I had the most homewrecking dream

I dreamed I was recording a Madonna radio ad that would promote her new tour. We were at my grandmother’s house and sitting on a bed that was in the living room in front of a bunch of people.

Madonna went to record her voice over but she said I was moving slightly or breathing or murmuring and it distracted her. She was playfully correcting me about this.

When it was over, I walked Madonna to the door. She whispered to me that I had to get the number of one of my married friends. She said she knew he was unhappy in his marriage and new to Delaware and had $1 million so she wanted to have an affair with him. I took her out front on the porch and read Madonna the riot act. I told her my friends were happily married and I wasn’t about to break up their relationship. Besides, he did not even live in Delaware so I wasn’t sure what she was talking about. She dropped the subject and left.

Meanwhile, there was a massive crowd of people trying to get in my grandmom’s house, so many that the fire department was there to watch for overcrowding. They carried these two women up the steps who were so old that they were slumped lifelessly. People around me seemed to recognize these women and didn’t think it was a big deal that they were basically vegetables. “That’s Myrtle,” they said.

I often have dreams involving Madonna but she isn’t usually a homewrecker. Usually we will be sitting in some sort of high school auditorium and she will be performing or she’ll be re-enacting a tour from the past but it will be all different. Sometimes I’ll discover some big stash of new music I’ve never seen before. Then I’ll wake up and be annoyed because the music doesn’t exist.

Thoughts About Celebrities

Is it my imagination or is Tim Burton basically doing the same goddamn thing over and over again with Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham-Carter?

Hey, another remake of a classic fairytale, children’s story or pop culture curiosity! Look, a monochromatic palette! And there’s Johnny Depp in pancake makeup playing a misunderstood man-child! But where’s Helena Bonham-Carter? Oh, there she is! With crazy hair! And don’t you just love the forced atmosphere of Gothic horror/Victorian whimsy?

I mean, don’t you just love it over and over and over and over and over and over and over again?

In the last couple of years, this trio has done nothing original. It’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory followed by Sweeney Todd followed by Alice in Wonderland followed by Dark Shadows and I haven’t cared since God knows when. Burton, Depp and Bonham-Carter are like members of some obnoxious theater clique who keep casting each other in everything.

Speaking of celebrities, who the fuck is Kendra and why is she on top and why would I want to watch a reality show of this person? I’m too disinterested to Google her but I do want to know why she’s in ads that letterbox the We channel while we’re trying to watch The Golden Girls. The commercials feature Hugh Hefner so can I infer she’s some kind of porn star?

This is why I have no interest in most reality TV. I do see the appeal of shows like American Idol or Dancing With the Stars since they require some talent and people are actually doing something. But if a show is just a glimpse into some celebrity’s life, I couldn’t be less interested. I’d rather clean my bathroom because I find the soap scum more engaging.

Taylor Swift sounds like an immature person, even for her young age. I’ve heard she wrote a song called “Mean” about some critic who criticized (which is his job) her live performance. It just sounds like a childish whine to say, “You’re meeeaaan” to someone who notes that you were off-key because it’s a legitimate point about a singer. Cope with criticism like an adult instead of crying about it because if you can’t, the entertainment industry will destroy you. Swift just sounds as if she’s still in eighth grade, writing vengeful songs in her notebook about the people who wrong her, and barely veiling anything. It’s embarrassing.

I hope nobody tries to conflate the criticism of a pop star with bullying because bullying is when a powerful person attacks a powerless person and Taylor Swift is far from powerless, as evidenced by the huge platform she has to express herself. Actual bullying is a problem but I would hope everyone with a grievance doesn’t crumple to the floor and cry “bullying” just because someone is critical of them. As one critic said, “Instead of actually doing something to improve on her inability to find or hold pitch consistently, Swift has simply written a song about how it's 'mean' for people to point out that problem." If anything, Swift is bullying the critic by writing a song about his legitimate complaints.

My God, Taylor, take off your crown of thorns and quit moaning.

Is a tux always just a tux?

In the short time that gay marriage has been legal, I view the weddings as sort of Wild West territory. Traditions are out the window from the beginning, as same-sex weddings are by definition not traditional (at least not so soon), so people can sort of do whatever they want and start their own traditions.

There are some aspects of gay weddings that make no sense to me and one of them is in a lesbian wedding when one woman wears a dress and the other wears a tuxedo. When Cynthia Nixon got married, she wore a gown while her wife, Christine Marinoni wore a tux with a neon green vest. People can do what they want and I’m no fashion expert but I thought this looked ridiculous. I’m trying not to be offensive or insensitive but I just don’t get this.

I understand that some women might not like the look of a skirt and would opt for pants. No bride should have to wear something that makes her uncomfortable. Then why not wear a suit intended for a woman? Once a woman wears a man’s tux, it gets into drag territory and starts to look more like a gimmick. It’s like some girl going to a prom in a tux and thinks it’s clever and it’s been done. Madonna did it 20 years ago and Marlene Dietrich did it 70 years ago. It’s also a blah way to dress. I envy the fact that woman have so many more choices than men as far as formalwear so why are women choosing a boring old tux? There has to be some more interesting option for a bride that will suit her personality and taste rather than a cookie cutter tuxedo. There’s a happy medium between a frilly white dress and a cummerbund.

If it’s a statement that has nothing to do with fashion, then I’m not following what it’s supposed to mean. If you look hard enough at the picture of a bride in a dress and a bride in a tux, the unintended effect is that the couple is trying to pass as a straight couple getting married, trying to fit their marriage into a straight framework other than celebrating the fact that they can now legally have the wedding on their own terms. In a way, it’s still conformity. I have no idea what Nixon and Marinoni intended by their wedding regalia but there are meanings people can read into it, and will read into it, since gay weddings are politically charged right now whether we like it or not.

This brings up some odd thoughts about gender politics, including the old idea that in gay relationships, one person has the male role and the other the female role. Does a lesbian bride think, “Well, I’m the man in the relationship, so I’m calling Men’s Wearhouse”? I don’t think the idea of gender roles is entirely accurate in gay relationships because in both straight and gay relationships, men and women don’t fall squarely into rigid categories. Steve and I do what we’re good at and split some of the work. He bakes because he’s awesome at it and I don’t know the difference between baking soda and baking powder. I barbecue because I like meat. He handles computers because he understands them a lot better. I mow the lawn because he’s allergic to cut grass. He vacuums because I can’t stand doing it. I clip coupons for the supermarket because I’m cheap. We split the laundry and cleaning. Et cetera. I think it’s that way in a majority of couples, gay or straight.

Maybe sometimes a tux is just a tux and these brides have made fashion choices that have no semiotic meaning, but it’s a curiosity to me. At our wedding, a tux will be just a tux. We will each be wearing one. One of us will not wear a dress. It will be a regular old reception with food and music and booze and laughs — things everyone, gay or straight, enjoys. I figure there’s no point in making any kind of gender or political statement because two guys getting hitched is statement enough. The rainbow flags would just be redundant.

Vote Romney for Amercia

In 2012, Mitt Romney is the right president for Amercia. Therefore, I’m asking my fellow Amercians to step up and vote for Romney.

Romney has the solutions for all the problems in this country. Nobody else — no congressman, senator or governor — is as equipped to resuscitate the economic problems that face our beloved Amercia. The former governor of Masschusets worked economic miracles in that state and can surely do the same for the country by reducing unemployment and making us number one again. He can help us face the economic challenges posed by Chinna and avoid the pitfalls that nations like Grease have fallen into.

In addition, Romney represents the values that Amercians hold dear. This includes a deep and abiding respect for the Constution. He will uphold the values of the First Ammendment, such as freedom of speech and the Second Ammendment’s freedom to bear arms. Romney will protect the family values that make Amercia such a wonderful country.

Mitt Romney has the potential to be as great a president as George Washinton, Arbaham Lincoln, Franklin Delano Rosevelt, Thomas Jeffreson or Ronald Regan. I would not be surprised to see his sculpted visage on Mount Rushmoore someday.

If you care about the future of the Untied States of Amercia, you will vote Romney this November.

Dignity.

Nothing says “Dignity” like vomiting on the beach.

That was my main lesson during Memorial Day weekend. We were on the beach when this group of 20-somethings set up camp right next to us. After awhile, this one train wreck was lying on the beach and started throwing up right into the sand. I had my back to them and my iPod on so I wasn’t aware of anything. All I saw was Steve staring at me and mouthing “Dignity.” I guess the guy buried the upchuck in the sand because I didn’t see it.

This was at about 1 or 2 p.m. I’ve been hung over, too, but I’ve never done the liquid laugh while on the beach. I guess there weren’t too many options for this guy because once you need to throw up, you pretty much have no choice. The beach was very crowded so there was nowhere isolated to go to puke in private.

Still: Eww. Also, thanks. This was after these people set up their towels right up on us. I uprooted my umbrella and moved it because they were so close. I absolutely fail to understand why some people have no boundaries in public settings. The beach was crowded but we weren’t packed like sardines and there were more places these people could go.

This has happened before. I was on the beach once in relatively deserted Fenwick Island and this family decided to set up a huge canopy right next to my elbow. There was plenty of space and they could have gone anywhere. Do you not fucking see me sitting here? Am I a person? I didn’t want to move because I was there first and it’s a pain to set up an umbrella again. I figured I’d just linger and if the family was uncomfortable with me sitting there while their kids were playing, it was their own goddamn problem for setting up close enough to read my book over my shoulder.

Man, I hate that. I like the beach because it’s tranquil and a break from the ratrace and claustrophobia of life. I don’t need to be isolated but I thought there was a generally acceptable radius between you and strangers. It’s like how at the movie theater, if it’s not crowded, keep an empty seat between you and strangers and move in only when it becomes too crowded not to. Christ, can’t I read my book or try to nap without hearing your conversation six inches from my face?

It was a minor annoyance for us but I felt worse about this couple on the other side of the vomiting guy. This crew set up camp literally six inches from this couple’s towels. They were so close that if the vomiting guy and his friends had not been there, there still would have been an appropriate amount of space between us and the other couple. It was like we kept an appropriate following distance from the next car but someone got between us and made it unsafe. Anyway, this couple saw this guy blowing chunks into the sand and moved somewhere else in disgust.

Again: Dignity.

Avengers Assemble

I saw the Avengers movie and was very happy with it. I was able to enjoy it without worrying too much about how the movie deviated from the continuity in the comics. I have a tendency to nitpick comic movies for mistakes. (“The Juggernaut is not a mutant! Nooottt a muuutaaaaant!”)

Since I’ve been reading the Avengers for 30 years, I can be a continuity snob about the team. When I heard of the cast, I was a little dubious that the founding members of the team in the movie were not the same as in the comic. In the movie it’s Captain America, Thor, Iron Man, the Hulk, Black Widow and Hawkeye. In the comic it’s Thor, Iron Man, the Hulk, Ant-Man and the Wasp. I realize they changed the cast out of necessity, since if you wait for the rest of the Avengers to find Captain America in suspended animation in the ice after their founding, it would take too long to introduce the character, although it does have more resonance if it’s the Avengers, not SHIELD, who find him. I also understand that Ant-Man and the Wasp are not well-known characters and might not translate onto the screen. But it’s a shame not to include them, especially the Wasp, who has been the heart of the team in many ways (and whom a lot of people online want to include in the sequel).

Joss Whedon’s movie nailed a lot about the spirit of the Avengers team. He deftly captured the bickering of the members, which has been a constant since 1963. That may have been why Marvel’s heroes always appealed to me more: They act like real people, not always getting along, in contrast to the sometimes bloodless heroes of DC. There were nice allusions to Cap’s tension with Iron Man and the Black Widow and Hawkeye’s fling. There was a great montage at the end of the news footage of the destruction of New York, showing how the citizens of the Marvel Universe sometimes distrust their heroes.

I absolutely loved the post-credit sequence with the Avengers eating silently in a ruined diner after saving the world. It captured the tentative beginnings of friendship among the six members.

Some characterizations were spot on, like the idealism of Captain America and lonely darkness of the Hulk, nicely captured by Mark Ruffalo. Samuel L. Jackson is good in anything. Others were not so accurate. Thor didn’t have quite enough bluster for me. I needed more scenes of him throwing Mjolnir and screaming “I say thee nay!” The character of Hawkeye (sexy, sexy Jeremy Renner) was wasted. Hawkeye has the most distinctive personality of the team but he spent half the movie brainwashed and was blah the rest of the time. His portrayal should have been more of a smartass douchebag like Tony Stark (and Iron Man in the comic is not really like he is in the movie) but I guess there was only room for one smartass douchebag on the team. I really liked Scarlett Johansson. The Black Widow is a fantastic character and she nailed her badass portrayal. I would love a solo movie.

There were a few missed opportunities as I would have loved some subtle Easter eggs nodding to the Avengers’ rich history. They could have had a scientist named Dr. Pym, a socialite named Janet Van Dyne or SHIELD agent Carol Danvers. These would have been little things to put a smile on the faces of longtime fans.

The constant turnover of membership has always been a theme of the Avengers comic and I’m wondering who they’ll add for the sequel. My top choice is Wanda Maximoff, the Scarlet Witch. She was my favorite character in comics but the way they treated her a few years ago bothered me enough that I mostly stopped reading comics. The Scarlet Witch was one of the pillars of the team with a long track record of heroism but the Avengers author had her betray the team in a way that really defamed her character so a movie portrayal would be some nice redemption. Anyway, I would also love to see the aforementioned Wasp, Hank Pym as Ant-Man or Giant Man, Ms. Marvel, the Vision, the Black Panther or Photon. The Avengers have had dozens and dozens of members so the opportunities are endless.

My favorite little scene was the one near the end where all the Avengers assembled into a circle before fighting Loki’s demons. As the camera panned 360 degrees around my childhood idols, I was a kid again, buying comics at the 7-Eleven for 60 cents each.

Disco Never Dies

If I’d been born a decade earlier, I might have been a Donna Summer fan like I’m a Madonna fan now. I was not much more than a casual fan of Summer’s music, although before her death I was thinking, “She was pretty good. Why do I not have her on my iPod?” I’ve heard so much of her music over the years that it’s almost in the background and taken for granted.

So I listened to Steve’s copy of On the Radio after she died. Summer was deeply talented and went beyond just disco to flirt with other genres like rock and new wave. “Hot Stuff” is still nasty with a tangy synth sound. “Bad Girls” is pretty catchy for a song about whores. I like the wistful sound of “Heaven Knows” and “On the Radio” is fun. “Love to Love You Baby” still sounds lush and lusty. “I Feel Love” is, even after 35 years, hypnotic and pristine and prescient.

There was some Donna Summer music I never cared for. “No More Tears (Enough Is Enough)” is too gay for me and I am gay. Barbra Streisand will not appear on my iPod unless it’s “Barbra Streisand” by Duck Sauce. Summer’s wailing vocals and convincing performance can pull off “MacArthur Park” but that song is still laughable. I’m sure that cake in the rain is a symbol but it’s too stupid to ponder. I just assume the song is either by drugs or about drugs. “Last Dance” is well constructed and undeniably catchy but it’s cliché now. It’s every wedding you’ve ever been to. I don’t want to play this at our reception. If people really want to hear it, fine; but you’ll hear it as the first song of the evening.

Songs like “Last Dance” sound cliché until you realize, “But it was new then.” It’s a little like Casablanca where you’ve heard “Here’s looking at you, kid” so often that you groan when Humphrey Bogart says it until you realize this was the first time anyone had heard it. I think that’s part of Donna Summer’s legacy. She had been around for so long and her songs were such a part of the radio and dance floor that maybe I never really looked it her.

There have been so many disco divas since Donna Summer’s heyday that they all owe her something. Summer was such a trailblazer that without her work in dance music, I don’t know what Madonna would sound like today, let alone God knows how many other dance artists. And I think Madonna knows that since she opened the Confessions Tour with a brilliant medley of her own “Future Lovers” and “I Feel Love.”

Summer had an astounding run of hits in the late ‘70s and in 1979, her hits were overlapping each other on the chart to the point where she had more than one hit in the top 10 at once, which is really hard to do. The mainstream hits petered out after that but she never stopped having club hits. Between 2008 and 2010, she had four number 1 hits on the dance chart to add to her total. I think that’s astounding for someone who had been around since the ‘70s to get strong club play in a genre that is constantly moving on to the next new thing. It seems like the clubs never forgot Donna Summer.

People sneered about disco in the early ‘80s and it’s true that while there was a lot of crap in that genre, there was plenty of good disco like Summer and the Bee Gees. I never thought disco died. It was underground for awhile but you can hear echoes of it in every hit in the clubs. It’s funny that some people saw disco as disposable and forgettable but nobody ever forgot songs like “Last Dance” or “Staying Alive.”

People still sneer at dance music and yes, there is a lot of terrible dance music out there and yes, if you read the lyrics on paper, they are often nothing profound. But I find that dance music at its best — “Enjoy the Silence” by Depeche Mode or “I’m Addicted” by Madonna or “Dancing on My Own” by Robyn or “We Found Love” by Rihanna — has a quality that’s almost hymn-like, with an uplift that’s almost spiritual. If you can make music to get people who don’t even speak the same language to shake their collective ass on the dance floor, that’s no small accomplishment. It’s close to profound.