Home of the crass, outre and sweet

[Just got back from voting in the California primary. If anyone cares, I followed the Bay Guardian endorsements from Governor all the way down to local Democratic Party committee. The issues that most interested me this time 'round were the Australian-style instant runoff voting scheme, and Harry Britt's run for Assembly. Britt was Harvey Milk's handpicked successor on the Board of Supervisors, was a firebrand for progessive causes during his tenure there, and teaches part-time at my school. He's the anti-establishment candidate (or the candidate of the alternative establishment working to replace the current entrenched machine) at a time when San Francisco has an embarassment of riches: two gay, more-or-less liberal men running, one of whom is sure to be sent to Sacramento come November.]

[It's been over a week since John and I got back from London, and I'm finally feeling well enough to continue my description of our trip. I'm feeling a bit of stress about catching up at school, after missing most of two weeks because of London and getting sick, so it feels good to hark back to what already seems the distant past...]

[Friday night, after seeing Taboo, we walked over to the Astoria, a huge old music hall near where Charing Cross becomes Tottenham Court Road. The Astoria host Club G-A-Y several nights a week - it appears to be one of the most popular gay club nights in London. Neither of us has been big into the Universe-Pleasuredome-Mass circuit scene here in S.F.: the music's grindingly uninteresting, and the people, with their designer drugs, duds, bods, and attitudes, even more so. I must say...if we had anything like G-A-Y (except the dumb name) here, I might go out a lot more often. Friendly people (I got in for less more on the exoticness of my student ID than anything, I think...it's good to be a Californian in London), fun music (actual songs! with lyrics!), and while I know there were plenty of drugs floating about (we were suprised to see the open use of poppers on the stage and main dance floor), people seemed to be there for the sheer fun of it than to get into some expensively induced, isolative trance. And for once, I didn't feel invisible in a big, gay dance club.]

[They were hyping the next night's Bananarama show, of course, so there was lots of pop from the 70's, 80's, and 90's (including a long Stock-Aitken-Waterman bloc (Mel and Kim, anyone?) preceding the Nanas bloc at 1AM), with lots of current stuff mixed in. I got the feeling that "retro" wasn't a quirky style only deserving of its own ghettoized club night there...good music was good music, and there was no reason for the DJ not to follow up Basement Jaxx with the Bee Gees. But, girl, these little queens like their Kylie Minogue...and Steps...]

[We didn't get home until after 4, and for these unchemically-enhanced over-30's, sleeping 'til almost noon was a necessity. We did manage to drag ourselves, with Daveorama and one of the Chileans, to do some shopping and noshing in the Haight-esque Camden Town (I clicked a photo of a store in Chalk Farm Road called CyberGoth just because it reminded me of Casey) before we zipped down to the Strand to see Chicago, tickets we'd bought cheap online weeks before. It was a kick to see Alison Moyet live, but the show is one of those like my old high school bete noire, Anything Goes: a skimpy script stitched together as a reason to showcase a bunch of great songs. After the previous night's revelry, my head was bobbing like a bladder on a stick during the first half, and I think John's was doing the same after the interval.]

[We staggered back to the hotel, and collapsed to nap before the night's main event. At this point, seeing the Bananarama reunion was beginning to seem a bit anticlimactic (D. and the Chileans, with a tenatative John, seeming unable to talk of anything else for the previous 36 hours), so we needed to recharge to regain energy and enthusiasm.]

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