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Today is Adrian's birthday. No, I will not be posting pictures of him in his birthday suit, but yes, you may send him birthday greetings!!! Something tells me the guy who gave him a $40 tip on a $70 coloring service last week would like to see him in his birthday suit. You know, the guy who said he was 24 or 25 (Adrian guessed older) and owns 11 hotels, and wanted to know if Adrian would call him if he gave him his number, despite Adrian having a partner. Yeah, that guy. But I digress, as I am wont to do.Also, if you missed it, be sure to read about my revelation about Carson Kressley yesterday.
(a quick recap: I technically work for an academic department at my college, but 80% of my time is spent working at a research institute here, and I'll officially move over to the institute next semester, not a moment too soon)

I teach a course with a large enrollment, nearly 500 students. Since my school is very proud of its low student-teacher ratio, we don't actually teach one 500-person lecture, but instead have 20-person classes, which means there are many sections and many professors and instructors teaching those sections. We have one professor who oversees the course and coordinates it. Personally, I teach two of those sections, so I have about 40 students.For the last month we've been telling our students that there's no final exam in the course. This is nice for them because a) they don't have to study for a comprehensive final, and b) they can get out of here sooner when the semester's over. The have a test right before the semester ends, but it only covers the last third of the course, not the entire semester.But our coordinator screwed up some paperwork, and our course ended up on the Registrar's final exam schedule, which means the Registrar is expecting us to give an exam, and the department head refuses to ask them to remove it from our course requirements because this kind of mistake has happened so many times that the Registrar is tired of hearing from us. So, rather than owning up to the mistake and taking it on the chin, we will instead be giving the last test during the final exam period. While the students still don't have to study for a comprehensive exam, they do have to stay here longer and worry about an extra exam in the midst of all their finals. Now, this might not sound like much, but what bothers me is the "fuck 'em, they're just students, tell 'em to suck it up" attitude displayed by my fellow faculty members. I hated that when I was a student (read any journal entry about my dissertation process and you'll see that) and I despise it now that I'm on the faculty. I've raised my objections and have been reminded that I'm a fairly junior faculty member and should just do what I'm told. Also, the lack of accountabilty on the part of senior faculty members is revolting. If this has happened so many times that the Registrar is tired of us, how come no one's been disciplined for their unprofessional inattention to detail???That tears it. Though I originally planned to teach for this department again next semester after I transfer to the institute full-time, I've instead decided to find another department that would appreciate my services. One of the nice things about a public policy degree is that it's interdisciplinary and allows me to teach in a number of fields.

I also just learned that the grassy area where my how-to-kill-people class meets and rolls around on the ground is fertilized using partially-processed human sewage. Nice. That explains a few things.


Saturday night, Adrian and I went clubbing with my college roommate's gay stepson. We had a great time and enjoyed the chance to not only spend time with him but also to visit a new club (well, new to us, anyway). So, here's the question:How exactly should we write that one up for the alumni magazine? Oh, and here's another question, since we're asking questions: if you're fixing a couple vegetarian Boca Burgers, does it defeat the purpose if you toss some bacon on them? Oh, and a fried egg? Here's another one: how cool is it that KarlTM called me from the University of Texas to chat the other night? I can answer that one -- it is VERY cool. Final question: does it say something about America's educational priorities when I, a college professor, pay a high school history teacher 30 bucks a week to mow my yard? I'm pretty sure there's some kind of message in there.


June 30th, my assistant department head: "I don't think you should be assigned here if you aren't going to be working in the department full time."

September 8th, my assistant department head in a feedback session: "Since you're spending most of your time over in the research institute, you're going to need to make a special effort to be a part of the team here."

Hmmm...you told me 2 months ago that I shouldn't be on your "team" and now you want me to make a special effort to be a part of it? Ummm, NO. Idiot.



Adrian gave me blond highlights last night. They were totally hot and sexy and stuff. The high school girl at KFC was hitting on me. That's the first time I've ever had highlights. We have yet to take a photo that really shows them, but if we can get one that looks good I'll post it.



Here's an important safety tip for the mothers of gay sons: don't tell your kids how worried you are about them because they're gay. When your son mentions that he has a roommate who moved here with him, don't say "well, try not to get in trouble," when you've never actually talked about the fact he's gay. And don't do it over the phone from 2000 miles away, so that they're left wondering what kind of conversations are now going on back at the ol' family home. I'm just sayin', is all.

In a much cheerier vein, Adrian and I are off to a fundraiser being thrown by a good friend of ours. The fundraiser is for a local gay youth group, and the irony is that it's a martini party, so the kids being helped by it couldn't attend even if they wanted to. We're looking forward to meeting lots of new people tonight, as we haven't really had the opportunity to make a lot of new friends here.

And Sunday, it looks like Dave and Paula are finally going to get to see the house. It's not their fault they haven't, because we haven't allowed them to come until it's ready. We've let everyone else come, of course, but not them.

And I learned that Monday morning, I have a 7am meeting at work. Bleh.




So we went to a gay youth group fundraiser Saturday night and had a very good time. We met up with a few new people, donated some money to a good cause, had a few drunks, and so on and so forth.Two of the folks we met were a client from Adrian's salon and his boyfriend. As we were driving over there, Adrian said "oh, by the way, his boyfriend's a senior at your school." OK, fun, and not a big deal, though I was wondering if he was one of MY students, since I do teach some seniors. He wasn't, though, he's already taken the course that I teach. He's a sweetie, and his boyfriend is nice, too, though he'd do better not to drink as much. We look forward to seeing them again.Incidentally, the client's name is Scott and his boyfriend's name is Scotty. Too cute, and very easy to remember.

After the party the four of us went to a new club here in town. It has potential, but it's too bright on the dance floor, and it could stand to change the music a bit. And there were some creepy looking people checking us out, some of whom showed up at another club we went to. I got hit on twice at the second club, once by a Puerto Rican guy who had seen us at the first club and whose English wasn't too good (he didn't quite understand what I meant by "my partner"), and once by a gay Korean adopted Jewish college student who plays violin and reminded us a lot of Adrian's younger brother. He had joined up with our group and at first didn't realize I was with Adrian, and when he did, he said "so, do you think I'm cuter than your boyfriend?" He was actually an interesting fellow, though a bit hyper, and he bonded with Adrian as "my little brown brother" before he went off and started smooching some guy.

Sunday Adrian and I went out for bagels then ended up in a small mountain town (no, not South Park) and people-watched and played Skee Ball. And then Monday I went back to work. Poop.

I'm giving my first test on Friday. My students are far more nervous than they need to be.



Somehow, conversation in the office turned to reality shows. One of the guys was talking about Fear Factor, all about how some folks had to suck milk from a goat's udder or something. Anyway, our right-wing, homophobic, fundamentalist Christian secretary who lives three houses down from Adrian and I, has a new favorite show: Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. And when Mister Fear Factor said, "I don't watch homosexual shows," she said, "don't be phobic!"I looked around for Evil Cartman, because surely I was in an alternate universe.


We just got back from seeing Eddie Izzard in concert in Denver. Ever since I was first turned on to this British "executive transvestite" about 4 years ago I've longed for the day I would see him in concert, boobs and all, and that day finally arrived. We bought our tickets as soon as they went on sale, four months ago when we still lived in Alabama, and I'm glad we did because the whole US potion of his tour appears to be sold out.It was fantabulous. The show was about 2 1/2 hours, with an intermission, and he was amazing. During the second half in particular I was laughing so hard my sides hurt. He talked about transvestite super heros, Neanderthals, George W. Bush (funny how those went together), french fries, archeologists, poo, and many other wonderful things. Oh, and about all the fun things you can do with your breasts when you're a transvestite.I'm sure there's more I could say about the show, but I have to get up in 5 1/2 hours and go teach, and anyway, there'll be a DVD someday.



I've been in DC on business since Wednesday, so that's why there haven't been any updates. I'm finishing up some grading tonight and have to teach early Monday, so I'll post my tales later.



My trip to DC last week was mucho fun, and mucho tiring. I was at a conference all day Thursday and Friday, learning many, many fascinating things (well, maybe not THAT many) and then spent my eveings and the weekend getting together with friends. One thing I've learned is that I often try to do too much on short trips, and just make myself tired. Next time, I'll be a little more chill. Of course, I said that the LAST time, too.The conference was good -- it dealt with terrorism, one of the subjects I'm starting to do more work in. I guess I'm getting more confident in my abilities, because I sat there and listened to speakers whose names I've known for years, whose books I've read, who've risen to positions of prominence in the government and the academic world, and on more than one occasion I thought "wow, you're really not saying anything worthwhile, are you?" Not that I'm a super-genius-boy or anything, but I can do better than these guys. Then again, no one's inviting ME to speak at a conference.Except that's not true, and I'll actually be speaking at two different events in October. heh heh heh Time to start spreading the gospel according to Bill.

But back to DC...one of the highlights, naturally, was the lady at the hotel registration desk who looked me up in the computer and said "you can't be a doctor...you look way too young." heh heh Cool. Of course, there were quite a few other highlights as well. Among the biggest was having dinner with Kevin and his partner Kim. I saw Kevin when we went back for my graduation in May, but I'd never met Kim before, and considering they've been together about 4 years, it was definitely time for me to confirm that he exists. For the record, he does, and he's VERY nice. And I got to see Andy before he went out of town on a trip, and meet the man he's seeing, who turned out to be someone I'm probably going to start doing some consulting work with in the next few months. So they better not break up, or this guy might not want anything to do with me. Friday night I took my brother-in-law, Khamla, out to dinner. We went to one of my favorite French places in DC. I figure he deserves to be taken out to a nice meal in a nice restaurant, and let's face it, none of the guys he's dated since I've known him would ever do that. Granted, I think he'd be just as happy picking up some Popeye's chicken and catching a movie, but it gave me a chance to see him dressed up. Sadly, he recently left a job at a Sisley store, and when I say "sadly," I mean "it's sad because I really wanted to buy some clothes with his employee discount." But he's much happier now, and that's more important. I guess.Saturday morning was breakfast with Tracy, which is in no way related to Breakfast at Tiffany. It was our custom when we lived there that we went to breakfast every Saturday, and though we tried a new place on this trip, it felt very much like old times. He was concerned about trying a new place and disrupting our routine, but since Adrian and I moved away over a year ago, I'd say our routine was already pretty broken.Saturday afternoon I caught up with Angelo and his roommate and we chatted a bit. Then Saturday night I had dinner with Angelo, Arlington Michael, and another Mike whom we knew from Alabama but who now lives in DC (and whose boyfriend is Sean, whom I've know for 10 years, and yes, it's a small gay world indeed). We had a really good time then headed out to Cobalt for a bit, until Billy faded around midnight. What can I say, I was keeping long hours all week.

Sunday morning it was brunch at the Carlysle with River and Peter (notice how so much of my socializing revolved around food...is that the reason I'm carrying about 5 extra pounds?) then a quick visit with Arlington Michael, and then BOOM, back to the airport and a long flight home. I had managed to leave 5 exams that needed grading on my desk here at home, so I spent 3 hours Sunday night finishing them as I was handing them back Monday. Yippee. 4 hours of sleep, and then I was off to teach.

In addition to friends, some of the other interesting things included:

- landing in DC on an alternate runway because there was a United Airlines plane on the main runway that looked like it had experienced an emergency evacuation. I'll bet the passengers loved that.

- getting hit on while riding the Metro. And by "hit on," I mean "hey, I live near the Metro stop at Springfield, why don't you c'mon over?" (the answer was "no" in case you're wondering)

- learning from Peter about selling old clothes on eBay rather than donating them to Goodwill.

OK, maybe they weren't THAT interesting, but they weren't that boring, either.And now I'm home. And Wednesday night we go to see Cher again. And I got some very good job-related news Monday, unofficially, from a friend in a position to know, and it should be made official Wednesday or Thursday. So yay me. (I'm betting Carol can guess what I'm alluding to)