Back to School

Just to make sure I know that summer is officially over; fall semester has started at College. The first day was true to form, our wolf mascots was running around the hall like the star of a Furries convention. Fellow classmates, less than half my age, wondered around wearing ironically ‘80s outfits. I snickered at the Dudes sporting the neon high tops and graphic -insert generic band here – tee shirts. I did it when it wasn’t ironic.


This semester has me in more history classes, as I’m now a “History Education Major” it’s not a surprise. In keeping with my history major, yesterday found me at my old study place, the Coffee Shop on 9th Avenue. On my first day of class it was decided we would write a five page paper on some part of western civilization in the eighteen-hundreds. Because I’m an idiot, I blurted out; “The Treaty of Utrecht” not knowing anything about this topic other than it was printed on the poster behind my Professor’s head.

Sunday, I found out how incredibly dull this time in history truly was. I’ll spare you the details. Unless they make a movie staring Channing Tatum as Louis XIV of France, and a shirtless Zachary Quinto as the King of Portugal you don’t need to know anything other than, France got some ass kicked. I got my paper done for class, which is all that matters. This was done only by imagining Channing Tatum giving up his power to Zachary Quinto.

I Need a Hero

When I stumbled across this photo I suddlenly stated to sing a Bonnie Tyler song..... 

I wonder why?

http://englishrussia.com/2012/08/16/one-of-the-most-weird-muscovites

Quote

Quote for today:

Never dwell on what you have lost, only on what you have left. Count your blessings. You'll always find plenty. Your most prized possessions are your unexpired years.

-
Author Unknown

Cool

I had a very odd sensation as I walked from my front door to my car. Like something was wrong, not necessarily wrong, just unusual. There wasn’t sweat rolling down from my tightly buttoned shirt collar. It was actually cool outside. A nice light morning breeze drifted and lifted my tie over my shoulder.


Is it time already? Time for the heavy drapery of oppressive heat to break and the mornings and evenings to become cool? I guess it is mid-August, I wonder if my windows still operate? I have been living in a bubble of A/C for so long I am excited about leaving the window open at night.

The Day After

I will not go into a post-Olympic downer. Nope, not me. Not like every time since my first Olympics I became obsessed with back in 1984.

For weeks after the 1984 games ended I moped around the house with nothing to watch on TV, and nothing to dream about.  I spent the entire remaining summer, after the closing ceremonies, begging my Mom to let me try out for my Junior High’s Track and Field team the next school year. I knew that since we lived so far out in the country there wouldn’t be a way for me to get home when the after school practices were done. And no way I could make it to the meets. 

Every four years I become obsessed with the games and attempt to watch every televised event. I watch the Badminton, Lesbian Kayaking, and the even the hours of team Volleyball. I memorize as many athlete’s names as I can. I try to get their entire back-story, and find them on Twitter.  I quiz myself on the number of points each athlete needs to reach the qualifying rounds. I feel what they feel when they don’t win. I cheer when they do win.

For seventeen days I’m the biggest sports fan there is, then it is over.  To quote Michael Phelps, quoting Dr. Seuss, “Don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened.

Olympics or Porn?

Olympics or Porn?

Olympics or Porn? Day 3

Olympics or Porn? Day 2

14 Days of Summer

Yesterday morning I was in the middle of my run, suddenly a perplexing question came into my head.  When does the fall semester for my school start again?

Class start on the 20^th of this month. That’s only two weeks away. Suddenly, it dawned on me that my summer is over in two weeks. But…but… what happened to my road trip to Devil’s Tower?  Camping?  Lazy evenings spent on the front porch sipping Stella? Now it’s a mere 14 days until I have to step back into a classroom. 

Although, I am one of those nerds that actually like school, and my fall classes are centered on the building of Western Civilization. And, since I’m such an Anglophile, I can’t wait to start class.  The fall semester still just seemed to come out of the blue days of summer.

Summer over, Man! 14 days to drink Stella whilst driving to Devil’s Tower. 

Olympics or Porn?

Mmmmmmichael Phelps.

Benjamin Disraeli is on Google +

“Action not always brings happiness; but there is no happiness without action.”

-Benjamin Disraeli.

This is my quote for the day. Earlier in the week I was discussing my blog with my boss, this is when she mentioned that I should write for the company’s blog site. My response, “I write; I never said I was any good.” Fell upon deaf ears.

Now I’m blogging on a weekly basis and getting paid to do so. Since I accepted my Directorship at a private school, I guess I need to learn to blog as an adult. Yet, since my personal blogging has suffered a tad, maybe this will energize my creative flow….

My first topic:

What’s the deal with that Google +? It’s like hello! Where is everybody?

I kid. Google + you’re all-right. Although, maybe I could stop with the quoting of British Prime Ministers.

Apples to Apples

When we stepped across the threshold of the Moroccan Bazaar that is the Apple store I could hear the moan come from Fuzzy.  I was determined to finally go for the thirteen inches I so desperately want before school starts again in the fall. Fuzzy, my homosexual lifetime companion partner was tired of his thirteen and wanted to finally move up to fifteen inches.

Remember when the Apple store was an all white, quiet sanctuary, not unlike the world of Logan’s Run?

Now the store is more like the original Star Trek…

With all the choices and options it soon became too much for the Fuzz man. He began looking towards that door and the safety of the Cinnabon counter. That’s when, after a Red Shirt asked if we were the ones asking for an Apple Specialist that spoke Espanol, it dawned on me that we needed an Apple crewmember that spoke Loud Italian/IML Finalist. An individual that could relate.

This is when, no doubt smelling the fear of solid-state fused hard drives, our specialist found us. Manson.  Finally a Mac Specialist that spoke gay.  A smartly dressed lesbian, that quickly explained to Fuzzy that he could pop all his favorite X-tube vids onto the bedroom TV. 

If it were not for Mason, I’d be the proud owner of Microsoft Office for Apple. Thinking I needed the program for my school papers, Mason explained that Apple has thought of this and made Import/Export options for it word editor.

As Fuzzy and I sat later at Cinnabon, I thought again about the experience with our sales-lesbian.  If you have questions, find the right person, the right person that also understands you. 

Twenty Thousand Years Later

Okay, maybe it hasn’t been exactly twenty thousand years. Maybe it’s closer to twenty-three years since I revisited this block on Downing Street between Ninth and Tenth.  Still, clearly time has marched forward. Not for the street, but the subject in the photo. 

Biking

I really want to ride my bicycle.


I have this thought every time I pass my well neglected bike, as it sits lonely on the front porch. Don’t get me wrong, I do ride my bike quite a bit. It really is more about going for a ride with someone else.

At one time Denver, CO. had a full page in its gay newspaper dedicated to GLBT social clubs. If you were a transgendered lesbian that enjoyed crock-pot cookery, there was a social club for you. During this heyday of social networking, I believe there were no less than three gay men’s bicycle clubs. One for the guys who thought Kevin Bacon was hot and yearned to race, one for the lovely ladies of transgenderedness, and one for… my style of biking.

My "style" is that I just want to put on some Lycra, my helmet adorned in the same graphics as a 1970’s shag-wagon, and my fingerless gloves to peddle around Cherry Creek. Is that too much to ask?

I guess I need to start networking.

Gym Time

I finally found my "real" gym in the last month. A gym without all the trappings. No cardio queens, no angry Moms pushing past on their way to a "stretch and fit" class. Just hard working dudes pushing plates. The gym didn't even have air-conditioning, it was truly a hard core black iron gym.

This gym is the type of place where I didn't have to hear from the other half that I wasn't stopping to gossip and chat with the muscle queens.

"Joe told me you haven't been talking with him at the gym?" I heard on several occasions. This kind of social hair salon setting made me glad I found a working class, blue collar gym.

With the testosteronieness of this gym, I even rediscovered and found it easily to ramp up my work outs. I wanted to push past my "comfort zone" and perform at the level of the muscle heads flipping tracker tires in the parking lot.

I was feeling pretty damn happy for my self. Well, until yesterday when I read the noticed taped to the front door. The one with the really bad grammar explaining that the gym was either being clothed at the end of the moth, or that it was closing at the end of the month.

I found out the gym was closing.

Bummer. I guess it's back to 24 hour fitness for me. Plenty of time to stop and chit-chat with the gays.

Super Sunday

Just thought I share a Super photo.

Under Where?

As part of my daily work life I have quite a lot of Skype conversations. I went from avoiding the whole “video chat” thing to having this as part of my daily Habitrail. Yesterday was no different, Two Skype calls with clients, and one with based on interviewing someone for a new position.


It seems that I have lost my aversion to video conferencing, and it is as easy as someone coming into my office for a conversation. You talk business, and then chat about your day and the weather. Yesterday, after my interview with the perspective new employee, he mentioned that I must be ready to go to the gym.

“Sure” I stated.

“Well, it seems you’re ready to head out to the gym, your gym bag is at the ready.”

Wondering why he knew about my gym bag, tossed behind my desk, I finally focused on my picture in the video chat window. Yup. There was my bag on the video. Completely open with my Under Armour briefs in full display.

I pretty much displayed my undies to clients all day long.

System of a Down

Everyday I get into my car and plug my iPhone into its swanky console iPod connector. When I do this automatic and mindless task, akin to clicking the coffee pot on as I head out to walk the dog every morning, it is without thought or measure.  When I combine my phone and my car together the same thing happens every time, and has for close to three years.  The hard driven beats of System of a Down (SOAD) start to blare. Loudly. 

I’ve become so familiar with my music beginning automatically that I have a pavlovian response of clicking the satellite radio button and finding something good to entertain me on Sirius radio.  This action happens every time use my car, for three non-stop years. Until, strangely yesterday morning when I clicked my iPhone into its tiny holster, and when the driving guitars and hypnotic vocals of Serj Tankian, the lead singer of this alternative heavy metal band started, my automatic response failed. I sat there listening to this bands proprietary song, as it moved forward I was moved backward.

I received Toxicity, System of a Down’s first major release as a present from my Ex Dalton, right after September 11, 2001.  We took the CD on our first road trip. A black Dodge Ram driving across west Texas in the middle of the night.  Two men hand in hand.  September 11 fresh on our minds. We listened to the album over and over as night covered the Texas landscape. The heat of night trying to force itself into the cab of the truck. We didn’t know our future. We barely knew each other.

We spent a week in Santa Fe. Getting to know each other.

There is no other reason why this album starts when I connect my iPhone other than the first song starting with an “A”

NTSSB.COM

Sometimes I feel downright cleaver. Like when the female Prostitute approached me on the street the other day, my quick response of “Lady I’m wearing a yellow bow-tie! That should signal to you that I’m very gay!” It helped my ego that she looked disappointed. I spent two days feeling quite smug about my quick sarcastic response.


Today I have spent feeling like a dunce. I didn’t handle the emails warning me that my domain name, NTSSB.com was up for renewal very well. I ignored the “This domain name is about to expire” emails because originally it was registered through GoDaddy.com, and sense we all know what a bunch of Douche Bags they are, I didn’t reply. I planned on just transferring to a new company.

I put it off.

The next I did think about it was when Patrick mentioned that my NTSSB site was dead. Well, if he’s upset then I need to act. The last thing I want is for him to pull quarters out of his ass and chucking them at me. Quickly I went to register the precious name, keeping in mind that nicetoseestevieb.com and nicetoseestevieb.blogspot are humming right along… or else you wouldn’t be reading this…

This is about the time I began to learn the shady world of name registering. If you let a domain expire the registrar will then charge you $98 bucks. Just to renew it. I think they call it an idiot tax. The only other choice is to let NTSSB fall from grace and when it comes open to the public I can re-register it for $20 bucks. IF someone else doesn’t do it first; like it’s a big flipping deal.

This is an open apology to anyone who has missed my not-so-subtle sarcastic wit in the last couple weeks due to the NTSSB domain not redirecting to my BlogSpot address. I won’t be spending $98 smackers on redirecting you. But, here’s what you missed.

I ran.

I shopped for a new fridge.

I sat in the grass.

I’m an ENTJ.

It kicks like a sleep twitch.

Mystery Date

I'd like to ask your opinion. I'm torn between the fact that I might be losing my memory, I'm just over worked, or just way too polite for my own good.

Last night I made dinner plans with a friend for next Thursday. I assume it was a friend; although, I haven't a clue who it was. No idea. Now, maybe I should of remembered. Maybe I should of texted, "BTW who the hell is this? Either choice would of been better then re-reading my texts with an "Oh! Crap!" look on my face.

I guess it will be a surprise next Thursday. Like a mystery date!

The Grass is Greener

It’s funny how we can miss out on personal time. That quality “me” time that is so important for staying centered in this world. With priorities and commitments capturing our time, it is hard to unplug.  The simple act of running away, even if it is for just a couple of hours.

This thought struck me yesterday when I started out for a morning run, and couldn’t remember that last time I ran. My knees couldn’t remember either. Like chunks of rust falling off of an unused piece of ancient machinery, my body slowly began to move slowly down the running path. 

With road trips, houseguests, summer events, and the occasional household appliance catastrophe, the time to head over to Cheesmen Park and open up my personal sacred time had been shoved to the side. The funny part was that my body made me completely aware of my lack of running time. Yes, my knees creaked and my ankles burned, yet it was more the non-ability to shut off the business side of my brain. It was somewhere around the two mile mark when I stopped thinking about emails. At mile three I stopped beating myself up for not blogging enough. By mile four was when Steve returned. The Steve that doesn’t have “commitments” or “obligations” but instead enjoys the particular shade of green that the grass in Cheesmen offers.

You might not even really realize that you are not doing the things that make you truly happy. I implore you to stop and ask, “What do I love to do? Why am I not doing it?”

Cool Spot

My eyes opened to find the other half standing beside the bed staring directly at me. As my vision and my mind began to clear I could tell he was saying something. Since it was morning of our six year anniversary, I looked down his body to find the tray of breakfast and piping hot coffee. He has never brought me a breakfast tray in the entire six years we’ve been together, so it’s strange that I looked for this. As I came around, I focused on the warm anniversary morning greeting he was exhorting to me.


“The refrigerator is dead! Everything in the freezer is ruined.”

He turned and marched from the room to let me process the death that has befallen our house.

After much caucusing between the two of us and the dog as we stood over the corpse of our 10 year old Kenmore, it was decided that we had to go appliance shopping. This is when I returned to my theory that domesticity isn't pretty. You just might spend your anniversaries driving from massive appliance store to massive appliance store in hopes to find a great deal.

“Ok, so we need ice and water through the door” I said after the third store.

“Yes, but we’re to the point in our lives that we deserve a really nice fridge. So, freezer on the bottom and French doors.” My spendy partner said as he attempted to sell me on the 3,000 stainless models.

As I walked down the endless variety of ice boxes, I couldn’t help thinking of Scruff. There were things to consider: Bottom mount. Top mount. Side by Side. Dear God, who knew there would be so many choices just to keep my OJ cool.

“This will be our anniversary present to us” actually fell from my dear man’s lips as the salesperson attempted to ring us up. “Oooooo, like a trip to London, yet better. And colder. And a fridge. Without us leaving the house.” I said to the cashier as she attempted to sell us an extended warranty.

We decided on a nice black Kenmore Side by Side. It has ice and water on the door, because we’re fancy, yet not pretentious enough to have French doors on our fridge. I’m excited to take vacation photos of it, because… well it’s my summer vacation. And my anniversary present.

Alan Turing

When asked who my heroes are, I always start with Alan Turing.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Turing

The Center

Every year at Denver’s Pride Celebration I have an amazing time. Hanging out with close friends as we watch the parade of colorful floats, groups, and utter craziness go by, heading for the Civic Center Park in the heart of downtown. This is followed by wandering around the massive event filled with vender booths, clubs, and fattening food and beer.

Every year, since my first Pride Celebration back in ’89 I also get a ping of guilt. This is because every year since I first matched down the parade route in cut-off Z Cavaricci jeans, I really thought I needed to volunteer for the event. The celebration only happens once a year and is hosted by Denver’s LGBT community center. Every year I think to myself, I really want to do something to help The Center. I’ve gone so far as sign up for the volunteer orientation. Somehow, I made excuses to NOT step up and become a volunteer.

My excuses are lame. I have free time. I want to get involved.

My good intentions have made no progress.

This is why I must be writing about it here. It has prompted me click on the sign-up for information on the next volunteer orientation. If you live in the Denver area, I encourage you to join me. Click here. If you don’t live in the Denver area, I encourage you to harass me until I attend one of the classes. It’s the only way I’ll learn.

Lunch Time

Starting out for lunch today brought me nothing but giggles.

My workplace is in the heart of Denver's hip and trendy Capital Hill neighborhood. It's a place I know very well. Right out of high school, my first apartment was in this gay, counter-culture area  next to the downtown business center.

As I walked down the sidewalk I found myself front of the first gay bar I ever fightenedly walked into, so many centuries ago. I snickered that it's now a hipster bar. Out front was a gaggle of young gay kids killing time. I made my way through the gang, just a forty year old in a suit. The conversation I heard could of been from the days that I hung out in front of this stoop. One of having nothing to do, not enough money, and why there so many old men in suits pushing past them.

I wanted to stop and inform them that they're nothing new. They didn't invent "being cool." I over styled my hair, wore Daisy Dukes, and sported tiny T-shirts to highlight my wash board abs too. And did it better.

Instead I straightened my tie, winked at the smoking hot twenty-one year old checking me out, and thought about the last twenty-two years.

Good Friends

Sunday afternoons during the summer mean warm long shadows as the Sun takes its sweet time to set. For me it means heading over to our local bear bar for Beer Bust. A long standing tradition of beers, beards, and buds. You can tell the beer bust is in high season by the metal cattle fencing surrounding the bar’s parking lot turned play space for the bears, otters, and other animal themed male homosexuals.

This really is the time to connect with old friends. I get to have a couple quality hours without the pressure of everyday life; it’s less about hanging out in a bar and more about hanging out with friends. Old and new.

This last Sunday I had the chance to spend time chatting with a good friend I met way back in 2004 when I first moved back to Denver. I consider him a long-time bud. We were given some time to catch up on our lives, flirt a little, and generally spend time enjoying each other’s company. Please don’t ask me his name. I can’t remember.

Moving from Dallas to Denver was pretty traumatic. Leaving the gay ghetto, they had to peel my fingers from the door jamb of my beloved gay gym. When settled in Denver the first thing I did was to sign up at Denver’s small gay club, Broadway Bodyworks. This helped the decompression to a city without a centralized gay neighborhood. Around this time was when I met ___. We started to match our workout times to get more gym hangout time. We have been great buds ever since. Well, all but that small part where he greets me with “Hey! Steve! How’s it going?” And I once again, have to stumble over saying hey…. handsome. It’s been 8 years, how frickin horrible is it that I can’t remember his name.

Yes, I have tried all the games of introducing him to other friends, yet it seems that his name never comes up. “This is my good friend________. We’ve known each other since ’04.”

Maybe I should ask him to friend me on Facebook?

You Go

Well, get her.

My Theme This Week...

ENTJ

All this week I'm in a training seminar. It's training so I can be a Practitioner of the Myers-Briggs personality test. I find this funny because I am so anti personality test as part of my nature.

If you don't know this structured test it lumps you into four defined groups, assigned a letter, to be formed into an acronym. I'm sure you've heard at parties, "oh... I'm a INFP" and everyone nods like they know what the heck that means. Well, I'm now trained to explain what the letters mean. Good times.

The funny part of this training is my perceptions. If asked, I'd say I was a feeling, introvert. With all this testing, I've come to terms that I'm very extroverted. And I'm all Judging, not what I hoped, a touchy-feely guy.

Guess this stuff works. So my intuition tells me.