Metalhead's big day at Long Beach Pride

Every year, save one or two when I just was not feeling well enough, I have gone to the Pride Festival in Long Beach, CA. 

 The first few years I just went to wander around, check out the booths selling everything from belt buckles to gyros.  Music from rock to gospel, salsa to techno and always a country music line dancing tent are spread around the edges of the festival like the edges of a pizza crust.

In the last 10 years or so, I have gone to the festival on Saturdays (occasionally Sundays) and volunteered to work at one of the Pride sponsored areas.  Most years I sell tickets at $1 a pop for festival goers to take to Pride sponsored soft drink/water stands and/or beer stands.  Sometimes the ticket selling feels like wading into the midst of a slow running stream to fly fish and, on other years, the four-hour minimum block of time one can volunteer soars by with chatty, sometimes pickled patrons and easy-going fellow volunteers.

Every now and then, I've worked Security for one of the stages (either I'm too old or the music is too loud or the work too dull, but I'm not cut out for Security) or given soft drinks/water in exchange for tickets (I almost got a friend of mine connected with a dude at which he could not stop staring and drooling.  My friend begged and begged me not to do it and, at the last minute, I acquiesced).

This year, I volunteered for something new.  To say what it was would wash away any anonymity.  Suffice to say it was the least amount of fun I have had at any one of these events.  I'm thinking next year (and for years to come) I'll stick with beverage ticket sales.

I usually volunteer in the afternoons.  The festival has a fair number of attendees in the afternoons and, by the time my shift is over, the grounds begin to swell with partygoers and the whole atmosphere begins to change.  Sadly, by the time my shift ended, I had missed watching that same friend of mine from years ago at the soda/water booth singing on one of the stages for his first time.  I did get an photo of an interesting paring of booths.  One of the best things about the Festival is that commerce, social awareness and politics all exist side by side here.  

The effect as one walks past these booths with a funnel cake in one hand and a souvenir plastic mug of diet lemonade in the other can be a bit jarring; however, it's as an eclectic a mix as the festival goers themselves.

Just a few handouts passed to me this year. The gay bars/clubs, as usual, were in full force.  One of the most clever was a tiny baggie for a spa chain (the home page is tame, but I'd imagine going much further into the site would be "adults only") There is another word which I could use to describe this chain; however, I cannot bring myself to do it.  The baggie contained, of course, a business card sized advertisement for the spa that doubled as a coupon, a link to another side for "hookups", a single use fast-food style packet of personal lubricant and a condom (which, as the advertisement says in slightly smaller font than the rest of the ad, encourages use of by saying "Play Safe / Condoms are always FREE").

If you must frequent a place like that for activity it can suggest but not outright say, you might as well be properly equipped and fully educated.  And, if they hold true to their house rules, better still.

Cutest flyer goes to the South Coast Chorale.  I even took the time to enter into their drawing for two tickets to their next performance.  I have a little over a month into talking my better half into going - I'm a sucker for choral performance.

Best moment of my day in Long Beach?  I'd have to pick two though neither occurred on the festival grounds!  Thanks to my employer's metro pass, I had a free ride to and from Long Beach.  On the ride there, I was so amused first watching a infant boy, couldn't have been more than a year old, staring at me intently like I was the oddest thing he'd ever seen.  Later in the ride, I could not get over a couple my age with nine children, early teen to toddler, in tow. How they managed to keep all nine of them in line, especially with kids so often left to meander by their parents while out in public, was especially impressive.

Then, on the ride home, I could not resist playing (as did most of the riders in the vicinity) with a little girl who couldn't have been any older than three.  Her parents both looked exhausted yet the girl was ready, able and willing to carry on through the night.  Another man's sleight of hand and my silly version of "peek-a-boo" were all she needed to stay amused and she played right along with all of us.

I look forward to next year's Festival and hope that I may experience it then as those little ones on the metro yesterday saw their world - wide eyed, energized and anxious to see what's around the corner.

Bits and pieces and more party music !

I'll start with the cynical and build up from there.

• With many thanks to the General (what, you're still not reading this freakin' hi-larious blog yet? Shame on you!  What're you waiting for??), here's yet another story of hypocrisy involving sex. 
• Watched Oprah today and was not surprised in the slightest.  If you must check this pre-Inauguration show out, click here.  Otherwise, it was just too saccharine for my taste. 
• Took my partner to the movies this afternoon where we saw Gran Torino.  Really good drama well acted and directed by Clint Eastwood.  I had to fight back the tears toward the end, so grab a couple of extra napkins at the snack bar.
• It took the last 5 minutes of the drive home from the movies to pick tonight's party song.  I can't help from bang on the steering wheel and dashboard like a set of bongos to this song.  Here's "Renegades of Funk" by Rage Against the Machine.  Click here for lyrics.
  

The birds, the bees and the pastor

The tying together of gay marriage to pedophilia, incest and polygamy made by Rick Warren in this interview was all I needed to hear to tick me off.  After 2 minutes and some deep, cleansing breaths, I realized that Warren is not the only one who effortlessly wraps all of this behavior together.

While I am a Christian and gay, reading the Bible is difficult psychologically.  I still own a copy of the Bible given to me as a child which is underlined, highlighted and noted in places where the Bible refers to homosexuality.  Seems I did not need someone else to bash me over the head with the Bible; I was doing a good enough job on my own.

Now seems as good a time as any to start conquering my fear.  The first place most go to quote Christianity's laws against homosexuality is Leviticus.  Leviticus 18: 6-13 cover incest.  Verses 14-18 cover Jerry Springer territory. Verse 19 . .eww!   Verse 20 . . again, Jerry Springer territory.

OK, Leviticus 18:22, here we go.  Well, as I've not "lie(d) with a woman" ever, I'm thinking I get a free pass.  OK, I am splitting hairs, I suppose.  However, as I'm a Christian, I actually do get a pass on this one.  Click here to better understand how this works.  

And, finally, Leviticus 18:23 talks about bestiality.  On to Chapter 19.

Here we go, Leviticus 19:19 talks about wearing clothing "woven of two kinds of material".  I sure hope Pastor Rick has checked the labels on his shirts (I think the jeans are safe being denim) and his suits.  As there doesn't seem to be a point value assigned to each of these laws, wearing a polyester/wool, cotton/polyester or cotton/lycra article of clothing is just a big a no-no as Leviticus 18:22.

(I'm breaking Leviticus 19:19 right now . . I leave it you to figure out how !)

Oh, Pastor Rick, how could you!  In Leviticus 19:27 and Leviticus 21: 5-6, that trendy goatee/mustache thing you have has to be grown out!  I'm thinking about 6 - 8 weeks should give him a full beard and start on forelocks?

Leviticus 20 goes into the penalty phase of the law breaking referenced in Leviticus 18.   Wow, there's a lot of blood and dying in this chapter.  Maybe, to adhere closely to this chapter, Pastor Rick can band together with like minded others and lobby to get our penitentiary system back in line . . or, on second thought, perhaps some further study would be helpful.

OK, enough with the nitpicking.  In my review of five chapters of Leviticus, I didn't see anything saying I could not marry another adult male who is not my blood relative.  There was also an imperative thousands of years ago that the tribes of Israel procreate and have lots of children to give them the best chance of maintaining and growing the tribes.  Put in this context, it makes a bit more sense why pork and shellfish were also verboten (pork not cooked thoroughly still contains trichinosis which is deadly to humans; a shellfish allergy, which some people have, can also be deadly).  It also makes sense why incest and sexual relations while women are having their period were also against the law -- both would either not produce children or produce a child much more prone to genetic defects.

In a world where we know of shellfish allergy, we process, test and cook pork thoroughly before eating and where most have a basic understanding of the human reproductive system and genetics, the laws written in Leviticus make a bit more sense and we understand the actual consequences of not following these laws.

Specifically to Leviticus 18:22, it is important to note that thousands of years ago, there was no such thing as a microscope, which is needed to view sperm and ova.  According to The History of Obstetrics and Gynaecology by Michael J. O'Down and Elliot Elias Philipp (pages 256 & 257) ova were not described and observed until the 19th century!  

 It seems most likely that men contained all the ingredients needed to create children and women's wombs were much like a farmer's field.  A man, literally, would be planting his seed in a woman's field in order to grow a child.  If a man was not having procreative sexual relations in compliance with laws in Leviticus, he was wasting seed, throwing it everywhere but in a place it would be most likely to grow.  And in a society where creating families with lots of children was most important, waste of any kind would, of course, be contrary to that goal.

If I have figured all of this out with the help of my Pastor (and a lot of search engine use), it makes me wonder if Pastor Rick Warren had the same opportunity I had to learn all of this and to change his mind about gay marriage in the last . . uh . . . week or so.  Certainly, with six billion people on the planet and so many children left orphaned, abandoned and neglected, the requirement to procreate is not nearly as important as it was in biblical times.  

Now that is commonly knows the creation of human life requires sperm and ovum and that the meeting of the two can be aided outside the womb, perhaps Pastor Rick is now open to helping nurture loving relationships amongst his congregation, no matter if the couple is infertile, post-menopausal, two consenting men or two consenting women.

Guess we'll find out next month.