Author: Becky

This. Makes. Me. Crazy.

Ah… June. The annual opportunity for whiners to say to their gay brothers and sisters, “Stop dressing (or undressing) like that for the Parade! You know the media will focus on you. Then all the straight people will be scared and think we don’t deserve equal rights and blah blah blah…”

Spectators who are too stupid to have figured out where the media turns its cameras are too stupid to grasp the concept that “equal rights” is not the same as “special rights.” If a parade was 500 people calmly strolling along in business suits, the streets wouldn’t be lined with anyone, including the media, and it still wouldn’t make stupid and mean people strike their foreheads and exclaim, “Oh my gosh, yes! They are JUST LIKE US. Quick, let’s give them the right to marry and adopt children and leave their partners their worldly goods and not be fired or bashed or ostracized for who they are!”

It’s a parade. It’s a PRIDE parade. So if getting your sculpted body on a bar float, or wearing a wig that weighs more than a golden retriever, or pulling the leather out of the closet helps you feel proud of who you are and celebrate it, hooray!

And next time, dammit, throw me more beads because that bratty kid next to me who was there with his whole family–and I’m betting NONE of them were gay–was lunging for and snatching everything that came our way.

Joys of Home Ownership, Part 2

Good thing it was a cool night last night and we have lots of fans. New central air unit: $1700 including tax and labor. But it will be installed today, and the guy who came to check things out is a responsible pet owner.

I figure the unit in Tim’s apartment is about three years behind this one in needing to be replaced. At least I know what I have to look forward to.

Tim’s and Jim’s planet

Mercury does not go retrograde until July 23, so what IS wrong with the universe? Recurring modem problems, air conditioners breaking down, computers dragging, things costing more than they should. At least R&L closed on their house and Greg got moved before that planet started messing with us.

Speaking of the universe, the moon was beautiful tonight. But no one howled.

I really need to get to work

Things that intrigued me before noon today:

My LJ Friends’ entries. (And waiting for an update on R&L’s house closing.)

Meandering through comments on ‘Nathan’s Live Journal and giggling over a discussion of a live web cam that had a Book Crossing book on it.

Meandering through comments on Greg Herren’s Live Journal and finding a sort-of meme from Poppy Z. Brite, who got it from someone else, asking, “What would your Self of 11 years ago think of the Self you are today?”

Any takers on that one?

E-mail from FARB. Rob always makes me laugh. Yesterday I was talking to author Dean James, and we agreed that writers need to share more of their experiences with one another. Definitely over the past few months, other authors have helped me keep some perspective on this profession that is best suited for masochists.

A Disney Movie

Several years ago, when my writing partners and another couple of friends and I still frequented our chat room, I was always telling long, pointless stories about my daily life. I never realized how many of these had to do with animals until Tim one time said, “Your life is like a Disney movie.”

It is weird that I could live in the middle–not the urban sprawl–of the country’s fourth-largest city and still have so much wildlife around. The Compound is only a mile from Houston’s beautiful skyscrapers. Yet we have more than the usual pigeons and squirrels (although we have those in abundance). I see and often interact with tons of birds, opossums, racoons, an occasional escaped ferret, and of course, that boldest of urban dwellers, big fat rats. So far, not one of them has sewn me a dress, broken into cheerful song about following my dreams, or rescued me from a wicked stepmother…maybe because I forgot to have a stepmother.

The view from our dining room is a privacy fence. I hung flowers there to make it more interesting. They all died. I don’t know if it was because of our relentless sun or because the cross piece of that fence is what I call the “habi-trail.” It’s a major rat route. Nothing like sitting at the table with dinner guests and remarking, “Oh, look! A rat!” I finally filled the pots with cacti and aloe, all thriving in spite of being on the rodent highway.

Traffic on that highway has been slow lately. I think it’s because of the neighborhood bully, Yellow Cat from next door. Not only has he waged war on the rats, but he keeps beating up everyone’s house cats when he catches them outdoors. Day and night, I spot him all over the ‘hood, looking for trouble. Everybody’s talking about him–Notorious C.A.T.

I suspect his story’s ending is going to be more De Palma than Disney.