Birthday

Today’s my Birthday. I turn 225 today. And I don’t feel a day over 175. I feel comfortable in my skin, so I started by dying my grey beard...

After it settles I guess I’ll go get pancakes.

Birthday Eve

I like to think of today as, “Birthday Eve.” It’s the anticipation that something good is good to happen. Although whenever I think of it in these terms, I begin to sing the old Kate Bush song, Cloudbusting “Ooh, I just know that something good is going to happen… I don't know when, but just saying it could even make it happen.” The simple fact about is, I love for my Birthday. And the anticipatory thinking is just one of the best parts. The best part began last night….

We were walking through the grocery store. It was “date night” and my idea of a great date was a hamburger, followed by Krogering. I casually mentioned that I needed to pick up a boxed cake mix, because I wanted to bake a chocolate cake for my birthday. The look that was upon my date’s face was heart-melting. He had already planned to bake me a chocolate cake from scratch. God, I love my Birthday.

My day will bring adventures around the city. With one notable exception. Readers of my blog over the years will remember that there is one restaurant I go to on my Birthday. It is a historical fact, and unwavering tradition that I eat my Birthday Dinner at Le Central, Denver’s legacy French Restaurant.  That will change this year. After thirty-four years in business, Le Central closed last September. My Birthday tradition is gone… just like my youth.

But, I will eat cake. And celebrate. My friends, will gather around, regardless of the physical location. I will celebrate the forth anniversary of my fortieth birthday. Meanwhile I will quietly sing… “I just know that something good is going to happen… saying it could even make it happen.”

Beard today, Gone tomorrow

School has begun with fervor and abandon of all personal time and space. Week one; just as an ice breaker saw our hero write a paper on Shakespeare's tragedies focusing on Macbeth. Fun. And, over in history class I researched the debate of the native people living amongst the American continent before 1492. Although nothing should get in the way of blogging, my life quickly came to developing the new habits. That part of life, the establishing of new habits, always throw me for a loop. One professor wants all work turned in on Mondays, the other on Thursdays. I'm pretty sure I have it figured out, now.

I did find time to shave off the beard. Although I couldn't possible work up the courage to shave completely. A radicle trim had to suffice.  On my trip annual visit to a local museum I snapped the last known photo of my 2014 beard....

Then later that night, hanging out in the boyfriends bathroom I trimmed down my face like a sheep being trimmed in early spring....

A year of beard, gone. Meh. No big deal. Time for 2015 and more follicle frivolity

Pre-Birthday

Next Tuesday is my fortieth Birthday. Again. In fact, I will be turning forty for the third time. It is all in my plan to only age by fives from now on. I will be forty until I turn forty-five, then it will be forty-five for five years until I celebrate fifty. This really isn’t a vanity issue, because I am already finding this...

After flirting will an amazingly hot guy I re-read his Scruff profile. That’s when I saw the “Age limit is 35” sign posted to the front door. Remember that Snoopy cartoon where Snoopy is attempting to travel across country and faces anti-dog segregation in public spaces? I thought that was just an allegory for racism. Now I know how people facing this type of overt segregationist views felt.  Okay, not really. But, the blood did stop pumping from my over thirty-five year old heart for a bit. 

It is really that in this day and age I cannot be bothered going to every social media site and changing my age. It took my like ten minutes to remember my Big Muscle Bear.com password, just to change my ten year old photo to a five year old photo. At least now I’m not sporting Z. Cavericci. jeans. So, if you ask me my age, just add up to four years. And know that I am aging gracefully. 

Weekend Wrap-up

My Birthday weekend started out with a visit to my favorite breakfast restaurant to load up on carbs and gravy.    

The carbs were needed for the marathon tour of three amazing museums.

At the Museum of Contemporary Art, a cushion called me fat.

After an amazing day out with friends, I came home to find that Britain’s Queen had sent me yet another birthday present. It’s embarrassing; really, I still haven’t sent her a gift for her 132^nd birthday.

I couldn’t dwell on my social faux pas, as it was soon time to head to dinner.

My new favorite drink.



It goes by many regional names; in these parts it is called a Colorado Bulldog. It’s a White Russian with Coke.

 
 
Just thirty-seven of my closest friends. It’s like a “Where’s Waldo” more like a “Where’s Steve?”

Dinner was amazing.



By the time Sunday rolled around I was still in my whirlwind. A run in the park, breakfast with buds, then off to the mall to shop for some new Pumas using my stack of Puma gift cards.


Running through the mall with the new kicks.


 

 
 

Driving to the next engagement.

I finally had time to relax at a friend’s get-together.  That was when I discovered that my cocktail thought I was handsome.



It was a truly awesome birthday. Now I need a nap.

Le StevieB

Birthdays for me have been a day to live if I was on another continent. This is one reason I drag my friends to the same restaurant every year. Every year on my big day I eat my birthday dinner at the same French restaurant in Denver, Colorado. The restaurant itself holds amazing memories going back to my childhood.

Back in the 80’s my family would drive by this Downtown restaurant. I would stare out of the car window and gaze at the building as if it were the Eiffel Tower itself. I would spend hours dreaming that Dack Rambo would fall in love with me and take me to this French Restaurant to express his undying love for me. What? I was twelve. And hopeless in love with Dack Rambo, or at least his jeans. In high school I would have to change buses near the corner where Le Central stands. During this time it wasn’t Dack Rambo but, Scott Bakula who would profess his undying love.

Today I turn forty, Dack Rambo has been dead since 1994, and Scott Bakula destroyed our love with Enterprise. But, the idea that I’m still here and can still dream of far off places and far off faces is still very much alive. The friends will gather around for my annual pilgrimage and together we will celebrate another year of us.

"Patience, Grasshopper"

I’m trying to be very Zen about the growing stack of boxes on the dining room table. The Femail Man came to drop a new one everyday for the last three days. They sit there, mocking me. They are soldiers awaiting the battle. A battle they will lose tomorrow. When their spilled guts will be my birthday presents. I can barely walk by them, unable to make it through the dining room without their low call. “Your birthday presents are right here! Trapped inside us!”


Torture. Tomorrow, will be my release.

The boxes arrive.

They get placed on the table.

Ripped open tomorrow.

The Big 40

On this coming Saturday I will turn forty. I am honestly thinking nothing of it. Well, about the age thing anyway as I always revel in my birthday. For me it’s a day of luxury, to indulge in boisterous festivities.

Since this year the big day will fall on a Saturday, my adventurous day ‘bout town can be shared with friends. We will make the annual pilgrimage to my favorite Cajun style restaurant for breakfast, and then spend the day on a walking tour of museums in the city. I will be joined by friends and relatives on different stops along the way.

You are Sixteen, going on Forty...

Spend your birthday wandering around museums? Yeah, it’s crazy to think this, taking a perfectly good birthday and blowing it inside a stuffy museum. I would have thought this as well. I guess I’ll chalk this up to being forty. Isn’t this was old people do? When I was sixteen I wouldn’t have dreamed that I’d even make it to forty, much less spending it looking at art. It would be such a boring, un-cool way to waste your time. But then again at sixteen I spent my days lounging in the grass of Cheesman Park, eating nothing but gas station nachos. So really who was I to judge? Shut up, sixteen year old Steve!

My fortieth year will find me in a museum gift shop. This really is why I go to museums in the first place. You get to play with cool stuff in the gift store, and act like a sixteen year old.

LE STEVIEB

What do I want for my birthday? Well other than a brand-name vacuum cleaner, a tasteful trunk organizer and not having to wheeze on the decline bench trying to get a flat stomach back. I want a day off to visit my cities museums. Just a quiet day to walk around the smooth clean floors, rub my hands over the stanchions, and experience the intellectual gravitas. Or something like that. Then I’m going to see about buying the tightest fitting Super Boy T-shirt I can find.


Birthdays for me have been a day to just pull out of my life and live as I would if I was on another continent. This is one reason I drag my friends to the same restaurant every year. Every year on my big day I eat my birthday dinner at the same French restaurant here in Denver. Now that I type this it sounds little… repetitive.. But the restaurant itself holds amazing memories going back to my childhood.

For some reason back in the 80’s my family would drive by this restaurant. I would stare out the car window and gaze at the building as if it were the Eiffel Tower itself. I would spend hours dreaming that Dack Rambo would fall in love with me and take me to this French Restaurant to express his undying love for me. What? I was twelve. And hopeless in love with Dack Rambo, or at least his jeans. In high school I would have to change buses near the corner where Le Central stands. During this time it wasn’t Dack Rambo but, Scott Bakula who would profess his undying love.

Now I’m in my late thirties, Dack Rambo has been dead since 1994 and Scott destroyed our love with Enterprise. but, the idea that I’m still here and can still dream of far off places and far off faces is still very much alive. The friends will gather around for my annual pilgrimage and together we will celebrate another year of us.

THIRTY-NINE

They say that humans learn more before the age of two then the remainder of their lives. I beg to differ, since I’m days away from my thirty-ninth birthday I would like to offer that as for me I’ve learned more in my late thirties then I ever thought possible.

Some of this learning I’m referencing would actually be un-learning. A perfect example would be my snap judgments. In the last year I’ve had to unlearn making quick judgments on people. Character is more telling than looks. Or maybe I’ve had to unlearn my steadfast taste in men, or even down to my need to only drive a 4X4.

I’ve realized this week that I’m learning that what I thought I knew, I don’t know. Confusing? Not really, it’s like I’m finally calming down. Getting comfortable in my own skin.

This was made clear not long ago when I gave a hug to my friend Carl. See, I spent the last twenty years hating hugs. I’d never hug anyone because I didn’t see the point and it somehow made me “less masculine” in my eyes. Thirteen years of friendship and not once had I hugged Carl. Really? How does that make me more masculine?

I feel I’m going to enter my thirty-ninth year with a much more clear Idea of what it takes to be Steve. That being said, let me re-read this when I ‘m at forty-nine so I can have a good laugh.

I'm Still Here

Last Friday I met the boys out at a British pub and finally found a great Shepard’s pie since the vegetarian restaurant where I was a gay waiter back in college. After watching some rugby and cleaning our plates at the British Bulldog, we walked next door to a bar that I had never been in and yet knew every inch of its dark layout.I turned twenty-one on January 28^th, 1993. On the day of this major event through the birthday breakfasts, the beers bought by family and friends there was only one thing on my mind. The Denver Triangle.

The Denver Triangle was Denver’s the tri-state region’s premiere... and well only men’s leather bar.  I had snuck into a lot of bars before turning twenty-one, knowing a whole routine to get into The Ripcord in Houston, Texas. But, this night I was going to walk in as a man. Not a boy having to promise sexual favors to anyone letting me step foot on its hollow ground.

I believe like a Bat Mitzvah or leaving for your first mission gay men have their own rights of passage. There’s realizing that they don’t have to be effeminate to be gay, learning how to give an amazing blow job and walking into their first gay bar with their head held high, proud of who and what they are.

My twenty-first birthday was that night.

To tell you the truth I was scared shitless, I don’t know why but I was. My friends quickly spread to the bar that I was fresh meat.  This actually helped me meet a lot of great guys that I remained friends with for years.  This also helped me not forget the passage into manhood by not being able to sit down for a week. [insert giggle here] 

The Denver Triangle is long gone.

Last Friday after dinner we walked next door to a bar that I’ve never been to and yet knew every inch of its dark layout.  I knew every inch of this hipster beat-box bar, I giggled to myself as I showed my ID to a twenty-five year old hip-cat door man.

As I walked to the back of the bar it was if I was  desending the staircase of the Titanic. the atmosphere was thick with rust. It was lost forever but I’m still here. 

BIRTHDAY WRAP UP

Well…. I guess my blog post for today just…..disappeared. Great. And it was almost Shakespearean in its luminosity. Almost.

Anywho. The birthday weekend was pretty damn great. We went to a great French restaurant for the grown up portion of my birthday, then to Casa Bonita Mexican Restaurant for all you can eat indigestion.

Yes, that Casa Bonita…..



Thanks again for all the Birthday wishes.


Sorry about posting a clip of South Park..It won't happen again.

BIRTHDAY STEVE

My Aunt Barbara sent this to me...

NICE RACK

Like you and the rest of America, last night I was glued to the TV to watch the Jersey Shore reunion special. Not since VH1 aired its Vanilla Ice Behind The Music have I seen such gripping dialogue.

When that was done sucking twenty minutes out of my very soul, I went online to shop for my Birthday present. My big day is this Thursday. Wheeeeeeeee! I immediately realized what I want-NO-need for my Birthday…




What a great way to get tricks to leave.

THIRTY-SEVEN

How was your weekend? On Saturday we went to Pappadeaux for a gay family dinner. Pappadeaux is one of those high-end chain Cajun type of seafood places. Although, Mike referred to it as river bottom food. Fuzz had a dozen Oysters on the half shell. I tried not to puke.

The Thirty-seven year old thing has settled in most ways, I did overextend my shoulder at the gym on Friday because two nineteen year-olds on the bench next to me. I put one more plate then they had on the bar. OUCH! But, I showed them!

I ran into the Leather Avenger at the gym. You know, you have a Leather Avenger at your gym. The guy who works out in a codpiece and jack boots. He’s the one you find on the cables wearing leather Wonder Woman wrist cuffs. He wished me a happy birthday but said that it was nothing compared to his Fifty-two years. He added,
“Last week I was at the bathhouse being plowed by a twenty year old. And he stopped and said is that hurting you?
So I said Boy I’ve got twelve rings hanging from my balls, do you honestly think you can hurt me?”

I smiled and back away.
When you Google Leather Avenger this is what you get:

Birthday Wrap

The Birthday went exceedingly well. We went to Lucille’s for Breakfast, had a great workout and sat at Dazbog for way to long chatting with friends. The Afternoon was filled with a self-made Ghost in the Shell marathon whilst Fuzz made me a meteorite shaped chocolate cake. Every year we go to Le Central for my Birthday Dinner. This year was pretty damn yummy, with Onion soup and nibbling things followed by a French cut rib eye. No one could tell us what made a French cut rid eye, French cut but none the less it was pretty damn good. Today I’m back to carrots and celery. But after a day of Creole Breakfast, American coffeecake, and French dinners. I’m looking forward to nibbling on rabbit food.

Birthday Steve

Here's a picture of me on my 33rd Birthday....



Man I was skinny, I can't believe that was four years ago today.

Cake or Fox?

I just ran out of my office. It was "monthly birthday cake" time. God, I hate having to be all "team workish." I'm hiding in the lobby, but the massive TV is tuned to Fox news. Damn! Out of the frying pan.