point out that for years we’ve been forced to watch many ridiculous and impossible straight sex scenes. For example:

* The rape/love scene between Sharon Stone and Fill-In-The-Blank Baldwin in “Sliver,” in which he sneaks up behind her and is suddenly inside her without her knowledge, ramming her against a pillar.

* The waterfall fuck scene between Kyle McLaughlin and Jessie Spano in “Showgirls.” Even we queers know sex in a chlorinated pool ain’t that great.

* The reverse cowboy situation between Sharon Stone and Catherine Zeta-Jones’ dad in “Basic Instinct.” If you think Jake Gyllenhaal was hurting…

So cut us some slack on the lube thing. After all, we remained quiet all those times in films when women had real orgasms even when they weren’t on top…

There Was Definitely An Episode Of Queer As Folk About Exactly This

A gay rights group has filed a lawsuit against Massachusett’s Attorney General Thomas Reilly for allowing an initiative to reach the polls that could overturn the State Supreme Court’s decision to allow gay marriages. They say his actions were unconstitutional, as a ballot does not have the power to overturn court decisions, according to the state’s constitution. Conservative opponents to gay marriage throughout the state easily obtained the 170,000 signatures needed to get the initiative onto the ballot, mostly through the help of the well organized church networks through the state.

This is all very complicated, and we don’t live in Massachusetts. But what seems clear to us is that these opponents to gay marriage are frighteningly well organized, while we are at best a ragtag crew that gathers together occasionally for cocktails and parades and sunbathing. Nobody carries a pen to these events, much less a ballot initiative petition. (Honestly, we’re lucky if we can even get everyone to wear underwear.)

So we had an idea. What if we started a queer RELIGION? (Unitarian doesn’t count, even though it’s pretting fucking gay.) The Mormons did it less than two hundred years ago! Something that everyone could agree they believed in - that everyone loved and wanted to get involved in. We could take the best elements from other faiths! We could invent heirarchy of holy figures, like the Catholics. Following the Buddhists, we could practice our religion on our own in a quiet place, or in groups if we chose. Like Fundamentalist Christians, we could encourage gays to donate money regularly - and there could even be online worship. That way we could create an huge database of contacts, and reach people quickly and easily!

And hey, for the Jews we could even throw in some institutionalized guilt.

Now if we could think up something like that...

Anti-Gay Politician Wears Popped Collars, Once Laughed At Will & Grace

Conservative hacks are rumbling that Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, a vocal anti-gay rights activist, is just too 'mo friendly for a national GOP candidacy:

"He opposes gay marriage, refuses to allow out-of-state same-sex couples wed, and supports amending the state constitution to bar gay nuptials, but for many in the the right wing of the Republican Party Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney still is too tolerant of gays and lesbians to get their support for a presidential bid.

They point to a 17-year-old Massachusetts law that allows governors to issue one-day certificates to officiate at weddings. Romney has been granting dozens of those certificates to people who want to perform same-sex weddings for friends and relatives. The certificates cost $25. The Boston Globe reports that last year Romney approved 189 requests for special certificates used by people who performed same-sex marriages."

We like this line of thinking. We can't wait for when McCain gets disqualified by Republican brass for being "soft", and Condi Rice loses out because she's just a bit too, well, "white." Alan Keyes for the GOP in 2008!