…and back, away and back. How can I feel like I’ve been so far away when I haven’t gone anywhere? I still can’t really get into the swing of posting from the house, especially when there are so many irritating little projects to tug at my attention.
This weekend was big on the meat and the magazines. On Saturday thornyc, bad_faggot and I hit the BBQ block party and then wandered around Madison Square Park, which lake a number of the other small parks in Manhattan, is experiencing a bit of a comeback. Pictures will be posted later. Most of the BBQ was excellent, with the exception of the “pig snoot sandwich”, a few flavorless cracklin’s in blah sauce dumped on potato bread. Providentially, a two and a half block long hindu parade passed by, reminding us of the brisket we had so sacrilegiously consumed moments before. While wandering around I spied my hair and facial hair role model seated on a park bench and we managed to plunk ourselves down nearby and light up our pipes, much to the amusement of a number of onlookers.
Next we sped off uptown, where Thor had gotten tickets to a program of shorts at the G&L film festival. Most of them were dismal. The most interesting was a brief documentary about a guy who has modified his body by pumping two pounds of silicone into his dick. It contained footage of windmills.
Afterward we had burritos in Chelsea, and I dragged him to a benefit auction I had some work in, to raise money for Richard Foreman’s work. Thor was good sport, hanging out for an hour or so, leaving me to make my way back to Brooklyn under my own steam.
Sunday, bad_faggot drove me over to the Elizabeth Ikea, where I fell victim to the carefully designed retail environment and ended up in the sort of shopping haze that eats up time and energy. We escaped late in the day and then duplicated the experience at a Home Depot and a Lowe’s on Staten Island (Lowe’s now officially wins, by the way). I got to see someone’s mom’s house.
Monday became all about installing all the IKEA purchases and then sorting through the enourmous number of magazines, comics, zines and such that have accumulated. My reward was the shocked laughter and outbursts of amazement that accompanied bad_faggot’s discovery of a particularly choice bit of ephemera that’s been sitting around in a box for a decade. The down side is that all of this stuff is slow going, and to really do it right, I would need to let the house get much messier than I’m prepared to do right now. So the sort is provisional, and hopefully I can schedule a more detailed version later.
Current box tally: 18 left out of 200 some odd originally.
Did you get some Lingonberry juice from the Swedish food store? I LOVE IT! I also love the Julskum candy. Fuckin’ awesome!
I miss Juls cum so bad 😛
Now that I’d love to see. I hope you took photos!
Which, I trust, was the most interesting part of the docco, considering the way you mention it. Doesn’t bode well for Mr. Two Pounds Of Silicone in any case.
Mr two pounds is in your neck of the woods, actualy and the windmills in question were the ones to the north east of SF.
I met that guy with the silicone dick. He was hanging out (literally) at Mark Chester’s studio in SF during Folsom. I asked him all about it and he let me touch it.
Yep – he seemed like a nice enough guy in the film. And i can understand the appeal, though it doesn’t quite turn me on.
Are we talking the cruisy Golden Gate Park windmills?
(Head thrown back, guffaw): Windmills? I want stills of both images on a wall in my apartment. OBviously that is the last missing piece to my full picture of happiness. 🙂
(Pout): Although NYC scares me generally (never been there, owner of the turnip truck here), I would love to tromp around it like y’all do! Like ragamuffins loose in the city of museums and jabber and smoke.
“…reminding us of the brisket we had so sacrilegiously consumed moments before.”
Sin for me, Baby! Siiinnnn!
even better than BBQ, which is saying a lot
You forgot to mention the highlight of the entire day, if not weekend — getting to see the first just-off-the-press copy of your catalog, Some Kind of Love: Nayland Blake Performance Video 1989-2002 which goes beyond the title to include the broadest overview and documentation of your work to date, as well as a lengthy interview with lots of words, not all of them large. Why not give your fans here a little taste?
MMMMMMMMMM beastbriskett – sacriliscious!
Re: even better than BBQ, which is saying a lot
Damn you, Thor! First the Bluto thing, and now this. Is it your goal to get me all hot and bothered with no way (well, save for one) to fulfill my desires?
And no, it’s not the Madame! Eugh!
Re: even better than BBQ, which is saying a lot
Is that Mark Raymond- the guy with the silicone dick? He was in my class at City College a while back..real nice guy…strange fetish…I just remember him always usingthe stall to take a piss…whatever…It’s not that I would have looked or cared anyway…
Re: even better than BBQ, which is saying a lot
I think it is him, although I can’t quite recall the name right away. The thing that I found disturbing was that I seems that the silicon is injected under the skin directly, meaning that it’s just loose in his system. Has the research on toxicity of internal silicone been completely discredited?
I’d love to feed you a whole bunch of banana…
I was so frazzled by the end of my time there that I just collapsed on a bench and ate two hotdogs – a no-no on my new dietary regime. Fruit juices are also a no-no so I just had water.
All the more Juls cum for you!
Well HELL YEAH!
i actually interviewed mr silicone a couple years ago for Unzipped magazine. it provoked a lot of reader outrage.
Mr two pounds is in your neck of the woods, actualy and the windmills in question were the ones to the north east of SF.
Yep – he seemed like a nice enough guy in the film. And i can understand the appeal, though it doesn’t quite turn me on.
Oy – reader outrage -the least fun outrage of them all. Hey, how’s the movie? I haven’t seen it yet…
MMMMMMMMMM beastbriskett – sacriliscious!
Re: even better than BBQ, which is saying a lot
I think it is him, although I can’t quite recall the name right away. The thing that I found disturbing was that I seems that the silicon is injected under the skin directly, meaning that it’s just loose in his system. Has the research on toxicity of internal silicone been completely discredited?
I was so frazzled by the end of my time there that I just collapsed on a bench and ate two hotdogs – a no-no on my new dietary regime. Fruit juices are also a no-no so I just had water.
All the more Juls cum for you!
Well HELL YEAH!
Oy – reader outrage -the least fun outrage of them all. Hey, how’s the movie? I haven’t seen it yet…
yay for 18!
That’s quite the achievement, down from 200!
I’m currently in the process of a move, and am trying to ditch things right and left (old unstretched paintings, microwaves, ugly t-shirts, books). Heartbreaking but freeing, too!
Re: even better than BBQ, which is saying a lot
that marionette in the box is very like Bill and Cora Bairds work, where did you find it?
Re: even better than BBQ, which is saying a lot
It’s a replica of Madame, the dummy used by famed gay ventriloquist Wayland Flowers (best-known for about 10,000 appearances on Hollywood Squares. Between him and Paul Lynde, it seems they knew which side their bread was buttered.)
Re: even better than BBQ, which is saying a lot
It actually is one of Flower’s original Madame puppets, not a replica.
Re: even better than BBQ, which is saying a lot
and now they have Bear in the Big Blue House! (who was unofficially outed in a Leonard and Larry strip – as if we didn’t know, he’s a bear for fucks sake! 😉
Re: even better than BBQ, which is saying a lot
I’d love to see more of Madame we didn’t get her over here
Re: even better than BBQ, which is saying a lot
It actually is one of Flower’s original Madame puppets, not a replica.
Re: even better than BBQ, which is saying a lot
Madame was, basically, a drag queen. Only in the 70’s, eh?
(Though in the 80’s, she starred in a bad, syndicated sitcom called Madame’s Place.)
Re: even better than BBQ, which is saying a lot
Wow, that’s very cool.
I seem to recall Flowers had another dummy, a black female character. I can’t for the life of me remember her name, though.
SAUSAGE!
Re: yay for 18!
Thanks for noticing this. Believe me it has been an long hard struggle, but it is actually coming together a bit more each day. Only took me two and a half years. Now my big advice is eliminate it before you have to move it!
Re: even better than BBQ, which is saying a lot
I think Madame was more along the lines of a Sophie Tucker/Mae West/Moms Mabley/”dirty old woman” than a drag queen.
Here’s a sample line from a video of his/her nightclub act:
(Madame relates to the audience her latest escapade with a very old age boyfriend): “We were humping, thumping and hoping, neither one of us getting it off, so I stop and ask him, ‘what’s the matter Jaime, can’t you think of anyone else either?'”
I wonder how many Madame puppets there were? Reportedly he was buried with one, there’s one in the Center for Puppetry Arts museum in Atlanta, and this one here.
There’s a good short bio of Wayland Flowers and his Madame at the online GLBTQ encyclopedia, here: http://www.glbtq.com/arts/flowers_w.html has written several incisive essays for, which you can find here: http://www.glbtq.com/contributors/bio_277.html).
(which, incidentally
Re: even better than BBQ, which is saying a lot
At the time of the auction I was told that there were six all together. This one had belonged to Flower’s agent.
And the creepiest part: That isn’t paint on her face – she is actually wearing make up. The smell reminded me of my grandmother.
Re: yay for 18!
Thanks for noticing this. Believe me it has been an long hard struggle, but it is actually coming together a bit more each day. Only took me two and a half years. Now my big advice is eliminate it before you have to move it!
Re: even better than BBQ, which is saying a lot
At the time of the auction I was told that there were six all together. This one had belonged to Flower’s agent.
And the creepiest part: That isn’t paint on her face – she is actually wearing make up. The smell reminded me of my grandmother.
The next step after seeing Mom’s house is, of course, meeting Mom. :)One person in our circle has already been so fortunate. I have this elaborate, dangerous fantasy of the Leatherbears on her back patio, gnawing on bones, huffing on cigars, and snuggling with Soup (who loves big furry men). Oddly enough, I wonder if she’d even mind …
As to the mags: the laughter was the sound not of derision, but of gratification.
Re: even better than BBQ, which is saying a lot
as a kid Madame was my favorite thing in the world.. i still plan to get her inked somewhere on me