Larry and I are no longer a couple. Nothing bad happened - no fights, no one else is involved, and there's still a lot of love between us - just he's really busy and he's about to be even busier and really doesn't have enough time to maintain a relationship. We had a hard time trying to find time to spend together as it was. I'm sad but not bitter about it. I'm gonna think of this as the Firefly of relationships... Beautiful, brilliant and amazing while it lasted and over far too soon. I'm taking only good memories from it and I'm happy we were a part of each other's lives for a time. And hey, I'm still the only non-family person he's ever said "I love you" to, so, yeah, that makes me feel very special. :) I'm gonna go drink and cry for a while now.

Today marks 4 months since my first date with Larry. Which just happened to be 4 months after my 40th birthday and today is also 4 months 'til my 41st. Things with Larry are still good, being 40 is turning out very well and I really don't care about 41. Except it's a cool prime number. Justin's birthday is tomorrow, we're having a party Saturday, I'm cooking dinner. Beef stroganoff with brussels sprouts and bacon crumbles on the side and cheesecake for dessert. And that's about it. Not much point, but it's been a while since I've written a blog, so... Cheers

My boyfriend said that to me one week ago. He preceded it with "I never thought I'd feel this way about someone, but...". There were other words, too but that's the gist. My boyfriend said he loves me, and I'm just super giddy about it. Of course I responded likewise. :) He's a spectacularly amazing man, and I'm still a bit surprised that he was interested in me enough to ask me out for a date in the first place. 4 weeks ago tonight he asked me (in a very sweetly romantic way) to be his boyfriend... we were out - karaoke at the Biz - and he was texting a friend, he asked me what I thought of a message he was about to send to his friend, the message read "I'm thinking about asking Jay to be my boyfriend..." Of course I squeed a bit and told him "OMG, YES YES YES, I'd love to be your boyfriend!" I was kind of surprised because the first night we'd talked, about 10 days earlier, right after he asked me out for a date, he said he wanted to take things slowly and just see how it went. And so now, here I am with a boyfriend who lives like a thousand miles away (not really, just a 30 minute drive, but it feels like forever) who loves me! Did I say that clearly? My boyfriend loves me! Yes, for real, in this universe in which we all reside there is a man who loves me whom I love back. And blah blah blah... the end

I have a date Tuesday! I'm so excited! His name is Larry, he's 4 years older than I am, really cute and a very nice man. He's a hairdresser by day and 3 or 4 nights a week he does drag shows as Lucinda Holliday. I've seen a few of her shows, she does comedy a lot, she's really funny. Anyway I've seen him out of drag a few other times and he always said 'hi' to me, but then a couple of days ago I went with Justin and another friend who does drag (Brad, AKA Veronica Chase) to his hair salon to pick up a wig. We all sat and chatted for a bit and he flirted with me some, then tonight he showed up at a benefit show I went to tonight and we flirted a bit more. When we left to go to Woody's for their costume contest Justin drove Veronica in my car and I rode with Larry. We had a nice chat on the way and when we got there we sat together and he started holding my hand and stroking my leg and back. After a while he asked me "So when can I take you out?" I was a bit surprised... it's been a looooooonnnggg time since anyone asked me out. When I gathered myself I told him "Anytime you want is good with me." :) Later I went out to the patio to talk to Justin, Larry came out a few minutes later... when I was done with Justin, Larry put his arm around me, looked at me, leaned close and asked "do you mind?" I got a sheepish grin on my face and just shook my head and he kissed me... wow, sparks! And that's all I say about it now, this is a family show. ;) -------- in other news -------- Justin went out in drag for the first time tonight as Alotta Amora and did a number - now he's hooked and wants to keep doing it. :D He did really well, especially for it being his very first time, and he got a lot in tips. All the performers tips tonight were donated to The Observer, a newspaper for the LGBT community in Tucson - that's what the benefit was for. W00t Alotta! :D

That's a very strange, truly oxymoronic, phrase. By it's definition, something "aggressive" requires action and it's not possible to act and be passive at the same time. I think it's not possible to use that term correctly at all. So, everyone, QUIT SAYING IT! :P I kid, I kid. :) But I do propose a new phrase to use in place of it: "Indirectly-Aggressive" or even "Obliquely-Aggressive" will work. My father is a master of it and it took me many years to realize that I picked up that bad habit from him and quit being that way. I still act that way sometimes though, unthinkingly. The only mitigation I can offer is that I always feel guilty about it and I never intend to be mean or uncaring. :) I didn't really have a point here, I was just thinking about words. I'm not only a math-geek, I'm a word-nerd too. :D

I don't really have much to write about but I just wanted to write something to get the one about the accident with the bike off the top, 'cause it still unsettles me when I see it. Actually, since my last, I have started 3 blogs which I didn't finish and are now mostly irrelevant because they were about things going on at the time. Maybe I'll rewrite and finish them at some point, but probably not. The topics were mostly about going out or the people I met while out, so nothing important. Or interesting either, probably. :P The only thing of note recently was meeting a guy I really liked and who seemed to like me, at least he told me he wanted to see me again but he hasn't called yet, so... whatever. I haven't called him either and there's no rule that says he has to call first, except he said he would. That happens a lot, not to me, but still, gotta stay positive. :) I don't want random hookups. Everybody says that, but it seems to be the thing that happens most of the time. I want a relationship with someone I can get to know and care about and who cares for me as well, so I guess I'll keep looking. And who knows... maybe he's nervous and wants me to make the next move. He told me I was the first guy he's been with, I hope that wasn't just a lie to convince me to have sex with him. We didn't just jump into bed, it was several days between when we first met and we talked for a few hours in his home before we did anything. I know that sentence doesn't make sense grammatically, but I'm not gonna fix it. Anyway, he told me I was his first after we were already ... um... doing stuff, so I don't think it was just to convince me to. I was already obviously convinced. ;) God, I'm such a slut. At least I think he enjoyed it. :) I'm gonna go take a shower and get ready for work, and then text him before I finish this. Nothing ventured... Fortune favors... [start some other encouraging platitude implying its end]... Okay, I just sent him a text reading "Hey, Chris :) How's it going?". So, we'll see what happens. Wow, this is a first for me, writing about my lack of a love life as it's actively not happening. :P See, this is the problem with sharing so much in the DOTT and other OT threads, I having nothing left to write about in my blog. But I guess I did have something to write about in this one after all! 5 minutes later... No reply yet. I hope I'm not being pushy or clingy. I found him on FB and resisted the urge to add him. It's getting close to time when I need to leave for work so I should probably wrap this up. But I'll leave it open and submit it right before I leave. And if he replies I'll write about that too. I'm gonna write both a Yay he repied and a Boo hoo no answer yet line right at the end and delete the one that is not true Another 5... Still none, I'm getting nervous and losing hope a bit. :| 20 minutes later... Boo hoo, nothing yet. :( Okay, bye bye, thanks for reading. :)

I had one of the freakiest/scariest experiences of my life last night after one of the funnest nights out I've had recently. Justin, Peggy and I went out last night, we started at the Biz for karaoke. We stayed there for a few hours, 'til a little after midnight. We decided later to go to Woody's for karaoke there... I had had a few pints of beer so Peggy drove us to Woody's in my car. We stayed 'til closing, 2 AM. On the way home we were talking about all sorts of things, among them about how one night it would be nice to rent a limo so we could all drink if we wanted and ride around in style. While we were talking about that, something happened. We were in the left hand lane, Peggy was still driving, being the only one who hadn't been drinking, Justin was riding shotgun and I was in the back seat. I saw a guy on a bike appear out of nowhere from behind some bushes in the median, right in front of my car while we sere driving about 30 mph. Justin and I both exclaimed and Peggy slammed on the brakes, but there was nothing to be done... we hit him less than half a second after we saw him. We came to a stop very quickly and we all jumped out of the car to check on him, all of us reaching for our phones to call 911, but some bystanders got through before we did. When I first approached the guy I thought he must be dead and I started to panic, but then I saw him moving a bit so my panic was lessened, just a little. His movement was seizure-like so I thought there might be some serious brain trauma because there was also a not-insignificant amount of blood on the road under his head. I turned away for a second to gather myself, that much blood really scared me. While I was looking away I saw that the mangled bike had been thrown about 30 feet down the road, but what really freaked me out were the guys shoes. They had been knocked off his feet and were lying on opposite sides of the 3 lanes of our side of the road, about 50 feet further on, one in the left lane, one in the right while he was on the line between the middle and left lanes. The shoes lying there as a result of the collision is an image I will never ever forget. It really drove home how hard the impact was. And it makes tear up and feel guilty just thinking about it. I know it is misplaced guilt, but I can't help it... it was my car and I was there when someone got hurt. I turned back and knelt down next to the guy, trying to help the bystanders who rushed in keep him still until the EMTs got there. Eventually an ambulance came and he was tended to, but he was struggling and trying to refuse to go to the ER while they strapped him to a stretcher and loaded him up. Most of the bystanders had left by that time and the police told us to sit on the curb and wait. At one point one of the officers questioned me about who was driving, what I was doing, how fast we were going where we struck the cyclist and if the driver had been drinking. The answers were... Peggy, sitting in the back seat, about 30 MPH, left lane near the median and no. Another officer administered a field sobriety test to Peggy which she passed handily. We were all feeling scared, nervous and guilty, even though there was nothing we could have done to prevent the accident. We were all crying, and Justin started having an asthma attack and trouble breathing. We had to stay there, sitting on the curb, until a crime scene photographer came and took pictures. Eventually he did, and we were allowed to get up and walk around. One of the officers called the hospital to check on the guy and told us that the guy was going to be okay, nothing more severe than a sprained ankle, which was a huge relief for all of us. He also said that the guy had been cited for improperly riding his bike on city streets and for riding under the influence of marijuana. That was another minor relief, knowing that neither Peggy nor I would be charged with anything. Still though, I worry for the guy and hope he'll be okay, and can't help feeling a bit of guilt. Another reason not to do drugs, kids. You do stupid things and get hurt and others bear the emotional guilt. Justin called his sister, who had come over to stay with us earlier in the day, to ask her to pick us up. We walked to a fast-food sandwich shop on the next corner and waited for a few minutes until she got there, about 4:30 and we got home shortly after 5. So, 2 weeks ago we each had a car, now Justin's is ... somewhere, probably still in Wikieup, and mine is in the city's impound lot, (with a newly damaged right front bumper, quarter panel and hood) until I can afford to pay the towing and storage fees and we're down to only Peggy's small pick-up truck. I have the option of taking the guy to small claims court to try to recover any damage related costs but I doubt it'd do any good. Still, those shoes haunt me. Here's the damage to my car...

...Or, What Happens in Vegas Stays in... Wikieup. I know, 3rd blog in less than a week. That usually happens only when... never. Only once before, when I was feeling hurt, pissy and sorry for myself. Since my birthday morning blog: I had a great day and evening on my birthday. Most of the day I just relaxed and read. My daughter sent me the sweetest hand-made card ever that made me cry happy-tears. She's just so sweet and thoughtful and generous and I love her more than anything in the world. About 6 I met Cathy so we could carpool to the restaurant for dinner since it's on the other side of town. We got there about 6:30 and had a great time just chatting and catching up. I hadn't seen Andy in more than 6 years, and I was a little nervous to see him again because it had been so long and I've changed a lot since then, but it was just like old times. Everything was fun, we all talked for more than an hour before we even ordered dinner. If I weren't gay Andy would have a fight on his hands over his girlfriend, she's great and fun to talk to and she's just as obsessed with Firefly as I am. :D We left the restaurant about 10, of course after I had my delicious birthday cheesecake. Cathy dropped me back at my car about 10:30, before I got in my car Justin called me to say there had been a change of plans and he was not going to Vegas after all. When I got home, about 11, Justin was trying to figure out what he wanted to do for the weekend since his plans had been canceled. He suggested we go to Phoenix for a few days, I was wavering on the idea when his cousin, who he was going to Vegas to see originally, called and told him to come anyway, so he got his stuff ready, I helped him clean out his car and he left about 2:30 AM on the 3rd. He was back 10 minutes later after having been pulled over, right as he left the apartment parking lot, for having a burnt out headlight. We searched for a 24 hour auto parts store, but the only one we could find was more 20 miles away, so he decided to wait a few hours until it started getting light and leave then. It was about 4 when he went to lie down. I set my alarm for 6:30, just in case, 'cause I was intending to stay up 'til then anyway. Well, time does it's thing and makes me sleepy, so sleepy that I don't hear my alarm. I woke up about 7:30, woke Justin and he was on his way. I went back to sleep for a few hours, then spent the rest of the day just relaxing, posting/tweeting, enjoying the solitude etc. I woke late on the 4th since I had no plans other than to continue my few days of lonely (not the bad kind) relaxation. In the afternoon I went to the mall to have a late lunch/early dinner and buy some pomade for my hair (never done that before). When I got home I decided to satisfy my seriously hard-core jonesing for Firefly since I hadn't watched it recently. I plugged my lapyop into the TV and watched all the eps available on HULU (Jaynestown through Trash), and just reveled in the Whedony goodness. This took me beyond the point when all the fireworks displays were over, but I didn't mind. After 40 years, they all start to look the same anyway. I finally finished the BSG mini-series and started watching the rest of the first season (really good, so far), but, again, time etc... Sometime around midnight I fell asleep... ... To be awakened by a text message from Justin at about 3 AM saying his car was broken down and a cop was dropping him off in Wikieup, AZ and he needed a ride home. It's a tiny little town in the middle of nowhere, about 250 miles from Tucson, with nothing but a gas station and a restaurant. Which was closed at the time. I had gas enough to get about 50 miles and no cash to buy any more. I tried calling a few friends to beg to borrow some until I get paid but no one was answering. Cathy called back about 3:30 AM and, once again like the saint of a true friend she is, said I could have whatever I needed. Her purse was in the front seat of her car, which was unlocked, at home, just take what I needed from it and pay her back when I could. It's so great to have a friend who trusts me implicitly and will always do what she can to help. I love her dearly. So, I called Justin back to tell him I'd be on my way shortly. While I was on the phone with him I drove to Cathy's, found her purse, rooted through it until I found her cash and took $72, drove to a convenience store and filled up. I finally hit the highway at about 4:30 AM. It was a longish, unfamiliar, drive during which I spent probably about 2 1/2 or 3 hours on the phone with Justin. He was giving me directions in places I didn't know while he was trying to cope with the cold, tiredness and nowhere to rest, then later the heat of the Arizona sun. We got disconnected many times because, once out of the major metro areas, there's not much cell service between here and there. My phone's battery was on its last bar by the time I got there and I don't know how many roaming minutes I racked up. I pulled into the gas station where he was waiting at about 9 AM. He already had a little extra color in his face from the sun. He hopped in the car and was already snoozing within 5 minutes. About 20 minutes into the drive back we passed the spot where I thought he had broken down and I didn't see his car, so I woke him, kinda worried that maybe it had been stolen. Turns out it was a few miles further on, so we stopped and retrieved some of his things and talked about what he should do. We briefly considered going back to Wikieup to get some oil and see if he could drive it any further and started driving back there, but decided not to after a few miles and turned around to head home again. We stopped by his car one last time to get more things the drove straight back, stopping once for gas. I almost killed both of us when driving on the freeway in Phoenix on the way back. I was just driving, following the car in front of me, and I drifted off for a second. I startled awake and realized I had made an unintentional lane change, thankfully there were no cars in the way. So I pinched myself hard on the leg to wake myself up fully and finished the trip without incident. We got home about 2 PM, I checked in online and then passed out until about 6 PM tonight. You may have noticed, nowhere in this nearly hour-by-hour, or event-by-event, account of the past 3 days did I mention Peggy. She was off having a weekend camping date at a lake with her guy and his boat. She got back about 8 tonight, mildly sunburnt and with a hornet sting on her leg. And I've spent the past hour or so, off and on, writing this blog and I've come to the point where the recount is catching up to reality. Weird. I am now typing this sentence. And then this one. I s'pose I should end it here because it's just getting silly, in a stupid, not funny, way. Goodnight. This has been an eventful, and mostly fun, birthday weekend+. Not a bad way to start year 41. :)

As of right this moment (2010, July 2nd, 7:05 AM) I am 40 years old. And, yes, I do feel older. :P Older than I was when I was the age many of my friends are, anyway. As I expressed in my previous blog and subsequent comments, it has been an eventful year, with lots of unhappy experiences which have served to highlight the more numerous positive things about my life over the past year. I am a much different person than I was only 2 years ago. Even though my life isn't ideal (Whose ever is?), I think I'm more functional as a human being than I've ever been before. And in large part that's due to the friends I've made here (and Twitter and Facebook) over the past year and a half, and the new/renewed off-line friendships since I've been back in Tucson. Because of things that were done to me when I was a small child by people I should have been able to trust, I have a tendency to be very closed off. I appear to be very open and sharing, but that's a defense mechanism to prevent people from prying, and there has always been a wall that could not be breached... you can get to know me to a certain point but after that I've never been able to get any closer to anyone. That's a large part of why my marriage ended, and also what kept me living in denial of being gay for most of my life. I've been suicidal since I was 10 years old, and have acted on it twice, in my 20s, and came close to a third when I lost my job and apartment last year, in addition to the self-destructive choices I've made my entire life. I've been trying to change these things about me and having friends I can talk to candidly, without fear of judgment, both on-line and off, has been, quite literally, a life-saver for me. And a life-changer. For the good. :) I write these things not to generate sympathy but simply to express truths about me (from my perception) that I think my friends should know. And because I'm feeling extra share-y right now, some more about me (as if that's not enough already)... I write this without conceit: I am one of the most intelligent people you'll ever know. I say intelligent because sometimes, quite often actually, I'm not very smart... I've got the brain power, I just don't always use it well. This is both good and bad because I learn quickly and am able to figure things out pretty easily, but I also tend to over-analyze things and live in my head too much. I am generous to a fault, it's very easy to take advantage of me, even unintentionally. Ask something of me and I will do whatever I can to do it, even if it's detrimental to me. The thing is - even if it's unintentional I am always aware when I'm being taken advantage of and it can generate unfair resentment in me that would be avoided if I simply learned to say "no". Again, that's a defense mechanism, I want people to like me so they won't hurt me. I find it hard to trust people, but I do tend to give people the benefit of the doubt about their intentions. And once you've earned my trust it's life-long... you'd have to do something truly heinous to lose it. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Enough of the heavy stuff. It's my birthday and I should be cheerful. I am over-all happy, mostly healthy and I'm living in my favorite city in the world. I have great friends whom I love and, I think, love me back. And of course my daughter, who is my life and, luckily, hasn't started hating me yet, even though she's almost a teenager. :D Instead of being worried or fearful of turning 40, I'm excited that I've had the chance to, because, honestly, there were times in my life when I thought I'd never make it this far. Last night Peggy and Justin took me out to start celebrating. :D We went to a place called Howl at the Moon where Justin DJ'd for the evening, then after midnight we went to the Biz for karaoke. We brought cupcakes and a regular cake that Peggy got for me. I had so much fun, I sang a few songs and the whole bar sang Happy Birthday to me and a girl who was also celebrating her birthday. Tonight Cathy and Andy (2 close friends I've known since high school) are taking me out to eat at the Cheesecake Factory, so, yum! And my birthday card from my daughter should be arriving today! From here it looks like it's going to be a great day to start off a great year. :) Urgh! B1tch-ass tv.com is ruining this. I have no HTML tags here yet it's complaining about mal-formed ones and it's not letting me use my preferred title of "40" because it's "all caps" so the time it's taking to "fix" these things that weren't broken and finally get this posted has made me miss the exact time I wanted to post this. :evil:

I don't usually do the traditional "reflect over the past year" thing for my birthdays, but the upcoming one is fairly major, so I might as well... Over the past year I... (more or less in order) Fell for someone Lost a job Moved to a different state Had my heart broken Went to Disneyland Started questioning/exploring my sexuality Moved again Got tattoos Got more tattoos Got a tongue piercing Met a new really really good friend Had heterosexual sex for the last time Got my nipples pierced Moved again Realized I'm gay (or maybe stopped living in denial) :) Came out! Moved again Moved again So, it's been an eventful, but all in all good, year for Jay. :)