Ginger's follies, foibles and fixations.
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| You Listen to Me, Mr. Kick-Ass Ginger's follies, foibles and fixations. |
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Saturday, June 22, 2002 Funny that Steve would mention wanting to see Britney Spears this weekend, as I've also been pondering going to see one of her shows here in early July. I'm not a big fan of her "music"--with the exception of a couple of catchy dance numbers, the one album of hers I own is pretty unlistenable. But I am a sucker for spectacle, and no doubt BRITNEY! would deliver. Tickets are still available, but man, even the cheapest seats are like 50 bucks apiece, with all the service charges, and if you want to actually see the stage, forget it. Even I have a problem justifying spending that much, even if there is an onstage rainstorm! Unless I decide that spending a hundred bucks to see this generation's dumbed-down Madonna is a worthwhile cultural expense on my meager income, I'll have to be satisfied with the more age-appropriate Laurie Anderson next month. But the big news of today was of course the Coney Island Mermaid Parade! Nell has been talking this thing up all year, and I was excited to go. It reminded me a lot of the Fremont Solstice parade in Seattle (scheduled for today as well). No advertising, no political candidates, no Shriners in little clown-cars--just kooky folks dressed up like fish and a mild dose of public nudity. My favorite float was the White Trash Mermaids. The leading mermaid had a crown of Pabst Blue Ribbon cans and achieved PG-13 status with PBR blue-ribbon pasties. Her fellow mermaid had a tail made out of a patchwork quilt and they were followed by a mermaid-and-mermen jug band. I was grateful to Nell for lending me her new parasol--much like the one in this picture. Aside from nearly gouging the eye out of someone next to me (sorry, lady!!), it was pretty good at keeping me from evaporating in the high-eighties afternoon sun. As much as I generally dislike summer, the lack of humidity and the pleasant ocean breezes kept me from complaining--I actually enjoyed it! Afterwards, we hung out on the beach for a while, watching the kite-flyers and waiting for the sun and the crowds to go down a bit before walking the boardwalk. I tell ya, sunblock is the shit--despite my pasty-ass Seattle skin and several hours in more-or-less direct sunlight, I don't appear to be burned (much). Getting on the F train to come home, a bundle of college-age kids almost crushed me as they drunkenly fumbled their way onto the bench. One girl was pretty much passed out, and the one sitting right next to me kept saying "I gotta pee! Guys, I really need to pee." As she squeezed her crossed legs together, I kept glancing at her nervously and hoped they would get off before I found myself sitting in drunk-girl urine. "How many more stops?" she pleaded with the slightly-less-drunk guy with them. "Eighteen," he answered (truthfully). I think she and I both blanched at that. It made me glad that I don't get that drunk any more, and then a bit wistful that it doesn't even occur to me to get that drunk any more. I mean, standing outside in the blazing sun makes me think of water, not a six-pack of overpriced Corona. I guess that's just me getting old before your very eyes. I found out that there are still tickets available to some Brooklyn Cyclones games! Plus, they have "rush" tickets every game day at 10am, so there's still a chance I'll get to see some baseball in Brooklyn this summer--hooray! And with that, kids, I have to rest up for tomorrow's weekly brunch adventure. posted by Ginger | 10:34 PM Friday, June 21, 2002 Happy summer! I had entirely forgotten about the summer solstice, but I did manage to get outside today. It was a little hot for my taste, but I had better not complain. When it's sunny, in the lower-mid-80s with NO humidity in New York, you better damn well enjoy it while it lasts. Soon enough it will be the draw-your-shades-and-sit-in-the-refrigerator time of year, and I'm not looking forward to that. After 8 gorgeous summers in Seattle, I'm now facing what was one of the biggest misgivings I had about moving here--a hot 'n' sticky next few months. It doesn't help that no matter what is going on outside, it's easily 20 degrees warmer in my apartment, but no doubt you've heard me complain (and complain and COMPLAIN) about that before, so I'll spare you. Because I once again don't have much news to speak of, I'll direct you to read elsewhere. I will likely have more to report tomorrow, after the Mermaid Parade, whee! linx o' the day Proof that Depeche Mode was right-- God does have a sick sense of humor. Courtesy of Reuters. And don't forget your daily dose of Tom Tomorrow. As always, today's entry is full of Things That We Should All Be Thinking About. Thanks for keeping us on our toes, Tom. Finally, lest you think I'm getting too serious, here's a new take on The Super Friends! I must have been busy with girl scouts or snorting ether or something in my childhood because I never once watched Super Friends. Ever. In my life. Still haven't. So, all this time I have had to get all those snarky pop-culture references to "Wonder Twins--activate!" by sheer osmosis. posted by Ginger | 10:03 PM Thursday, June 20, 2002 The Science News is a heap of laffs again today, as we find out--after the fact--that we were nearly crushed by a humongous asteroid. As the article points out, it's not much use worrying about it, but it is kinda funny to think of the scientists slapping their heads and saying "D'oh! Missed that one!" Especially if it had hit us. A nice pointless distraction from dirty bombs and the continued evisceration of our civil rights by the Bush administration. As you can tell, I'm too tired/lazy to report my own news, so in my usual pre-blogging blog-surfing (in which I browse all my friends' blogs to see if there's anything worth pointing out), I found this gem on Steve's blog. It is the best description of a heterosexual male's experience of a strip club that I have ever read or heard. I have always wondered what in the hell guys get out of it--and though Steve doesn't answer that question, it makes me realize that at least some guys find it as utterly unsexy as I do. But then again, I've never been to a strip club that features females, so really I have no room to talk. So I might as well share with you my one and only strip club experience, which was several years ago at the now-defunct Mr. Paddywacks in Seattle. Stationed in uber-gay Capitol Hill, I suppose the intended clientele was guys, though frankly there wasn't enough audience in the place to get a clear idea who the usual patrons were. I went with my friends Michael (visiting from Nebraska), and a gaggle of friends and housemates--all male except for me and Gia, the lot of us sexually attracted to men. There was no cover charge, but you were required to purchase a large watery soda (no alcohol at strip joints in Seattle) for $10. We were the only people there except for a het couple near the stage. The dancers emerged one by one, each dancing for a song and each embodying a "type"--the uniformed muscle-man, the leather guy, the trashy sexpot in chaps, and--my personal favorite--the youngish grunge-boy. To call it "stripping" is a bit of a stretch. As I recall they weren't wearing a whole lot when they came out on stage. And "dancing" is a misnomer as well. Mostly, the guys came out wearing little, moved around aimlessly, then took off whatever they had that wasn't panties. One guy didn't even pretend to dance, he just performed series of poses, like a handstand and some bodybuilder-type flexing. After their "dance," the guys would come out and hustle the meager audience for lap ($10) & couch ($25) dances. All of us had some drinks before we got there, so we spent a lot of time shrieking and laughing. I dig men, but I've never been that interested in seeing people I don't know naked (or in their jockstraps/bikinis, as the case may be). In this case, I didn't find most of the men attractive anyway (musclebound is a turn-off for me), thus the situation was pretty useless as a sexual experience. The guys I was with seemed to be enjoying it a bit more, however, and Michael had his eye on the trashy sexpot in the chaps, probably because he came over to us and repeatedly flashed bits that were probably illegal to show us. This just made me a bit queasy, but somehow this didn't get through to Michael, who bought me a couch dance with the guy. To receive said couch dance, I was led to a back room which was filled with the sort of vinyl booths you find in restaurants. They were scattered around haphazardly, as if they had been removed from somewhere else and kept there in storage. I dutifully sat down, hands planted on the booth at my sides (no patron->dancer touching allowed), while "Jamie" spent a song gyrating around and, sort of, on me. I again got an unasked-for peek at his bits, which failed to appeal to me any more than they did out in the other room. Instead, I spent the whole time peppering him with questions: "Are you gay?" "How long have you been 'dancing?'" "Do you like your job?" "Is 'Jamie' your real name?" "Is the pay any good?" "What other jobs have you done before this?" "What do you think is the fundamental difference between male and female strip clubs?" Jamie, however, was not having any of it. He non-answered each question with an evasive purr that I think was supposed to be sexy, but only succeeded in annoying me (most annoying: Me: "Do you prefer women or men?" Him: "I'm a nymphomaniac, I like everyone." Please.). The song wasn't over nearly soon enough. It didn't take long for most of our party to get bored and leave, but despite the "Jamie" experience, Michael and I were having so much fun it warranted an extra trip to the ATM, as we kept buying lap dances for each other. I ended up with another couch dance--this time with Grunge-boy, "Trevor." He was probably the gayest of the bunch, although he wouldn't admit a preference either (it probably was some rule that they couldn't say, or at least couldn't say to women). Whereas the Jamie experience was humorless in his misguided attempt to be "sexy," Trevor was oddly sexier in that we spent most of the time cracking up. He did the expected bumping and grinding (though no flashing, which was appreciated), but as he was rubbing himself against me, he answered all of my nonstop questions as cheerfully as if we were girlfriends yakking over a cup of coffee. The primary topic was the difference in power dynamics between dancers and patrons at female strip clubs vs. male strip clubs (talk amongst yourselves...). It was so absurd that we both started giggling. At one point he accidentally knocked my glasses behind the couch, and we spent half the song digging around trying to find them. It might not have been the best 25 bucks I ever spent, but it was worth it. After a fun night was had by all, Michael and I stumbled home (because we were tired--you can't get drunk on $10 soda), significantly poorer than when we went in, but with smiles on our faces. Later I found out that evasively-ambisexual "Trevor" had given his real name and phone number to Peter, one of the guys in our party who left early. Figures. A few weeks later Mr. Paddywacks was busted and closed up for good for supposedly violating some obscure regulation or other, while numerous trashy gal-strip joints ("50 Beautiful Girls and 3 Ugly Ones!") not only remained open but significantly expanded. posted by Ginger | 11:54 PM Tuesday, June 18, 2002 I sure dig the science news. We're one tiny step closer to "beam me up Scotty." posted by Ginger | 9:40 PM Sunday, June 16, 2002 Happy Father's Day, Daddy! Yes, JD I called him! He is busily working on his annual summer electronic music concert (see link). If you are anywhere near Lincoln, Nebraska on July 20, come check it out! It's free! But on this happy, HallmarkTM-created holiday, tragedy struck. I dropped and broke one of my favorite Darth Vader pieces. If you're looking for gift ideas, there's one. Besides having our usual Sunday English Brunch at the Chip Shop with Nell, the most I got accomplished this weekend was listening to a lot of Eminem's new album. I've been trying to write some sort of explanation of how I--as a feminist-identified woman--can not only tolerate Eminem's work, but actually like it a lot. But it has become one of those bears of a project that grows and grows until it resembles a cross between a memoir and a graduate thesis, and then basically degenerates into a lot of lyric-quoting. In the middle of it all I have to stop and wonder--who gives a shit whether I like Eminem or not? I expect people to be shocked and dismayed at my revelation of yet another controversial musical preference, but maybe everyone reading this is just shrugging their shoulders saying "Well, after the whole Hanson thing we knew she didn't have any taste anyway." So maybe I'm only trying to convince myself that it's okay. But damn, he really can be brilliant sometimes. Plus he hates George Bush, so, you know...bonus points for that. Speaking of Dubya, reliable information on the situation at Ohio State Commencement last Friday is difficult to find. This AP article was one of the few which even mentioned that graduates were "urged" to greet the president with "thunderous ovation" (see the last paragraph), which offends me more than the equally inappropriate threat to arrest anyone who protests in any way. Unfortunately, the left-leaning watchdog sites--and in particular the letters written to OSU President William Kirwin by enraged liberals--have been disappointingly incendiary and chock-full of exaggerated rhetoric, which I doubt will be of much help. I don't care how valid your point, if you start a letter equating the recipient with Adolf Hitler, you're not going to get anywhere. Still, this event was sufficent to get me pissed off about the constant trampling of our most basic rights by Bush and his passel of bootlickers. So, I wrote my own letter--a real one which I will send in the mail. I'm not posting it online, but if you have any great interest in reading it, I'll be happy to email it to you. posted by Ginger | 10:14 PM |
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