The Trials and Tribulations of the not-so-New Bear Icon

°Yesterday we ate at Applebee's. Here's a thought...Why the hell do we ever go to Applebee's? The food's not very good, the waitress reminded me of Joan Cusack playing dumb - and perhaps just out of the halo - and the average age in the place was just a few years shy of the 4:30 dinner time at Luby's Cafeteria.

°Chili's on the other hand has pissed me off as they got rid of my favorite burger. Actually the burger has been off the menu for about 15 years, but still, they could make it for you up until this month. Chili's got rid of their chili. The strangest thing. now you can still get chili at Chili's, but it's a different chili, with beans - and that doesn't set well with me. It is also kind of weak - they brought out a little for us to try - and wouldn't stay in a burger very well. So there you go, goodbye Chili's Trip burger - the burger that had been there since day one, but now you can't even get an Oldtimer with chili. It too is off the menu. It's a sad day, indeed.

°Today was President's Day, so I had the day off. I let the dog chase the Roomba around the house and did my taxes, but I also went out to a park and studied on my NASD Series 7 test. I take the exam in May, but the brokerage exam is pretty long, extensive, and detailed, so I probably should have started a long time ago. It was a great day to be outside. It was sunny and in the 60's here. I sat out in the park for a couple of hours reading about Bonds and calls and puts and yields. I also watched several ducks swim around a pond, and that seemed much more interesting than being able to tell how a bonds price raises or lowers given the current interest rates. I've taken the Series 6 before, so I have some knowledge of what I'm in for, but the 7 is a six hour test vs. a three hour one. There's also lots that I've forgotten.

°Seeing posts from Dave (meatybear) talking about how he forgot his watch today, and from Jeb (arthole) talking about the 80's era Swatch watches he had for his costume as he DJ'ed the 80's party at IBR made me think about this story I saw the other day that I saw on Yahoo showing that watches have declined in popularity since everyone's been carrying cell phones and other gadgets that display the time.

Personally, I wear a watch every day, I don't always wear it around the house, but it's certainly a part of me when I go out. Maybe I'm just old, but I tend to rely on my watch for the time more than my cell phone, or iPod or even my computer monitor at work. When I go down to the cafeteria for my thirty minute lunch, it's my watch - a square-faced Fossil I bought at the San Marcos Outlet coming back from the wonderful ACL/Hurricane Rita escape back in 2005 - that tells me that it's been 45 minutes and I need to get back to my desk.

I've owned dozens of watches, including a digital watch with red numbers on a black face back in 1980 to Snoopy, Mickey Mouse and Superman watches, and several Swatches, including my favorite, the clear one that you could see all the gears turn. I had a Pac-Man watch and the ever geeky calculator watch. Most of them have been analog (hands) and many of them from Fossil. i don't think I've ever spent more than $100 for one. My dad has had a Rolex that he's had since before I was born. Perhaps if I invested a bit more cash I could do the same, but like my glasses, I like to change it up every few years.

The strange thing is that this year I didn't "fall back" when we went back to Standard Time this past fall. My watch has been an hour ahead for months - and when someone asks me the time, I have to do the little mental calculation to tell them it's 3:30, not 4:30. I'm not sure why I'm being stubborn about this, but with Daylight Saving Time starting earlier this year, that will be remedied next month. I guess I'll hold out.

Still, like Dave, suddenly finding that you've walked out of the house without your watch makes you feel naked, and then you're constantly in need to know what the time is. It's an insecurity as you can't rely on yourself to know. For some reason the digital clock on your cell won't do. It's a strange and irrational feeling, but we are governed by the construct of time. Our watches are just a way that we try to keep it all under control.

As I've mentioned in a previous post, I have some time off coming up in late august. my problem is, I'm not sure what to do with it. Of course my first idea is to consult with Chris on his availability, since he has more time off available, and i thought, more flexibility. This however, is not entirely the case as Chris has an upcoming office move this month, and if everything works out, may get scheduled for some boot camp training for a couple of weeks soon afterward.

So, here's my first dilemma, should I just go and prepare a vacation on my own? It would be nice to go somewhere with him, but for one thing, we have very different ideas about what a vacation is, and for two, perhaps after the home invasion I staged 5 months ago, he'd like the house to himself for a few days.

I have a full week. I know that doesn't sound like anything special, but it was one of the last few weeks available to sign up for. the awful system that we have at the new job is pretty much first come, first serve, and because you have to put your requests in so early, many people just start grabbing Mondays and Fridays all over the calendar, locking them up. Still, I got the week of August 21-25 and the Saturdays and Sundays surrounding it, of course.

So what do you do with a week? Last year Chris and I explored the Bay Area and some of Northern California, and for that, we had ten days. I like to pack a lot into those days, seeing new places and exploring. Chris likes to relax. Luckily a stay at Chris' parents place allowed us to slow down a bit, but trust me, we saw a ton of stuff in San Francisco, and I still have a very big list of things i want to go back and see. It wasn't enough time.

Sure, I could go back, but why do it without Chris? Of course Chris would like to do a cruise. I'll make this statement by stating that I've never been on a cruise, but truly, I can think of nothing more boring than being trapped on a ship all the time, with a couple of outings to see a beach (yawn) or shop island stores that are made for tourists (also yawn). The only cruise I've ever though might be interesting is the Alaska tours. If I'm going it alone, then I'm certainly not doing a cruise.

My passport has expired (stupid, I know), so I'm pretty much going to be stateside this year.

So here's my dream vacation that's totally unrealistic. My desired destination this year is Boston, but i also want to see my sister in Baltimore, so my idea - why not do both? I'd really like to fly to Boston, spend four or five days there, then take the train down to Baltimore and stay with my sister for a couple of days before coming back to Dallas.

Boston's a decent city for public transportation, so I don't think I'd need to rent a car, and i can get a decent deal on hotel rooms through the company. Baltimore's easy with my sister, and being there on the weekend means we can go out and do something on Saturday before i have to jet back.

I don't know if I'd have time for New York City or not. I think I'll have to just pass that by.

Of course any trip to a new place usually means going to a ball game, but since the Red Sox are only in town on Sunday and Monday (both day games), and it's against the Yankees, that may be an impossibility. Would there be a ticket available? Will I fit into those tiny seats at Fenway? Would anyone else want to go?

So there's the idea. Now to see if I can even to afford this, as airfare is going up everyday. Since I wouldn't be flying round trip, I'd likely need to get a travel agent involved to make the whole thing work.

One of my other thoughts is to just go to Baltimore and take the shorter jaunt up to Philadelphia and do some exploring there. I still haven't seen much of the Atlantic coast, or new England, so it's all new to me. If Chris were going, I'd probably town down my plans considerably, giving him more time to relax, but I just don't know what it's going to be just yet.

Damn, I'm already getting stressed about a trip I haven't even started scheduling. I'm just crazy, I know, but my sense of wanderlust, and desire to see Boston and the friends and acquaintances there has my rather psyched.

I just need answers, and maybe some advice, soon.

So, a couple of weeks ago I mentioned that we sometimes start saying "Big Boy" and "Fluffy" when people get those voice recognition call menus that I hate so much, mocking the Citibank ad.

Well, I think we've found the correct password that seems to get you past most of those prompts and directly to a person. It came from a conversation about Tom Cruise.

The Word? Xenu. So far it has a pretty good track record with most of the financial companies with voice commands.

Who knew they were all aligned against the true way?

I’ve got questions to answer, and even a couple of statements to make, so there’s plenty to write about today. It will be chopped up into different posts, because, for one thing, I’m at work at this moment.

Before questions, I have to tell this tale. Last night Chris and I were out at a small Italian restaurant we were visiting as we were trying to get out of the rut of constantly going to Chili’s, Tin Star, BW3 and Chipotle all the time. The food was good, Chris had some vegetable pizza with spinach and artichokes and more, which I stayed safely away from with my bowl of pasta.

On one projection television they were showing the food network, but over the bar, there was a television with Fox News on it, close captioned. As many of you know, Fox News likes to cover any missing white girl story it can find, especially when there’s news that makes Tom Delay, or Dick Cheney, or George Bush look bad that’s being covered by other channels. The “human interest” of an abducted or disappeared 16-25 year old woman with decent photos from the last spring break is definitely newsworthy.

So, there it was, the needed story about some girl who was missing from her spring break trip, with the crying parents and all. It is sad, but not national news. Then they turned to another missing persons story, one about a male college student who apparently was drunk, and his dorm mates threw him down a trash chute, and now he’s missing. Apparently he got dropped into a trash truck, and now officials are looking for him in landfills in the area. It’s a terribly odd story.

Of course, not wanting to say anything bad about the likely dead, I still couldn’t help thinking about a quote from the movie, Better Off Dead, so I turned to Chris and said, “Now that's a real shame when folks be throwin' away a perfectly good white boy like that.”

Now onto the first question I want to answer. John (pteroglyph) asks me this about the post I used to solicit questions:

Why would one agree to answer all in a public venue and be open and honest and then, well, not?

Well, the first thing is, I said “ask me anything”, not that I will answer any question. Semantically, it’s different. I know that it’s a bit of a cop-out answer, but truly, it’s what I meant.

Now, to the deeper issue, why would I solicit questions and not want to answer? Really, there isn’t much of a reason to not answer, but I do have a couple of categories that I will deflect, or answer obscurely. First, I don’t want to answer a question that would end up having to try to think what someone else’s thoughts might be. I’ve run into a couple of entries I’ve written where I tried to guess what someone’s opinions of me, or a situation we were in, and I’ve gotten it wrong, and been called on the floor about it. I’d rather deal with questions about me, and not about others – unless it’s “is so-and-so hot?”, or something.

Second, I don’t want to answer a question that might put someone else in a compromised position, or reveal something that they may not want revealed. For example, Yes, I might have done something in a moving motor vehicle during TBRU, and I’ll own up to that, but the others may not want that revealed, so my truthiness factor is not telling all, or observing the lie of omission.

So, yes, you can ask me about anything. I will answer as honestly as I can, without hurting others. That’s the intention, and that’s what I’m sticking to.

If anyone wants to ask me a question, I’ll continue answering over the weekend.

Ev'nin', ma'am.

Would you mind sayin' that again?

I said, 'Ev'nin', ma'am.

Ev'nin', ma'am'!
Mister, you've got a way of sayin'
Ev'nin', ma'am
That puts me in a friendly state of mind.

Would you mind sayin' that again
I mean 'friendly state'.

Friendly state.

Sister you've got a way of saying
'Friendly state
'That gives me the impression
You're my kind.

Would you mind sayin' 'crazy crystal'?

'Crazy crystal!'
Would you mind saying 'Nieman Marcus'.

'Nieman Marcus!'

Wait a minute!
Wait a minute!

You're from Big D
I can guess
By the way you draw!
And the way you dress
You're from Big D
My, oh Yes
I mean Big D little a, double l-a-s
And that spell Dallas
My darlin', darlin' Dallas

Don't it give you pleasure to confess
That you're from Big D
My, oh Yes
I mean Big D, little a double l-a
Big D, little a double l-a
Big D, little a double l-a-s
And that spell Dallas
Where ev'ry home's a palace
Cause the settlers settle for no less

Hooray for Big D
My, oh Yes
I mean Big D, little a double l-a
Big D, little a double l-a
Big D, little a double l-a-s

You're from Big D
I can guess
By the way you draw!
And the way you dress

You're from Big D
My, oh Yes
I mean Big D little a, double l-a-s
And that spells Dallas
Just dig a toe in Dallas
And there's oil all over your address

Back home in Big D
My, oh Yes
I mean Big D, little a double l-a
Big D, little a double l-a
Big D, little a double l-a-s

And that spells Dallas
I mean it with no malice
But the rest of Texas looks a mess(!)

When you're from Big D
My, oh Yes
I mean Big D, little a double l-a
Big D, little a double l-a
Big D, little a double l-a-s

Big D, Big D
Talkin' 'bout big D, big D

Oil! Oil! Oil! Cattle! Cattle! Cattle!
My, oh Dallas, Dallas, Dallas, Dallas!
Big D! Little A double L-A-S!

And that spells Dallas
My darlin', darlin' Dallas
Don't it give you pleasure to confess
That you're from big D
My, oh yes
I mean
Big D
Little A, Double L-A
Big D
Little A, double-A
Big D, little A, double L-A-S!

I haven't made you all suffer with a meme lately.

Two Names You Go By
1. Mike
2. Egg

Two Parts of Your Heritage
1. English
2. The rest of the British Isles

Two Things That Scare You
1. Being Unemployed
2. Being Alone

Two of Your Everyday Essentials
1. Sausage Biscuits
2. Blogs

Two Things You Are Wearing Right Now
1. Big Dogs Boxers
2. Glasses

Two of Your Favorite Bands or Musical Artists (at the moment)
1. Bloc Party
2. Low Millions

Two Things You Want in a Relationship (other than real love)
1. Companionship
2. Someone who makes me laugh

Two Truths
1. I'm a media junkie...I need to be connected to TV, radio, internet, or something all the time.
2.

Two Physical Things that Appeal to You
1. Facial Hair
2. Body Fur

Two Places You Want to go on Vacation
1. Boston
2. Australia

Two Things You Want to Do Before You Die
1. Zack Galifinakis
2. Move in with Chris, but I hope that's a short term goal.

Two Ways that you are Stereotypically a Guy
1. I can't watch Lifetime Television
2. I love Baseball, which actually makes me a minority among sports fans

Two Things You Normally Wouldn't Admit
1. I cry at movies
2. I want sex all the time.

Two Things You Are Thinking About Now
1. Sex
2. Shouldn't I be folding Laundry?

Two Stores You Shop At
1. Target
2. Randall's

Two People I would like to see take this quiz
Please, Meme's shouldn't be forced on people.

Two People I haven't Talked to in a while
1. John Bland
2. John Adams

The other night I was out late and I needed dinner, so I went to good old Whataburger close to my apartment. Generally this is an out of the way location and is often empty, even when other locations would be full. Maybe this is because it is next to a 24 Hour Fitness location.

I pulled in and saw that the parking lot was fuller than normal, and there seemed to be several teens outside the location. After walking in, I noticed that one whole side was taken up by several more. After I ordered and sat down, and even larger group strolled in. So now the group was around 30 and of course, not all of them were eating.

There were a couple of girls with cheerleading outfits on, they had letters on that spelled SBS, or Second Baptist School. The large christian campus is nearby, and has a school. I had forgotten that they have a football team that plays other religious schools in the area, and apparently the game had let out, and here were some of the students, of course without their parents.

Here I was eating my burger and reading My Queer Life by Michael Thomas Ford. I'm not sure if this was really the best situation, but I had this feeling...and I get it often when I'm in a room of people from a christian organization...that I just want to jump up and waive a rainbow flag. I'm not sure why this is. I'm wondering if this may partially be from coming out so late, or just a frustration with fundamentalist society.

I watched the spoiled brats for a bit. I say that without irony, these are definitely privileged kids who don't know how good that they have it. It's just like those kids on that awful show on MTV, My Super Sweet Sixteen. Kids, you're parents are spending a lot of money to keep you sequestered from a lot of the world's ills, too bad that for most of you it will take years if you ever come to your senses.

Still, as I thought about it, There really wasn't a reason to jump out and be Mr. Hairy Fag to these people, heck, they may be more open to it than their parents, or their grandparents, but I'll never know, because I'll never know these kids. who knows if they are really fundamentalists like their school wants them to be, or not.

I'd probably just color myself worse if I did have a rainbow flag hidden somewhere on my person, being the big, in-your-face faggot. Sometimes being the normal out guy, like I am at work is the better way to change perception. You never know, some kid in that Whataburger might have noticed the book I was reading and figured it out, or not, but still, if any of them were to know, hopefully I put on a decent face...if you can call a guy who's alone at a Whataburger at 11pm a great role-model.

Of course it did cross my mind that really, doing or saying anything could get me in far more trouble than I could handle, too. I recently heard that the men who beat up and left for dead Houston citizen Paul Broussard back in the early 90's were up for parole this week. Those men were in high school in the Woodlands when they found their target, looking for a gay man to beat up one night. Again, sometimes you have to think.

So no, there was no big show. I'd have no idea what it would have been if I actually would ever do something like that, but I guess we always have to think about when and where we come out, whether to be proud of ourselves, or to prove to the world what being homosexual is all about. I know that sometimes I want a parade to happen, and it doesn't come, but that's just because I don't want to feel alone, like I did in that restaurant. Perhaps another reason we come out is just to find our place in the world.

As a light addendum to this, one little remarkable thing happened tonight that kind of set my National Coming Out Day for me. I went over to Jerry's (goofycubb) to see tonight's Amazing Race episode and he had a guest staying over from New Braunsfels. As we got to talking, Tim was telling me that he used to live in Houston and grew up in the Woodlands. I mentioned that I had grown up in Conroe.

Suddenly there was something there...a recognition. he asked me when I graduated high school and I told him, one year before he entered, but the connection really rolled in when we talked about where we lived, a block away from each other! I said, "What's your last name?" "Bratcher," he said. Suddenly I was bowled over. Tim Bratcher was not only here, but a bear.

If I had only known this several years ago. I'm telling you, he's cute now, but it would have helped to have known him several years ago. Apparently he was much more able to come out in school and part of it is that he went to the new school, and not redneck Conroe High.

So we ended up talking for a while, especially how my family's ownership of a computer back in the early 80's helped him pick the career he has today. It's interesting the lives you touch, and you barely know it.

On Wenesday as I was playing golf I looked like this:





What I wanted to look like was:



I have a little bit of work to do to look like Kevin Stadler. (Thanks to bearpawly for the inspiration).