More Monday Miscellany (Eyes Half Open Edition)

Also known as mmm.

Friday night, I did something that I probably shouldn't have done with someone I really shouldn't have done it with. As such, I choose to remain entirely cryptic about it, though I will say that I don't regret having done it, at least not yet. We'll have to see whether there's any fallout. I suspect that in the end I shall come to regret having done it halfway instead of full out, but that couldn't be helped because I was so very fatigued.

I have been informed that I can say that I'm sleepy, but that I should never tell anyone that I'm tired because "tired" has very bad connotations to and for other gay men. That's why I said I was fatigued, even though I was so tired that I almost fell asleep while I was doing what I either should or shouldn't have been doing, depending on your point of view.

Anyway, after I was done doing that, I still had to make the cake for YFU's birthday party/sleepover. Fortunately, I don't have to be very awake to bake a cake. I was going to make an eight-layer cake, but when it was six layers high, I realized that any more would have been overkill. I'll try to post a picture of it later. I didn't bake eight separate layers, of course. I baked four layers and then split three of them to make the six layers. Even though I know better, I bought some cheap non-stick cake pans that were on sale at the supermarket. I have plenty of cake pans, but if I leave them anywhere in the kitchen, b&c finds them and then hides them in the basement. So I needed more. The nonstick cake pans always overcook the cake. I should have compensated, but I didn't, so before I put the very rich ganache on each layer, I brushed on some seedless raspberry jam that had been melted and then mixed with Triple Sec, all in an attempt to moisten it. I have to confess that I was disappointed with the finished product, but it looked good, and the kids loved it. I suspect that many of them have never had a cake that was both a) made with real butter and b) not from a box mix. I'm sure the ganache also helped. I not only put it between the layers, I spread it over the top, so the whole cake was encased in rich, chocolaty goodness. And I whipped some very heavy cream at the last minute as an accompaniment. This is always something of a revelation to people who are used to the aerosol cans.

If there's one thing that I hate more than box mix cakes, it's "buttsecks." Really, people: what the fuck? If you're going to write about anal intercourse, can you please try to do it in a non-cutesy sort of way? "Buttsex" is perfectly descriptive and appropriate. As are "anal sex," "anal intercourse," and "taking it up the ass." Sex between men is something wonderful and basic. Why do you want to make it sound like something that your stuffed animals do to each other? If you can't talk about sex in an adult manner, just don't talk about sex at all. We will all continue to assume that you're having sex, and the sex that we imagine you're having is probably superior to what you're actually having, anyway.

Speaking of anyway: I was up until 3 am working on the cake, and then I was up again before 8 to go to the office, so by the time nine twelve-year-olds descended on the house, I was a little too tired sleep deprived to be at my best. Still, I avoided yelling at anyone, and I got the pizza ordered and the punch made and the other food out on the table, and I got everyone set up making jewelry, and then I pretty much left them to their own devices, except when they asked me for something, which was often. Around midnight, one of the girls knocked herself on her back, so I had to call her mother and ask whether I could give her an Alleve, but it turned out to be no big deal. I got almost eight hours of sleep, and then I got up and made them all breakfast. YFU had told me that only four of the nine were spending the night, but it turned out to be seven. Oh well. Afterwards, she told me that she'd had a good time at the party, but that it had been "a little chaotic." No, really?

Most of the girls were dropped off and/or picked up by their fathers, all of whom I'd do, given the chance. They all seemed relentlessly straight. They were very different types, but they were uniformly in awe of my willingness to host a sleepover for twelve-year-olds. I was having a discussion with one of them when he came to pick up his daughter, and it became apparent that when he'd asked me what I do for a living, he'd heard "taxi driver" when I'd said "tax accountant." This led to some amusing misunderstandings; eventually, however, all was made clear.

Later on Sunday, I took YFU to see Penelope. I found it entirely charming, as did YFU. The film takes an especially dim view of the rich, which I wholeheartedly approve, but it's really stretching to see it as any sort of class-conscious message vehicle. It's a charming fairy tale, and as it is the first and last duty of fairy tales to be charming, it is a complete success on its own terms.

These days, I'm working my way through b&c's collection of gay fiction, and I find most of it, well, lacking. My current reading, however, is Mike Albo's Hornito, which might make me reconsider my fatigue over gay coming of age novels if I weren't so convinced that it's an outlier in the genre. (All the others that I've finished, or even started, recently have seemed very tired. And tiring, if not downright tiresome.) What I notice most about Mr. Albo's writing is his ability to invoke strong visual images. As I'm not typically a visual thinker, this feat is all the more remarkable. I'm very impressed, but I'm only about two-thirds of the way through, so there's still plenty of time for him to disappoint me. And given that the book's conclusion seems somewhat pre-ordained from its first chapter, I'm afraid that my not liking the ending seems distressingly likely. Still, given the dreck I've read lately, a novel that keeps me happy up to a couple of pages before the end is something to celebrate.