I dropped into Star Gaze on New Year's Eve and met Charisma, the new chef everybody is talking about. Sadly, I didn't have time to stop off for dinner; I was a man with a mission, to photograph as many New Year's Eve parties as possible. I did Touche's, Jackhammer, Star Gaze, Madrigals, Eagle, Different Strokes, Lolitas, and finally ended up at Scot's for the witching hour.
Had a blast at Different Strokes. Frankie Da Kat onstage is an unforgettable experience, and it's always good to see Christian and Brian-Mark shaking their edibles around.
Big Tip: Gina, the Goddess of all things raunchy, seems to be a regular at Frankie's shows now. And you thought soul began and ended with Aretha ...
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Someone has just solved one of the great mysteries in my life i.e. why do people come and talk to me when I'm peeing? It really is the strangest thing, and if I had $5 for every time this has happened in the last year, I could have really hit the after-Christmas sales.
This is how it works: I'm in a bar or restaurant with friends. Eventually I have go to the bathroom. I get myself out and I start peeing, and that's when I hear, "Hey! Aren't you that guy who works for the newspaper?" Often their eyes go down to see if I've got one of those penises that "guys who work for the newspaper have." A sort of minor extremely minor, if you ask melocal celebrity penis.
I imagine them going back to their friends and saying things like, "He's not pierced down there. I heard he was pierced," or "Someone told me he had a big one, but it's a tiny little thing."
And they always say things like, "I loved that thing you wrote about ( Fill in the topic ) ," and I can never remember the article because I've written another 50 since then, and anyway, I'm having a private moment ... I'm in the process of peeing!
I'm not complaining, though; I don't think you can write for a community paper unless you go out and talk to the people you're writing for/about, but why do I always get nabbed when I'm peeing?
Then a friend reminded me that Americans are very polite, and when someone sees me out and they want to talk to me, they don't want to interrupt my conversation with friends, and so they wait until I'm separated from the herd ... in the bathroom.
How sweet!
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Now I know that I'm well past my sell-by date, because I've started getting propositioned by hustlers. I was recently leaving a bar in Andersonville and there was a young man standing outside shivering in the cold. It was bitter cold. He stopped me, and I said I wasn't interested, but I asked him why he didn't go in the bar to keep warm. "They won't let me in there," he said. I didn't ask him why but I guess he was bothering the customers, or doing drugs in the bathroom, or whatever. He looked like he could be trouble.
I gave him enough money for a beer and pointed to another bar where he could get warm. He took the money, looked me straight in the eyes and thanked me. We had one of those deep eye-contact moments. He was beautiful, but desperately lonely and lost. Like William Blake wrote: "Some are born to Sweet Delight, and some are born to Endless Night." I guess the young hustler was the latter.
I hope he's OK. Why should I care? I don't know why I care, I just do.