2005 Gay Pride San Diego

Why do I even bother?

I shoulda stayed in Idaho.

Instead I came home full of expectations only to find a spousal unit who's idea of fun is to drink until he falls asleep on the sidewalk. A guy who is so loud and obnoxious on the elevator coming down the 6 floors from the Top Of The Park, that by the time we get to the bottom I'm telling him I'll drop him off at his next stop and see him in the morning.

After I left him I went out and hit a couple of my favorite local haunts . . . if you can call them favorites. I've never spent much time in either, but compared with the screaming twinkie watering holes here, they're much better. The Loft and Pecs.

The Loft, which would hold 50 on a tight day had probably 300 people in it. After 15 minutes of trying to get from point a to point b, I gave up and spent 10 more minutes making my way back to the door and out on the sidewalk. Two blocks later I hailed a cab and went on to pecs. Slightly bigger -- built to handle 100, maybe, I estimated 600 in the place. It's so strange to be inching along in a worm line and suddenly to stop. You expect there's a reason: we stopped to let people going the other way get by or something. You stand there and get warmer and warmer and you begin to sweat and get a little catastrophically anxious . . . and then you realize you're stopped because the guy in front of you has come upon someone he knows and they need to have a 15 minute conversation before they move on . . . if they ever do. Exhausted, I turned to the guy in line behind me and said, 'You know, I think I've had just about all of this I can enjoy,' and I made a left turn and headed back out the door.

Tomorrow will be just as stupid: the same old floats, the same tired queens, the same muscle boys humping one another as the parade passes by and then the 'festival' with the same vendors selling the same shit they sold last year and the year before and a stage set up for non-stop lesbians with guitars (one of the most frightening things on planet earth) to hold forth for two days. Oh, shit! I hate Gay Pride.

Oh, excuse me. That's not politically correct. What I meant to say was: Oh, Shit! I hate Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgendered Pride. What a complete crock of . . . well . . . .shit.

After I got home from my own two bar circuit party, I leashed up Homer and took him for a walk. That's when I cam across Bob, dead drunk, passed out on the sidewalk about a block from home. 'Hello, Bob,' I said. 'Enjoy the sidewalk.' and I pulled Homer from him and continued on our walk. I never looked back.  Several blocks later I thought how appropriate it would have been for me to call the police and report and dead person on the sidewalk. In fact, I decided to do it, but only after I completed my walk with Homer and doubled back to make sure he was still there. He wasn't. So I didn't do my evil deed.

Instead, I found him at home passed out in bed, fully clothed and wearing his shoes. Although I'd given him a single key to our condo, he apparently lost it or forgot it was in his pocket, because I could see that he had climbed through the kitchen window to get in. Now, that's pretty scary; we are on the third floor and the distance between the railing from which he'd have to leave and the window is about three feet. Three floors below is hard concrete and a steel fence with sharpened prongs sticking straight up. A fall would be certain death. It's a maneuver I'd never attempt. But he did it. Drunk. Fool.

I decided something tonight, before I found him sleeping on the sidewalk and before I saw how he got in the house. You've probably already guessed what it is. But that doesn't matter. I'm not going to tell you, even if to do so would be to simply confirm what you already suspect. But stay tuned, little buddies. I think there's going to be some interesting reading in the near future.

P.S. By the way: I'm not really proud of anything that goes on during Gay Pride Weekend. I certainly don't identify. Think I may drive out to the desert and check in to a cheap motel.