The Calm Before the Storm

by baad lamb

Waiting for the overhyped and underwhelming Irene to arrive, I was up very early on Saturday morning and took a long slow stroll in Central Park.

There was a grey sky, a gentle mist and a rich green glow all about, as grasses caressed shrubs that tickled trees, all pasted together by the thin swirls of a late August algae bloom on The Lake.

LURID HEADLINE OF THE WEEK

"Cannibal admits to making meatballs out of victim lured to his death from gay sex site"

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/index.html#ixzz1WYv8v0xe

today in bryant park

GARBO

Back in the mid 70s when I first moved to New York I lived on east 54 street between 2nd and 3rd avenues.
One warm Spring day I was walking home and noticed a woman down the street coming towards me. She was wearing a teal and black print dress with short sleeves and a scooped neckline, but what really caught my attention was her lipstick color. It was a fairly bright pink with a violet undertone. I kept my eyes on this lip color until she was close enough to walk past me, at that moment I realized it was Greta Garbo!

I later learned she lived in the neighborhood on east 52 street.

Irene Has Moved On, and Tony and I Have Moved a Little Uptown

By West Village Bill

New York made out pretty well during Tropical Storm Irene, and this Queer New Yorker moved to a new place within the West Village with my Tony—Tony P.—just before the storm hit.

There were no deaths reported from Irene in the city, and the damage was less than anticipated. Our super said there was flooding farther downtown, but my part of the West Village seemed OK except for a few downed trees next to Bleecker Playground, one of which blocked off Bleecker Street between Bank and 11th streets, and some broken-off tree limbs in a triangular mini park near Abingdon Square.

On Friday, Tony and I moved in together in a new apartment just north of the square, on Jane Street. It was fairly easy, as far as moves go. Tony is a minimalist who doesn't have too much in the way of possessions, and I had a good deal of stuff stuffed into my one-bedroom. We spent our forced indoor time during the storm getting some of our crap put away, but we've still got quite a bit to unpack.

When I took my corgi, Emme, out to do her business this afternoon, I saw—I'm almost certain—Janeane Garofalo walking her dog. And yesterday morning, when Tony was buying some last-minute provisions at the Westside Market, he saw RuPaul wearing biker shorts and a pink tank top and carrying a parasol. I would have been starstruck beyond belief. I would hope I would have managed to tell him how much fun I have watching his TV shows, but I might have been too shy to say anything.

I hope that wherever you're reading this post, you're secure, dry, and unscathed from Irene.

The Hurricane Hype

by Ivan Vargas

So here I am sitting in front of my laptop, looking out at my cute lil' street that is now dark and peppered with the warm glow of lights from inside every family home, a tiny sliver of the New York skyline visible for my entertainment as the Woolworth tower.

It's still windy and there is the possibility of a little more rain tonight, but nothing like last night when it came in bands and just as quickly, were gone, only to come back slamming at my walls and windows and shake the house. A house that has seen quite a bit of storms and may still stand to see even more.

You see, the media blew (pun intended) this out of the water and it's the reason I've stopped following much of it when an impending event is about to take place. Anyone who's seen The History Channel or NatGeo has at one point seen their descriptive love letters to destruction porn -- it's not if, it's when, is their catchphrase. Needless to say hurricanes have been covered, the what-ifs of a Cat 5 hurricane into New York City, the images of iconic buildings, streets, parks, subways and overall infrastructure yielding to a water invasion, leaving the city in tatters.

Tom Ford Turns 50 Today......

Happy Birthday Tom!

42nd annual stonewall march

again, i'm late, late, late with the photos from the parade...

On a rainy NYC Sunday

My husband, the Baad Lamb, deserves a big gold star for adventurous and fearless cooking. He is not experienced with rice or chicken, but he turned out an absolutely spectacular Thai basil chicken on a whim. I was busy packing and studying my new waterproof camera in advance of my travel writer gig shooting the rapids in the Grand Canyon while he did a minimum of research on the net and then dashed out to Whole Foods at Columbus Circle and returned to assemble the most delicious lunch imaginable. Fluffy rice, tender chicken, and even though he was vexed because he didn't have "holy basil", the results were sublime. I'd like to think that I had something to do with introducing him, years ago to the art of food exploration, and now I reap the rewards!

Central Park, Bear Hill, Saturday, August 20, 2011

Including some QNY folks!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JEFF!

Jeff Stryker is 49 today

Ice Cream Sunday

By West Village Bill

This Sunday is Ice Cream Sunday at the New Amsterdam Market at the old Fulton Fish Market. For 25 smackers, you'll get to try eight flavors produced by ice cream makers from New York and the surrounding region, including Ben Van Leeuwen of Van Leeuwen Artisan Ice Cream, Fany Gerson of La Newyorkina and Gabrielle Carbone of Princeton, New Jersey's The Bent Spoon. For 10 bucks more, you'll get 10 mini cones instead of eight, and you'll be able to start eating at noon instead of 1. Proceeds benefit the market itself, which gives an amazing variety of local vendors a chance to sell their wares. You must buy tickets in advance.

I'm going with my sister, Tracey, and my nephews, Mike and Matt. I'm hoping, though I'm not going to bet, that they'll tell me no one else's ice cream can beat Uncle Bill's. :-)


Cone illustration via the New Amsterdam Market website

Rainy Sunday



Bike/Pedestrian Path to Riverside Park North

  Once it was clear the lightening had moved on last Sunday, I went for a rainy stroll through my neighborhood.  As with walks in snowstorms, it's very easy to see who is out in it because of unavoidable errands, a refusal to give up one's exercise regimen, and who, like me, is out for the sheer joy of it.  I like being reminded, ever so gently, that weather still has the last word.  There's that wonderful point where you realize you simply can't get any wetter.  I shouldn't have worn my sneakers though; it was three days before they dried out.  It took that long for my camera to speak to me again as well.  Might want to give old manual a look-see for future adventures.  

Michael Kors & Lance LaPere Married

After 21 years of dating the couple were wed on Aug 16 in a ceremony on Dune Beach in Southampton.

"To marry someone as wonderful and special to me as Lance barefoot on a glorious beach is more than I could have dreamed of," designer Kors said, according to WWD.

We wish them much happiness!

MAE WEST

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

empire state building

Book: Benedetto Casanova

"No doubt you have heard of Casanova, the famous womanizer, and maybe you have seen the movie, or read the account of his life. But did you know he may have had a gay brother? Benedetto, a few years Giacomo’s junior, was pressed into service of the Church to follow the famous lover of women through the courts of Europe. On the way he had amorous adventures with countless men, but, unlike his brother, fell in love and kept alive a romantic relationship with a strapping German soldier over time and distance.
His 'memoirs' were discovered only in 1881, when an English traveler rummaging through a private library in Rome found them glued to the pages of a book. They were written in Italian and have never before been published in English. Marten Weber delivers a wonderful 'translation' of this challenging text, full of linguistic cunning and his usual talent for breathtaking eroticism."

 Check it out here. Cover photo by Adam Bouska. Sales of this book will directly benefit the NOH8 campaign.

Bert and Ernie aren't getting married.....

"Sesame Street" said that the famous roommates are just "best friends" and "they remain puppets and do not have a sexual orientation."

"Bert and Ernie are best friends," the PBS show said in a statement posted today on its Facebook page. "They were created to teach preschoolers that people can be good friends with those who are very different from themselves.

"Even though they are identified as male characters and possess many human traits and characteristics (as most Sesame Street Muppets do), they remain puppets, and do not have a sexual orientation."

The statement came in response to an Internet petition started earlier this week urging that the two Muppets get married.

As of today, nearly 5,000 people have signed the petition in favor of an on-screen marriage between the two puppets.

A Brief Glimpse into the Mind of a Genius

One wonders why in the history of mankind, many genius's lives are cut short. You can name many artists who were at the top in their fields when they left this plane of existence early. Perhaps it is predestination that they were taken early as to rouse the rest of us to their life's work toward a message for mankind or it could be fatalism that they took on the dark side of mankind and found it so unbearable to manage that they burned out quickly and left us to marvel in their wake. This past Sunday I was privileged to get a glimpse inside Alexander McQueen's head and be bowled over by his wake.

Alexander Mcqueen, 17 March 1969 - 11 February 2010, was a genius, futuristic prophet, and fashion guru. A hint of this can be seen during an interview in 2010 in which he was talking about creating a fabric that could produce a new, 21st-century silhouette, he said; "what's in my head isn't feasible at this time. I'm trying to weave a fabric that goes from a structure into a chiffon, but the loom doesn't exist."

The Alexander McQueen "Savage Beauty" exhibition is a view of a man's work pulled from many cultures across time and space to create an epic story. The show has many symbols which one could find in human mythology, like the antlers on top of one model's head reminded me of the Celtic Horned God of the Forest, "Cernunnos," or a similar being in Native American culture. His use of feathers throughout his work reminded me of other artists that have similar signatures like painter Salvador Dali's "Crutches" or director/film-maker Guillermo Del Toro's "Eyes." Alexander's last collection "Plato's Atlantis" has some of the most inspiring and amazing clothes. I couldn't help wonder if somehow he had reached back across time and pulled the ideas out of the collective consciousness of what those in Atlantis wore before the cities destruction.

the coney island mermaid parade

the coney island mermaid parade took place last june 18th, so i'm a little late in posting photos, but here's a collection of what the day looked like:

 

more after the jump:

LAST NIGHT TONIGHT

The Metropolitan museum says the show "Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty" in the Costume Institute will be open to the public until midnight for the last two days of its run.

The show is closing Aug. 7. The museum says visitors will be able to enter the museum through the 81st Street and Fifth Avenue entrance to see the show after regular operating hours have ended.

Michael Kors and his partner Lance LePere will be tying the knot

fter 21 years together -- and only a few weeks of being able to legally marry in New York -- fashion designer and television personality Michael Kors and his partner Lance LePere will be tying the knot, reports Life & Style.

"The two were spotted at City Hall in NYC on Aug. 3 getting their marriage license," reports the magazine, which goes on to quote an eyewitness saying, "They were both very casually dressed. [Kors] was really nice and let the girls at the office take his picture."

The couple met when LePere was an intern at Kors' office in Paris. Working together, they realized that they had a lot in common and something more than a business relationship began to develop.

"We share a certain level of taste, an American point of view," LePere has said. "And I think we like to play with Americana. Over the years and the day-to-day process of dreaming together, things just naturally fell into place."

There is no word yet on what the grooms will wear -- but we can only assume it will be a Michael Kors original.

The Daily News

Only in New York!

(via JoeMyGod)

Logo's A-List Season 2 Cast Party: We've Got The Secrets!

QNY's Miguel Dominquez and I attended the A-List Season 2 Kick-off party at District 36. He took the pictures and I got the dirt!

Reichen Lehmkuhl, handsome as ever, was not shy about expressing his dissatisfaction with President Obama's track record on Don't Ask Don't tell. He admits progress has been made but is quite sure that someone else could have gotten the job done sooner and to completion. Reichen told me he is single, dating, happy and just a little anxious about season 2 of the A-List. He says that in a show like this "there are never enough moments to capture the total person." He is also very excited about his new book, "It'll Be Great Exposure" and his new line of skin care products.

More photos and the dish, after the break.

reach for the sky

Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty

The Metropolitan Museum of Art is giving visitors a late-night look at one of its exhibitions.

The museum says the show "Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty" in the Costume Institute will be open to the public until midnight for the last two days of its run.

The show is closing Aug. 7. The museum says visitors will be able to enter the museum through the 81st Street and Fifth Avenue entrance to see the show after regular operating hours have ended.

The late-night exhibition hours are a first for the museum.

So far, the McQueen show has had more than 500,000 visitors since it opened in May.