Manhattan Offender

The white thong of Madison Square Park

Which of the following is most surprising:

• The fact that a guy was laying out in a shiny white thong in Madison Square Park?
• The fact that the guy in the white thong spoke with an Argentinian accent?
• The fact that I did not know White Thong Latino?
• The fact that I did not cam-phone White Thong Latino?

YouTube Tuesdays: Madonna Get Together

Did anyone else watch Madonna with the Gorillaz at the Grammy's this year and not think to themselves:  I wonder how quickly Madonna will have an animated video out?

Virtual WYSIWYG

Below is the transcript of my presentation at tonight's WYSIWYG, based on a post written June 20, 2005.

Hi, my name is Rod Townsend and I have a little site called Manhattan Offender dot com.  The piece I’m reading tonight is from a piece that I wrote on June 20, of 2005.  When I originally wrote this I thought that it could actually make a nice little performance art striptease type of piece.  I’ve since decided that the words are strong enough to leave my clothes on, but if audience reaction isn’t strong enough I’m totally dropping trou.

Sinners on parade

I don’t think I need to tell anyone in this crowd that Gay Pride is back in the city this week, meaning that sin
will be on parade down Fifth Avenue.

Not just general sin, but very specifically the sin of Pride.

Which is totally unfair.

Maybe I should explain.

In my bathroom at home I have a shower curtain designed by Jonathan Adler.
as well as a color-coordinated trashcan by Jonathan Adler,
and a color-coordinated soap dish by Jonathan Adler,
and a color coordinated cup by Jonathan Adler,
and color coordinated towels by Jonathan Adler
and some slightly off bathmats from Ikea. 

But back to the shower curtain.

It’s from Adler’s "Seven Deadly Sins" bathroom collection and it lists in bright semi-retro very-fag colors all of the seven sins, in both serif and sans-serif fonts.

But as I was staring at the shower curtain, it occurred to me how unfair it is that Pride gets a gay parade, but the other sins?  Woefully neglected.

In the name of equality, couldn't all of the sins get their very own gay parade?

After all there are seven sins and seven days of the week and damn but we homos loooooove synergy!

MONDAY!
Gay Pride –
Let’s not rock the boat too much to start.
Go with what we know.
We start the week with our traditional,
"I'm okay, you're okay …
what's her problem."

TUESDAY!
Gay Envy –
We line the parade route with regular working class ‘mo’s.
Down Fifth Avenue our big gay icons like David Geffen, Barry Diller, Rupert Everett and, oh, I don’t know … Tom Cruise
parade by us flaunting their wealth, fashions a good looks while we on the sidelines try to figure out if what Geffen's wearing is available at Century 21.

WEDNESDAY!
Gay Covetousness –
For this parade we really don’t need to go all the way down Fifth. We can probably take care of everything we need between 50th and 60th streets.  For Covetousness, the snotty shopboys will come streaming out of Saks, Gucci, Fendi, and beloved Bergdorf flaunting their wares in taunting choreographed consumerist cha-cha lines.

Envy and Covetousness are going to leave us really riled up, so our next parade of sin will be perfectly timed.

THURSDAY!
Gay Anger –
Let’s face it.
The G’s, the L’s the B’s and the T’s?
We’re some of the best protesters out there.
Bring out the signs, the banners, the buttons and the tee’s.
and, oh yeah, the whistles. Must have whistles!

And once you have your anger worked up the next one is a natural.

FRIDAY!
Gay Lust –
Just cover Fifth Avenue with black plastic, lube it up and let the fun begin. Parade Sponsors include Wet, Eros, and a personal favorite … Magnum!

Too be honest, it’s shocking-slash-wonderful how the sins just flow one into the other. 

SATURDAY!
Gay Gluttony –
Power-bottom, crystal pig-sluts Unite!
This parade is a perfect time for a masquerade parade with every participant wearing a mask.
Why the masks?  Because we gays like our gluttony to be on the Anonymous tip.
i.e.  Cocaine Anonymous, Sexual Cumpulsives Anonymous, Alcoholics Anonymous  … cheers by the way.

Six sins down and one to go.  Any big sinners out there know what the last one is?  This is that lack of reaction I mentioned.  (Remove clothes.)

SUNDAY!
Gay Sloth –
Parading around for a whole week makes you just want to order brunch in, where old worn out clothes, and, finally, most importantly
Finally you get to breathe and let your gut go natural!  (sucked in gut becomes pushed out gut)

WYSIWYG

It's tonight.

For those that have asked me what I'm performing, I'll give one clue:  It is an interpretation of a post written June 20. 

MO Music: Pet Shop Boys Fundamental

The Pet Shop Boys are putting out their first studio album in years.  Fundamental drops June 27 with two versions:  one with eleven new tracks and another with a bonus disk with remixes.  A full review will come later in the week, but so far I like what I hear.

You can listen to th e entire album for free, or, if you are a true believer of Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe, you could just buy it.

Of course, you could enter the CONTEST and win my review copy of Fundamental!  Drop a line of lyrics into the comments.  Winner will be selected randomly by the lovely Montana.

Sunday Sunset

Click for bigness.

Saturday: day to night

Clicking makes thing bigger.

Friday Funnies: Name that fag

That's right Rick Santorum is a lavender and pink wearing fag!  (Photo via Queerty)

More fun:  Play Boot the Bigot!

They're all going to laugh at me, theoretically

Being a professional slightly afflicted with stage fright a hyper-analytical control freak, instead of just doing a dry run of my bit for WYSIWYG I first performed it at an open mic at a lesbian bar with the thought being that if the material could make the ladies laugh between poon poems that it could do even better at WYSIWYG.  Happily success can be reported.  Although there were no reports of peed in pants, there was much general guffawing and mental notes were easily made as to what to stretch and what to cut (which sounds vaguely like a circumcision) and the strip-tease portion turn out to be unnecessary!

The proof though is in the pudding (along with the horse hooves), so, if interested, come! Even if my portion is a flog you have the talents of Curly McDimple, Joel Derfner , Greg Walloch and Spinster

WYSIWYG Talent Show
Way Gay, Even Gayer Gay Gayness
Tuesday, June 20, 8:00 p.m.
Bowery Poetry Club
308 Bowery (at Bleecker)
Tickets: $7

Doors open at 7:30 and the show typically sells out so early birds get the tequila worms.

Karma says my ass is yummy

Writing about the various characters in my gym's locker room has apparently set the karmic scales a-rocking.  But not necessarily in a bad way.

Yesterday:  My usual cleansing routine post-workout involves facial cleansing at the sinks and then a shower.  There's really no reason to clean the face at the sink other than to look at myself and identify new wrinkles.  The keys were left on the sink counter, and, upon return, had disappeared.  They were nowhere to be found.  Nor was the locker-room attendant.  This left me hanging out in a towel for ten minutes waiting for the lock to be clipped.

Today:  Arrival at the gym is delayed by the need to purchase a lock.  7-11 carries none, but Walgreens does.  In fact they carry a variety, including what could be the best lock ever with a combination that with letter choices instead of numbers.  A four-letter word combination?  Nirvana.  My four-letter word is so perfect that it will never exit my mind, but it might be something that one of my gym cohorts could figure out.

Bonus accecdote from today:  Two new faces, Typical East-Village Gay 90's was arriving as Typical East-Village Gay 00's was leaving.  The two exchanged greetings and chatted
a bit, suddenly shifting to a hushed tone. TEVG'00 stopped and asked TEVG'90, "Why are we whispering?" and I chimed in "Because you never know who's got a website in here".