check yourself, girl, you got a cameltoe

thursday got back into oakland, and while waiting for the bart experienced a 4.1 earthquake. well, moreso ignored/dismissed. but it makes my travels sound so much more exotic!

barely made it in time to enjoy kirk read’s smegma, a spoken-word orgy in the lobby of eros bathhouse in san francisco. my favorite had to be michelle tea’s amazingly vivid rant of all of the things wrong with san francisco, yuppie scum and pottery barns and hip-hop thugs and gentrification all the way to 14th street. also, katastrophe’s hip-hop stylings were nearly as good as my boy qboy, but katastrophe had the added queer points of being an ftm, allowing him to rap about gender-bending, lesbianism and still be macho. word to your mommy.

had a scrumptious american meal with hooman at chow—i’m so glad that we’re friends again, and always pleased when we get to hang out. hit badlands solo, and loved the attention. the bartenders were all like so where are *you* from? and the cloakroom boy was all like i’ll have to frisk you if you lose your ticket and as i left, the sidewalk sale outside yelled hey, red jacket boy, come back! and then as i cruised down to the café cars drove by yelling come home with us! don’t go home alone. too bad they were all disgusting trolls.

friday
locating my mates during my trip was slightly inconvenient because [1] my uk mobile phone is too expensive to use in the us [2] nobody does text messaging in the us [3] nobody answers when i call from an unlisted number—eg payphone [4] there are exactly 3 working payphones in all of technogroundzero san francisco.

after enjoying a swanky sushi lunch downtown with my wife mom galpal stacy, i decided to take a coffee break in front of the 36-story office building i used to work at. while sipping my iced mocha next to the pot-smoking bike messengers, my old boss-cum-mentor mark happens to stroll by. he was a slightly older got-it-together gay boy that i used to work with, who was sorta the vice-president-type who got my ass transferred to london rather than laid off in san francisco.

i used to turn to him for advice and guidance in all aspects of my life. when he visited london last year, he sorta shook his finger in disapproval of my life, my new job, the whole shebang. we fell outta touch after that, and seeing him in front of our old office was sorta ironic. i love him to death, and still look up to him.

spent the afternoon with my old chum dancer jason, who is as cute as ever with his new hairstyle. we hung out in his sunny haight street apartment, swapping stories, playing with each others’ gadgets and swapping mp3s. met stacy for dinner at firewood, and then dove in head-first to my old haunt, the bar. i held court there for an hour or two, running into cheri from burningman, aussie ken and his friends, angela, several new admirers [hey, um, you're cute] and even scott from friendly society in london. got dragged to badlands, where i begrudgingly hooked up with paul, some kinda-cute-in-the-dim-light-of-the-bar-but-not-in-broad-daylight boy visiting san francisco for his [30th? 21st?] birthday.

san francisco boys are, in fact, ugly. they dress poorly, have no sense of style. they’re too friendly, too goofy, too clueless, too lispy. everyone sounds so… gay. well, except for my friends—they’re all cute and sassy and perfect. maybe all the other good ones have already coupled up? maybe there are like hidden clubs where all the cute boys in san francisco go to. hey, go ahead and send my membership card to london.

sucker for a view

monday, continued—decompressed as we made the 7 hour drive back from burningman to san francisco. started off not really knowing cheri or juan or even really have bonded with ken or mancage jason, by the end we had triumphantly connected and renewed our faith in humanity.

returned to ken’s place, and after unloading and a delightful shower & shave, hit the infamous familiar-yet-so-unfamiliar badlands… eric was horrified by the gruesome latino/asian gayboy crowd. mirrored troughs. cheap-ass castro cocktails like cosmos and citron & tonics and so on. the music was horrendous—slow, bland dance remixes of otherwise sexy chunes like justin & beyoncé. dorks.

collapsed in a heap with juan back at ken’s.

tuesday—juan, hooman & i had a technicolor brunch at squat & gobble, [re]processing the week’s events in the desert. trying to keep the vibe alive, we camped out in dolores park for a few hours, overlooking the leathery 58yo wannabe rent boys in their imported non-speedo speedoes. gross.

enjoyed some not-as-good-as-uncle-bert’s bloody marys at what used to be uncle bert’s, but is now called the mix. went on a bit of a shopping spree, getting socks & undies & shirts [i packed at 530am after only a few hours sleep, and didn't really plan well enough for my 2-week trip]. the fashion found at clothing shops [much like the gay scene in san francisco] is pathetic, boring, and a poor imitation of what i’ve become accustomed to in london.

but, i still relish many things of san francisco and california life, it’s just so easy to spot the shortcomings and inadequacies of san francisco life, culture, and entertainment. small trashy boring gay bars. with weird clientelle, none of whom i find even remotely attractive. the reason i never pulled boys in san francisco clubs when i lived there for two years was not because i was timid or shy—it’s because most san fran boys are freakishly ugly.

juan drove back to san diego, so hooman, ken and i continued our debauchery, with a sushi snack, some delightful cocktails at my old haunt the bar, and eventually dinner [cocktails] at nirvana. the café and badlands were both hopelessly dead, so hooman and i hopped over to trannyshack at the stud, where i nearly wasn’t let in by the door nazi. don’t you know who i think i am?!

ugly, wrinkly drag queens, faux trannies and goth boys made for a fun, boozy sleazy night. i chatted up a few cuties, including some new yorker named aaron—god, american boys are just so difficult to seduce. i’m happy to play your silly games, but eventually i need to win that trophy, boy!

next thing i know, hooman & i are cruising down market street in the back of a pickup truck, driven by two outlandish [c'mon, really, is there any other kind?] trannies. we arrive at the afterparty, to find a huge flat filled with leathery trannies, leathery furniture, cocktails and coke.

i spend a few hours nauseating myself with refreshments, and chatting with an older, straight trannie who has a daughter and is an architect. a total sweethart, he listens attentively to my life story, and insists that i follow my dreams, do some snowboarding, and write an article on tranny culture.