Monthly Archives: August 2009

Hello, all! Coty from the comments here! Since I am actually way too lazy cool to have my own blog, I thought I’d do a simple guest post to show you all my talents (in bed). I actually volunteered to write the post before having any idea what the write about. But since I had ages to write it, I wasn’t worried. I should have remembered that I am a terrible procrastinator.

I will now detail my struggles through interpretive dance lolcats:

So what do you think? BEST POST EVAR?! Yeah, that’s what I thought. Tell me about your procrastination problems and solutions in comments… you know, when you get time.

Today’s guest post comes from the wonderful FDot, from I Deny You The Nidus! who happens to be the ultimate source for all things awesome, including but not limited to the final three episodes of Pushing Daisies, the radio episodes of Torchwood, and my very own DVD of the Star Wars Holiday Special. Enjoy!

By and large, there appears to be in every person’s family one member who, more than any other, provides the bulk of the entertainment for stories to be passed around. The family member whose words and actions generate the most smiles and eye rolling. In my family, that member was my father’s Aunt, my Aunt Marie. Let me tell you a little about her…

My father’s family came from Joliet, Illinois; my mother’s: Garden City, New York. The two families did not meet each other until a few days before my parents’ wedding. My father’s family; especially my Aunt Marie, were very nervous about meeting my mother’s family, as they believed my father was marrying above his class and they wanted to make a good first impression. At the initial get together, the day before the wedding, my mother’s family wanted everyone to feel at ease so her father, in an attempt to do so, poured rather liberal drinks. Aunt Marie proceeded to get plotzed on three incredibly stiff martinis, threw up in the bathroom and ended up missing the rehearsal dinner that night. At the wedding the following day, when everyone kept checking to see if she was feeling better, her story was that she had really not drank very much, but that she had eaten a bad tuna fish sandwich on the way to New York and that was to blame for her sudden illness. She never broke from that story.

In the 1980’s, of all things to happen, Aunt Marie ended up as a contestant on The Price is Right. She managed to get on stage from Contestant Row by winning some exercise equipment. For her game, she played One Right Price, having to decide if her price tag belonged to a sailboat or a bar set. The price was rather high and obviously belonged to the sailboat, but Aunt Marie chose the bar set. Later on, she told me: “Of course I knew the sailboat was more expensive, but I’m 70 years old, what the hell am I going to do with a sailboat?” After her game was over, during the commercial break, she asked Bob Barker how his wife was doing, his wife who had died 10 years earlier. She said he shot her a rather nasty glance. Her response? “I don’t think he’s a very nice man. They put all this yellow tape on his face to try to make him look younger. It doesn’t work. I don’t like him.” Then, to top it all off, at the big wheel she spins 95 cents, only to have the next contestant spin 1 dollar. She ended up donating the exercise equipment she won to a local church for pretty much the same reason she didn’t bother to win the sailboat.

There are many more stories. She would find at least $5.00 a year in loose change and keep them in individual tins labeled with the particular year. Her husband once kicked her out of the car on a thruway for too much backseat driving. To the day she died, she insisted that her family is related to Austrian royalty, despite the fact her side of the family comes from Slovenia. But what I remember the most is the last time I saw her…

In 2004, shortly before she passed away, I visited her at a rather nice nursing home she was living in in Virginia, where she was close to her daughter. I spent a long afternoon with her, reminiscing about family, watching some TV, talking with some of the other residents. At one point, while we were downstairs chatting with other people, a little white haired old lady came into the room and asked some innocuous question. Aunt Marie clammed up and glared at the woman. Once she left, Aunt Marie whispered to me: “I don’t like her. She’s nasty. She’s mean.” No further explanation was given. Eventually, we decided to go back upstairs to her apartment. We entered the elevator in the lobby and turned around to see the little white haired old lady shuffling toward us on her walker, about 10 feet away. “Could you hold the elevator please?” she asked. Aunt Marie stared at her for a second, then said “NO!” and pushed the ‘close door’ button, having the elevator shut in the little old lady’s face. Aunt Marie turned to me. “She’s just a nasty person. I didn’t want her in here with us.” I never did find out exactly why she disliked her so.

Above is a picture of myself and Aunt Marie on that day, just before the elevator incident. She passed away a few months later. Her daughter said that she was laid out nicely on her bed, but word later got to me from her granddaughter that she had in fact, died while sitting on the toilet. I smile at that tidbit, because that would be my Aunt Marie. I can so easily picture her walking up to my father in the afterlife and greeting him by saying: “Larry, wouldn’t you know it, I died on the crapper.”

So Aunt Marie was that one in my family. I’m sure everyone else here has theirs. Who would like to share some of their stories?

Hello everyone, Javi here! I’ll be your guest poster for today while Craig is busy with his writing. Today I present you guys with my “Top 4 Most Awesomest Female Icons” list. Growing up I naturally gravitated to strong women characters rather than the archetypal manly heroes. Many gay men have a fascination with strong women figures that break barriers and I am one of them. However, instead of your typical gay icons like Cher or Bette Midler (not that there is anything wrong with them) I have an eclectic mix of strong women who I admire. They also represent different facets of my personality such as my artistic side or my villainous side. Of course there are more than four on the list, but for brevity’s sake I’ve listed only the top 4. Also some characters are technically fictional but are just the same as fierce. So I present you with my list, enjoy.

1. Ellen Ripley: The Bad Ass (Sigourney Weaver; Alien series)

Perhaps one of the most iconic sci-fi action heroines ever to be brought to the silver screen, Ellen Ripley blasted her way to the top of my favorite female icons list with lots of moxy and a big f’n gun. Played by the venerable actress Sigourney Weaver, Ripley was something rare for sci-fi at the time in that she defied gender norms for women and was not defined by her relationships to men. The first time I ever saw the Alien movies it was love at first sight. I mean here was this fierce woman kicking alien ass and taking names, a woman who didn’t think twice about taping a flamethrower onto a large automatic rifle in order to increase lethality. Watching those movies was one of the defining moments of my childhood. I knew I wasn’t like the other boys at this point (gaaaaaay) and seeing this strong character who defied all expectations really resonated with me. Ripley was someone I wanted to be, a person with immeasurable badassery, confidence and guts. Her final battle with the Queen in Aliens is the stuff of legend in sci-fi. (*fanboy squeeeeeee!*) I am not alone in her adoration though, she tops many a “Greatest [Sci-Fi] ______” list, and she absolutely deserves it. If you have never seen the Alien movies (the first two at least) you do yourself a great disservice.

2. Frida Kahlo: The Artist (Mexican painter)

Frida Kahlo is one of the more famous and one of the first internationally known Mexican painters. She is otherwise known for making unibrows sexy. Her unique painting style is best defined as an amalgamation of her sexuality, Mexican heritage and tortured soul. At first, history only knew of her as the wife of famous Mexican muralist Diego Rivera but was eventually recognized as a talent in her own right. Her life story was revealed to be one of great suffering: childhood Polio, a crippling trolley accident as a young adult, a womanizing husband and a tumultuous marriage. She channeled all of her pain and hurt into her art and was able to create powerful and evocative pieces. I am nowhere nearly as talented as she was but I also like to dabble in the arts from time to time. I mostly doodle sketches and sometimes paint with oils. I express myself through my drawings and painting just as Frida once did. My style is my own, but I relate with Kahlo and understand her passion as an artist and her life and pain. She was also openly bisexual and was very unapologetic about it. Even though she left this world too soon, she left behind a legacy that continues to inspire growing artists everywhere. Oh yea, she was also portrayed by a pair of boobs named Salma Hayek in a biographical film… or so I’ve heard.

3. Hexadecimal: Villain/Virus (ReBoot)

ReBoot was an animated series from the mid-nineties that was the first series ever completely animated in CGI. Appropriately, the setting for the series was inside a computer system and the Internet. Hexadecimal being a villain was of course a virus whose function was to bring disorder to the system. A being of infinite power, she was however clearly very insane. Hex was the self-proclaimed “Queen of Chaos” and very often lived up to the title. She would terrorize the citizens of Mainframe on a whim, for example once turning all the inhabitants to stone with her Medusa bug just for kicks. Although being a benign virus she did not actively infect others, unlike her brother Megabyte. Of the two sibling viruses, she was by far the most powerful being in the system, if not the entire Net. However due to her unpredictable insanity she was never able to put her transfinite powers to any productive means, choosing rather to cause mischief than actual damage to the system. She also had a not so secret crush on the system’s Guardian, Bob, whose mission was to keep the inhabitants of Mainframe safe. A one-sided love, Hex would often kidnap Bob and try to win his affection, sometimes the hard way.

I know what you are saying, “What the eff could this cartoon character have that is icon worthy?” Other than the fact that Hexadecimal was tons of campy fun (the outfits, the masks, the one liners) she was also a very misunderstood individual. She had to live alone in a desolate area of the city and was feared as a monster. She had an unrequited love interest in a love that could never be. These characteristics were all too familiar to young gay teenager in a small southern town in the middle of nowhere. I’m not even going to lie y’all, I was a teenage villain. I would cause trouble as a way of lashing out at the world and out of complete boredom. Needless to say I didn’t have a lot of friends in high school, being the villain was a lonely business. As ridiculous as it may sound, I drew certain parallels with a misunderstood character on an animated series better than real life individuals at the time. But luckily things changed over time for both Hexadecimal and me! Though Hexadecimal went through many changes over the course of the series (once even losing all her powers and becoming a normal sprite) she eventually had to become the monster once again. In doing so she was finally able to use her powers for good and save everyone one last time in one of the most teary and awesome finales I have ever seen. *cries!* We should all be thanking Hex for saving the entire internet! Also the show used a lot of computer terminology in puns and was very geeky! Speaking of nerds, a perfect segue into my No. 4 icon:

4. Rachel Maddow: The Nerd (Television/radio host, political commentator/awesome)

Rachel Maddow exploded onto the primetime television scene with her own show on MSNBC late last year and was an immediate sensation. Although she has been present on the landscape of radio and television for many years (often guest hosting Countdown with Keith Olbermann) she only recently came to my attention at the beginning of this year. When I first saw her show, I was enveloped by her natural charisma and her amazing eloquence, I became an instant fan. After several more viewings of her show and researching more about her I found only more reasons to love her. Not only was she openly lesbian but she was also a Rhodes Scholar and a cocktail enthusiast. I quit drinking a while ago, but would not think twice about having a cocktail with her given the chance. She seems so comfortable in her skin and I love the sound of her voice. Whether she is eviscerating bigots or pointing out the hypocrisy of “family values” politicians who cheat on their wives, she is so entertaining to watch. Gosh, I want to be her when I grow up. Nerd Power!

So there you have it my top 4! What about you guys, do you have any strong women that you admire? Leave your list in the comments!

Here to kick off a month of guest posts is Michelle M. who I’m sure you remember from her amazing Fantastical Creatures and Puntabulous Can posts! Enjoy!