How in the name of [insert favorite deity’s name here] did we ever do anything without the Internet?

I was reminded this morning of an old friend with whom I lost touch years ago.

Danny was flamingly gay (he called himself a nelly fag once) and a hardcore alcoholic. I only knew him for a few months before he moved to the Bay Area, but one particular memory of him remains.

We were in a grocery store picking up beer and such for a small gathering at someone’s apartment. I felt a cold coming on, so I mentioned we needed to get some orange juice.

“Orange juice? What’s that?” Danny said, quite seriously.

I turned to look at him, not quite sure what he was asking. His face turned from askance to realization and he said:

“Oh! That’s riiiiight! It’s a mixer!”

To this day, when I pick up orange juice, I say it.

Miss you, Danny. Hope you’re liver has held out.

We got the preliminary update book for Dragon*Con this past weekend. Special guests include:

Apollo and Dr. Gaius Baltus from the new Battlestar Galactica series
LeVar Burton (do I even have to say Geordi LaForge here?)
Roger Dean (the artist most famous for his album covers for Yes and who also designed the Virgin industries logo)
Chiana and Sikozu Shanu from Farscape
Corey Feldman (wtf?!)
Nurse Ratchet (not kidding)
children’s book author Gris Grimly
Langly from The X-Files and The Lone Gunmen
perrennial guest Richard Hatch
the kid who played Boba Fett in Episode II
the original Wednesday and Pugsly Addams
actors from Stargate: SG1 and Stargate: Atlantis
Harmony from Buffy
Darth Maul
the redheaded twins from Harry Potter
horror makeup artist extraordinaire Tom Savini
Counselor Deana Troi (mmmmmmmm!)
Hercules/Captain Hunt (Kevin Sorbo)
Dean Stockwell (best known for Quantum Leap, but I liked him best in Blue Velvet)
AND the entire cast and the writer/director of Firefly

Yet, what am I most excited about?

Rob Balder. The guy who writes PartiallyClips.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve written something - either in print or online - and someone, somewhere is so thoroughly convinced I am talking about them, they pitch a hissy over it.

Usually, the fit is passive-agressive. One time, someone took all the issues of my monthly ‘zine, tore them up, and left them scattered all over the street. Another, I received e-mail threats from anonymous sources for about a month. Yet one more, someone sent a letter out to a public e-mail list and attempted to have me branded an unsafe BDSM player.

Aaah, e-mail, the safe haven of the coward.

I’ve been around long enough to have had experiences with a lot of people and - here’s the part some may not understand - the experiences tend to repeat themselves. People are, after all, people. Nearly all social groups have the same individual personalities and, therefore, the same mistakes are made among them.

If what you read hits too close to home, try to think for just the tiniest of moments (unless your name is right there in black & white) that it’s not about you. It probably isn’t, too, at least not directly; rather it’s likely a culmination of stories involving a bunch of people, all of whom have done the same thing you have.

Remember, you’re unique …… just like everyone else.

Looks like the soreness I’ve been experiencing has dissipated, meaning the problem was either a pinched nerve or a hormonal issue. Either way, I’ve schedule my very first mammogram.

Some Lesser-Known Norman Rockwell Paintings

Bobby learns to stroke it
Susie at the gynecologist
Turn your head and cough
Darla gets her boob squished
Dad’s porno stash
Mary’s first topless job

I hear having your boob squished flat between two pieces of steel is incredible. I suppose I could ramp up to the pain of it, BDSM style, but where’s the fun in that? Oh …… yeah. Riiiiight. It’s been so long I nearly forgot.

[end whining]

Thanks to all who expressed concern and offered (at times sage) advice on this one. It will more-than-likely turn out to be nothing, but if it is something, I know I’ll have all the support I need.

I spent $700 on each of my eyes last Thursday. After wearing glasses since I was nine - and contact lenses off and on since I was 19 - I went and had lasik done.

My vision in my left eye, prior to surgery, was 20/400. In the right, it was 20/200. Now, each eye is 20/20 and in stereo they are 20/15 …… or they were on Friday at my follow-up appointment, anyway.

Lasik is the strangest medical procedure I’ve ever been through. It doesn’t hurt a bit and the surgery itself takes all of 2-1/2 minutes from start to finish, though there is about 90 minutes of prep time involved (including Valium …. mmmmmmm, drugs).

The weirdest part is knowing full well they are cutting on your eye, seeing your vision go cloudy when they do, but not feeling a damned thing. Also, the doc says I can’t wear eye makeup for three weeks (three weeks! but Dragon*Con is only two weeks away!), so I’ve been running around au natural for a few days. It feels strange to be without eyeliner, but the fix is worth it.

The neatest part so far is being able to see clearly immediately upon waking in the morning.

The worst part is suddenly seeing how filthy our shower is. When you bathe without corrective lenses, there’s a lot of grime you don’t see. Ick!

One should always know one’s place on the food chain. Presenting oneself on the banquet table - silver platter and all - is hardly an excuse for being surprised when one is sauteed, sliced, and savored.

To be angry when your better consumes you is fruitless. To remain angry when the meal is over is simply gauche.

Very few understand the frailty of the human condition, how easy it is to be wrong. No one is perfect, yet the self-righteous are a little unclear on this point.

However, they do tend to make a hearty meal when they get on their high horse.

There is never the need to suffer the loss of a battle you cannot win; simply do not enter the battle at all. [Sun Tzu]

After strangling his 53-year-old neighbor in her home on April 27, 1985, Dennis Rader took the body of Marine Hedge to the Lutheran church he attended and snapped photographs of her in bondage positions, a Sedgwick County sheriff investigator testified Wednesday.

I can’t even begin to tell you how weird it was to find myself smiling at this. No one can defile a church quite like a serial killer, eh?

Dennis Rader knew it was sacred space. That’s why he took her there. It was his big “Fuck you!” to the deity on whom he was raised to believe would save him.

Some people can’t be saved.
Some people don’t want to be saved.
Some people aren’t worth saving.

TOP THREE THINGS Q*BERT IS PISSED ABOUT TODAY.

1. #@*!&%$!

2. @!#?@!

3. &%#@!&#$

[by Mike Singer and copied from McSweeney’s Internet Tendency]

Hypothetical:

You open a business. You spend a few years cultivating it. You take a job in another town and leave a trusted manager in charge. You contact your staff because it’s clear you won’t return and it’s time you closed the long-distance business. They indicate they want to continue on, so you offer to transfer the existing business funds as venture capital to them.

It’s only then you discover your manager has disappeared with the very proceeds you were going to give the new venture.

With a healthy dose of WTF? and after a month or two of attempts at contact, your manager finally resurfaces and wants to know why you’re even asking about the capital.

Now, take the generic word business and change it to a more artistic endeavor, like a PR firm for local bands, a quarterly travelling art show, an annual poetry slam night, or a website devoted to digital art.

Is it not considered a real business because of content? Is it less than any other business because there is no real-life and real-time office or store location?

Is the situation any different because it’s an artistic endeavor?

I don’t think so, either.