Tag: New Orleans

Mandatory “25 Things Meme,” Cross-posted from Facebook

Posted on by nolageek

By now, if you have an account on Facebook, you’ve noticed everyone and their mother is writing their “25 Random Things” list and posting it. Well, it took me almost a week to put this shit together so I’m getting some more millage out of it and puting it here as well.

25 Things About Vincent

1. I am a total slob. My idea of sorting laundry is “Clean clothes in the basket, dirty clothes on the floor.”

2. Even though my first crush was on a male teacher when I was 10 (I think. I don’t remember exactly.) I didn’t accept that I was gay until I was 22. I went on my first date (ever) when I was 23.

3. Although it seems to be in glaring contradiction with #2, I saw the Rocky Horror Picture Show almost 300 times in high school.

4. Most of my stories are told in relation to three periods of my life: “Before Katrina,” “After Katrina” and “When I Worked in Radio”. If you have a problem hearing the word Katrina said occasionally, you shouldn’t hang out with people from the Gulf South.

5. I’ve had a website in one form or another since ~1996. One of my first “personal pages” was on my friend Duckie’s domain, flamingpoo.com.

6. I’ve had a blog since 2000: noleftturns.com, nolageek.com and now queerandloathing.com

7. I ran a computer BBS from 1993 until January 2000. It went by three names: TARDIS, Peaceful Death and finally Fear and Loathing. It was hacked one night while I was working – I came home to find my entire hard drive had been deleted. The hackers later posted a log file to another BBS showing them systematically wiping my drive one directory at a time.

8. My favorite song ever is “Sympathy for the Devil” by the Rolling Stones.

9. I’ve broken my left shoulder twice; both times from flipping over my handlebars while riding my bike and avoiding being hit by cars.

10. Since Katrina (see #4) I am terrified of buying furniture.

11. Despite being a native New Orleanian, I didn’t touch alcohol until I was 24. (I think it has something to do with #2)

12. The level of my self-conscienceness when dating someone is directly proportional to the degree of which I like them. If you wonder why I’m not calling, it’s probably because I really want to.

13. Whenever I use white antiperspirant my armpits break out in a really bad rash.

14. I am a dog person but I own cats because I perceive them to be less needy. Someone let Plato in on this.

15. During my first semester at UNO I would wake up at 7am and drive to school just to listen to Howard Stern in the parking lot for two hours. I’d then spend four hours in the computer lab on the internet and then drive home to get on the computer. My GPA was .7

16. During the second semester I had a panic attack in Political Science before I had to give a presentation on the Brady Bill in front of the class. I lied and said I left my handouts in the library when really I just went home. I never went back to that class.

17. I’m chronically either a half an hour early or fifteen minutes late for any given scheduled event — including work. If I happen to be 10 minutes early I’ll stop off for coffee or something to “kill time” – and inevitably it will take me 20 minutes. It’s a curse.

18. I hold a special place in my heart for nerdy guys in glasses and/or shirt and ties. By “heart” I mean “pants”.

19. It’s been months since the last time I’ve done it but I sometimes take pictures of random guys on the street or metro if I think they’re cute (without them knowing, of course.)

20. Prior to moving to DC I rode my bike at least 8 miles a day. Since living in DC I’ve ridden it twice — both times to the grocery three blocks away.

21. My friend Don is the only person I’ve known personally who has died from AIDS. I met him through Marshall and we only hung out a few times on our own, but we had started becoming friends just before he moved back to Florida to be with his family. I’d see him online every now and again and we’d chat a bit about life, about dating, about being gay. After a while he just stopped logging on. I didn’t know for sure he had passed until later, when Marshall told me he had heard from Don’s mom. I still haven’t removed him from my AIM buddy list.

22. After my father died when I was six, my mom brought me to see a psychiatrist. One of the things the doctor and my mother talked about was how upset I would get when Wile E. Coyote would keep coming back to life after dying on the Road Runner cartoon — I wanted to know why my dad didn’t come back. Another thing they talked about in front of me was how the fact that I still slept with stuffed animals at the time ‘didn’t mean I was a homosexual.’ Yeah, I know. Bitch, right? I didn’t know what it meant at the time, but I knew that it was supposed to be bad.

23. I’m 34 years old and I still like to mix flavors at self-serve soda fountains. My current favorite combination is Diet coke with a splash of Orange and Root Beer.

24. My favorite color combination is dark brown and light blue. No, dark brown and mint green. Fuck.

25. It took me over a week to finish this list.

Holiday Ramblings

Posted on by nolageek

To be completely honest, I was really dreading xmas this year. I’m not religious and I don’t buy into the whole commercial aspect of the holiday season. Behind closed doors I’m probably known as the big scrooge that doesn’t give gifts, etc. I don’t know, I just don’t get excited by the whole thing. The only part of the holiday season I do like is that it’s a chance to get together with friends all at once and do something together. Post Katrina this was very important to me since my schedule was flipped so topsy-turvey I rarely got to see my friends.

I moved to DC around this time last year and although xmas 2007 was definitely odd being away from everyone, being new to the city was a distraction and I didn’t notice it much. Plus, most of my newly-made friends were in town so it wasn’t as depressing as it could have been. This year was a whole other animal though. I don’t think anyone I know in DC was in town this week and I was prepared to spend xmas day reading tweets about everyone’s fabulous holiday dinners and fantastic parties while the cats stared at me all disapproving-like as I watched x-tube and ate from a jar of peanut butter on the cold floor of the bathroom.

Luckily, it didn’t end up being that way.

Wednesday night I went with Gerry to support his friend Richard on his excursion to St. Matthew’s Midnight Mass. I didn’t quite get the full story why any of us were there though, but I imagine it revolved around repressed Catholic guilt of some kind (but doesn’t everything?). Now, I was fully expecting to burst into a flaming pillar of salt upon walking into the church, but not much happened other than some catty remarks and a couple rounds of “peace be with you” with Gerry and his friends and the couple behind us. Other than that, i tried to think of reasons why the people in line should be allowed to participate in the pseudo-cannibalistic blood ritual and not me, just cause I like to, um, you know, every now and then.. I felt left out. I wanted to pretend like I was drinking blood too.

Gerry came over on Thursday and we spent the day watching bad TV on the sofa, drinking bad wine, napping and trying to forage for food at a restaurant that was A) Actually open and B) NOT over-priced Chinese. (A C)Chinese buffet would have ruled though.) It was a very laid back day and other than being with my friends back home as well, I couldn’t have asked for a better time.

Then, this afternoon my friend James called and said he wanted to go walk around and play with his G1’s GPS Tracking Program. We were looking for a cupcake place in Georgetown, but since they were closed when we found them we settled for coffee and a slice of ginormous chocolate cake at SoHo Coffee and Tea. You can see some pictures from our walk on his blog.

So, now I’m sitting at home with the kitties doing laundry and wishing Christmas wasn’t over so soon.

Yeah, me. Weird, eh?

Banksy Videos for my friends in New Orleans

Posted on by nolageek

Banksy visited New Orleans for the anniversary of Katrina this year. I thought I’d post some of these videos up for my friends back home who may not have heard of him. From what I understand, many of his works have already been covered by the “Grey Ghost” but a few are still up. I hope a few are still up when I visit again (January, I think.)

Sitting on the toilet at work, thinking about feet.

Posted on by nolageek

I don’t know where it began, but I absolutely cannot stand to have my feet uncovered. I hate walking on tile or linoleum with bare feet, my soles sticking to the floor. The thought of walking on hard wood flooring unshod, possibly impaling myself on a splinter, makes the hair on the back of my legs stand up.

Once I had a dream that I had just woken up and was paralyzed, held down to the bed by an unseen force only able to move my eyes to look toward my uncovered, unprotected feet while my then 4 year old nephew was inserting sewing needles into my arches, giggling as he watched them travel up the veins in my legs.

Understandably I do not wear flip-flops.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t have any fear or hatred of the human foot itself, nor do other people’s feet bother me. I’m not podophobic, I just recognize that my feet are particularly doughy and vulnerable and I project this vulnerability onto other people. I don’t mind cuddling up to someone in bed and having their feet touch me under the covers; I rather like that actually. In fact, I prefer to cuddle with guys who have a set of intact feet.

Where was I? Yes, back to flip-flops.

What is it with people and these abominations of footwear? Is it because they’re so cheap inexpensive? It can’t be because they’re comfortable, with that annoying string between your toes, constantly… there… between your toes being all “string like.” They’re also not cute and they’re noisy. Plus, what if something should happen where it would be beneficial to have footwear that actually covers and protects your feet?

Being from New Orleans, of course the first situation that comes to mind is a drunk frat guy or sorostitute throwing up on the floor near you or finding yourself accidentally stumbling through a mound of horse crap the size of Monkey Hill in the middle of the street; or the middle of the sidewalk. If you have spent any time there, you know that two thirds of every block in New Orleans is basically covered in either horse crap or tourist vomit and yet there are hundreds of people constantly walking around wearing nothing more on their feet than a piece of nylon twine and nerf refuse.

Frequently I see people wearing flip flops with shorts or jeans on the street or in the bars and although my logical mind acknowledges that this is a fashionably acceptable combination, it terrifies me, given the amount of people in very close proximity in a bar. It’s just asking for trouble: a crushed distal phalanx, a wet foot from a spilled drink or accidentally puncturing a cute guy’s Achilles tendon with my sharp, talon-like nails.

It’s hard to keep them trim them while constantly wearing socks.

Today, here in DC, I saw someone wearing flip-flops with a suit and tie for god’s sake. What’s up with that? What if some crazed defendant, unable to control his rage, suddenly bolts across the room when the verdict is read? What if before the bailiffs taze him and tackle him to the ground, he accidentally steps on your foot or vomits? What if one of the bailiffs has a horse? What then, mr lawyer-man with the flip flops? What then?