Friday, June 29, 2007

Levels of Discretion



Further to my recent bitch about men on gaymatchmaker.com.au who can't tell the difference between "discreet" and "discrete", I read one the other night who was looking for "a discreate relationship."

It sort of puts the others in perspective.

Wednesday, June 27, 2007

Yet another man to sigh over



One of the byproducts of tracking my little crushes and infatuations through this blog is that I've come to realise just how quickly they change.

For the last few days I've been fantasising about a friend of mine. Last week he was just a reasonably attractive guy I know. This week he's at the centre of most of my intimate thoughts. Next week he'll probably be back to just being a guy I know.

He's okay to look at (pleasant face, decent body), but the most captivating thing about him is not on the outside. Put simply, he is one of the most selfless, compassionate and just plain nice people I know. Since I tend to be selfish, callous and intolerant of idiots, I think he's a good balance for me. Plus it's always good to have someone around upon whom one can model better behaviour...

You want me to take you to the airport? Well, you can just take your passport and ram it right up your... no, wait a minute. Mr Nice would take you to the airport. He'd put himself in your shoes, appreciate your need and selflessly avail himself to help. I want to be more like Mr Nice. Emulating Mr Nice is a good thing, and let's face it, it's the only way I'll ever learn how NOT to be a selfish bastard.

On the downside, Mr Nice does have a rather serious mental illness. It's not an issue when he takes his meds, but if he goes off them, trust me, all hell breaks loose. I suspect that this, and not homosexuality, explains why he's in this 30s and unattached. Women are pragmatic creatures; they'd look at him and think, "Nice guy (with a great ass!), but mad and stuck in a crappy job, so he's never going to be able to buy me a BMW convertible. Pass."

Whereas I just see the nice guy (with a great ass!).

Tuesday, June 26, 2007

On feeling good


Has this ever happened to you?



(c) www.sinfest.net

It happens to me all the time. Stupid mercurial personality.

Monday, June 25, 2007

Eight things you neither knew nor cared about



I've been tagged by Paul at Paul Up Late to reveal eight things about myself that nobody in the Wide Wide World of Web knows. It's pretty hard, not because my life is such an open book, but because my life is such a long, dull, boring book. I think if my life were a book, it'd be an owners manual for a complicated stereo system that's been broken since 1997.

But I have to write something, so here goes...


1. I don't own any porn. No books, no magazines, no DVDs. I don't even have any stored on my computer - the closest I get are the four fairly chaste images on this blog. I do look at it occasionally on the internet, but I think that if you use it too regularly it corrodes something inside you.

2. Shameful confession #1: I still haven't seen Brokeback Mountain.

3. Shameful confession #2: I have a secret hankering to buy a Kylie Minogue CD. But I don't, partly because it's such a gay cliche, but mostly because I can't see her without being reminded of her 'Locomotion'-era horror perm.

4. On the other hand, I own CDs by Eartha Kitt, Peggy Lee, Shirley Bassey, Abba, St Etienne, The Pet Shop Boys and TWO by Marilyn Monroe. How anyone can look at my CD collection and not immediately know that I'm gay is a mystery.

5. I despise Rob Schneider and all that he stands for.

6. Nobody I know in real life, gay or straight, knows about this blog. At least as far as I can tell.

7. Call me a cynic, but I don't believe in soulmates. I suspect that anyone who claims to have found theirs is merely redefining their soul to match the partner they've got.

8. Shameful confession #3: I have two degrees and an IQ over 150, but I get a huge turn on from really, really dumb men. Providing they're hot, of course ;)

Sadly I don't know anyone to tag with this meme, but if you follow the link back to Paul's blog, there's some interesting stuff going on there. I don't think he's going to be able to resist the demands of readers wanting to know the full story of the "orgasm on the train" episode.

Friday, June 22, 2007

You lefthanded, anticlockwise whorling, dense thumbprinted fag you



If you've been wondering about the current state of sexual orientation research, this article in the New York magazine condenses it down to a few succinct pages. I'm not exaggerating when I say that every single word is fascinating.

It's been suggesting it for years, but now science is proving that "homosexuality", as most of us understand it, is not a lifestyle choice or even a product of inadequate parenting, but a fundamental physiological condition. To argue otherwise is the equivalent of positing that eating bread crusts makes your hair curly.

The article notes that there are some odd aspects of the body, such as the direction your hair whorls and the density of ridges on your thumbprint, that are more prevalent in gay men than straight. For the record, I am right handed, my hair whorls clockwise, I'm the first son of my mother and my thumbprint density seems pretty standard - all of which are heteronormal.


However my ring-to-index finger ratio is as gay as they come. Damn you, ring and index fingers! This is all your fault!

Wednesday, June 20, 2007

Time for some light relief



I've been a little negative in my recent posts, so I think it's about time I did what every gay blogger does when he needs to lift the tone: post a picture of The Rustmeister!






What is it about Rusty that makes him so ubiquitous? Obviously the answer is "Well duh... look at him". But there are plenty of hardbodied hunks on the internet. Why do we all flock after this particular slab 'o man?


I think it's his face, or more specifically, his perpetual expression of mild bewilderment. Rusty gives the impression that, if you just could just find the right words and the right tone of voice, you could trick him into doing anything.


"Sorry? You want me to do what to you? Here? Now? With my what? Aw, I dunno. No, it's not that I'm scared. I'm just don't know. Do you really think it's a good idea? Really? Well, if you're really sure about it..."

It's okay to kill if you're cute

It's a sad reflection on myself, homosexuality and society in general that I look at this man and, instead of thinking "You're gonna pay for what you did, you evil sonofabitch", I think "Whoa, what a hottie!"



Are all gay men this shallow?

Personally I blame Hudson himself. If he had the decency to wear a proper Hell's Angels biker beard (you know, one that looks like he's got a lhasa apso stapled onto his face) this wouldn't be an issue.

Tuesday, June 19, 2007

The dangers of a sub-contracted social life



Over the last couple of days I've been considering my relationships with a few platonic male friends. Or at least, I've been considering my relationships with their wives.

I have a number of friends who are basically big, friendly dogs trapped in human male bodies. They're bumbling, gregarious, fun-loving and loyal. They see the best in every person they meet, and they don't have a mean bone in their bodies.

Their wives, on the other hand, are pleasant enough - even friendly on a superficial level - but they're not as easygoing as their husbands. Perhaps because they're married to anthropomorphised Golden Retrievers, they're... well, let's be charitable and say "protective".

When I talk to these wives at parties, they tend to fix me with the same shrewd stare. This stare says, "I don't understand you. You get on well with my husband but you don't have a wife, therefore something is wrong. I don't like my husband being around wrongness, and I'm not sure I approve of you."


It's not actual antagonism; merely a sort of un-preference. But since wives generally control the social lives of couples, I'm pushed down low on the priority list for dinner parties or intimate gatherings. She feels more comfortable with other couples who are following the same Life Script. Before you know it, my friend's cry of "Hey, come over and have a beer tonight!" has become "Hey, we really should get together sometime."

This has been in my mind lately because one of my good friends is getting married in a few weeks. Perhaps I'm being overdramatic, but his fiance's position seems to be, "He used to belong to you, his gaggle of friends. Now he belongs to me. I will decide his activites from now on, and if you want to see him you'd better remain in my good books."

I see this guy at least once a week, and I've met her maybe four times, total, since they started dating. She tolerates his life rather than embracing it. I fear that she's found a good man, she's snagged him, and she can't wait to dump all of his social baggage and remake their circle to her own tastes.

A year from now, I'll probably be struggling to remember what he looks like.

Saturday, June 16, 2007

Don't sleep with the drummer

I got winked by a guy on gaymatchmaker.com.au a couple of days ago. He wasn’t bad looking, but he seemed primarily interested in meaningless sex, so I’m not sure he and I are much of a match.

He’s also middle eastern, and judging by his writing skills he’s not a native English speaker. While I do admit to finding middle eastern men rather sexy, I know from experience that they tend to be… well… less than stable. They’re either convinced that you are the greatest gift to humanity since penicillin, or they desire nothing more than to kill you and wipe your name from the pages of history. Often they can hold both of these opinions about the same person on the same day, depending on circumstances, mood and/or changes in barometric pressure.

So after a little consideration, I sent him the automated, “Thanks, but you’re not what I’m looking for” response.

Then I turned my attention to another guy. At the risk of sounding like a complete fag, he was dreamy: a rugged, uncomplicated face, a great body (well built but not too toned), a professional background and a comprehensible writing style. In short he was attractive, but no so much that he’d be out of my league. I gave him a wink of my own.

The next day, I checked GMM and found a message waiting for me. Needless to say, I felt a little thrill! Mr Dreamy was writing back!

But no. Mr Dreamy was not writing back. Mr Middle East was writing back, to say thanks for the wink, you seem interesting, I’d like to get to know you better.

You want to get to know me better? How about actually reading the message that was attached in large, bolded letters next to the wink… which wasn’t even a wink but a reply to your wink! Damn it!

Yet again Cupid’s arrow misses my heart and pokes me in the eye instead.

All this might be immaterial – just part of the ebb and flow of internet personals – but against my better judgement I feel myself being tempted to give Mr Middle East a second chance. He really is sort of cute, in a lumpy, swarthy kinda way…

But damn it, that’s just the loneliness talking! I can tell it as soon as the thought drifts across my mind. I’ve spent the last 24 hours daydreaming about Mr Dreamy, so of course I’m in a romantic mood (not to mention as horny as hell). It’s a classic case of lusting after the lead singer of the band but ending up sleeping with the drummer.

Note to self: do NOT sleep with the drummer. I don’t care how desperate you are.

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Only one of them is the better part of valour



Why doesn't anybody on gaymatchmaker.com.au know how to spell?

Look and learn, guys...

discrete - constituting a separate entity : individually distinct, or, consisting of distinct or unconnected elements.

discreet - prudent; especially : capable of preserving prudent silence: unobtrusive: unnoticeable.

If you are looking to keep your activities on the downlow, you are not looking for a discrete relationship. You are looking for a discreet relationship. Get it right!

I'm sure people can have discrete relationships, but there wouldn't necessarily be any element of discretion about them. In fact, juggling several discrete relationships would probably be about as discreet as a roomful of Lucille Ball impersonators.

Tuesday, June 5, 2007

In any relationship, there is the one who quotes, and the one who consents to be quoted

After my last post about the nature of love, or more specifically the nature of being "in love", I remembered a quote that goes something like this:

In any relationship, there is the one who loves, and the one who consents to be loved.

As with all misanthropic pessimism, it's not quite true, but it contains just enough truth to be poisonously effective. I think the quote sticks with me because it casts those who love as suckers, so I can excuse my own lack of love as "enlightenment".

Ah, the things we tell ourselves in the pursuit of self-justification.

I'd recalled it as being a quote from Rosseau, but of course that name was just one that I more or less completely pulled out of my ass. So I tried googling it. The internet, in its infinite wisdom, suggested that the quote was from Thackeray, Jerome K. Jerome or Somerset Maugham. None of the sources were particularly scholarly, so without any further evidence, I'm going to attribute it to Maugham. It is, after all, exactly the sort of thing that bitter old queen would have said.