Pride Diary

Hey stranger,

I know, I know. It's been OVER a week. I mean, c'mon, what is this, late 2006? (I say that, because in late 2006, my blogging frequency was spotty at best. AT BEST.)

Well if ever an excuse was appropriate, t'would have been the fact that this past week was Pride.

T'kicked off Tuesday with the Pride Edition of Bitch Salad, which went famously, thanks for asking. Slight snaffoo: we had to compete with something in the next room at Buddies, entitled Pride Prom. "A costumed prom for gay/lesbian/bisexual/transgendered/whatever youth who all probably give terrible blow jobs, as has been my experience with high school kids", as I put it. They was loud and all ova' the place. But whatever, o bla di, o bla da, sha-la-la-la "Life Goes On" is what I always say. Particularly because no one remembers the short-lived ABC dramedy "Life Goes On" starring a young, pre-Gypsy but post-Evita Patti LuPone.

Following that, a gaggle/whack of us headed to Crews for some much needed karaoke - I, personally, had set my sights squarely on Glenn Medeiros' "Nothing's Gonna Change My Love For You" - ONLY TO FIND THAT, *GASP*: Crews was closed. Due to some sort of liquor violation. Can anyone say catastrophe? Probably not if you're dislexic, but that problem is a horse of entirely different colour. Anyballs - yeah. Can you imagine? Crews - Toronto's premiere cover-free, gay-&-lesbian-mixed hotspot which boasts an exceptionally rude and belligerent bar staff - closed?! FOR PRIDE?! Wow.

Anyballs, Wednesday night I took part in a seemingly never-ending Pride edition of Spirits Open Mic, hosted by the incomparable Jo-Anna Downey - WHO, by the by, was on the Pride Edition of Bitch Salad the night previous, and, by the by, received what I might consider my best introduction yet: "What do our first guest of the evening and Maple Leaf Gardens, Sam The Record Man and the GM Plant in Oshawa all have in common? They're all venerable, life-giving landmarks of the Greater Toronto Area. However, what do those things NOT have in common with our first guest of the evening: she's still open and serving the public". Eat your fucking heart out, Bruce Vilanch.

B'anyway - besides being a very late night, fun times continued to ensue there. Thursday I forced myself to have a very low-key day, despite the fact that I had the photo shoot for the next Bitch Salad... expect to have details about that crammed in your face very shortly. After that ended at like, 7:45, I decided to treat myself to a cab home. It was frivolous, but y'know when sometimes, you're just so fucking tired that you'd rather make love to a cactus froggystyle than take the TTC? Well, that's how I felt.

Friday was supposed to be a day off for me, but I had to come into work for a half-day. Boo. This was particularly 'boo' as a gaggle of my friends were heading to Canada's motherfucking Wonderland including, but not limited to Heidi, Yerxa and Bort (YES! BORT. I MISSED A DAY AT WONDERLAND WITH BORT). I haven't been to Wonderland since I was like 11. I miss it. Especially Smurfland. I seem to recall somebody telling me that Smurfland closed. Or maybe it was a nightmare I had - a terrible, terrible nightmare that can't be true - because Smurfland was the shit. Anyballs...

I spent the afternoon doing some last minute Pride weekend shopping. I was super dead-set on buying shoes, but was wearing flip-flops, and didn't want any of that fucking 'you have to put on the store sock' action, so that's still on m'to-do list. Following a perfunctory nap, I headed over to an already-swinging pre party after which we were apparently to 'head to Church, and see what happens'. Church St. was pandemonium. PANDEMONIUM. Holy balls. Do you know the only place we could get into? This random Vietnamese restaurant that no one ever knew existed and even this place was PACKED. We all did shots of tequila, drunkenly heckled the Vietnamese waitress like we were the most entertaining beings on the face of the planet (which, no doubt, we were), and played a game that reared its head three more times this very weekend... 'go around the table and name 80's sitcoms'. Here's how this game breaks down every time:

Someone: Full House!
Someone: Family Matters!
Someone: 227!
Someone: Mr. Belvedere!
Someone: Silver Spoons!
Someone: Alf!
Someone: Facts a'Life!
Someone: Mr. Belvedere!
Someone: 8 Is Enough!
Someone: Webster!
Someone: Roseanne!
Someone: Mr. Belvedere!
Someone: Perfect Strangers!

And so on and so forth... then...

[sometime later]

Someone: ... ... ... Did anyone say Mr. Belvedere?

For real. Happens every time. For some reason "Mr. Belvedere" is that thing that everyone says, but no one remembers anyone saying, but then springs to someone's mind waaaay after the fact. Anyballs - as per expected, I got waaay more hammered than I resolved to (or rather resolved not to), and ambled myself home.

Cut to: Saturday morning. Yikes. Hungover. I blame the Vietnamese. Somehow I got myself functioning and watched the previous days' installment of "The View" - the ladies were live from Vegas all week - with guest Bette Midler, who's currently on stage at Caeser's palace taking over the gig once famously held by Celine Dion (I'm sure Bette's great and all, but I doubt bitch can conduct lightning from her hands a-la Celine...) - Anyballs, apparently excerpts from Better Midler's "The Showgirl Must Go On" did the trick because I was off and running in no time... after some obligatory cardio, booze shopping and a crazily painful Nair mishap, all of a sudden it was time to go.

The scene: Buddies for the annual Homo Night In Canada, which, after what I interpreted to be a disastrous appearance at last year, I was invited back to again this year. So hooray for that. I was on last, so I was completely hammered by the time it was time to go on. I don't remember it going badly, though. So there's that. Anyway - fun fun fun fun fun FUN fun afterwards. Basically everyone I know in the world was there, basically. It was like a high-school dance, only with tranny's taking the place that inappropriately dressed 14-year-old skanks once occupied. Then, for one reason or another, at around quarter to 1, I vamoosed. Yep. For no reason at all. Certainly not [necessarily] because I met someone, and, even if I did - which I absolutely did not (necessarily) - I certainly wouldn't discuss it here as I'm famously guarded about discussing my a.) religion, b.) finances and c.) boy-beav. Not that there's anything to discuss, of course. [Necessarily].

B'aaaanyways, after a surprisingly active evening for going home early and [not necessarily] alone, I was plumb-wiped out Sunday morning. Best efforts were made, but despite them, I missed the parade for the first time in like 6 years or some shit... I know, I know, I know... but from what I heard - it was more of the same. Elderly junk on full frontal display, Beefy be-speedo'd dudes dancing on ridiculous corporate floats and more trannys than you conceivably shake a stick at. But, for old times sake (I used to blog a roundup of pictures I'd taken during pride and caption them humorously... now, because I'm clearly moving up in the world, I'm doing that for Fab magazine...) I'll include a photo that jumped out of me - of a chola tranny, bits un-gloriously exposed to the world, who spun down the street in a gigantic hamster wheel. It's really somethin' to see.

I've gotta tell ya, though - skipping the parade was perhaps the best idea I had... I'm usually so effin' tired because of waking up earlier than I humanly would after the night I usually have before it, then going to it, getting sun, then going home, napping, then being totally lethargic for the night - but no... languidly lounging around luxuriously all afternoon was exactly what the doctor ordered, let me tell ya... I then took in the first 10 minutes of a show that I'm presently obsessed with - "How Do You Solve A Problem Like Maria?" - and met people for drinks on the only patio that we could possibly get seated at, the Micky Finns at Church & Carlton a-k-a Hooker Central. After casually swigging back some cocktails (that's what she said), we strolled our way up Church St. It's at this point that I'm reminded how very much I hate crowds. Sheesh. Then we settled at the Artful Dodger where I didn't [necessarily] meet up with someone I didn't [necessarily] meet the night before and have some more drinks.

Why Heidi Brander is the most amazingly entertaining human being in the world, Reason # 1,229,836: After menus were distributed, she ran across the street to a Rabba, bought a $7 jar of Cheese Whiz, ran back, took her seat, and asked if she could "have an order of steamed broccoli... but, could [she] add her own personality to it?" and whipped out the Cheese Whiz accordingly. The waitresses reply: "Well, sure. But we don't have steamed broccoli." So she ordered toast points instead and added her own personality to them.

After a while, we all parted ways. I heard Heidi and Bort went and sang SingStar karaoke at someone's house. Anth had to work in the morning. Yerxa had been passed out for hours after spending all afternoon line dancing in a beer garden. And once again, I [didn't necessarily] go home alone and [didn't necessarily] do nothing. And that was that with that.

That was pretty much it. I took Monday off and it was the second best decision of my life. Last night was pretty low key as well - just some convergence on a back porch in the west end, thinking we could see the fireworks, which we totally couldn't, but oh well. Luckily the night was spiced up by A.) Bort telling us a story from her childhood - or, rather Borthood - about making her severely hungover grandmother barf by farting in the car and B.) The fact that one Dean McArthur can only communicate via showing people youtube clips recently... anyway... he showed us this - an apparently not-retarded contestant on the latest British version of Big Brother -

Just might be the most uproarious thing I've seen in some time. Certainly since the wheeling chola tranny with mangled business above.

So yeah. That's about it. Not the kind of stuff that makes up for an over-week-long absence, but still. It's at least an alibi.

--- Aj