i'm prouded

i've discovered that if anything can make you feel like a) an old man; b) a stick-in-the-mud; c) out of touch with the club scene; or d) all of the above, it's spending nearly two full days at a gay pride festival. i stayed with ricky in DC this weekend and went to "capitol pride," having sort of an extremely gay mini-retreat with an uncomfortable bed.

so many people are ashamed of gay pride parades because they think that they show off the "worst" of the gay community--people dancing around, hairy asses sticking out of their assless chaps. the argument is that if that's all straight people know about the gay community, since gay pride parades are one of our more visible events, they'll think we all dance around with our hairy asses sticking out of our assless chaps. when, in reality, i like to keep my hairy ass tucked away in my jeans.

the leather fetishists, the skinny, black baton-twirling queen straight out of paris is burning, the people who moderate queers don't want straight people to see, those are my favorites. i imagine that the pride parade is the one time some of these people get to really show off; they practice in front of their mirrors in their apartments all year, from june to june, until they get their big chance. then again, maybe some of them are professional baton-twirlers and this is just another day at the office. a day at the office in a pink spandex unitard.

yesterday afternoon was the "capitol pride festival," and as stated earlier, nothing will make you feel older than being the only person in the crowd, standing right there at the front of the stage, who doesn't know a single one of the dance numbers the apparently-uber-famous gay diva is singing. that's not quite true--deborah cox, whose name i was at least familiar with, sang my favorite (the only) dance song i know, something about "going to work in a miniskirt" and "dressing her up in chanel." (i remember dancing with ed like crazy to that song, a few years ago at the hippo when i still danced and ed still talked to me.) the next big singer, amber, came out afterward and ran through the gamut of her greatest hits. everyone in the audience was losing their shit; i had fun, but had to invent a game with ricky called "hands up," in which we shouted "hands up!" and had to wave our hands around in the air to look as excited as the queens around us.

frenchie, american idol expatriate, sang "you're gonna love me" and blew the roof off the place, which is quite a feat since the event was outside. that bitch can SANG. i'm pretty sure they heard her at the capitol. also, chi-chi larue, drag pornographer, did a filthy dirty performance. she instructed the audience, "this is going to be dirty. i'm serious. so if any of you have kids, go take them to get a frosty. and if any of you have weak stomachs: frosty." her performance was so raunchy that i had to pretend to be shocked. the truth is, i love how much this drag queen loves cock. i mean, come on: she's a sex-forward transgendered porn director. you don't get much queerer than that, unless you're liberace sewing a taffeta ballgown while watching an episode of queer as folk and making an egg-white frittata while sucking dick.

ah, multitasking.