Random Musings

This week Carlos and I attended the celebration of Mexican Independence — it’s September 15th, y’all, not Cinco de Mayo … that’s a whole other celebration — at CAM, the Contemporary Art Museum in Raleigh, North Carolina. The event was sponsored by the Mexican Consulate in Raleigh — Carlos has worked with them here in South Carolina so that’s how we came to be invited — and was hosted by the Consul General of Mexico in Raleigh, North Carolina, Javier Diaz de Leon, whom we both met.

It was a fun night … great mariachi music and great dancers, along with some fabulous food and killer margaritas … I do love me a good tequila drink, you know. But this is more a Carlos story so let’s go with that …

We’d never been to Raleigh, so I Google Mapped it, with directions to our hotel. As we entered downtown Raleigh, Carlos began reading the directions to the hotel and he said, Continue straight and turn left on West Ln.

I continued on, and on, and on, and right on out of the downtown area and never saw West Lane so we turned back and headed downtown again. I said to Carlos, Now, I’ll turn right on West Lane, right?

He agreed. We stopped at a traffic light and Carlos said, This is it!

I pushed him out of the car. We were looking for W. Lane Street, not West Lane. Oy. We really are Lucy and Ricky only this time he was Lucy!

Ken Ham, the head of the new Creation Museum, will lead a conference for a group that advocates for a new Christian America to be carved out of the southern states.

Yes, he wants the southern states to secede from the United States and form their own Christian nation where only Christians can become citizens.

I guess he forgot what happened the last time the South decided to pull away.

Asshat.

Comedian and actress and gay icon and all-around fabulousness that is Lily Tomlin will be one of 5 recipients of this year's Kennedy Center Honors, making her the very first out lesbian to receive the award.

 Lily, and fellow openly gay comedian Ellen DeGeneres, have both received another Kennedy Center award, the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor, but this is a first for the Kennedy Center Honors.

Way to go Lily. And well deserved.

Speaking of fabulously gay and well-deserved, Neil Patrick Harris and his longtime partner David Burtka were married earlier this month in Italy.

NPH Tweeted:

“Guess what? @DavidBurtka and I got married over the weekend. In Italy. Yup, we put the ‘n’ and ‘d’ in ‘husband’.

They have been together for over ten years and have two children together, making for a very happy family wedding.

Eighty Utah state legislators have filed an amicus brief in which they warn the Supreme Court that upholding the Tenth Circuit's ruling on same-sex marriage will lead to the legalization of polygamous and incestuous marriages. 

Siddown. That’s an argument no one truly believes any more.

Thomas Guerra, a 29-year-old man who is accused of knowingly exposing an ex-boyfriend and potentially dozens of other men to HIV has been ordered by a judge to no longer use Internet dating sites.

Um, like that’ll stop him.

A criminal complaint against Guerra lists one alleged victim, and city attorney's say the investigation is continuing and more victims may be added. Guerra has pleaded not guilty to the misdemeanor charge, which carries a maximum sentence of six months in jail. However, his alleged victim is hopeful that additional text message records could prompt prosecutors to upgrade the case to a felony, punishable with up to eight years in prison.

I think that’s best.

Down there in Mississippi, Starkville mayor Parker Wiseman has announced that his city will begin offering domestic partner benefits for its LGBT city employees—a first for the state.

In Mississippi, y’all.

The measure was unanimously approved by the Starkville Board of Aldermen. Back in January, Starkville became the first city in Mississippi to officially recognize the dignity of its LGBT citizens.

The march goes on, in even the smallest of towns …

So, last year, a woman accused Cee Lo Green of drugging her with ecstasy and then raping her while she was barely conscious or completely unconscious; she remembers having a drink with him and then waking up naked in his bed.

First thing: ick.

But the DA did not believe there was enough evidence to bring sexual assault or rape charges against Green so those charges never happened. But last week Cee Lo pled “no contest” to the drug charge and agreed to perform 360 hours of community service and attend 52 AA meetings with a private therapist. He’s also on probation for three years.

And since he thinks he got off he decided to take to Twitter to talk about rape … uh huh … you know this won’t go well.  The tweets included these musings:

“Women who have really been raped REMEMBER!!!”

“If someone is passed out they’re not even WITH you consciously! so WITH implies consent.”

“When someone brakes on a home there is broken glass"

"Where is your plausible proof anyone was raped?”

The shiz hit the fan and splattered all over Cee Lo’s fat, drugging women’s face and he deleted all the Tweets, though not before several news outlets screen-grabbed them for posterity. And then he issued this response:

 “I sincerely apologize for my comments being taken so far out of context. I only intended on a healthy exchange to help heal those who love me from the pain I had already caused from this. Please forgive me as it was your support that got me thru this to begin with. I’d never condone the harm of any women. Thank you.”

Sit down, Cee Lo. You’re a rapist who got off on a technicality, that’s who you are, and instead of trying to help those “who love you” to heal, why not try helping the woman you forced your fat ass on to heal.

Then, go away, for good.

The Family Foundation, an anti-gay Christian group, has begun a planned 40-day ‘fast’ to oppose same-sex marriage in order to influence the US Supreme Court into rejecting same-sex marriage when it hears the first of a series of appeals cases in October.

However, they later quietly clarified that members don’t actually have to give up any food at all to take part in the ‘fast’ saying:

“We are asking the entire Body of Christ to join us for this feast – giving up physical food isn’t necessary – but feeding on the spiritual food provided is vital.”

So, the group that is opposed to what they call redefining marriage has decided to redefine what it means to fast?

Siddown. With Cee Lo.

Carlos and I started watching Outlander on Starz last weekend. I thought it was some kind of sci-fi time traveling thing, but it turned out to be some kind of love story time traveling thing.

But it’s beautiful to watch, and reminds me a great deal of something you’d see on Masterpiece Theater, or the BBC, but with nekkid people … though not the Cloud kinda nekkid.

And two men who’ve appeared shirtless, and pants-less even, are Tobias Menzies and Sam Heughan. With accents, too, and y’all know how much I loves me a man with an accent!

Why all the fuss over people reclining their seats on airlines? Three times in the last two weeks airlines have been diverted and forced to land because some got their knees knocked.

Seriously? I have a plan to stop this foolishness: charge those unruly dumbasses for the fees and fuel it costs to reroute an airplane to a different airport, and then allow every single other passenger on the plane to file a lawsuit to have their flight paid for by the asshats who don’t like to be crowded.

Maybe then this nonsense will stop.

Facebook Financially Supports Anti-Marriage-Equality Candidate

After Utah's attorney general resigned—and was later arrested bribery charges—Utah Governor Gary Herbert appointed Sean Reyes, a Republican Party official, to serve out the AG's term. Reye’s time in office began just ten days after a federal court ruled that Utah’s ban on same-sex marriage was unconstitutional, so the first thing Reyes did was to begin his defense on inequality based on sexual orientation. He hired a private law firm to assist in his defense of the ban and vowed to spend $2 million in taxpayer money — can y’all afford that, Utah? — to do it.

He also petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to issue a "stay" halting the same-sex marriages in the state, and thus leaving in limbo the 1300 couples who had married legally in the state. Reyes then issued a statement saying the stay was needed because, with the recognition, and legality of same-sex marriage, there “is a likelihood — indeed, a certainty — of irreparable harm to the State."

Naturally, he did not say what that harm might look like because, well, liar. He then dismissed those 1300 couples and their legal marriages by calling them "interim marriages.”

Why all this talk about Reyes? Well, just last week Facebook — and ALLEGED LGBT ally — donated $10,000 to help Reyes win election and return as Attorney General of the state.

And when folks began questioning the donation, a spokesman for Facebook replied like this:

“Facebook has a strong record on LGBT issues and that will not change, but we make decisions about which candidates to support based on the entire portfolio of issues important to our business, not just one. A contribution to a candidate does not mean that we agree with every policy or position that candidate takes. We made this donation for the same reason we’ve donated to Attorneys General on the opposite side of this issue – because they are committed to fostering innovation and an open Internet.”

You cannot have a strong record on LGBT issues and then give money to a candidate who not only works against LGBT issues, but calls the legal marriages of 1300 couples “interim marriages” and treats them as though they don’t count, don’t matter.

You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Facebook, for saying you’re one thing and then proving your another through your actions and your campaign donations.

Funding a candidate who is aggressively working to deny equality to a community you say you support is the lowest of the low. You really need a ‘Hate’ button for that.

Go to Change.org to sign a petition asking Facebook to donate an equal amount to Reye’s opponent.

via NCRM

The Nomen Global Language Center Is "Homophonic"

During the school year, as part of his job, Carlos teaches English to a group of Hispanic adults and children and one of the areas that can provide a bit of trouble is homophones; you know, words that sound the same but have different meanings and sometimes different spellings: be and bee, through and threw, which and witch, their and there.

I never knew, though, that the mere mention of the word ‘homophones’ could get a person fired but, apparently, in Utah, it can.

Tim Torkildson, the social-media specialist for Nomen Global Language Center, a private Provo-based English language learning center, realized that, for people to whom English is a second language, homophones can be very confusing, wrote a blog post to explain homophones.

He was fired because, well, homo.

No, silly, he’s not gay, but he was fired because he was creating the perception that the school promoted a gay agenda. His employer, and Nomen owner, Clarke Woodger, called Tim into his office and told him he was fired because he could not be trusted and that the blog about :::gasp::: homophones was the last straw.

"Now our school is going to be associated with homosexuality." — Clarke Woodger

Torkildson says he knew that the ‘homo’ part of the word might be kind of a lightning rod, so he was very careful in his post about homophones, knowing that an explanation of them might be useful to people learning English.

For his part, Clarke Woodger says his reaction to Torkildson’s blog has nothing to do with homosexuality but that Torkildson would "go off on tangents" in his blogs that would be confusing and sometimes could be considered offensive … homophone. Nomen is Utah’s largest private English as a Second Language [ESL] school and caters mostly to foreign students seeking admission to U.S. colleges and universities. Woodger says his school has taught 6,500 students from 58 countries during the past 15 years and, in his words, most of them are at basic levels of English and are not ready for complicated concepts like homophones.

You know, because they don’t speak English so they cannot understand anything, I guess.

"People at this level of English … may see the ‘homo’ side and think it has something to do with gay sex." — Clarke Woodger

Um, no, Clarke, I think it’s just you, and maybe a few Neanderthals. I tend to think that a person who wishes to learn English might just want to learn English and not find homophones a bad thing.

But I’d be careful about synonyms, lest people think bad thoughts about them.

source

Random Musings

Carlos and I were watching TV the other night and that commercial for Dove Chocolate came on; the one which stars a dead Audrey Hepburn selling candy. Don’t get me started on that! But to my surprise Carlos was offended, mumbling something about there only being one Audrey Hepburn. I was stunned; I never knew he was a fan of Audrey’s so, innocently, I asked:

Since when are you a fan of Audrey Hepburn?

I love her.

Really? Name one movie she was in …

::::crickets:::

Seriously, give me the name of one movie.

There are so many—

I know that’s why I asked for one, just one, movie. I mean, I can think of five right off the top of my head!

Well, there was the one where her father was artist and there was a car ….

What was that one called? My Father’s An Artist and There’s A Car?

Ten minutes pass. Ten minutes.

Breakfast at Tiffany’s.

Bless his heart.

Yaz’min Shancez, a transgender woman who lived in Fort Myers, Florida was murdered, her body burned and then tossed behind a dumpster. Police are investigating but they don’t think it was a Hate Crime.

Fort Myers Police Lt. Jay Rodriguez:

“If you really think about it, a hate crime is killing someone for a specific reason, being black, Hispanic, gay. We’re investigating as we would any other homicide.”

Not a Hate Crime? Transgender woman, burned to death and then thrown away? Let me set this queer, again.

If Yaz’min was beaten and murdered because someone wanted her new phone, or her car, or maybe her credit cards and money that would be a hateful crime. But when a transgendered woman is beaten and tortured and burned to death and then her body is tossed away like garbage, that is Hate.

Are we queer on that now?

Apparently the GOP in South Dakota has nothing to do. I guess everyone in the state is working, the jobs are all good, health care in place, environment protected; it’s all good.

I mean, it must be, right, because how else do we explain that the South Dakota state GOP passed a resolution calling for the impeachment of President Obama.

The resolution says Obama has "violated his oath of office in numerous ways." It specifically cites the release of five Taliban combatants in a trade for captive U.S. soldier Bowe Bergdahl, Obama's statement that people could keep insurance companies, and recent EPA regulations on power plants.

Allen Unruh of Sioux Falls sponsored the resolution, saying he has a “thick book on impeachable offenses of the president" and asking that South Dakota "send a symbolic message that liberty shall be the law of the land."

I have a better plan; rather than sending symbolic messages why don’t you do your f**king jobs?

I was home during the day on Monday and happened to catch an episode of The View. I stopped even glancing at the show when Joy Behar left because the table including idiotic Sherri Shepherd, daft Babs Walters, and Behar’s replacement, moronic non-thinker Jenny McCarthy. I only ever wondered how Whoopi Goldberg could stand to stay on that show surrounded by fools and morons.

I heard them discuss a story about Arkansas training teachers to carry guns in schools, and when McCarthy said it was a great idea, I nearly pulled out my gun and shot through my TV set.

Luckily, I don’t own a gun, because I can’t afford a new TV this month. But, seriously, Jenny? The solution to crazed people with guns shooting up schools is to put guns in the hands of teachers?

You know damned well that, god forbid there was a school shooting at the school McCarthy’s son attends, and a teacher didn’t protect her son, or a teacher accidentally shot an innocent child, or a kid got hold of a teacher’s gun, McCarthy would be the first person on social media ranting about it.

That woman needs to take a seat, on another show, where her opinions don’t matter.

FoxNews.

So, there’s this on NBC called Taxi Brooklyn. It aired last night, and I, mistakenly, thought it would be a comedy; I was thinking Taxi and Brooklyn-9-9 but I was wrong. It’s your standard police procedural with a ridiculous twist, wherein a female detective is such a bad driver that she is not allowed to drive a police car so she teams up with a taxi driver to solve crimes.

Dumb. I know. But then there’s Jacky Ido, a gorgeous Black Frenchman playing Leo the taxi driver. Hot, with an accent. Did I mention hot? Accent?

Plus, in a rare twist, Raul Casso plays Ronnie, Leo’s roommate, a cross-dressing, sexually fluid war veteran and taxi driver. In one scene last night he blatantly flirts with a burly looking police officer and then offers up his card, saying, “Call me.” And the officer looks around, shrugs and then takes the card.

I kinda liked the surprise of that.

I’ll stick around and see if this show pans out, but mostly because there’s a Hot Black Frenchman.

Lotsa marriage news this week….

New York Congressman Sean Patrick Maloney married his partner of twenty-two years, Randy Gene Florke, over the weekend. Florke proposed in December after the youngest of their three children wrote to Santa wishing for her parents to be married—Maloney and Florke have three children ranging in age from 11 to 24.

Congratulations to the happy couple.

Out there to Indiana, the minute the same-sex marriage ban was declared unconstitutional, Craig Bowen and Jake Miller were wed in Indianapolis. They have been together for eight years.

The moment the decision came down, Jake texted Craig and asked him if he wanted to get married … now. Craig said yes, and they headed to the county clerk's office, where they were the first same-sex couple to arrive.

Congratulations to them, as well.

Also in Indiana, after the ruling striking down the same-sex  marriage ban, Marion County Clerk Beth White announced she was ready to marry some gay couples, and by the end of the day there had been 186 same-sex weddings.

And, White added that marriage licenses, and ceremonies, would resume again this morning at 8AM and that the civil ceremonies would be offered for a  voluntary donation of $50 to the Indiana Youth Group.

White has, so far, raised $4,000 for the IYG.

Get married and help a charity for LGBTQ youth? Win. Win.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit issued a 2 to 1 decision yesterday upholding a district court decision that Utah’s marriage ban for same-sex couples is unconstitutional.

The decision in Herbert v. Kitchen is the first from a federal appeals court on a state marriage ban since the U.S. Supreme Court decision in U.S. v. Windsor and this ruling puts the Utah case closest to arriving at the Supreme Court. And we all know what happened the last time … a year ago today!

 Interesting side note … although the Tenth Circuit stayed its order finding a marriage ban for same-sex couples unconstitutional in Utah, Boulder County, Colorado  began issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples as well since the Tenth Circuit includes Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Utah, and Wyoming. 

Yesterday was a great day in the March For Marriage!

More good news? Can you stand it?

Broadway actors Andy Mientus and Michael Arden announced their engagement. Arden has appeared on Broadway in The Times They Are A-Changin’ and Big River and has been seen on TV in series including Anger Management, Nurse Jackie and The Good Wife. Mientus, who makes his Broadway debut in this season’s Les Misérables, has also appeared in Anger Management and in NBC’s Smash.

Announcing their engagement on Instagram, Mientus quoted Shakespeare’s As You Like It:

"Come, woo me, woo me, for now I am in a holiday humour and like enough to consent." 

Congratulations to this happy couple.