I'm Told Mercury is in Retrograde

Perhaps that explains why-- amidst the insanity of Steve's dad's house burning down-- my car got broken into.

What they took:
*The change in my console - approx .85-cents
*$5 I keep in the glove compartment
*My Nike sunglasses

What they didn't take:
*My stereo with removable faceplate. They tried, it wouldn't budge.
*My Thomas Bros Map Book from 1993 when I moved to LA
*My dance mix CDs from early 2000
*My Cirque du Soliel CDs
*My yoga matt
*The collectible bags from the Disney employee picnic that they could have sold on eBay
*The empty Redbull cans in the backseat they could have recycled for money
*Empty water bottles they could have recycled for money

Obviously we're dealing with amateurs.

You know when you watch a TV show and there's a dead body with a murder weapon and the hero walks up and you're like, "Don't touch the knife, you idiot!" Well, I touched the CDs, the stereo to see if worked, even the back door where they broke the window so I could lock it (Um, WHY did I lock the door of a car with a missing window?).

So fingerprints were taken this morning, but they'll probably just find mine. It was all very CSI but without anyone to clean up the dirty black powder.

Hopefully I'll get a new window this weekend. I'll probably deal with the stereo after returning from Detroit. Good times.

Crisis with the Thompson Family

Hey Kids,

Yesterday morning, Steve's dad's house burned to the ground. He barely escaped and suffered some burns trying to save Emma Thompson, his cat. He's lost everything-- the house, the cars, pictures, Steve's art-- the works. Sadly, Emma Thompson didn't make it.

Right now the police suspect the fire was started by some kids who were setting off fireworks behind Kurt's house. Other houses were also damaged, and a major investigation is currently taking place.

Needless to say, we're all in a lot of shock. Steve, Jeff, John and myself will be flying out next week; ironically, the extended family had already planned for a reunion, so we'll be attending that event as well.

Keep Kurt in your prayers, and we'll keep you updated on what's happening.

Gay Weddings: Dave & Alonso

Dave White & Alonso Duralde: 13 years together.
Married Sunday, June 22, 2008

Trapeze Showcase Prep - It's All in My Head

In my head, it all works very nicely.
I start from a ball on the ground, do a couple forward somersaults, jump to the bar, hook my knees and the showcase begins...

Not so much when you're actually moving to the beat of an actual song and gravity is in place.

This is what I realized last night as I ran through my showcase routine for the first time with music. I knew there were certain transitions I wasn't quite ready for-- to use an alphabet analogy, I don't know how to go from A & B to D & F-- but I know trainers Aloysha and Elizabeth can help me through that.

I also rushed the routine. Even though I chose a song that would help me move at a good, steady pace (with a couple gay "double clap" moments in it), I would get into a position and think, Okay, this is taking too long, this is boring, move on.... So by the end it felt very frenetic.

I also blanked at one point-- completely-- and to make things worse, I blanked on the few moves that I picked up immediately in class. The easy moves.

I also have some killer bruises on my left leg (which I only saw this morning after showering at the gym). I'm wearing shorts to work. I can only imagine what the co-workers are going to think.

At least I had Aloysha take a couple pictures of me looking good on the tissue.

Celeb Sightings, Super F-R-I-E-ND-S

Steve and I went to a preview screening of Wanted last night. Fun action flick-- comic book all the way and there are some extreme moments where the movie's "rules" kind of get twisted, but definitely worth the ride. Oh, and Angelina Jolie is just hot shooting a gun. End of story.

It was the big gay screenings we often attend and we ran into:

Gina Gershon and Jackie Warner. Together. Possible undercover dyke date? Who can say? But Jackie kept staring at me-- I wonder if she knows who I am. Steve and I are semi gaymous, after all. Perhaps she even wanted to congratulate us on our upcoming wedding.







If you have 5 minutes today, there's a fun little video (also pasted below) to check out. It's one of those many edited things you find on YouTube, only this one takes an episode of Friends and edits it into The Superfriends. Kind of genius.

There was something else I thought of writing for today and it escapes me now. I'll toss it in tomorrow if I can remember it. More wedding news next week.

Happy Gay Marriage (in California) Day

And the big news for Rick & Steve...
Our wedding is in September. (More to come...)

Help Equality California keep gay marriage legal!

Celebrity Sightings While Location Scouting

Steve and I ran into four random celebs on Sunday (not that they were all celebs... but one out of four ain't bad). It started with a visit to Larkin's in Eagle Rock, which is owned by our two friends Joshua and Larkin.

The first star we ran into was a real celeb, Hamish Linklater, from New Adventures of Old Christine (to the left).

After eating, Steve went outside and saw Curtis Armstrong who played "Booger" Dawson in Revenge of the Nerds.

Kind of crazy and random, especially for a restaurant in Eagle Rock, but when you're in LA you expect these sort of odd meetings.

Then came the porn star sightings (which we know is why you read this blog, right?)
We ended up at Service, which was formally known as "Mass" at Eleven on Sunday afternoon/evening (What? They changed the name because EVERY GAY in EVERY gay city in America calls their Sunday event, "Mass"? I guess...) Anyway, that's where we met various adult film stars, including...

Brad Benton (and yes, we did pick this horrible photo deliberately because it's tragically hilarious).

We also ran into, and actually hung out with, Johnny Hazzard (yes, I got this image from his website, and YES, it IS pretty genius). He was lovely, especially when Steve and I told him it was our anniversary.

Yes, my friends, Steve and I celebrated our 7th anniversary this Sunday.

So we had a great day, then came home and ate some pizza. Good times.

Oh, we have some big news. But I'm not going to talk about it yet. I have too many other things to talk about this week.

More tomorrow.

I Fell in Trapeze Class

So I'm standing on the trapeze and have to do a forward flip to sitting.

I grip the ropes tightly, lean forward-- PANIC-- and don't let go of the bar with my feet.

One complete and rapid rotation later, I'm on my ass on the ground.

BONK!... the bar taps me in the head as if to say, "Stupid!"

As the photo shows, I wasn't very far from the ground so it was more sudden and startling than painful. I was up in a second trying to perfect the move again.

I hope I get it soon. On July 13th we're having our first student showcase. This is where we each do a 3-minute performance for friends, family and fellow classmates.

I'm somewhat nervous, I haven't settled on my music yet, and it's barely a month away. PLUS, it looks like I'll be doing two sets-- a solo trapeze and then a partner set on the tissue (the long draping fabric) with the other guy named Rick in our class. Just as an aside, Rick and I started at the same time in January. He fell from an ankle hang seconds after I fell.

Pray for us. I'm now hitting class twice a week.

Los Angeles Gay Pride 2008

Do you all remember my special friend from last year's Gay Pride?

Here she is. Lovely.





Well, guess who we ran into this year!

















I think this is the start of a new annual Gay Pride tradition for us. (God willing.)















Steve and I started the day off at my old roommate Mark's condo where we had brunch with a group of his friends. Here Mark and I are, recreating the photo pose that's in every picture from when we lived together.

The group of us then walked down to Santa Monica and began our usual Gay Pride adventures. Here's how it works...

1. Walk into a bar. Realize it's very warm and we must take shirts off.

2. Get a beverage (with friends Kurt, Don, and Kurt's partner Robert who I accidentally hit in the face just as this pic was taken).

3. Look at the video monitors. Race outside when PFLAG walks past and applaud.

4. Walk into another bar and order another drink.

5. Realize the time/space continuum has warped and the parade somehow ended without us noticing.

6. Eat pizza.

7. Go to another bar. Or two. Meet Norma Jean and have your picture taken with her. Make a mental note to put her in the blog so that years later when you look at these photos you'll remember who she was.

8. Stumble into the festival. Eat bad carnival food.

9. Consider dancing but realize you're too tired.

10. Go home and watch HGTV while eating pizza.

11. Go to bed by 10pm.

Pride was a little off for both of us this year. Steve and I decided to leave at the same time, exhausted, and not feeling like it was an amazing weekend. It was fun, definitely, and we had a great time with Kurt and Robert, but it felt like a normal drunken Sunday out-- making us think we probably go out more often than necessary.

We missed seeing Olivia Newton John perform at the festival (we did hear Joss Stone singing on Saturday night). Olivia went on at 8:30pm and we knew we had no energy/interest in trying to be out that late. So we went home, and we're both very happy to not be hung over this morning.

But it did feel like something was missing. Maybe Steve and I are getting old; maybe (as I suggested) we go out too often; or maybe we missed having our enormous posse of 100 friends (like brothers Jeff & John) around. Whatever the case, there will certainly be plenty of other opportunities for us to get our pride on in the coming months.

Gay Pride Friday - Celebrity Sightings

Very fast, we went out last night to The Eagle in Silver Lake and saw...

Norm from The Real World Season 1 (center). Every time we run into Norm at The Eagle there's no one there. I'm not saying he's the bringer of boring nights-- because I've been to plenty of parties with him, including one at this castle he and some roommates were living at in the Hollywood Hills years ago and that was CRAZY-- but the night was lame so Steve and I went home.

But earlier in the night we had dinner at Marix in West Hollywood and ran into...

Alec Mapa (most recently seen as the fashion reporter in Ugly Betty)







Then we saw Drew Barrymore. She smiled at us, and at one point her hair touched my shoulder. We're friends with her friends, and they said hi to us but didn't introduce us.

It's a shame. She needs to realize that she and Steve would be best friends.

Bottom line, she was as adorable and cute as you'd imagine.



Must dash now. Steve and I are having our own personal fashion montage (Set to the Sex And The City soundtrack) in the bedroom so we can decide what to wear to Gay Pride tomorrow.

It's Gay Pride Weekend and...

I've had article deadlines all week.

Plus, I've taken on a bunch of front-end development work at the office (we need to hire a new developer soon). This is only strange in that I didn't go to school to learn html-- I just kind of had some help then taught myself the rest.

So no time for entries this week. It could be an odd weekend. Most of our friends are out of town, brothers Jeff & John are out of town, and that means Steve and I are on our own. We tend to have much fun going solo, and we're both taking Monday off, so I hope to have some great photos and stories to tell at that time.

Be safe out there, and if you're in LA and see us say "hi" for a pic.

Who Does THAT Before Gay Pride (part two)?

Gay Pride is less than a week away, and guess what Steve and I had to do?

A restaurant review!

Specifically The Waffle on Sunset Blvd., Scooter Kanfer-Cartmill’s (The House on Melrose, Naya in Pasadena) tribute to the 24-hour diner. Incredible ingredients, fun flavor combinations, and lots to eat-- this is the type of place you AVOID before the shirtless holiday that is Gay Pride.

You'd go here before International Bear Rendezvous, maybe, but NOT Gay Pride.
Well, it would have been rude to not go (and we sure as hell wouldn't miss an opportunity to enjoy Scooter's food because we have a love affair with her) so Steve and I dove in.

The space is styled like an old-school diner-- yellow, orange, brown and gold and smelling of syrup and fried foods-- and located in an office building near Sunset and Vine. There's also a swank bar upstairs...
Perfect for meeting friends before seeing a movie at the Arclight. Oh, and if you're not a drinker, the "shake and shot" (thick malted shake with a flavored liqueur) is the yummiest way you could ever get your drink on.

And what did we eat? No lie, here we go...

1. A sampling of 3 waffles: toasted pecan with frosted nuts and maple syrup, baked-in blueberry waffle topped with blueberry sauce and lemon curd, and a sticky bun waffle with cinnamon, raisins, walnuts and a maple brown sugar cinnamon glaze

2. Kanfer-Cartmill’s famous mac and cheese

3. Meatloaf with sour cream & butter mashed potatoes and garlic green beans

4. A side of thin-sliced onion rings

5. Cornmeal jalapeño waffle with collard greens, a crispy boneless chicken breast and gravy (pictured left)

6. The off-the-menu secret item— the Double Wide: a sandwich using baked-in applewood-smoked bacon waffles for "bread" and filled with crispy fried chicken, slices of applewood-smoked bacon, lettuce, tomato, sliced red onions and melted Tillamook sharp cheddar cheese with a side of sawmill white country gravy.

And then for dessert (though the waffles would have sufficed, but since we started with them it just didn't make sense to not go all the way)...
7. An 8oz glass of full fat milk.

8. Freshly baked chocolate chip and peanut butter cookies (one will easily serve two people).

9. Vanilla pudding with chocolate ganache in the bottom.

10. Baked hot chocolate (their version of molten chocolate cake-- pictured above).

The shocking part? No leftovers. We were hurting through most of the night, but it was really well worth it. Happy Gay Pride.

Who Does THAT Before Gay Pride?

Next weekend, June 7-8, is Gay Pride weekend in Los Angeles. That means this week is full of boys hitting the gym and dining on Tic-Tacs and chicken broth (for the protein, you understand). They're also madly dashing to various queer stores for fancy shorts, tight shirts, naughty undies and other things I can't mention on this family-friendly blog.

Where did Steve and I go?The 99 Cent Only Store!

We were actually looking for Tab Energy Drinks, which we think have been discontinued, and since the .99 Cent Only Stores are the place where random brands go to die, we hoped we'd find some. We didn't. This makes us sad because Tab Energy Drink may be pink and girly looking, but it's a wonderful low-carb beverage-- especially when mixed with vodka.

The store did have random sugar-free things we thought we would try to see if they were any good (cookies were, everything else was absolutely vile), some Take-5 bars because there are two in a pack they make a perfect post dinner snack, Smartees and Sprees because Steve loves those with a diet Mountain Dew, South Beach breakfast bars because they're a good snack in a pinch, Dentyne Ice-- which was our only useful purchase for Gay Pride weekend because one always needs fresh breath while drinking shirtless on the street-- and Chiclets because we thought it was funny.

This is what your world comes to after forking over serious cash for central heating and air. I can't wait until we start using it!